Court Opinion

ID: 9586228
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 23:08:28.007256+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:25:39.223653
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing.
The state urges that this court in its opinion has overlooked the statutory law of this state in reaching its decision. Specifically cited are Code Ann. § 6-806 (Ga. L. 1965, pp. 18, 26), Code Ann. § 6-804 (Ga. L. 1965, pp. 18, 21), and Code Ann. § 24-3611 (Court of Appeals, Rule 11). This court is most aware of these statutes, but is constitutionally bound by the decisions of the Supreme Court of Georgia. Art. VI, Sec. II, Par. VIII of the Constitution of Georgia (Code Ann. § 2-3708).
The state also urges that this court in its opinion erroneously construed and misapplied the opinion of the Supreme Court in McAuliffe v. Rutledge, 231 Ga. 745 (204 SE2d 141). The state points out that McAuliffe was the result of a denial of a writ of habeas corpus and followed a full hearing in the superior court on the issue of effectiveness of counsel. Again, we are aware of this fact and were aware of the decisions of the Supreme Court in McAuliffe v. Rutledge, 231 Ga. 1 (200 SE2d 100). However, it seems utterly illogical that this court should ignore the clear import of McAuliffe and affirm the trial court. Such would simply precipitate the filing of a petition for habeas corpus in the trial court which would inevitably result in its being granted pursuant to the Supreme Court’s decision in McAuliffe, 231 Ga. 745, supra. This further protraction of the judicial process would merely add to the burden of the trial court and serve no useful purpose.
In reflecting on our opinion and the opinion of the Supreme Court in McAuliffe, we are reminded of the opinion and philosophy of one of Georgia’s most gifted jurists, Justice Logan Bleckley. In Cochran v. State, 62 Ga. 731, 733, Justice Bleckley wrote: "Those who are impatient with the forms of law ought to reflect that it is through form that all organization is reached. Matter without form is chaos; power without form is anarchy. *389The state, were it to disregard forms, would not be a government, but a mob. Its action would not be administration, but violence. The public authority has a formal embodiment in the state, and when it moves, it moves as it has said by its laws it will move. It proceeds orderly, and according to pre-established regulations. The state, though sovereign, cannot act upon the citizen in a different manner from that which the laws have ordained. It cannot inflict capital punishment without first trying the prisoner according to law. There is no dispensing power. Courts have none. Courts are bound by the law no less than a prisoner at the bar. ” (Emphasis supplied.)
That the prisoner at the bar is bound by the law, seems to have been lost in the 95 years that have elapsed from the Supreme Court’s decision in Cochran to its decision in McAuliffe.
"[T]he right of appeal is not absolute, but is one based upon the conditions imposed by the General Assembly for bringing cases to the appellate courts. The Constitution (Code Ann. § 2-3704) vests in the General Assembly the power to 'prescribe conditions as to the right of a party litigant to have his case reviewed by the Supreme Court or Court of Appeals.’ Whether wise or unwise, as long as the Act does not offend the Constitution, courts must abide by it. Thus the Constitution gives the General Assembly the authority to enact laws placing conditions upon appeals.” Fife v. Johnston, 225 Ga. 447 (169 SE2d 167). See also State v. Hollomon, 132 Ga. App. 304, 306 (208 SE2d 167).
In Jordan v. Caldwell, 229 Ga. 343 (191 SE2d 530), our Supreme Court again construed Art. VI, Sec. II, Par. IV of the Georgia Constitution (Code Ann. § 2-3704) in a case where the appellee moved to dismiss an appeal on the ground that a notice of appeal was not filed within the required 30-day period from the filing of the judgment. The Supreme Court held on p. 344: "The proper and timely filing of a notice of appeal is an absolute requirement to confer jurisdiction upon the appellate court,” and dismissed the appeal. We again note that the same rule applies in both civil and criminal appellate procedures, to both plaintiff and defendant in *390the former, and to both the state and the accused in the latter. Prior to its decision in McAuliffe, supra, the Supreme Court in Brown v. State, 223 Ga. 540, 543 (156 SE2d 454) denied the appellant’s motion that the record be withdrawn and returned to the trial court until a transcript of the evidence and the proceedings is filed therein. In Brown, supra, a 12-1/2-year-old juvenile was charged with five cases of arson. In rendering its decision, the Supreme Court noted: ". . . the record shows the transcript of evidence and proceedings for purposes of this appeal has not been filed as provided by law nor can it be filed now for consideration by this court. Accordingly, this court is not presented with the evidence in the case, or the ruling of the court, if any, on the motion to 'quash the complaint.’ This is a court for the correction of errors only, and where consideration of the errors enumerated is dependent on the transcript of evidence and proceedings, this court has nothing to review without such transcript.” The only possible difference between Brown and McAuliffe is that the issue of "effective assistance of counsel” was not raised in Brown. Does McAuliffe mean that the defendant in Brown can renew his appeal based on McAuliffe? It should not. However, this is but one of the "ill winds” that will be released from the "Pandora’s Box” of McAuliffe. We are reminded that at various points in the processing of a criminal case the accused must act if certain defenses or rights are to be effectuated. Thus, a demurrer to the indictment, challenges to the jury array and poll, a motion to suppress, objection to the admissibility of evidence, motion for mistrial, motion for new trial and notice of appeal — each and all must be done within a prescribed time. If the law doesn’t bind the defendant to timely file the transcript, is the defendant excused from the timely assertion of all other rights and defenses? To so hold, disembowels the principle stated by Justice Bleckley that public authority "proceeds orderly and according to pre-established regulations,” (Cochran v. State, supra) and hurls our courts over the precipice into the abyss of judicial anarchy.
The potential for harm, mischief and chaos in criminal procedure, both trial and appellate, does not *391escape us. We are simply powerless to do anything but apply the McAuliffe rule to the facts before us. If the state is to obtain relief, it must do so in a higher court.

Rehearing denied.