Court Opinion

ID: 9582621
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 22:29:33.107114+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:38:03.095999
License: Public Domain

Duckworth, Chief Justice,
dissenting. Believing that the law has been badly treated by this court’s contradictory decisions, and by the legislative attempt to usurp the exclusive jurisdiction of the judiciary, I wish to set forth here what I believe to be the controlling law in this case, and try to demonstrate errors of this court and of the legislature.
Since the facts here are identical with the facts in State Board of Examiners in Optometry v. Friedman’s Jewelers, 183 Ga. 669 (189 SE 238), we are bound by that decision, and our decision here is sound law only if it follows that full bench decision. The two decisive rulings made in the Friedman case were (1) optometry was not a “learned profession,” and (2) *210a corporation by employing a licensed optometrist, and selling glasses only on his prescription, was not practicing optometry, and that its acts in such circumstances will not endanger public health so as to thwart the purpose of the statute. The first ruling was based upon sound judicial reasoning. It is there said (p. 672): “It is most earnestly contended by the board, however, that the practice of optometry is a ‘learned profession,’ as is the practice of law and medicine. The distinction between the so-called ‘learned professions’ and other professions, trades or callings, has been continuously recognized by the courts.” (Italics mine). The opinion then sets forth Webster’s International Dictionary definition of the word “profession,” concluding with a note therein as follows: “The three professions, or learned professions, are especially, theology, law, and medicine.” Then this court said: “This distinction between the ‘three professions’ and others is not derivable from statutory enactments, but is one recognized and established through time because of the inherent difference between these professions and those of ordinary vocations and callings. . . Optometry itself is a profession of ancient standing (Martin v. Baldy, 249 Pa. 253, 94 A 1091); but so far as we are aware, it has never been recognized to be a ‘learned profession' . . .” (Italics mine). Having thus met with a judicial determination that optometry was not a learned profession, and that a determination of what is a learned profession is not derived from statutory enactments, resort was made by the board to the legislature, and the legislature obliged. See Ga. L. 1956, p. 94. In Section 1 thereof it is said: “Optometry is defined as the art and science of visual care and is hereby declared to be a learned profession.” (Italics mine). In McCutcheon v. MacNeill, 197 Ga. 72 (28 SE2d 469), this court held that Mrs. Evelyn McCutcheon was not an employee of Fulton County on June 1, 1943, under terms of the Civil Service Act of 1943. By an Act approved February 8, 1945 (Ga. L. 1945, p. 556), the legislature purported to amend the 1943 Act as follows: “It is hereby declared that as of June 1, 1943, Mrs. Evelyn W. McCutcheon was an employee of Fulton County.” In McCutcheon v. Smith, 199 Ga. 685 (35 SE2d 144), this court held the amendment void as an invasion of judicial *211authority. Even that flat judicial rebuke did not restrain the legislature from attempting to usurp judicial powers, and this court with equal firmness ruled such attempts void in the following cases: Parks v. State, 212 Ga. 433, 437 (93 SE2d 663); Martin v. Baldwin, 215 Ga. 293, 299 (110 SE2d 344); United Hospitals Service Assn. v. Fulton County, 216 Ga. 30, 33 (114 SE2d 524); Northside. Manor, Inc. v. Vann, 219 Ga. 298 (133 SE2d 32).
We completely overlooked this sound principle of law and the foregoing binding decisions when in Pearle Optical v. State Board, 219 Ga. 364 (133 SE2d 374), we said that that portion of the 1956 Act, supra, which declared optometry to be a “learned profession” is valid. What we there said is itself invalid because it is in irreconcilable conflict with the numerous older decisions holding to the contrary. As above demonstrated whether or not optometry is a learned profession is a judicial rather than a legislative question. It has been judicially decided in the negative, and the legislative attempt to overrule that decision by this court is utterly void. Likewise the full bench decision in the Friedman case, supra, involving facts identical with those in the present case, demands a like ruling here that the corporation is not practicing optometry. The Pearle Optical case involved materially different facts. There the optometrist gave prescriptions which were filled elsewhere and a fee was charged for them, and there were other material facts showing the corporation to be engaged in the practice of optometry. The judgment there was sound. But the approval of the Act of 1956 was contrary to law and is unsound and is not binding. It was stipulated in that case that: “There has been no substantial change in the actual procedure utilized by licensed optometrists in the practice of optometry in Georgia other than the normal scientific developments and improvements in procedures, methods and equipment since February 13, 1956, nor since December 15, 1936.” These dates are respectively when the Friedman ease was decided and when the 1956 Act declaring optometry to be a learned profession was approved. Thus is shown that optometry has been the same throughout, and hence the ruling that it is not a learned profession applied in 1956 and in 1964.
*212In view of the numerous briefs filed on behalf of lawyers, doctors and dentists, I would say that I would judicially hold all those professions to be “learned,” and my position here holds no threat to them. For all the foregoing reasons, I feel that I am bound by the Friedman case, supra; and since it is not overruled, the judgment here should be the same as the judgment there rendered.