Court Opinion

ID: 9587864
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 23:27:17.962586+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:03:15.485228
License: Public Domain

*464On Defendant in Error’s Motion for Rehearing.
Counsel for the defendant in error contend that the employee’s assignment of error made it so uncertain what issues were to be decided by this court that they were “left to flounder in a sea of speculation” as to how'the contentions of the employee could be met adequately.
It is interesting to note that while the Georgia Merit System law has been in operation for twenty years, this is the first case to reach the appellate courts on the merits of a discharge. One might draw one of these possible conclusions: (1) that during all these years the law has been so scrupulously and fairly administered by all departments of State government that there were no complaints worthy of reaching the appellate courts, or (2) that review through the jungle of administrative procedure, petition for certiorari to the trial court, and then writ of error to the appellate court is a financially impractical remedy to an employee of limited means.
The employee in this case was receiving gross compensation of $371 per month at the time of his discharge. He is acting as his own counsel, pro se. The defendant in error has been and still is represented by the State Law Department, an agency composed of a multitude of legal counsel with financial resources of approximately one-half million dollars per year. When this case reached the superior court, counsel for the defendant in error raised a technical objection to the employee’s certiorari bond. The objection was sustained by the trial court forcing the employee to come by writ of error to this court in order to retain his right to present his case on the merits. His position was sustained by this court in the case of Scott v. Oxford, 105 Ga. App. 301 (124 SE2d 420). With the case finally in this court on the merits, counsel for the defendant in error raises yet another technical objection.
The record shows that the employee specifically objected to the notice of discharge in the hearing before the State Personnel Board and in his petition for certiorari as being “too vague, indefinite and ambiguous.” He assigned error on the overruling of his petition for certiorari as being “contrary to law,” and he argued this point in a brief before this court.
*465We cannot comprehend how counsel for the defendant in error, as part of a Leviathan operation, can be said to have been hurled into “a sea of speculation” so as to prevent the proper responding to the issue. Meeks v. Carter, 5 Ga. App. 421 (63 SE 517); Cusic v. Holland Furnace Co., 43 Ga. App. 770 (159 SE 882).

Motion to dismiss and motion for rehearing denied.