Court Opinion

ID: 9579046
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 21:51:02.253562+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:34:14.155538
License: Public Domain

Bell, Justice,
dissenting.
For the reasons that follow, I dissent.
1. The majority relies on former Code Ann. § 92A-503 to find that since 1937 it has been the intent of the General Assembly to vest all municipal courts with jurisdiction over misdemeanor traffic cases. That Code section provided
[a] 11 municipal courts and police courts shall have jurisdiction to dispose of misdemeanor cases as provided by this Chapter which arise within the territorial limits of their respective jurisdictions, as now or hereafter fixed by law. [Emphasis supplied.]
Former Code Ann. § 92A-503 did not delineate jurisdiction over misdemeanor cases by its own terms. Instead, it provided that jurisdiction over such cases would be “as provided by this Chapter.” Thus, under former Code Ann. § 92A-503 one had to refer to other provi*387sions of Chapter 5 of Title 92A to determine the jurisdiction of municipal courts. The relevant provision was former Code Ann. § 92A-502, now OCGA § 40-13-21, which limited municipal-court jurisdiction over misdemeanor cases to municipal courts in counties in which there was no city or county court.
Decided July 11, 1990 —
Reconsideration denied July 27, 1990.
Virgil L. Brown & Associates, Virgil L. Brown, Eric D. Hearn, *388for appellant.
*387Accordingly, even if former Code Ann. § 92A-503 should have been carried forward into the 1981 Code as part of § 40-13-21 (but see Division 2 of this dissent), jurisdiction of municipal courts in 1988 (when this case arose) would still have been “as provided by this Chapter,” that is, § 40-13-21. In 1988, before the amendment of § 40-13-21 in 1989, § 40-13-21 provided that municipal courts in counties in which there were state courts did not have jurisdiction over misdemeanor traffic offenses.
For the foregoing reasons, I conclude that the General Assembly did not intend from 1937 to 1989 that municipal courts have jurisdiction over all traffic cases. Further, in the instant case, I conclude the municipal court did not have jurisdiction over Whaley’s offense.
2. Moreover, even if former Code Ann. § 92A-503 has the significance that the majority attaches to it, then it was unconstitutional when enacted in 1937, and was still unconstitutional at the time the Code of 1981 was codified, and was therefore properly deleted by the codifiers in 1981.
At the time of the enactment of former Code Ann. § 92A-503, a 1937 constitutional amendment provided that municipal courts had jurisdiction over traffic cases only in counties where there was no city or county court, see Art. VI, Sec. VI, Par. II of the 1945 Georgia Constitution (Code Ann. § 2-4102), and therefore § 92A-503 (as interpreted by the majority) was unconstitutional. The statute remained unconstitutional under the 1976 Georgia Constitution, Art. VI, Sec. VI, Par. II (Code Ann. § 2-3502) (same provision regarding municipal courts as 1945 Constitution). Thus, the statute was unconstitutional when the Code of 1981 was drafted.
OCGA § 1-1-2 provides that the Code of 1981 was enacted to “revise and modernize and to repeal those laws which are obsolete as a result of the passage of time or other causes. . . .” As § 92A-502 was “obsolete . . . because of . . . constitutional principles,” Stepperson, Inc. v. Long, 256 Ga. 838, 844 (353 SE2d 461) (1987), I conclude that § 92A-502 was correctly not carried forward to the Code of 1981. Stepperson, supra, 256 Ga.
*388W. Fletcher Sams, District Attorney, J. David Fowler, Sharon J. Law, Assistant District Attorneys, for appellee.