Court Opinion

ID: 9539404
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 16:03:55.55172+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:58:48.048835
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Sutton
specially concurring:
In so far as the majority opinion is an affirmance based upon a failure to name the parties defendant required under Rule 57 (j), R.C.P. Colorado, I concur therein. And, in so far as Farmers’ Dairy League, Inc. v. City and County of Denver, 112 Colo. 399, 149 P. (2d) 370, and Colorado State Board of Examiners of Architects v. Louis E. Rico, 132 Colo. 437, 289 P. (2d) 162, have determined that one cannot enjoin the enforcement of a penal *248ordinance, I must bow to the rule of stare decisis, for as Mr. Justice Moore said in his special concurrence in Cover v. Denver, 120 Colo. 451, 211 P. (2d) 830:
“The majority of the court reached a conclusion in that case with which I could not have agreed had I been participating in the determination of the cause; however it received the consideration of all the members of the court as the same was then constituted. The rule there announced should not be overthrown and another substituted in its stead, simply because it might not be in harmony with the views of an individual judge who took office at a time subsequent to that determination. * * *
“A change in personnel of the court should not have the effect of raising doubts concerning the finality of determinations theretofore recently made by a divided court.”
I note, however, that neither the Farmers’ nor Rico opinions treat in direct fashion the point as to whether Rule 57, or C.R.S. ’53, 77-11, which relate to Declaratory Judgments, apply to a litigant who seeks to determine whether, as applied to him, a particular ordinance or statute is unconstitutional. In Rico that was one of the two causes of action, though it is true that the trial court based its determination solely on the ground of unconstitutionality with this court then applying the Farmers’ rule to reverse.
Our Rule 57 in substance repeats C.R.S. ’53, 77-11. Both grant to our citizens the right and privilege of having their “ * * * rights, status, and other legal relations” determined in our courts and expressly as they relate or “are affected by a statute, municipal ordinance, contract or franchise * *
The further point of this special concurrence thus is that I firmly believe that both Farmers’ and Rico should have determined the rights of the litigants and not have applied the rule that injunctions will not lie against enforcement of penal provisions. I think our statute and rule leave an equitable way out in those types of cases.
*249I believe the cited statute and rule are wise and salutary. Why should one have to run the risk of being branded as a criminal when the courts may warn him in advance if he is wrong in his interpretation of the law? That is what each person affected is entitled to if he brings a proper action. That is why I do not want my concurrence in this opinion to seem to be approval of a valid doctrine ignored in the two previous decisions.