Court Opinion

ID: 9607268
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 02:56:53.056209+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:02:37.833070
License: Public Domain

TRAYNOR, J.
I dissent.
Since 1899 the courts of this state have consistently held that the phrase “his term of office” in article XI, section 5, of the California Constitution means, not the period during which the incumbent holds the office, but the full period of time prescribed by law for the office. (Larew v. Newman, 81 Cal. 588, 590 [23 P. 227]; Storke v. Goux, 129 Cal. 526, 527 [62 P. 68]; Harrison v. Colgan, 148 Cal. 69, 73-75 [82 P. 674]; Robbins v. Lambert, 43 Cal.App.2d 463, 465 [111 P.2d 5].) Accordingly, there cannot be any increase in salary during the statutory term “regardless of the fact that different persons may successively hold for successive parts of the term, so that one who is elected or appointed after a part of such term has expired cannot have an increase made after the term began, though prior to his election or appointment.” (Harrison v. Colgan, supra, 148 Cal. at 75.)
Under these cases the “term of office” herein is that to which Mr. Boll was elected,1 and the salary ordinance, enacted after that term commenced, cannot take effect until the commencement of the next term of office in 1960. The majority opinion nevertheless holds that the ordinance became effective on July 1, 1958, the date that petitioner commenced serving the part of the unexpired term for which he was elected. It does not overrule the foregoing eases, but seeks to distinguish them on the ground that they apply only to persons appointed and not to those elected for an unexpired term.
I regard this distinction as meretricious. The express application of section 5 of article XI of the Constitution to “any” county officer precludes any implication that only appointed officers are included in its prohibition or that the phrase “his term of office” has one meaning for elected officers and a quite different meaning for appointed officers or varies in meaning according to whether the officer is elected or appointed for the full regular term of the office or for an unexpired part thereof. ■ The section no more permits the exclusion from its operation *665of officers elected for part of a regular term than it permits the exclusion of those elected for the full regular term. Nor can such distinctions be drawn from the purpose of the statute. Courts have often declared that the purpose of such a constitutional prohibition is to preclude an officer’s using his position to obtain increased compensation during his term of office as well as “unwarranted demands upon the public treasury resulting from a possible concert of action between public officers or expectant candidates for public office.” (Rutledge v. City of Eureka, 195 Cal. 404, 419 [234 P. 82].) These reasons apply as forcefully to an officer subsequently elected as to one subsequently appointed to an unexpired term. (See Samson v. Colgan, supra, 148 Cal. 69, 73, 75, 78; Lancaster v. Board of Commissioners, 115 Colo. 261 [171 P.2d 987, 989, 166 A.L.R. 839]; Clark v. Frohmiller, 53 Ariz. 286 [88 P.2d 542, 545] ; Thornsberry v. City of Campbell (Mo.App.), 274 S.W. 847, 848; Wilson v. Shaw, 194 Iowa 28 [188 N.W. 940, 941-942].)
In my opinion the result reached in this case can be justified only by discarding the long established interpretation of the crucial phrase, “Ms term of office.” (Italics added.) Were we interpreting this phrase for the first time, I should be disposed to view it as a reference to the term that the officer actually serves. Nevertheless, I would be reluctant to overrule the established interpretation in view of its still current plausibility, enhanced by its long standing. So long as it thus continues acceptable, the serviceable consistency of stare decisis should discourage its displacement. I would not undermine that consistency, while purporting to follow the precedents, by freighting the established interpretation with a distinction between elected and appointed officers that compels inequality in the application of the law.
Spence, J., concurred.

Section 13 of the Los Angeles County Charter provides that the term of office for district attorney “shall be four years, beginning at noon of the first Monday in December following the election, and ending at noon on the first Monday in December four years thereafter.”