Court Opinion

ID: 9810263
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 21:44:41.647711+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:39:31.455980
License: Public Domain

ClabK, C. J.,
concurs in the decision, but is further of the opinion:
1. That even if an equity had developed in the justice’s court it would not have ousted the jurisdiction. The Constitution, Art. 4, sec. 1, is as follows: “Abolishes distinction between actions at law and suits in equity feigned issues.- The distinctions between actions at law and suits in equity and the forms of all such actions and suits shall be abolished.”
Same article, sec. 27, prescribes: “Jurisdiction of justices of the peace. The several justices of the peace shall have jurisdiction, under such regulations as the General Assembly shall prescribe, of civil actions founded on contract, wherein the sum demanded .shall not exceed two hundred dollars and wherein the title to real estate shall not be in controversy, and of all criminal matters arising in their counties where the punishment cannot exceed a fine of fifty dollars or imprisonment for thirty days. And the General Assembly may give to justices of the peace jurisdiction of other civil actions wherein the value of the property in controversy does not exceed fifty dollars,” with a further provision that in all actions, civil or criminal, “the party against whom judgment is rendered may appeal to the Superior Court.”
*397It is clear, therefore, that the distinction formerly existing between law and equity (which was purely incidental, arising from equitable doctrines being brought into the law by progressive judges like Lord Nottingham and others against the protest of the more conservative occupants of the bench who deemed this, distinction an indispensable law of nature) was absolutely destroyed as a matter of jurisdiction by the above provision in our Constitution. This distinction could thereafter obtain as little in the court of justices of the peace as in any other court. There is no intimation whatever that the jurisdiction of a justice of the peace is restricted to matters formerly cognizable on the law side or is ousted whenever an equitable element arises in the controversy. After the adoption of the Constitution of 1868, the bench being still occupied, necessarily, by judges who had been thoroughly indoctrinated with the idea that the distinction between law and equity was something inherent in the Constitution of the Universe, there were decisions which still, upheld this distinction in actions brought before the clerk and before a justice of the peace, notwithstanding the explicit and unmistakable declaration of the Constitution. But we who can read the Constitution with clearer eyes, because without the prepossessions natural to those who studied law under the old system, should correct and not repeat their errors. Most especially is it true as to constitutional matters that the Constitution itself should be our guide, and not erroneous decisions, lest we bring upon ourselves the scriptural condemnation that we “make the Word of none effect by our traditions.” Matt. 15:6; Mark 7:13. It is true that a justice of the peace cannot issue an injunction, and neither can this Court. But this is not because neither court has equitable jurisdiction, but because the statute has not given to either authority to issue this remedial writ as a matter of ordinary litigation.
2. If the title to land arises in an action before a justice of the peace under the Constitution the magistrate has no jurisdiction. If the justice holds that the title to land is in issue he must dismiss the action (Revisal, 1423), but the justice must hold whether it does or not, and the Constitution gives the right of appeal in either event. When the case gets into the Superior Court on such appeal, the whole spirit of the Constitution and of our statutes based thereon is that, being then in a court of .general jurisdiction, .the appeal will not be dismissed and the parties required to go out by one door of the courthouse to immediately come back in by another into the same courtroom, for the court being seized of jurisdiction will proceed to try the cause on its merits. This has been expressly provided by statute where a cause has been brought before the clerk, but on appeal it appears that he had no jurisdiction. In such case, the court will proceed to try the cause (Revisal, 614, and cases cited thereunder in Pell’s Revisal), and even when the proceedings before the clerk were a *398nullity (In re Anderson, 132 N. C., 243) and tbe judge can make amendments to give jurisdiction in that court. Ewbank v. Turner, 134 N. C., 81. The same is true as to appeals from a justice of the peace in criminal actions.
There is nothing in the Constitution which indicates that this rule does not apply to appeals in civil cases from a justice. It has been held that the proper course in all appeals to the Superior Court, independent of any statute, is not to dismiss in that court, but to make the proper amendments and proceed. This principle was held by Smith, C. J., for the Court in McMillan v. Reeves, 102 N. C., 559, citing West v. Kittrell, 8 N. C., 493, and Boing v. R. R., 87 N. C., 360. There have been decisions since to the contrary, but not without objection thereto being made. See concurring opinions in Unitype v. Ashcraft, 155 N. C., 71; Wilson v. Ins. Co., ib., 176-178, and cases there cited; Cheese Co. v. Pipkin, ib., 401; S. v. McAden, 162 N. C., 578; McIver v. R. R., 163 N. C., 546, and dissenting opinion in McLaurin v. McIntyre, 167 N. C., 355, 356.