Court Opinion

ID: 9850503
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 04:58:25.619939+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:20:38.279421
License: Public Domain

Frankum, Judge,
dissenting. I agree with Judge Pannell that the authority on which the majority of the court assumes jurisdiction of this case, being, as it is, bottomed on the Act of 1898 (Ga. L. 1898, p. 92; Code § 6-804), and that Act and Code section having been repealed, it cannot logically be the basis for the court’s action in taking jurisdiction of this case. I would add, however, that if this court does have jurisdiction to consider this or any other appeal commenced since August 1, 1965, the authority to do so must be found in the 1965 Appellate Practice Act (Ga. L. 1965, p. 18 et seq.), and that we need look no further than that Act for any such authority. To my mind the opinion of the majority, in overruling the motion to dismiss the appeal, overlooks the first and cardinal rule of statutory construction, and that is, that “where [the language of] a legislative Act is plain, unambiguous and positive, and not capable of two constructions, the Act must be taken to mean what it says, and judicial interpretation is forbidden.” Fulton County &c. Pension Board v. Askea, 95 Ga. App. 77 (97 SE2d 389). And see Floyd County v. Salmon, 151 Ga. 313, 315 (106 SE 280); Board of Tax Assess, &c. v. Catledge, 173 Ga. 656 (2) (160 SE 909); Gazan v. Heery, 183 Ga. 30 (1) (187 SE 371, 106 ALR 498); New Amsterdam Cas. Co. v. McFarley, 191 Ga. 334 (12 SE2d 355). As was said by Justice Duckworth (now Chief Justice) in the New Amsterdam Cas. Co. case just cited (at p. 337): “If the statute is unambiguous, its wisdom is a matter exclusively reserved to the legislative branch of the government, and is no legitimate concern of the judiciary.” Nor may *860we in any case where the law is plain and unambiguous substitute, under the guise of statutory construction, our opinion as to what we think the law should be or what we think the General Assembly intended. Hood v. First Nat. Bank of Columbus, 210 Ga. 283, 286 (133 SE2d 19). In construing a plain and unambiguous Act which under the foregoing rules is not subject to construction we tend to make our government a rule of men rather than of laws, substituting the changing, vacillating and uncertain whims of the individual judges for the fixed, known and certain letter of the law. This, we contend, was never the intention of the framers of our Constitution, and I submit we should never align ourselves on the side of those whose philosophy of the law and of the nature of the judicial process permits them to assert that such is the function of a court.
Under Sec. 5 of the Appellate Practice Act of 1965 (Ga. L. 1965, pp. 18, 21), a notice of appeal shall be filed within 30 days after the entry of the appealable judgment or decision complained of. Code Ann. § 6-803. By Sec. 18B of the same Act (Ga. L. 1965, pp. 18, 32), “The filing with the clerk of a judgment, signed by the judge, constitutes the entry of such judgment, within the meaning” of that Act. (Emphasis supplied.) To me this language is so plain and unambiguous as to admit of no construction, and, therefore, the mandate of Sec. 23 of the Act referred to in the majority opinion requiring that the Act be liberally construed cannot affect the decision of the question as to whether the appeal should be dismissed in this case. To carry the reasoning of the majority to its ultimate conclusion would mean that, no matter how loosely the appellant prepares his notice of appeal or to what extent he disregards the plain requirements of the law, we are forbidden by the mandate of Sec. 23 to dismiss it. Obviously, this is not so as evidenced by such cases as Interstate Fire Ins. Co. v. Chattam, 222 Ga. 436 (150 SE2d 618), and others which this court and the Supreme Court have dismissed under the so-called new Appellate Practice Act. As has been said on many occasions in other contexts, the law without form or technical requirements which must be complied with by the parties would be chaos and impossible for the courts to administer.
*861The Act itself prescribes the form of the notice of appeal, and while it provides also that a substantial compliance with those forms shall be sufficient, it is not a substantial compliance with the form to appeal from something other than an order or judgment of the court that has not been entered in accordance with the provisions of Sec. 18B of the Act. For only upon the entry of such a judgment (that is, an order or judgment signed by the judge and filed with the clerk of the court) does the time start to run for the purpose of determining whether the notice of appeal has been timely filed. The record here shows, at the very least, that the appeal is premature. I would, therefore, dismiss the appeal in this case.
I am authorized to state that Eberhardt, J., concurs in this dissent.