Court Opinion

ID: 9660820
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 22:21:30.917505+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:14:22.463980
License: Public Domain

On Petitions to Rehear
Swepston, Justice.
A petition to rehear has been filed in behalf of each of tbe appellants in these consolidated suits. Before considering tbe merits of same it is necessary to dispose of tbe appellees’ insistence that these petitions do not comply with Rule 32 of this Court in regard to petitions for rehearing. Tbe petitions were filed with tbe Clerk within ten days after tbe announcement of tbe opinion of tbe Court but they were not “presented” to the Court.
In tbe first place, this rule as it reads literally has been honored more in tbe breach than otherwise. These petitions were bandied in tbe same manner that they have been bandied heretofore as far back as any member of this Court can recall. Also, when tbe Court is not sitting it is impossible to present such a petition to tbe Court. Therefore, we tbink this is no ground for our refusing to consider tbe petitions.
Tbe question is raised also in behalf of appellees that tbe last paragraph of T.C.A. sec. 6-310 ought to be *305interpreted to mean that no petition to rehear will lie in these annexation eases. This paragraph provides:
“If on appeal judgment shall he against the validity of such ordinance, an order shall he entered vacating the same; otherwise, it shall become operative forthwith by court order and shall not be subject to contest or attack in legal or equitable proceedings for any cause or reason, the judgment of the appellate court being final.”
We think this has no application to our rule allowing petitions to rehear. The petition to rehear filed in behalf of Mrs. Schmittou asserts two grounds: (1) that the Court erroneously overlooked the fact that it sits as an appellate court only to review the actions of lower courts; and (2) that it erred in taking judicial notice of the report of the Community Services Commission.
The second ground is overruled as it presents no new question but a question which was fully considered by the Court under the original opinion.
Under the first ground it is asserted that the record shows that the report of the Community Services Commission was not before the Chancellor and was not in any way considered by him; and that when we stated in the original opinion that we doubted the correctness of his ruling and then assigned a different reason for reaching the same result, we were violating the Constitution and the decisions to the effect that this Court is of appellate jurisdiction only. He cites Wright v. Nashville Gas & Heating Co., 183 Tenn. 594, 603, 194 S.W.2d 459, 463.
We first respond to the above statement in the brief that the record does not show the Chancellor considered said report. There is no record except the bill, *306the demurrer thereto and the opinion of the Chancellor. Counsel for appellee insist the reason for this statement by counsel for appellant Schmittou is that he was not one of the counsel who tried the case before the Chancellor and that the question of taking judicial notice of this report was presented to the Chancellor and he quotes from his brief to that effect. Of course, if this case had been tried upon proof taken, certainly the wise thing for counsel to have done would have been to let the record show that the matter was called to the attention of the Court in regard to taking judicial notice of same. However, in the situation in the case at bar there is no place for a bill of exceptions; the case is presented simply on the allegations of fact in the bill which facts must be taken as true, except where contradicted by matters of which the Court may take judicial notice, as in this case. Gribson’s Suits in Chancery (4th Ed.) Sec. 304, (5th Ed., Sec. 311).
In 3 Am.Jur., under Appeal and Error, 374, Sec. 834, it is stated that the general rule is, if the attention of the trial court is not called to a fact within its judicial knowledge and such fact is not judicially noticed below, the appellate court will not take judicial notice of it, but the text further states “not infrequently, however, in spite of this general rule, appellate courts have taken cognizance of facts which had been ignored by the trial court; and it seems clear that the failure or refusal of a trial court to take notice of a proper fact does not necessarily prevent the appellate court from doing so.” Under Note 11 are cited several cases, one of which appellees have in the brief, which is styled New York Indians v. United States, 170 U.S. 1, 18 S.Ct. 531, 42 L.Ed. 927. In that case the Supreme Court of the United States took *307judicial notice of certain documents from the executive and legislative departments supporting the claims of the Indians, although they were not called to the attention of the court below nor referred to in the lower court’s findings of fact.
In 31 C.J.S. Evidence sec. 13b, p. 521, Note 76, the case of American Legion Post No. 90, etc. v. First Nat. Bank & Trust Co. of Mamaroneck, 2 Cir., 1940, 113 F.2d 868, 872, it is said:
“Defendants assert in their brief that this regulation was not called to the attention of the court below, and that therefore we cannot take judicial notice of it. It seems, however, that, while an appellate court is not obligated to notice matters not brought to the attention of the trial court, Line v. Line, 119 Md. 403, 86 A. 1032, Ann.Cas.l914D, 192, yet it may take such notice where necessary either to affirm, or to show the impropriety of, a decision below. Hunter v. New York, O. & W. R. Co., 116 N.Y. 615, 23 N.E. 9, 6 L.R.A. 246,” (Obviously physically false testimony.)
Then as to a situation such as we have here, i. e., a demurrer and judicial notice of facts contrary to allegations of fact in the bill see Nev-Cal Electric Securities Co. v. Imperial Irr. Dist., 9 Cir., 85 F.2d 886, 904, certiorari denied 300 U.S. 662, 57 S.Ct. 493, 81 L.Ed. 871.
After all, however, it does not make any difference whether this matter was called to the attention of the Chancellor, because he reached the right result on the very question to be decided. The question to be decided, as stated in the original brief on page 23 in behalf of Mrs. Schmittou and on page 876 of the original opinion of this Court, is “Does the original bill contain sufficient *308allegations to permit the introduction of proof to show that the annexation ordinance in question is unreasonable in consideration of the health, safety and welfare of the citizens and property owners of the territory sought to he annexed and the citizens and property owners of the municipality. ’ ’
In a long line of cases this principle has been applied and recently in Denny v. Wilson County, 198 Tenn. 677, 686, 281 N.W.2d 671, where a demurrer to a declaration was sustained by the trial court on a ground not approved by the Supreme Court but he nevertheless reached the right result and this Court affirmed on another ground, that of estoppel.
That is exactly the analogous situation to what we have here and it is the proper exercise of appellate jurisdiction.
Wright v. Nashville Gas & Heating Co., supra, we think is not at all in point. That was a suit filed for a declaratory judgment to declare invalid a part of the charter of the Nashville Gas & Heating Company, which bill was filed by an individual solely on the basis that he was a taxpayer. The first ground of the demurrer was that he had no right of action as such. On his appeal this Court sustained the first ground of demurrer and declined to consider any other grounds because they had not been considered by the Chancellor. That is a situation of frequent occurrence and this Court will not under those circumstances pass on other grounds of demurrer that had not been considered by the court below for the reason that the other and different grounds raise entirely different issues. That case cites Dodds v. Duncan, 80 Tenn. 731. It likewise is wholly inapplicable to our present sit-*309nation. There, a judgment in the trial conrt in favor of the plaintiff was reversed by the Supreme Conrt and costs of the appeal were adjudged against plaintiff and his supposed surety. Relief was sought by the surety in the Supreme Court upon his allegation that his name on the cost bond was not his act and deed or authorized in any manner. Naturally this presented an issue to he tried on evidence that was not in aid of any process issued by the Supreme Court and hence was not proper to he tried by the appellate court. This Court stated that the surety ordinarily could get relief from a judgment of the Supreme Court only by a suit in equity, but that same would not lie here because the amount involved was less than $50; that since the Supreme Court could not try such an issue of fact, the following disposition was made of the case, “if no issue is tendered upon the facts alleged in the petition (for supersedeas), the supersedeas will be made perpetual. If issue is joined on the fact whether the bond in question was the act and deed of the petitioner, an order will be made declaring the rights of the parties to have the issue tried, and the cause for that purpose will be remanded to the circuit court” etc. (Parenthesis ours.)
By way of recapitulation then, the Chancellor felt that the issue stated, supra, was to be determined on the basis that the denials in the answer were determinative of the issue, whereas this Court, not agreeing with that theory, is of opinion that the facts stated in the report of which we take judicial notice show that the ordinance in question is not unreasonable in the context stated in the statute and in the issue quoted, supra.
Accordingly the petition of Mrs. Schmittou to rehear is overruled.
*310The petition to rehear filed in behalf of Ernest W. Colbert is a re-argument of the matters disposed of after full consideration by the original opinion except the question of due process. Complaint is made that the Court did not pass upon his propositions of law 1 and 2. We have no fault to find with same but simply did not consider them controlling in this case and are of the same opinion still.
The assertion that taking judicial notice of this report and thus denying the petitioner an opportunity to present evidence amounts to a denial of due process is in our opinion a proposition wholly unsupported by any case to be found in the books. Judicial notice is a method of dispensing with the necessity for taking proof. As stated in the original opinion on page 879, we are here concerned only with the question whether a fairly debatable question is presented, but not with whether the conclusions of this report are indisputably true, because if a fairly debatable question is presented, the judgment of the City officials in the enactment of this ordinance will not be interfered with by this Court.
Both petitions are overruled.
All concur.