Court Opinion

ID: 9543971
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 16:51:02.952875+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:11:37.678520
License: Public Domain

OPALA, Justice,
concurring.
The general common-law1 method for computing time, firmly settled in the United States shortly after the turn of this century as a universal rule of construction2 and adopted by this court’s early jurisprudence,3 is that, unless otherwise manifested by the contract in suit or by some applicable statute, the day of the act or event must be excluded and the last day to complete the period included This chronometric formula, which finds its most recent reaffirmation in this court’s 1983 opinion,4 stands as the State’s generally applicable rule of common law designed to promote certainty and uniformity. Because the unwritten5 component of Oklahoma’s legal tradition retains its efficacy and vigor with undiminished force of legislative approbation,6 the general common law must be universally enforced unless a different construction is mandated by a governing statute.
Oklahoma has two major statutory sections that deal with time computation — 12 O.S.1991 § 2006A and 75 O.S.1991 § 250.8. Each covers but a narrow stretch of legal chronometry; neither may he applied to compute time limitations for workers’ compensation claims. The former’s sweep stands confined to district court litigation7 and to the statutes applicable in the course of proceedings in that forum; the latter’s range is restricted to computing time prescribed by the Administrative Procedures *637Act.8 Inasmuch as the entire Pleading Code’s ambit is explicitly restricted by its § 2001 to district court practice, the phrase “cmy applicable statute ”, found in the Code’s § 2006A, cannot be viewed as intended to reach one iota farther than the Code itself. The § 2001 boundary of the Code would be impermissibly crossed if we were to declare that the § 2006A language may be extended to cover workers’ compensation procedure— an adjective-law regime patently dehors the Pleading Code’s purview.9 To put my concern in more dramatic terms, the permissible range of “any applicable statute ” — as these words are used in § 2006A — must be deemed circumscribed by the subject statute’s pertinence to a district court process in the context of which the time computation is to be made. That requisite pertinence is clearly absent here.
Although in this case the result of time computation would be the same, no matter which competing alternative we choose, the counsel I offer and vigorously advance is neither an act of supererogation nor an exercise in scholastic logic of the middle ages.
It is imperative that the Pleading Code be contained within its legislatively intended boundaries10 and not be allowed to invade areas dehors district court litigation.11 Any intrusion, however slight, must be resisted as at least potentially injurious to the eonceptual purity in our multifaceted system of procedure and to its delicate symmetry.
Fundamental fairness can be dispensed only within the framework of orderly procedure.12 The quality of process afforded in this Nation’s courts depends almost entirely on strict judicial fidelity to the norms of procedure — the rules of engagement in forensic games. The importance of this notion is eloquently encapsulated in these insightful words:
“ * ⅜ * It is procedure that spells much of the difference between rule by law and rule by whim or caprice. Steadfast adherence to strict procedural safeguards is our main assurance that there will be equal justice under law.* * * ”13 [Emphasis mine.]
Today’s opinion is clearly correct in measuring the time here in contest — a limitation period for compensation claims — by the general common law rather than by § 2006A, whose force may not reach beyond matters applicable to district court suits.

. For the meaning ascribed to the term "general common law" and for its genesis, see Conison, What Does Due Process Have to Do with Jurisdiction?, 46 Rutgers L.Rev., 1071, 1077-1086 (1994).

. Sheets v. Selden's Lessee, 69 U.S. (2 Wall.) 177, 190, 17 L.Ed. 822, 826 (1865); Lewis' Sutherland, Statutory Construction (2d Ed.1904).

. First Nat. Bank of Haskell v. Drew, 69 Okl. 59, 169 P. 1092-1093 (1918); Baker v. Hammett, 23 Okl. 480, 100 P. 1114, 1116 (1909); see also Caldwell v. State, 57 Okl.Cr. 320, 48 P.2d 356 (1935).

. Winn v. Nilsen, Okl., 670 P.2d 588, 590 (1983).

. The body of England’s customary or common law was known in the middle ages as that kingdom’s "unwritten law"-Regni Angliae lex non scripta. McCormack v. Oklahoma Pub. Co., Okl., 613 P.2d 737, 740 (1980); Mueggenborg v. Walling, Okl., 836 P.2d 112, 115 (Opala, C.J., concurring) (1992).

. The pertinent provisions of 12 O.S.1991 § 2 are:
"The common law, as modified by constitutional and statutory law, judicial decisions and the condition and wants of the people, shall remain in force in aid of the general statutes of Oklahoma....”
See also Nelson v. Sandkamp, 227 Minn. 177, 34 N.W.2d 640, 643 (1948).

. The provisions of 12 O.S.1991 § 2001 explicitly confine the force of Oklahoma’s Pleading Code, 12 O.S.1991 § 2001 et seq., to district court suits of a civil nature. The time-computation text of § 2006A applies to “any period of time prescribed or allowed by this title [Title 12] ... or by any applicable statute_" (Emphasis added.)

. The pertinent terms of 75 O.S.1991 § 250.8 are:
"In computing any period of time prescribed or allowed by the Administrative Procedures Act, the day of the act, or event, from which the designated period of time beings to run shall not be included. The last day of the period so computed shall be included....”

. Section 2006A is a rule of district court practice. Rules of district court pleading and practice are inapplicable to proceedings upon a compensation claim. Bass v. Lee Way Motor Freight, Inc., Okl., 804 P.2d 1138, 1139 (1991); Brown & Root v. Dunkelberger, 196 Okl. 116, 162 P.2d 1018, 1020 (1945).

. Our jurisprudence affords a rich source of authority for the principle that rules of pleading and practice in the district courts have no place in compensation proceedings. Dudley v. Major Construction Company, Okl., 345 P.2d 881, 884 (1959); Bendelari v. Kinslow, 192 Okl. 390, 136 P.2d 918, 922 (1943); McCallum & Forber v. Owens, 184 Okl. 66, 85 P.2d 411 (1938); Pure Oil Co. v. State Industrial Commission, 181 Okl. 176, 72 P.2d 779, 781 (1937). The cited cases hold that unlike district court suits, compensation claims may not be terminated by the trial court's involuntary dismissal. Involuntary dismissals of compensation claims are void on the face of the proceedings. Royal Mining Co. v. Murray, 167 Okl. 460, 30 P.2d 185, 187 (1934).

. Not all district court litigation is governed by the Pleading Code, 12 O.S.1991 § 2001 et seq. The Code's rules of pleading and practice do not accommodate all of the separate procedural tracks for various classes of district court proceedings. Williams v. Mulvihill, Okl., 846 P.2d 1097, 1102 n. 14 (1993); Board of Law Library Trustees v. State, Okl., 825 P.2d 1285, 1288 (1992).

. Pryse Monument Co. v. District Court, Etc., Okl., 595 P.2d 435, 438 (1979).

. Joint Anti-Fascist Refugee Committee v. McGrath, 341 U.S. 123, 179, 71 S.Ct. 624, 652, 95 L.Ed. 817 (1951) (Douglas, J., concurring).