Court Opinion

ID: 9666664
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 01:24:25.015453+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:15:31.787636
License: Public Domain

*15FAULKNER, Justice.
The City of Birmingham filed a petition for writ of mandamus, praying that this court require Judge Pickens to transfer the cause to the Birmingham Division. We grant the writ.
On February 4, 1975, the City Council of Birmingham adopted a resolution of annexation of certain territory located outside the city limits. An election was ordered to be held on March 8, by the Probate Judge. Meanwhile, on February 17, Mead Corporation filed a complaint in the Bessemer Division of the Circuit Court challenging the legality of the election, and seeking a temporary restraining order, and a preliminary injunction. Judge Pickens issued a temporary restraining order. Subsequently Birmingham filed a motion to transfer the case to the Birmingham Division, alleging that the cause of action did not accrue or arise in the Bessemer Division, and therefore that division did not have jurisdiction. Judge Pickens overruled the motion. On appeal to this court, we suspended the temporary injunction that had held up the election. The election was held, as scheduled, and a majority of the qualified electors voted in favor of annexation. In accordance with our order, the results were' not certified to the Judge of Probate.
After the election, Birmingham petitioned this court for a writ of mandamus, asking that Judge Pickens’ order denying the motion to transfer, be set aside. We issued a rule nisi requiring the Judge to show cause why his order should not be set aside, and the case transferred to the Birmingham Division. Judge Pickens answered that the territory sought to be annexed was within the Bessemer Division; consequently, the action was properly brought there. On the other hand, Birmingham asserts that the action was improperly brought in the Bessemer Division because the cause of action did not accrue or arise within the territorial limits of that division and that the Bessemer Division has exclusive jurisdiction only over causes of action arising within it.
In Ex parte Central of Georgia Ry. Co., 243 Ala. 508, 10 So.2d 746 (1942) this court said, “. . . the court at Bessemer has exclusive jurisdiction of all civil actions at law upon causes of action arising in the territorial jurisdiction of that court, and such jurisdiction is limited to suits upon causes of action arising within such territory.” In Ex parte Southern Building Code Congress, 282 Ala. 523, 213 So.2d 365 (1968) this court re-emphasized that the venue approach had been abandoned, and adopted as a basis of jurisdiction in the Bessemer Division, the fact as to where the cause of action, or case, accrued or arose.
In this case we are of the opinion that the cause of action accrued or arose in the Birmingham Division. The subject matter of the suit does not involve title to land. On the contrary, the subject matter is an election having its situs in Birmingham. The Probate Judge ordered the election held in Birmingham, the ballots were canvassed in Birmingham, and the results were made known there. Thus, all of the facts giving rise to the suit occurred in Birmingham. The suit, therefore, should be heard in Birmingham, and the trial judge erred when he denied the motion to transfer.
The writ of mandamus is due to be awarded.
HEFLIN, C. J., and MERRILL, BLOODWORTH, MADDOX, ALMON and EMBRY, JJ., concur.
*16SHORES, J., concurs in the result.
JONES, J., dissents.