Court Opinion

ID: 9791431
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 02:10:45.975264+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:37:36.289049
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Moore
delivered the opinion of the Court.
Plaintiffs in error Smith, Monk, and Ross are county commissioners of El Paso County. The Colorado State Association of County Commissioners was granted leave to appear as an intervenor. The interests of the commissioners and the intervenor are the same, and plaintiffs in error accordingly will be referred to as the Board. Defendants in error were plaintiffs in the trial court. The three parties first named in the above caption are judges of the district court of the Fourth Judicial District which includes the county of El Paso. The other defendants in error are employees of the district court of El Paso county. They will be referred to collectively as plaintiffs. The amount of salary which they are entitled to receive is the subject matter of this controversy.
The amended complaint of plaintiffs contained two claims for relief which, as stated in the prayer of each claim, were as follows:
(1) “Plaintiffs pray that this Honorable Court issue a *37Writ of Mandamus commanding the Board of . County Commissioners of El Paso County to approve the salaries listed in Exhibit A’ and set by the Judges of the District Court of the Fourth Judicial District or show cause why said salaries should not be approved, * * * ”
(2) “Plaintiffs pray that this Honorable Court, * * * by declaratory judgment construe and interpret each of said statutes, determine their validity, declare the relative rights, powers, duties, and liabilities of these parties under them, * * * and further that the Court order the Defendants in their capacities as County Commissioners to pay the Plaintiffs’ reasonable expenses of litigation, attorneys’ fees, and court costs from funds of El Paso' County, Colorado.”
The Honorable John N. Mabry, judge of the district, court for the Third Judicial District, was assigned by this court to hear the case. No evidence was submitted upon the trial since all pertinent facts were presented by written stipulation entered into by the respective parties.
The facts are as follows: In 1961 the four judges of the district court made a survey of salary scales in other district courts in Colorado counties having comparable county population, number of employees, court case loads, and other factors peculiar to such court’s personnel and their duties. They also made extensive investigation of the wage scale of office employees in governmental agencies, business, and industry in and near El Paso county. From this information so received, and considering the ability, proficiency, responsibility of the positions, and competency of the employees of the district court of El Paso county, the plaintiff judges and decedent Judge Schaper in October 1961 agreed upon, determined, and fixed certain 1962 salaries to be paid to said employees, listed in writing the names and enumerated the salaries so fixed, and delivered the list to the defendant county commissioners, and asked that the salaries be approved and payment made accordingly *38for the year 1962. A substantial number of such salaries were approved by the commissioners, but the salaries of plaintiff employees were disapproved, and the commissioners thereupon set a different salary scale for plaintiff employees under a formula the commission had adopted for all “county employees,” based largely on seniority of service and on the report of a survey made by an agency engaged by the commission for such purpose. The judges and commissioners conferred on two or three occasions in efforts to resolve their differences, but to no avail. During the pendency of the action counsel stipulated in open court that the plaintiff employees should be paid monthly salaries at the 1961 rate, without prejudice to their claims herein.
The judges maintain that under C.R.S. ’53, 39-16-1 and 56-3-8 (as amended), they have the inherent and statutory power to fix the salaries of their court employees as long as the judges do not act unreasonably, arbitrarily, or capriciously in fixing such salaries and the salaries so fixed are reasonable in amounts; that the commissioners have a ministerial and not a discretionary duty to approve the salaries under such circumstances, and the burden is on the commissioners to show unreasonable, arbitrary or capricious acts by the plaintiff judges, and that the salaries so set were unreasonable; that the commissioners have acted unreasonably, arbitrarily and capriciously in refusing to approve the salaries so fixed by the judges.
The commissioners urge that under the same statutes referred to above, they have the discretion to disapprove the salaries here considered; that there was sufficient evidence before the commissioners to sustain their actions, and that the evidence further shows that the commissioners acted reasonably and were not arbitrary or capricious and did not exceed their authority in disapproving such salaries and in setting the salaries of the district court employees in amounts different than the judges had determined and fixed. The trial court upheld *39the above stated position of plaintiffs and entered judgment as prayed in the complaint.
Pertinent portions of the statutes which are here subject to interpretation are as follows:
“39-16-1. The judge or judges of the district court of each judicial district shall appoint one or more probation officers who shall not be dismissed without good cause shown. The judge or judges shall fix the salary of such officers commensurate with the time required to discharge the duties hereunder, subject to the approval of the county commissioners of the counties of such judicial district. * * * ”
“56-3-8. * * * Such clerk shall receive such compensation as shall be fixed by the judge or judges * * * as shall be approved by the board of county commissioners. * * * ”
Interpretation of the foregoing involves the application of certain well established rules of construction, among which we mention the following: (1) It is the legislative intention, as expressed in the statute, which the court must ascertain and declare; and (2) it must be assumed that the legislature acted with full knowledge of relevant constitutional provisions, inherent judicial powers existing, and of previous legislation and decisional law on the subject; that it did not intend to create a situation amounting to a departure from the general concept of democratic government; and that it sought to recognize and confirm inherent powers rather than to destroy them.
Article III of the Colorado Constitution divides the powers of government into three departments and directs that, “ * * * no person or collection of persons charged with the exercise of powers properly belonging to one of these departments shall exercise any power properly belonging to either of the others, * * * .” In City and County of Denver, et al., v. Lynch, et al., 92 Colo. 102, 18 P. (2d) 907, we quoted with approval the following:
“The departments are distinct from each other, and, *40so far as any direct control or interference is concerned, are independent of each other. More, they are superior in their respective spheres.”
In the case above cited this court quoted from State v. Cunningham, 39 Mont. 165, 101 Pac. 962, the following: “It is incumbent upon each department to assert and exercise all its powers whenever public necessity requires it to do so; otherwise, it is recreant to the trust reposed in it by the people. It is equally incumbent upon it to refrain from asserting a power that does not belong to it, for this is equally a violation of the people’s confidence. Indeed, the distinction goes so far as to require each department to refrain from in any way impeding the exercise of the proper functions belonging to either of the other departments.”
We approve and adopt the following language contained in the conclusions of the trial court:
“It is an ingrained principle in our government that the three departments of government are coordinate and shall co-operate with and complement, and at the same time act as checks and balances against one another but shall not interfere with or encroach on the authority or within the province of the other. The legislative and executive departments have their functions and their exclusive powers, including the ‘purse’ and the ‘sword.’ The judiciary has its exclusive powers and functions, to-wit: it has judgment and the power to enforce its judgments and orders. In their responsibilities and duties, the courts must have complete independence. It is not only axiomatic, it is the genius of our government that the courts must be independent, unfettered, and free from directives, influence, or interference from any extraneous source. It is abhorrent to the principles of our legal system and to our form of government that courts, being a coordinate department of government, should be compelled to depend upon the vagaries of an extrinsic will. Such would interfere with the operation of the courts, impinge upon their power and thwart the *41effective administration of justice. These principles, concepts, and doctrines are so thoroughly embedded in our legal system that they have become bone and sinew of our state and national polity.
“In Colorado there are repeated confirmations of the proposition that the courts have the inherent power to carry on their functions so that they may operate independently and not become dependent upon or a supplicant of either of the other departments of government, and may incur necessary and reasonable expenses in the performance of their judicial duties and, in cases such as this one, it is the plain ministerial duty of those who control the purse to pay such expenses except only where the amounts are so unreasonable as to affirmatively indicate arbitrary and capricious acts. * * * ”
The foregoing conclusions are abundantly supported by decisions of courts of last resort in other states. Powers v. Isley, 66 Ariz. 94, 183 P. (2d) 880; Bass v. County of Saline, 171 Nebr. 538, 106 N.W. (2d) 860; Noble County Council v. State, 234 Ind. 172, 125 N.E. (2d) 709. We hold that the district judges of the Fourth Judicial District are empowered to fix the salaries of its employees. We further hold, in the absence of a clear showing that the acts of the judges in fixing such salaries were arbitrary and capricious and that the salaries so fixed are unreasonable and unjustified, that it is the ministerial duty of the county commissioners to approve them and to provide the means for payment of such salaries. We further hold that where a question is raised as to the reasonableness of the salaries fixed by the judges or whether their acts in respect thereto are arbitrary and capricious, the burden is on the Board to establish such facts by competent evidence. That burden was not sustained by the Board in the record before us.
Other grounds urged for reversal of the judgment, which are not covered by the foregoing, will be mentioned but briefly. It is argued (1) that the district court of El Paso county was without jurisdiction over the sub*42ject matter of the action and over the persons of the defendants because of a deprivation of procedural due process of law; (2) that the plaintiff judges are not real parties in interest and are without capacity to sue; and (3) that the plaintiff employees have a plain, speedy, and adequate remedy at law. Suffice it to say that we have examined the arguments made with relation thereto and the authorities cited in support thereof. We find the matters urged upon us as grounds for reversal to be without merit.
By way of cross error counsel for plaintiffs seek reversal of that part of the judgment which denied an award of attorneys’ fees to counsel for plaintiffs. No part of the stipulated facts on which the case was submitted to the trial court touches upon the subject of attorneys’ fees. If counsel fees are allowable under the circumstances disclosed by this record a claim should be filed with the proper county officials for action in due course. If such claim is rejected the propriety thereof can be made the subject of judicial action. While we affirm this judgment in the interest of a speedy determination of the issues involved, we do not determine that the procedure employed is the exclusive remedy by which enforcement of a judicial prerogative may be obtained.
As pointed out above, the judiciary, as one of the separate departments of the governmental structure, is charged with the administration of justice and must be free to perform its functions without restriction or impairment by the acts or conduct of another department. Hence a proper procedure in the circumstances shown by this record would have been for the judges involved to have certified to the Board of County Commissioners a schedule of salaries fixed for the compensation of the-several clerical employees involved, whereupon it would devolve upon the Board to procure and furnish the funds to meet such schedule. In the event' of its failure or refusal to do so, the court might properly issue a citation *43or rule directed to the Board to show cause why an order should not be entered compelling compliance with the schedule as so certified. Unless the Board was able to establish that the schedule of salaries so fixed was wholly unreasonable, capricious and arbitrary, an order compelling compliance therewith could be entered. We do not hesitate to affirm the judgment since it is clear that had a different procedure been pursued the result here would be the same.
The judgment is affirmed.
Mr. Justice Hall dissents.