Court Opinion

ID: 9792801
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 02:36:54.877966+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:36:16.970593
License: Public Domain

OPALA, Justice,
concurring.
I concur in today’s holding that the provisions of 40 O.S.1991 § 2-610 regulate venue rather than jurisdiction and that the teachings of Pribram v. Fonts, Okl., 736 P.2d 513 (1987) are applicable to this case. I write separately to provide my own analysis for the correctness of the court’s disposition.
The cited statute in controversy reveals no textually demonstrable legislative intent to make the situs of an appeal’s filing a sine qua non component of the court’s jurisdiction. Statutes that deal with geographical distribution of litigation within the Oklahoma district court system govern allocation of judicial business but do not abridge the constitutionally conferred cognizance of the district courts.1 See Art. 7, § 7, Okl. Const.2
Mislaid venue — no matter how facially apparent — does not cast a cloud on the court’s jurisdiction. As a matter of pure cognizance, the court’s power to resolve that issue, rightly or wrongly, remains totally unimpaired and unassailable. A final decision on venue, even if patently wrong, will nonetheless stand impervious to a later jurisdictional attack.3 Venue contests are waged entirely and safely beneath jurisdictional-flaw heights.
In short, when a case was timely commenced but its venue laid in the wrong county, there is no legal impediment to a Pribram transfer to the county where venue lies.

. Venue was clearly distinguished from jurisdiction in Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railway Co. v. Superior Court, Okl., 368 P.2d 475, 479 (1961). There the court said:
"... [Vjenue relates to geographical or territorial consideration; that is, where an action lies ... jurisdiction relates to the ... judicial power of a court to adjudicate the subject matter in a given case."

. The pertinent provisions of Art. 7, § 7, Okl. Const., are:
"(a) * * * The District Court shall have unlimited original jurisdiction of all justiciable
matters, except as otherwise provided in this Article, and such powers of review of administrative action as may be provided by statute. * * * ” (Emphasis added.)

.Toxic Waste Impact Group, Inc. v. Leavitt, Okl., 890 P.2d 906, 915 (1995) (Opala, J., concurring); Bill Hodges Truck Co. v. Gillum, Okl., 774 P.2d 1063, 1067 (1989); Ferguson v. Ferguson Motor Co., Okl., 766 P.2d 335, 338 (1988); Citizens State Bank of Hugo v. Hall, Okl., 413 P.2d 513, 516 (1966); Woodrow v. Ewing, Okl. 263 P.2d 167, 171 (1953).