Opinion ID: 1988547
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The History and Nature of the Writ of Mandamus

Text: We begin our analysis with a discussion of the common law writ of mandamus. A court of competent jurisdiction may issue a writ of mandamus in order to compel the performance of a non-discretionary duty. In 1799, the General Court of Maryland explained: The writ of mandamus is a prerogative writ, and grantable where the public justice of the state is concerned; and commands the execution of an act where otherwise justice would be obstructed. It is denominated a prerogative writ, because the king, being the fountain of justice, it is interposed by his authority, transferred to the Court of King's Bench, to prevent disorder, from a failure of justice, where the law has established no specific remedy, and where in justice and good government there ought to be one. It is a writ of right, and lies where there is a right to execute an office, perform a service, or exercise a franchise, and a person is kept out of possession, or dispossessed of such right, and has no other specific legal remedy. It is the true specific remedy to restore a person wrongfully dispossessed of an office or function which draws after it temporal rights. Runkel v. Winemiller 4 H. & McH. 429, 449 (Gen. Ct. Oct. Term 1799) (citations omitted); see also Philip Morris Inc. v. Angeletti, 358 Md. 689, 707-08, 752 A.2d 200, 210 (2000). More recently, in City of Seat Pleasant v. Jones, 364 Md. 663, 774 A.2d 1167 (2001), we described the writ of mandamus in a similar fashion: Mandamus is generally used `to compel inferior tribunals, public officials or administrative agencies to perform their function or perform some particular duty imposed upon them which in its nature is imperative and to the performance of which duty the party applying for the writ has a clear legal right.' Id. at 673, 774 A.2d at 1167, (quoting Criminal Injuries Compensation Board v. Gould, 273 Md. 486, 514, 331 A.2d 55, 72 (1975)). Commanding official action is the writ's most common use. Walter v. Board of Comm'rs of Montgomery County, 179 Md. 665, 668, 22 A.2d 472, 474 (1941); see also Mahoney v. Board of Supervisors of Elections, 205 Md. 325, 335, 108 A.2d 143, 147 (1954). In In re Petition for Writ of Prohibition, 312 Md. 280, 539 A.2d 664 (1988), we explored the history and nature of mandamus at common law. Quoting Blackstone, we stated: A writ of mandamus is, in general, a command issuing in the king's name from the court of king's bench, and directed to any person, corporation, or inferior court of judicature, within the king's dominions, requiring them to do some particular thing therein specified, which appertains to their office and duty, and which the court of king's bench has previously determined, or at least supposes, to be consonant with right and justice. It is a high prerogative writ, of a most extensively remedial nature.... Id. at 286, 539 A.2d at 666-67 (quoting 3. W. Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England 110 (fascimile ed. 1768)). Noting that the writ of mandamus issued out of the Court of King's Bench, we then reviewed the evolution of that court because we observed that its history revealed the nature and purpose of the writ itself: In its earlier days at least, the King actually sat in the Court of King's Bench, as by later fiction he was supposed to have done. 1 W. Holdsworth, A History of English Law 207 (7th ed.1956) (hereinafter 1 Holdsworth). Moreover, in the medieval period, the court was closely connected with the Council. Id. at 209. [T]he Curia Regis was a large undifferentiated court, composed both of the leading nobility lay and spiritual and of royal officials, by means of which the king carried on all the business of the central governmentjudicial, legislative, and executive. Id. at 477 [footnote omitted]. The notion of separation of powers even today somewhat foreign to British constitutional lawsimply did not exist. Thus this body exercised broad supervisory authority over subordinate officials, judicial and otherwise, probably without paying much heed to whether a particular act of supervision was judicial or administrative in nature. It exercised this authority in part through the prerogative writs. Id. at 226. As time passed and government became more sophisticated, or at least more complex, these arrangements began to change. Thus, towards the end of the 14th Century, the Council was becoming more especially the organ of the executive side of the government, and Parliament of the legislative side; while the court of King's Bench was tending to become simply a court of common law, which was concerned with the judicial side of government. Id. at 210 [footnote omitted]. But despite this metamorphosis, the court preserved both in its style and in its jurisdiction traces of the days when it was a court of a very different kind. In its wide powers of control over other courts and officials, and in its wide criminal jurisdiction, it retained powers of a quasi-political nature which came to it from the days when the court held coram rege was both King's Bench and Council. Id. at 211. Thus when King's Bench became established as a common law court, it had original jurisdiction and appellate jurisdiction in both civil and criminal cases. And it had a general superintendence over the due observance of the law by officials and others. Id. at 212. As we have seen, it was generally in the exercise of this power that it issued the prerogative writs. In the 16th and 17th centuries, for instance, [b]y means of these [prerogative] writs ... [and by other means] the doings of the justices of the peace, of the borough Courts, of courts leet, and of parishes were frequently controlled; and rules were laid down for the guidance of these authorities on points of law and procedure. 5 W. Holdsworth A History of English Law 420 (3d ed.1945). Id. at 287-288, 539 A.2d at 667. After reviewing the history of the Court of King's Bench, we explored governmental structure in 17th century Maryland. During that pre-revolutionary period, we observed, the structure was similar to that of England, as it reflected a time in Maryland's history where the executive, legislative, and judicial branches of government were largely undifferentiated. Id. at 288, 539 A.2d at 668 (noting that Maryland's Governor sat with this Council and this body performed administrative, legislative, and judicial functions). By 1638, we explained, the Governor and Council were sitting as a county court, which by 1642 was designated the Provincial Court. After the division of the legislature into upper and lower houses in 1649, the upper house (the Governor and Council) exercised the highest appellate authority in the province. But the Provincial Court became the chief court of the province, regarded as the local equivalent of the Court of King's Bench. Like King's Bench, it exercised both original and appellate jurisdiction. Id. at 288-89, 539 A.2d at 668 (citations omitted). According to pre-revolutionary sources, the Provincial Court as well as the Court of Appeals issued the extraordinary writ of mandamus on occasion. [5] Id. at 289, 539 A.2d at 668 (citing Bordley v. Lloyd, 1 H. & McH. 27 (Prov. Ct., June Term 1709); Mitchells Adrs. v. Majsty (1715), reported in C. Bond, Proceedings of the Maryland Court of Appeals 1695-1729, 196-197 (1933)). These sources, however, did not discuss the genesis of the court's power to issue the writ of mandamus. Id. After the Revolutionary War, the Maryland General Court succeeded the Provincial Court, and the Court of Appeals succeeded the Colonial Court of Appeals and was given authority to hear appeals from the General Court, the Court of Chancery and the Court of Admiralty. See Md. Const. of 1776, § 56. [6] In 1838, in Kendall v. United States, 37 U.S. (12 Pet.) 524, 9 L.Ed. 1181 (1838), the Supreme Court of the United States had occasion to consider whether the Maryland General Court had the power to issue a writ of mandamus in 1801, and it concluded that Maryland courts, indeed, had such a power. Id. at 621, 9 L.Ed. at 1219. As we noted in In re Petition for Writ of Prohibition, Supreme Court Chief Justice Taney, writing for the dissent but agreeing with the majority with respect to the power of Maryland courts to issue writs of mandamus, explicitly pointed to the source of the Maryland judiciary's mandamus power when he asserted that the Provincial Court possessed this power because its jurisdiction was co-extensive with the dominions of the lord proprietary and because the Provincial Court was to Maryland what [the] King's Bench was to England at common law. 312 Md. at 290, 539 A.2d at 668 (citing Kendall, 37 U.S. (12 Pet.) at 630-32, 9 L.Ed. at 1223-24 (Taney, C.J., dissenting)). As Chief Justice Taney explained, the mandamus power was vested in the General Court when Maryland declared its independence from England: When the revolution of 1776 took place, the same system of jurisprudence was adopted; and the fifty-sixth article of the constitution of Maryland provided, `that three persons of integrity and sound judgment in the law, be appointed judges of the court now called the provincial court, and that the same court be hereafter called and known by the name of the general court.' No further description of the jurisdiction and powers of the general court is given. It, therefore, in the new order of things, was clothed with the same powers and jurisdiction that had belonged to the provincial court before the revolution. In other words, the general court was, in the state of Maryland precisely what the court of king's bench was in England. Kendall, 37 U.S. (12 Pet.) at 630-32, 9 L.Ed. at 1223-24. Taney's view reflected the view of the General Court of Maryland in Runkel v. Winemiller , where that Court concluded that the source of Maryland courts' power to issue a writ of mandamus derived from the Court of King's Bench. 312 Md. at 290, 539 A.2d at 668 (citing Runkel, 4 H. & McH. at 449 (noting that the General Court had the same power that the Court of King's Bench has with respect to issuing a writ of mandamus and stating [t]he position that this Court is invested with similar powers, is generally admitted, and the decisions have invariably conformed to it; and whence the inference is plainly deducible, that this court may, and of right ought, for the sake of justice, to interpose in a summary way to supply a remedy where, for the want of a specific one, there would otherwise be a failure of justice)). [7] We emphasize that the power to issue writs of mandamus originally derived from the Court of King's Bench in order to stress the fact that the writ of mandamus is an extraordinary remedy because it retained, in large part, its executive character as it is a mechanism by which the court enforces the law. See In re Petition for Writ of Prohibition, 312 Md. at 287-288, 539 A.2d at 667. Nevertheless, the court exercises the power with caution, treading carefully so as to avoid interfering with legislative prerogative and administrative discretion. Lamb v. Hammond, 308 Md. 286, 292, 518 A.2d 1057, 1060 (1987)(quoting Hammond v. Love, 187 Md. 138, 144, 49 A.2d 75, 77 (1946)). Ordinarily, a writ of mandamus should issue only in those cases where another adequate remedy does not exist and where clear and undisputable rights are at stake. Walter, 179 Md. at 668, 22 A.2d at 474. With respect to adequate remedies, [i]t is well settled in this State that a writ of mandamus will not be granted where the petitioner has a specific and adequate legal remedy to meet the justice of the particular case and where the law affords [another] adequate remedy. Philip Morris Inc., 358 Md. at 712, 752 A.2d at 212; Hummelshime v. Hirsch, 114 Md. 39, 46-47, 79 A. 38, 42 (1910). A writ of mandamus, therefore, will not lie if there be another legal remedy, but that remedy must be specific and adequate to the object in view, `framed to effect directly the desired end' ... [and it] must afford `complete satisfaction, equivalent to a specific relief.' Harwood v. Marshall, 9 Md. 83, 98 (1856). Moreover, a writ of mandamus will not lie if the petitioner's right is unclear or issues only at the discretion of a decision maker. [I]f the right be doubtful, or the duty discretionary, or of a nature to require the exercise of judgment, or if there be any ordinary adequate legal remedy to which the party applying could have recourse, [the] writ will not be granted. City of Seat Pleasant, 364 Md. at 673, 774 A.2d at 1172 (quoting George's Creek Coal & Iron Co., 59 Md. at 259). [A] legal right and a corresponding duty must therefore exist before a court may grant a writ of mandamus. Buchholtz v. Hill, 178 Md. 280, 288, 13 A.2d 348, 352 (1940); see also Freeman v. Local 1802, American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Council 67, 318 Md. 684, 692, 569 A.2d 1244, 1248 (1990). Further, where the exercise of discretion is permitted, mandamus ordinarily will not lie. Freeman, 318 Md. at 692, 569 A.2d at 1248; see also Goodwich v. Nolan, 343 Md. 130, 145, 680 A.2d 1040, 1047 (1996); Board of Educ. v. Secretary of Personnel, 317 Md. 34, 46, 562 A.2d 700, 706 (1989); Maryland Action for Foster Children, Inc. v. State, 279 Md. 133, 138, 367 A.2d 491, 494 (1977); Tyler v. Baltimore County, 251 Md. 420, 425, 247 A.2d 704, 707 (1968); Green v. Purnell, 12 Md. 329, 336 (1858)(stating that a writ of mandamus cannot issue in a case where discretion and judgment are to be exercised by the officer; and it can be granted only where the act required to be done is merely ministerial, and the relator without any other adequate remedy).