Court Opinion

ID: 9538576
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 07:37:55.380801+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:57:59.224006
License: Public Domain

BISTLINE, Justice,
concurring in the result.
PART I.
The Court finds itself in an anomalous circumstance—likely one of its own making in following a questionable pathway. That conclusion is readily drawn by a reading of the Court’s opinion, and in particular footnote 1 thereof. Therein the distinction is seemingly drawn between “then” and “now,” the latter being the present wherein the Court makes and promulgates all of the rules, and “then” which relates back to the time when Court procedure was regulated by the legislature, and was far less complicated.
The anomalous situation is more readily recognized when one notes in today’s majority opinion that it is necessary to reach back into the “then” days in order to find support bolstering today’s rationale. More specifically, the Court hearkens back to Spivey v. District Court, 37 Idaho 774, 219 P. 203 (1923). Spivey is revisited with considerable interest. As the Chief Justice has correctly noted in footnote 1 of the majority opinion, in Spivey when the granting of new trials was controlled by statute rather than by court rule, this Court thought it necessary to interpret the statute, and did so to the effect that the trial court, after having entered its order on a motion for new trial, did not have jurisdiction to reconsider and change its decision.
Undocumented in today’s opinion is it that the Supreme Court at that time was careful to concede that the interpretive eon*160elusion which it reached was a minority view. Noting that “the authorities are in conflict” it conceded that “the greater number hold that ... it is in the interest of justice to permit a trial court to reverse its own action in order to correct mistakes." Spivey, 37 Idaho at 780, 219 P. at 204 (emphasis added).
The Court at that time also noted that “[u]nder Const, art. 5, sec. 13, the legislature may regulate by law the method of procedure in the district courts.” Id. at 780, 219 P. at 204. Times have indeed changed. Now it is the Supreme Court which does the regulating. As to how the change came about, one cannot be too certain.
The logic in not allowing a district court to reverse its ruling does not readily materialize. That any person, whether judge or not, sees a mistake and recognizes the need for rectifying it, and feels both obligated and justified in doing so, is not an earthshaking proposition.
Although no compelling reason suggests a challenge to the views espoused in the Court’s opinion, I remain somewhat dubious wherein the Court rules that district courts have to live and die with their own error. Because this Court is not so burdened,. it is with bewilderment and reluctance that I join the Court’s opinion. The plus which I perceive to arise here is that trial judges, be they district judges or magistrates, once having made their considered rulings on close and difficult issues, will no longer see any reason for further concern.
As to just this particular case, if the decision to be made were mine alone, I would prefer to be not all that fettered by what the Court said back in the year 1923, other than to observe, as previously stated, that the trial judge should be accorded the opportunity to have a change of mind which flows from further reflection. That happens so seldom that it is nothing to fret about. Moreover, when such does occur, it is only because of a trial court’s consciousness of the importance of being right so that litigants are not dealt with unjustly.
Moreover, it may be readily assumed that henceforth any and all rulings on evidentiary matters likewise, once made, are irrevocably cast in stone and not subject to revision, at least not by the judge directly in charge. One can only wonder who is in the best position to assess the loss in judicial efficiency by a policy which holds the trial judges to one judgment call and one only? Umpires and referees at athletic contests are allowed more leeway than that. At the same time there arises the concomitant question, who better than the judge who has presided over the trial and post judgment proceedings, and, as well, knows the intricacies of the controversy to make that assessment?
PART II.
Whatever may be the course this Court takes henceforth relative to motions for reconsideration, to my mind it is just plain wrong and unjustifiable to make the action taken today applicable to Judge Michaud’s ruling reversing himself on a decision relative to the granting or denying of the judge’s own motion to reconsider his previous decision on a motion for a new trial.
In June of 1986, this Court recognized its earlier ruling in Obray v. Mitchell, 98 Idaho 533, 567 P.2d 1284 (1977), “that a petition or motion to reconsider filed in the trial court, may be treated as a motion to alter or amend a judgment.” Hamilton v. Rybar, 111 Idaho 396, 724 P.2d 132 (1986). In December of 1986, this Court cited to the then relatively new Hamilton case, inter alia, for the proposition that “[a] ‘motion to reconsider’ has been called a ‘procedural practice of long standing and regular utilization.’ ” 111 Idaho at 399, 724 P.2d at 133. First Bank & Trust v. Parker Bros., Inc., 112 Idaho 30, 730 P.2d 950 (1986). In that case we found error in a ruling of the trial court, but it had nothing to do with the long recognized acceptance of motions or petitions to reconsider: “We do not hold or intimate by our decision today that motions for reconsideration are not authorized simply because they have not been expressly recognized in the rules.” Id., 112 Idaho at 32, 730 P.2d at 952.
*161The dissenting opinion of Bistline, J., in Hamilton v. Rybar, 111 Idaho at 399-400, 724 P.2d at 135-36, provided even more fuel for the fire:
I would venture that in at least one out of three cases that comes before this Court the record will contain one or more motions for reconsideration. As just one ready example, Green v. Bannock Paving, 111 Idaho 3, 720 P.2d 186 (Sup.Ct.1986), there was such a motion. The procedure is very much a part of our Idaho practice, and with today’s opinion the practice will continue. And, it seem to have served a good purpose. In the last year there were two cases where the district judge on reconsideration completely reversed his earlier decision.
One such case is Kleiber v. City of Idaho Falls, 110 Idaho 501, 716 P.2d 1273 (1986).
PART III.
By far the most troublesome aspect of this Court’s opinion is found in the proposition that the Court now is instructing trial judges that they do not possess the authority to sua sponte reconsider orders which they have entered in passing post-judgment motions for new trials. It has forever been the statutory law in Idaho that such action is within their authority. A quick glance at the 1932 Annotated Code shows that § 7-608 established the trial court’s authority to, on its own motion, vacate a verdict and grant a new trial. The previous codes had the same or similar provisions.
The most unfortunate aspect of the Court’s abrupt change in direction lies in the mechanics of the proceedings below, and in this Court. The vice of the Court’s rationale is its willingness to completely ignore a motion, which we granted, to suspend an appeal in this Court, which had been filed. Involved counsel in so moving the Court followed the Court’s rules explicitly. The motion completely informed us that counsel wanted jurisdiction revested in the district court so that there would be no problems regarding a then on-going procedure pursuant to the action taken by the district court. That action, taken sua sponte by the district court was to, on its own motion, reconsider a decision it had earlier reached on a party’s motion. The motion filed with us could not have been clearer in informing us what was going on:
COMES NOW the above named plaintiffs, by and through their counsel of record, Howard & Owens, P.A., and hereby respectfully move this Court for an Order suspending the appeal in this matter upon the grounds and for the reasons that the appeal may be mooted by the fact that the Order Granting a New Trial is currently under advisement by way of the trial court’s own motion and Appellants are presently waiting for the Court’s Decision.
Plaintiffs’ Motion to Suspend Appeal, dated October 11, 1989.
Plaintiffs’ attorney filed an affidavit concurrently with the motion to suspend appeal, which provided the additional information that both parties were again submitting briefs to the district court as assistance to its research, and:
3. That Defendants’ Motion for New Trial was granted on July 17, 1989.
4. That Plaintiffs moved for reconsideration of the Order Granting a New Trial entered by the trial court on July 18, 1989.
5. That the trial court, on its own motion, agreed to open the matter on August 25, 1989, and requested additional briefing from both parties.
6. That Plaintiffs are currently waiting for the trial court’s decision.
7. That if the trial court ultimately reverses itself and denies the Motion for New Trial, Plaintiff will move for dismissal of the Appeal.
Affidavit in Support of Motion to Suspend Appeal, submitted by plaintiffs’ counsel, dated October 11, 1989. This Court’s understanding and approval of the procedure is clearly spelled out in our Order Granting Motion to Suspend Appeal, dated November 13, 1989:
A MOTION TO SUSPEND APPEAL and supporting AFFIDAVIT was filed by Appellant seeking to suspend proceedings in this appeal pending a decision by the District Court on a Motion for Recon*162sideration of an Order Granting New Trial. No Objection was filed by Respondents; therefore, good cause appearing,
IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that the MOTION TO SUSPEND APPEAL be, and hereby is, GRANTED.
IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that proceedings in this appeal shall be SUSPENDED for a period of sixty (60) days from the date of this Order at which time the due date for filing the Appeal Record with this Court shall be reset unless otherwise provided by an Order of this Court.
The question before the Court is simply stated: Whatever the Court may do hereafter, are we not today in justice and in good conscience estopped or otherwise equitably precluded from reneging on our order which suspended the appeal so that the district court, Judge Michaud, could rule on his sua sponte motion?