Court Opinion

ID: 9751237
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 16:15:43.424552+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:26:40.227797
License: Public Domain

*298Dissenting Opinion by
Mb. Justice Bell:
The ordinance in question so obviously and intentionally sabotages the civil service provisions of the City Charter and so palpably and flagrantly violates the language, spirit and intent of the Charter that its validation by a majority of this Court seems incomprehensible.
The City-County Consolidation Amendment to the Constitution, by its terms, became effective on its adoption on November 6, 1951. The Philadelphia Home Rule Charter was adopted on April 17, 1951, to become effective January 7, 1952. Whatever ambiguities may exist in the 100 page magnum opus known as the Charter, the City Solicitor of Philadelphia certainly knew, and the officers of county offices which on November 6, 1951 became city offices, were certainly put on notice that the language, spirit and intent of the Charter was to provide and prescribe civil service for Philadelphia’s entire municipal government. This so-called civil service, they all knew, prescribed (1) “qualifying” tests for all county employees who held a position in a county office on November 6, 1951, and (2) a real civil service test for all persons * who thereafter sought employment in the government of Philadelphia, either in a former city office or in a former county office.
The City knew in January 1952 that employees of the former county office of Sheriff claimed to be entitled under the City Charter to the civil service provisions of the Charter.
The City well knew that the Supreme Court decided on June 24, 1952, in Carrow v. Philadelphia, 371 Pa. 255, 89 A. 2d 496, that those who were employed on November 6, 1951 in the county offices in Philadelphia, such as the office of Sheriff, came clearly within the *299Constitutional Amendment and were protected in their jobs by the civil service provisions of the new City Charter; and that such employees could not be discharged for political reasons or for any other reasons except for just cause.* The language prescribing civil service was, according to Chief Justice Stern “so clear that he who runs may read.”
The Chief Justice in his opinion said, inter alia (pages 257, 258, 260) : “The solution of the legal problem presented is entirely free from difficulty if the controlling enactments are read with an eye to their plain and unequivocal meaning instead of with a straining after forced constructions and a seeking of ambiguities where none exist.
“. . . the City-County Consolidation Amendment provided that, until the legislature should otherwise provide, all the county officers should continue to perform their duties and those then serving should be allowed to complete their terms, but it will be noted that no provision was made in regard to the continuance in their positions of the employes of county offices. Accordingly that problem was dealt with in the new City Charter under the comprehensive authority granted to the city by the First Class City Home Kule Act. The Charter set up an elaborate civil service system and enacted (section 7-301) that all employes of the city (with certain exceptions not here pertinent) should be under civil service.** . . . The former county employes were to be given the opportunity of maintaining their positions by passing a qualifying test at some time *300during the period of a year. If before such opportunity were afforded them they could be discharged by their employer without cause this provision of the section would be . . . wholly meaningless, . .
That decision was impliedly but necessarily based upon the fact that the City Charter became effective on January 7, 1952 and (except as limited or restricted by the legislature or by its own provisions) was self-executing. The Carrow decision, on June 24, 1952, also made clear as crystal that any person who desired employment in the municipal government after January 7, 1952, either in a former county office or in a former city office, or in any newly created city office, must first pass a civil service test. The only doubt which remained on this point was the question of what (officers and) offices were embraced in the words “county offices” and what were excluded for the reason that they were “state” (officers or) offices.
This doubt was resolved in Lennox v. Clark, 372 Pa. 355, 93 A. 2d 834, where the Court held (1) that the Amendment applied to and embraced the officers, and the Charter applied to and embraced the employees in the office of Sheriff, Recorder of Deeds, Coroner, County Commissioners, Clerk of the Courts, Board of Revision of Taxes and the Registration Commission; and (2) that the employees in each of those offices were subject to .and governed by the civil service and other provisions of the City Charter. *
The Court also specifically decided that the City-County Consolidation Amendment became effective immediately upon its adoption, viz., on November 6, 1951, and that it was clearly self-executing. Mr. Chief Justice Stern, speaking for the Court, said (pages 364, *301366, 367, 368, 369) : . Thus the county officers were effectually brought into the structure of the municipal government. And of course, when the county officers became city officers their employes automatically became thereby city employes.1
“. . . Its real and designed result was that, when the former county officers became city officers and the former county employes city employes, they automatically became subject thereby to the laws then in effect governing and regulating city officers and employes, and also, of course, to any such laws as might thereafter become effective: (cf. Davis v. Carbon County, 369 Pa. 322, 330, 85 A. 2d 862, 867).
“. . . Section 7-301 of the Charter provided that all officers and employes of the city, all departments, all independent boards and commissions and all departmental boards and commissions should, with certain exceptions, be under civil service. . . .
“On January 7, 1952, therefore, all city officers and employes became immediately subject to these provisions of the Charter, except that the former county employes were afforded by section A-104 of the Charter the privilege of taking a qualifying test to satisfy civil service requirements. Of course, any persons em*302ployed by former county offices after1 the adoption of the City-County Consolidation Amendment on November 6, 1951, were, from the very beginning of their employment1 city employes, and as such became subject, when the Charter went into effect on January 7, 1952, to all its provisions in reference to city employes1 just as all other then existing city employes became so subject.
“The court below held that the civil service provisions of the Charter were applicable to former county officers and their employes, ... In all these respects we are in accord with its decision. ...”
The decision in Lennox v. Clark, was handed down on January 5, 1953. It was, of course, declaratory of the law which was (legally) applicable (1) to those who were employees of county offices on November 6, 1951, and who had thus acquired a tenure of office subject to being discharged upon failure to pass a qualifying test; and (2) to all persons* who thereafter sought employment in the City government, whether in a former city office or in a former county office, or in any new city office — these, the opinion clearly said, could be appointed only, after passing a .civil service examination. The citizens of Philadelphia in their Charter clearly and beyond any. question (so far as they legally could) had put an end to the spoils system and had. adopted civil service for all city (including former county) employees; and on these civil service provisions of the Charter this Court put its seal of approval!
After January 7, 1952 the former county officers (most of whom, before election, were ardent advocates *303of the Charter) appointed without any civil service test, 384 new political employees. Far worse, many of these political appointments were made after this Court’s decision in Carrow v. Philadelphia. If these appointments were intended, as they undoubtedly were, to give these new political employees civil service status they were made in plain, palpable and flagrant violation of the language, spirit and intent of the Charter and of the decisions of this Court!
Moreover, the City Solicitor, who was thoroughly familiar with the Garrote and Lennox cases, which he ably argued, wrote a letter to the Chairman of the Civil Service Commission dated June 30,1953, in which he stated, inter alia: “It is my opinion that in the present state of your regulations the date of the adoption of the City-County Consolidation Amendment, November 6, 1951, is the effective date from which all new appointees in the former County offices must take competitive examinations.” No wonder it was asserted that the Advocates of the City Charter have now become Wreckers of the Charter.
The present regulation of the Civil Service Commission dated July, 1953, which attempts to give these new political appointees all the rights, privileges and civil service status of those persons who had been employed in county offices on November 6, 1951 — flies in the teeth of the clear language of the Charter and makes a mockery of civil service and of the clear, directly pertinent and controlling opinions of this Court in the Garrow and Lennox cases. The majority opinion in the present case admits, as it must, that this regulation is contrary to the law and to the prior decisions of this Court. I add that it is equally contrary to good morals and good government! Such a flagrant violation of the Charter and of our prior deci*304sions — adopted as it was with full knowledge of our decisions — should not be tolerated.
Both from a legal and moral point of view, the position of the City administration in this case in undermining and nullifying the civil service provisions of the Charter is indefensible. This is not a ease where the right of the City administration to employ 384 political appointees during the so-called transition period is challenged or involved; this is not a casé where someone is questioning the right of these men to be paid for the work they did during this so-called transition period. This is not a case of protecting the poor or helping the needy. The sole question here involved is whether these recent political appointees are entitled to (so-called) civil service tenure contrary to the clear language of the City Charter and the clear and mandatory language of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania. In Carrow v. Philadelphia, 371 Pa., supra, the Supreme Court, under the leadership of the Chief Justice, decided that under §7-301 of the Charter (‘all employes of the city (with certain exceptions not here pertinent) should be under civil service”; and that any person who desired employment in the City government after January 7, 1951 must first pass a civil service test. Furthermore, in Lennox v. Clark, 372 Pa., supra, a majority of the Court, speaking once again through Chief Justice Stern, said, inter alia (page 368) : “. . . Of course, any persons employed by former county offices after the adoption of the City-County Consolidation Amendment on November 6, 1951, were, from the very beginning of their employment, city employes, and as such became subject, when the Charter went into effect on January 7, 1952, to all its provisions in reference to city employes,* just as all other *305then existing city employes became so subject. . . . the civil service provisions of the Charter [which are the very heart of the City Charter] were applicable to former county officers and their employes * . .
The present position and contention of the city seeking to give permanent (so-called) civil service status to recent political city appointees, in the teeth of the plain language of the City Charter, in the teeth of the clear and controlling prior opinions of this Court in the Garrow and Lennox cases, and in the teeth of the written opinion of the City Solicitor dated June 30, 1953, is legally and morally indefensible. The City is in the position of the famous California center who picked up a fumble and ran toward the wrong goal. No heat of battle, no specious plea of an emergency or transition period can justify or validate a subsequent regulation (adopted long after the Garrow and Lennox decisions) which sabotages the civil service provisions of the Charter and so clearly and flagrantly violates its language, spirit and intent.
I would affirm the decree of the Court below.
Mr. Justice Allen M. Stearne joins in this dissenting opinion.

 With a few exceptions not here relevant.

 Margaret Carrow, who had been discharged for political reasons, was ordered reinstated as a telephone operator in the office of the Sheriff with payment of her salary for the entire period of her dismissal.

 Italics throughout, ours.

 The Court further held that the Register of Wills and the Prothonotary and their respective employees were not county officers or offices, and therefore were not included within- the Charter.

 “Section A-104 of the Home Buie Charter was made applicable by its provisions to those who ‘may become employees of the City by virtue of amendment of the Constitution of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the enactment of any legislation required by such amendment.’ In holding in the Oarrow case that the employes of former county offices had become city employes and were entitled to the rights conferred upon them by that section we intended to hold, and in reaching that conclusion necessarily did hold, that the amendment was in this respect self-executing and did not require-the enactment-of any- legislation.”

 Is it possible for language to be clearer?

Witb a few exceptions not here relevant

 Italics ours.

 Italics ours.