Court Opinion

ID: 9734172
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 17:26:57.671437+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:26:46.185780
License: Public Domain

*601Dethmers, J.
The facts are largely set forth in Lenz v. Mayor of Detroit, 338 Mich 383, in which we dismissed mandamus commenced in the circuit court on the ground that certiorari was the sole remedy available to review the action of the mayor approving and ordering plaintiff’s discharge as a city employee after hearing before the mayor under the veterans’ preference act. CL 1948, § 35.402 et seq. (Stat Ann 1952 Rev § 4.1222 et seq.).
The mayor’s order of discharge issued February 6, 1950, and plaintiff delayed instituting the mandamus proceedings until February 5, 1951. Our decision in that case was announced December 29, 1953, and rehearing denied February 18, 1954. Plaintiff again •delayed until September 24,1954, before filing in the ■circuit court his petition for certiorari in this cause. The original notice to plaintiff of his discharge was dated November 14, 1949. The records in the mandamus case and at bar disclose that on November 9, 1949, the common council unanimously voted to abolish the 2 positions of legislative clerk, of which plaintiff held one, and on November 15, 1949, adopted a formal resolution abolishing them, the work thereof being thereby directed to be divided among and assigned to various other employees already in the employ of the city. On September 18, 1950, the civil service commission discontinued the classification of legislative clerk in city employment and it has not since been recreated.
Plaintiff seeks reinstatement to an abolished position, with resultant disruption of the existing system under which the duties of the abolished positions have been distributed and otherwise integrated therein, and giving rise to a serious question of rights to pension and unearned back pay for a 6-year period. In both the mandamus and certiorari cases defendant affirmatively raised the defense of laches, supported by testimony in the mandamus case and *602in this case by an affidavit attached to the motion to qnash the writ of certiorari, showing such facts, which indicate that reversal of the proceedings discharging plaintiff would result in prejudice, detriment and inconvenience to the public service. Under such circumstances we believe that plaintiff’s delay of 1 year after the mayor’s order of discharge before commencing the mandamus proceedings, with subsequent delay of almost 3 years occasioned by that ill-starred selection of remedy, and his further delay of 9, or at the least 7, months after decision by this Court in the mandamus case before commencement of this action, render him guilty of laches. Jones v. Doonan, 265 Mich 384; McGregor v. Carney, 271 Mich 278. Plaintiff cites Chamski v. Wayne County Board of Auditors, 288 Mich 238, to the contrary. The holding in that case was that plaintiff there could not be held guilty of laches because it is an affirmative defense and no testimony had been offered on the question. The case is, in that respect, distinguishable from that at bar.
While CL 1948, § 609.19 (Stat Ann § 27.611), cited by plaintiff, serves to suspend the bar of the statute of limitations under certain circumstances (McOmher v. Chapman, 42 Mich 117), the statute is not controlling of the question of laches. See In the Matter of Lantis, 9 Mich 324 (80 Am Dec 85), in which we held that the writ of certiorari at common law is not one of right, but rests in the sound discretion of the court; to be allowed or not as may best promote the ends of justice, and that a statutory provision requiring the writ of certiorari to be issued within 2 years did not take away the discretionary power of the court to quash for laches in not suing out the writ sooner.
Plaintiff stresses that the trial court decided in the mandamus proceeding that no laches existed and that this Court, on appeal therefrom, did not disturb that *603finding. Defendant did urge laches on appeal but there was no occasion to pass on it inasmuch as we held mandamus not the proper remedy. Decision in that case was, therefore, not conclusive of the question of laches.
Judgment of the court below setting aside the mayor’s order of dismissal is reversed and the writ quashed, without costs, a public question being involved.
Carr, C. J., and Butzel, Boyles, Reid, and Kelly, JJ., concurred with Dethmers, J.