Court Opinion

ID: 9651487
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 16:20:11.399006+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:12:34.264371
License: Public Domain

Conford, P. J. A. D.,
Temporarily Assigned (concurring). I join the comprehensive and epochal opinion of the Chief Justice for the Court, subject only to the following comments, and concur in all of its determinations of the issues raised by the parties and amici.
With respect to “Legislative Delegation of Authority”, I regard the issue as fully laid to rest, prospectively, by L. 1975, c. 95. This statute is quoted in the Court’s opinion, and it expressly confers power on each correctional and penal institution, subject to guidelines set down by the Director, to adopt regulations governing the rights, privileges, duties and obligations of inmates, including matters of sanctions for violation of rules and procedure for imposition thereof. Taken together with the universally conceded inherent power of the keeper of a correctional or penal *564institution to enforce reasonable rules and regulations with regard to the inmate population thereof, 72 C. J. S. Prisons § 18, p. 872, there can remain no longer any colorable question as to adequacy of legislative standards for the guidance of the Department in respect of these matters. As to the adequacy of the standards prior to the adoption of the 1975 act, I agree with the opinion of the Court.
As to “Public Involvement”, I agree with the Court that the argument that Eirst Amendment values require the advance notification to the public of proposals for adoption or amendment of prison rules and regulations is without merit. Eurther, as the Court points out, such proposed rules are now published in the New Jersey Register in advance of promulgation (notwithstanding exemption from the Administrative Procedure Act), and the public thus has an opportunity for input on such rules before adoption. I would rest with these observations. I cannot, with all deference, join in the implication of the opinion that there may be harm to the correctional system in public debate over proposed rules. Such debate would not, in my view, at all compromise authority in the governance of the institutions. Over the long run, it is bound to be salutary, as the court itself implies elsewhere in the opinion. Legislative awareness of these considerations seems implicit in Section 13 of the Department of the Public Advocate Act (L. 1974, c 27), which establishes an Office of Inmate Advocacy, and authorizes it, among other things, to “act as representatives of inmates with any principal department or other instrumentality of State, county or local government.”
Conford, P. J. A. D., concurring in the result.
For affirmance as modified — Chief Justice Hughes, Justices Mountain and Sullivan and Judge Conford — 4.
Concurring in part and dissenting in part — Justice Pashman — 1.