Court Opinion

ID: 9533476
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 04:32:03.195106+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:29:03.879056
License: Public Domain

VANDE WALLE, Justice,
concurring specially.
Prior to 1981 (see 1981 N.D.Laws Ch. 337), when the Legislature specifically excluded the Superintendent of Public Instruction from the definition of an administrative agency contained in Section 28-32-01, N.D.C.C., it might have been arguable that the Superintendent of Public Instruction was an administrative agency, within the statutory definition of that term, for the purpose of Section 15-21-07, notwithstanding the “finality” language of Section 15-22-17, N.D.C.C. Prior to 1981, Section 28-32-01 defined an administrative agency to include “any officer ... having statewide jurisdiction and authority to make any order, finding, determination, award, or assessment which has the force and effect of law and which by statute is subject to review in the courts of this state.” [Emphasis supplied.] But this court held that the language of the title and first section of the Act “clearly indicate that its purpose was not to grant a right of appeal but merely to regulate the procedure in cases where a right of review was granted expressly by other statutes.” Dakota Nat. Ins. Co. v. Commissioner of Insurance, 79 N.D. 97, 54 N.W.2d 745, 747 (1952), citing Krueger v. American Christian Mutual Life Ins. Co., 77 N.D. 436, 43 N.W.2d 676, 680 (1950). Thus Section 28-32-15 did not grant a right of appeal but merely regulated the right of appeal where that right was granted by a separate statute. More significantly, for our purposes, the court in Dakota Nat. Ins. Co., 54 N.W.2d at 747, construed the term “review” to mean that it must be “a right of review of such decision in the ordinary course of law ...” Because the decision of the Insurance Commissioner in that case was not appealable in the ordinary course of law, the court concluded that a writ of mandamus was available. It therefore became apparent that a “review” of an agency decision by extraordinary process such as mandamus, prohibition, or certiorari was not the type of review contemplated by the Administrative Agencies Practice Act nor, presumably, by Section 15-22-17.
Accordingly, prior to 1981, as a result of the previous decisions of this court, determinations of the Superintendent of Public Instruction under Sections 15-21-07 and 15-22-17 were not appealable in the ordinary course of law. But, as the Report of the interim Administrative Rules Committee of the Legislative Council indicated in 1981, “One of the requirements not readily understood is that an agency’s decision is one ‘which by statute is subject to review in the courts of this state.’ In many instances laws administered by an agency do not provide for appeal or judicial review of administrative decisions. Under these circumstances, the agency is not an ‘administrative agency’ and is not subject to the provisions of Chapter 28-32.” Page 13, Report of the North Dakota Legislative Council, Forty-seventh Legislative Assembly, 1981. The report identified a number of agencies, including the Superintendent of Public Instruction, which were not administrative agencies because they were not within the definition of an administrative agency. The Committee recommended a bill, HB 1042, codified as 1981 N.D.Sess. Laws Ch. 337, which amended Section 28-32-01 to redefine administrative agency “to include every administrative unit of the executive branch of state government. The new definition specifically excepts those agencies or functions currently excepted from the present definition due to an Attorney General’s opinion or a Supreme Court decision. Thus the bill does not change the present application of Chapter 28-32 to those agencies or functions ...” Page 14, Report of the Legislative Council. Thus any lingering doubt was removed by the 1981 enactment which, as the majority opinion notes, expressly excludes from the definition of an administra*517tive agency the Superintendent of Public Instruction “except with respect to rules prescribed under section 15-21-07, rules relating to teacher certification, and rules relating to professional codes and standards approved under section 15-38-18.”
Although the Administrative Agencies Practice Act has been amended numerous times in recent legislative sessions, Section 15-21-07 has not been amended since 1961 (1961 N.D.Laws Ch. 158, sec. 5), at which time references to Chapter 28-32 were included respecting taking testimony under oath and the prescribing of rules, and Section 15-22-17 has not been amended since its inclusion in the Compiled Laws of 1913. Insofar as the language in Section 15-21-07 referring to the Superintendent of Public Instruction “as an administrative agency under chapter 28-32” might be construed to include more than certain rule-making functions, it is superseded by the much later and specific exclusion of the Superintendent of Public Instruction from the definition of an administrative agency in 1981.
It remains quite clear, however, that rules concerning the appeals from the county superintendents of schools to the State Superintendent of Public Instruction are subject to the Administrative Agencies Practice Act and are to be prescribed and enforced. That is the plain wording of Section 15-21-07, reinforced by the action of the 1981 Legislative Assembly in excepting that rule-making function from the exclusion of the Superintendent of Public Instruction from the definition of an administrative agency. The North Dakota Administrative Code reveals rules promulgated at Chapters 67-02 and 67-03 for teacher certification and educator’s code of ethics, respectively, both of which are referred to in Section 28-32-01(l)(q) but no rules implementing Section 15-21-07 which is also referred to therein. No such rules were promulgated, we were told at oral argument, because the procedure has seldom, if ever, been used.
I agree that an appeal under the Administrative Agencies Practice Act from a decision of the Superintendent of Public Instruction on the merits is final and is not a method whereby the lack of rules can be attacked. However, it is apparent that the lack of rules obfuscated the issues to be considered by the Superintendent of Public Instruction. If the procedures specified in Sections 15-21-07 and 15-22-17 are archaic the statutes should be repealed; otherwise, rules should be promulgated to implement the procedure as provided by those statutes and Section 28-32-01(l)(q).