Court Opinion

ID: 9733132
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 16:54:21.145761+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:26:38.562071
License: Public Domain

BROSKY, Judge,
dissenting:
I am unable to join in the well-reasoned opinion of the majority because my examination of the record and the *219decisional law of this Commonwealth leads me to conclude that we have no appealable issues before us.
As I see it, the Order of October 23, 1984,1 is not a final order, and the final sentence therein so states that “[j]urisdiction is retained.” This implicates the filing of post-trial motions pursuant to Pa.R.C.P. 227.1 and the entry of a final order after disposition thereof. The record before us discloses the filing of no such motion or order.
Pa.R.C.P. 227.1 provides:
Rule 227.1. Post-Trial Relief
(a) After trial and upon the written Motion for Post-Trial Relief filed by any party, the court may
(1) order a new trial as to all or any of the issues; or
(2) direct the entry of judgment in favor of any party; or
(3) remove a nonsuit; or
(4) affirm, modify or change the decision or decree nisi; or
(5) enter any other appropriate order.
(b) Post-trial relief may not be granted unless the grounds therefor,
(1) if then available, were raised in pre-trial proceedings or by motion, objection, point for charge, request for findings of fact or conclusions of law, offer of proof or other appropriate method at trial; and
Note: If no objection is made, error which could have been corrected in pre-trial proceedings or during trial by timely objection may not constitute a ground for post-trial relief.
(2) are specified in the motion. The motion shall state how the grounds were asserted in pre-trial proceedings or at trial. Grounds not specified are *220deemed, waived unless leave is granted upon cause shown to specify additional grounds.
(c) Post-trial motions shall be filed within ten days after
(1) verdict, discharge of the jury because of inability to agree, or nonsuit in the case of a jury trial; or
(2) notice of nonsuit or the filing of the decision or adjudication in the case of a trial without jury or equity trial.
If a party has filed a timely post-trial motion, any other party may file a post-trial motion within ten days after the filing of the first post-trial motion.
(d) A motion for post-trial relief shall specify the relief requested and may request relief in the alternative. Separate reasons shall be set forth for each type of relief sought.
(e) If a new trial and the entry of judgment are sought in the alternative, the court shall dispose of both requests. If the court directs the entry of judgment, it shall also rule on the request for a new trial by determining whether it should be granted if the judgment is thereafter vacated or reversed, and shall specify the grounds for granting or denying the request for a new trial.
(f) The party filing a post-trial motion shall serve a copy promptly upon every other party to the action and deliver a copy to the trial judge.
(Emphasis supplied).
Neither the instant record nor the docket entries before us indicate the filing of any post-trial motion. Thus, I would be constrained to find the issues addressed by the majority waived. Szakmeister v. Szakmeister, 344 Pa.Super. 465, 496 A.2d 1199 (1985); see also Hanik v. Pennsylvania Power Co., 308 Pa.Super. 352, 454 A.2d 572 (1982) (under former Pa.R.C.P. 1518, governing post-trial relief following an equity trial, rescinded and now replaced by present Rule 227.1, matters not addressed in exceptions [now post-trial motions under Rule 227.1] are deemed *221waived). Alternatively, I would be constrained to quash the instant appeal for lack of a final order in the instant record. Szakmeister, supra (appeal quashed where final order not entered on docket after failure to file post-trial motion).
I do not agree with the rationale set embraced by the majority in endnote 1 and reiterate my position that we have no appealable issues before us.
The majority’s reliance on Estate of Kotz, 486 Pa. 444, 406 A.2d 524 (1979), that Supreme Court Rule of Orphans’ Court 3.1, conforming equity practice to that of the local Court of Common Pleas, Pa.R.C.P. 1501, providing that equity proceedings shall follow the rules of procedure relating to civil actions, and Pa.R.C.P. 227.1, regarding post-trial relief, are not general rules applicable to the instant order in question is misplaced.
First, Kotz never mentions Pa.R.C.P. 1501, but, rather, it discusses Pa.R.C.P. 1518 which concerned post-trial relief following an equity proceeding. This Rule was rescinded effective January 1, 1984, and the note following indication of this rescission refers to Pa.R.C.P. 227.1, which Kotz, again, does not mention because the latter rule became effective after the decision in Kotz. Secondly, and more to the point of my disagreement with the majority, the order appealed from in Kotz was considered by that court to be a final appealable one, thus obviating the necessity for the filing of exceptions.1
The majority, in endnote 1, states that Lebanon County Local Rule of Orphans’ Court 7.1 A does not, by its very terms, require the filing of exceptions to orders or decrees because no act of assembly, general rule or special order exists expressly conferring that right. Lebanon County Local Orphans’ Court Rule 7.1a provides:
No exceptions shall be filed to orders or decrees entered in proceedings unless the right to except thereto is *222expressly conferred by act of assembly, by general rule, or by special order of court, and decrees other than those to which exceptions are so allowed to be taken, shall be final and definitive.
(Emphasis supplied).
“General Rule” is defined in the Judicial Code (42 Pa.C. S.A. §§ 101 et seq.) as follows:
“General rule.” A rule or order promulgated by the governing authority.
42 Pa.C.S.A. § 102. In turn, the Judicial Code assigns the following definition to “Governing Authority:”
“Governing authority.”
(1) The Supreme Court; or
(2) any agency or unit of the unified judicial system exercising a power or performing a duty pursuant to section 1721 (relating to delegation of powers).

Id.

Section 1721 of the Judicial Code (42 Pa.C.S.A. § 1721), referred to above, empowers the Pennsylvania Supreme Court to delegate supervisory and administrative powers to any unit of the unified judicial system. This delegation authority is derived from Article V, Schedule § 1 of the Pennsylvania Constitution which, in turn, is rooted in the ancient King’s Bench Power. See 42 Pa.C.S.A. § 502. The unified judicial system includes the Court of Common Pleas of this Commonwealth. Pa. Const. art. V, § 1; 42 Pa.C.S.A. § 301(4). Administrative powers of a governing authority, which includes within the latter term the unified judicial system {see 42 Pa.C.S.A. § 102, supra, relating to definitions), encompass the power to prescribe and modify general rules for the “[p]ractice, procedure and conduct of all courts ... if such rules are consistent with the Constitution of Pennsylvania and neither abridge, enlarge nor modify the substantive rights of any litigant____” 42 Pa.C. S.A. § 1722(a)(1); Pa. Const, art. V, § 10(c).
Thus, the gravamen of my quarrel does not lie with the power of the various Common Pleas Courts to enact local *223rules of court. Rather, I question the majority’s interpretation of Local Rule 7.1A. Instantly, the majority interprets Local Orphans’ Court Rule 7.1A as disallowing the filing of exceptions because no statutes, general rules or orders exist otherwise to allow the filing of exceptions (Majority Op., pp. 203-204, n. 1). Such a reading of this rule would, in my view, exalt a local rule of Court over rules having statewide applicability in civil actions and issued pursuant to directive of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court.
Orphans’ Court Rule 7, adopted by Order of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court on November 24, 1975, effective January 1, 1976, provides:
Rule 7. Exceptions
7.1 Exceptions
Exceptions shall be filed at such place and time, shall be in such form, copies thereof served and disposition made thereof as local rules shall prescribe.
(Emphasis added).
I cannot glean, from my reading of this Rule of statewide applicability, any language which would permit a court of common pleas to adopt a local rule denying a litigant the right to file exceptions from non-final orders or decrees of that court. Rather, Rule 7 states that “[ejxceptions shall be filed ...” and leaves to the discretion of the common pleas court the procedure for filing and disposition thereof. It does not, as the majority contends in endnote 1, vest in a court of common pleas the discretion to consider whether or not the filing of exceptions shall be permitted to non-final Orphans’ Court orders and decrees. The interpretation cast upon Lebanon County Orphans’ Court Rule 7.1A by the majority would render it inconsistent with the directive of Article V, § 10(c) of the Pennsylvania Constitution and 42 Pa.C.S.A. § 1722(a)(1) that rules may be enacted by a governing authority only if such rules are consistent with the Constitution of Pennsylvania and with the Pennsylvania Rules of Civil Procedure, as well. Such inconsistent local rules are deemed invalid. Byard F. Brogan, Inc. v. Holmes Elec. Protective Co., 501 Pa. 234, 460 A.2d 1093 (1983); *224Sporkin v. Affinito, 326 Pa.Super. 481, 474 A.2d 343 (1984); Pa.R.C.P. 239(b) (“Local rules shall not be inconsistent with any general rule of the Supreme Court or any Act of Assembly.”; emphasis supplied); Supreme Court Rule of Orphans’ Court 1.2.2 The Comment following subsection (b) of Pa.R.C.P. 239 states that the language contained therein is in furtherance of the policy “that a general rule of civil procedure normally preempts the subject covered [by the local rule].”
Moreover, 42 Pa.C.S.A. § 323 grants the courts of this Commonwealth the power to adopt rules of court “except as otherwise prescribed by general rules....” This aforequoted phrase was interpreted by the Brogan court to require consistency of local rules of court with the Pennsylvania Rules of Civil Procedure. In this context, I note with interest the qualifying language in Lebanon County Orphans’ Court Rule 7.1A which states that the filing of exceptions is permissible if the right is expressly conferred by general rule, etc., to be essentially identical in import and meaning with the exception carved out in § 323’s grant of authority to courts to adopt local rules.
Thus, applying the rationale of the Brogan court to the instant matter, I would conclude, unlike the majority here, that the qualifying language in Lebanon County Orphans Court Rule 7.1 A, supra, directs the filing of exceptions and, in so doing, defers to a higher promulgating authority of general rules of civil procedure, specifically, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court’s adoption of Pa.R.C.P. 227.1, supra, regarding the filing of post-trial motions, Supreme Court Rule of Orphans’ Court 7, providing for the filing of exceptions to non-final orders and decrees of the Orphans’ Court, *225and Supreme Court Rule of Orphans Court 3.1, conforming local Orphans’ Court procedure to equity practice.3 To read Lebanon County Orphans’ Court Rule 7.1 A in any other light would, in my view, render that rule inconsistent with the Pennsylvania Rules of Civil Procedure, Byard F. Brogan, Inc., supra; Sporkin v. Affinito, supra, the Pennsylvania Constitution, art. V, § 10(c), supra, and 42 Pa.C.S.A. § 1722(a)(1), supra.

. Although the appeal was filed from the order of October 3, 1984, that order was subsequently amended on October 23, 1984, to reflect the reference to the administrator-bank as “Administrator D.B.N.” In all other respects, the order of October 23,1984, is the same as the one entered October 3, 1984, and the appeal was docketed well within the 30-day period allowed from October 23, 1984.

. Throughout this dissent, I refer to "exceptions" because the Rules which I discuss employ that terminology. That term, of course, is now embraced in the phrase “post-trial relief.” See Pa.R.C.P. 227.1, supra.

. It seems evident that the need for this qualifying language would be obviated if the intent of the drafters of Lebanon County Local Orphans’ Court Rule 7.1A were to disallow the filing of exceptions. Since I conclude in my discussion, supra in text, that this disallowance is constitutionally and legislatively impermissible, this language is necessary to bring the Rule in conformity with the law of this Commonwealth.

. This Rule provides:
1.2. Local Rules
The Orphans’ Court of the several judicial districts of this Commonwealth may adopt local rules regulating practice and procedure, but such rules shall not be inconsistent with any rule adopted by the Supreme Court of this Commonwealth or any Act of Assembly regulating the practice and procedure in the Orphans' Courts of this Commonwealth.
(Emphasis supplied).