Court Opinion

ID: 9593665
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 00:23:46.631761+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:01:21.791734
License: Public Domain

BAKES, Justice,
dissenting:
I dissent for the following reasons: (1) the issuance of this particular writ is premature because the trial court, contrary to the majority’s statement, has not finally determined whether the petitioners will receive a jury trial on the issues raised in their counterclaim; (2) even if the trial court had denied the petitioners a jury trial on the issues raised in their counterclaim, such action would not be erroneous under the long established and consistent precedent of this Court, dating from the inception of the Idaho Constitution; (3) even if the trial court had entered an erroneous order, the petitioners have an adequate remedy at law by way of appeal; therefore this extraordinary writ of mandamus should not have issued. For these reasons, I dissent.
I
The issuance of a writ of mandate to the trial court in this case is premature. Contrary to the statement in the majority opinion, Judge Young has not yet denied the petitioners a jury trial on the issues raised in their counterclaim. Admittedly, in his order dated July 30,1987, he acknowledged the longstanding rule, established in innumerable decisions of this Court, that once equity obtains jurisdiction of a dispute the court will proceed in equity to a settlement of all aspects of the dispute between the parties. Nevertheless, due to petitioners’ urging, Judge Young, in the final sentence of his order, stated:
“IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that the court will reserve judgment to determine whether any legal issues remain after the court trial of the foreclosure action that will require a jury trial.”
The district court never proceeded further with the case because this Court issued its alternative writ. Thus, we do not yet know whether the trial court would have granted petitioners a jury trial on the issues raised in their counterclaim.
Starting with our earliest cases it has been recognized (1) that this Court will not anticipate that a trial court will commit error or exceed its jurisdiction and (2) that a writ will not issue to correct anticipated errors. In re Miller, 4 Idaho 711, 43 P. 870 (1896); Rust v. Stewart, 7 Idaho 558, 64 P. 222 (1901); Olden v. Paxton, 27 Idaho 597, 150 P. 40 (1915); Skeen v. District Court, 29 Idaho 331, 158 P. 1072 (1916); Gropp v. Huyette, 35 Idaho 683, 208 P. 848 (1922). Accordingly, there is no basis for the issuance of the writ of mandamus in this case. The petition should be dismissed for that reason alone.
II
Even assuming that the district judge had entered a final order holding that the petitioners were not entitled to a jury trial on the legal issues raised in their counterclaim, there would still be no grounds for issuance of the writ in this case. In entering such an order the judge would only have been following a long line of Idaho precedent, which it was his duty to follow. Numerous prior decisions of this Court have clearly held that a foreclosure action is an equitable action and that, “[Ejquity having obtained jurisdiction of the subject matter of a dispute, will retain it for the settlement of all controversies between the parties with respect thereto_” Boesiger v. Freer, 85 Idaho 551, 563, 381 P.2d 802, 809 (1963). Accord Carpenter v. Double R Cattle Co., Inc., 108 Idaho 602, 701 P.2d 222 (1985); Anderson v. Whipple, 71 Idaho 112, 227 P.2d 351 (1951); Fogelstrom v. Murphy, 70 Idaho 488, 222 P.2d 1080 (1950); Dover Lumber Co. v. Case, 31 Idaho 276, 284, 170 P. 108, 110 (1918) (“The fact that defendant sets up a legal defense to an equitable cause of action does not change the character of the proceedings or entitle him to demand a jury trial....”); Rees v. Gorham, 30 Idaho 207, 164 P. 88 (1917). Since Judge Young is bound to follow the decisions of this Court, it can hardly be argued that he either exceeded his jurisdiction or ruled erroneously when he simply followed our precedent.
*254The issuance of a writ is not a matter of right. It is used only to ¡ ompel a lesser tribunal to perform a clear legal duty, i.e., a ministerial duty which does not involve the exercise of discretion. Dalton v. Idaho Dairy Products Comm’n, 107 Idaho 6, 684 P.2d 983 (1984); Fitzpatrick v. Welch, 96 Idaho 280, 527 P.2d 313 (1974); Felton v. Prather, 95 Idaho 280, 506 P.2d 1353 (1973). Here, under the existing precedents of this Court, the district judge did not have a clear legal duty to grant petitioners a jury trial on their counterclaim in the foreclosure action. To the contrary, under our prior decisions, the entire proceeding was to be tried by the court as an equity suit, not as a legal action. It can hardly be argued that Judge Young had a ministerial duty to rule contrary to the precedents laid down by this Court.
Ill
In Kolp v. Board of Trustees of Butte County Joint School Dist. No. 111, 102 Idaho 320, 326, 629 P.2d 1153, 1159 (1981), this Court stated that “substantive issues [of law] generally are not appropriate areas of consideration in a mandamus proceeding and are to be considered only if other adequate legal remedy is unavailable.” (Emphasis added.) This latter statement is based on I.C. § 7-303 which limits the writ to “cases where there is not a plain, speedy and adequate remedy in the ordinary course of law.” The right of appeal is regarded as a plain, speedy and adequate remedy at law. Clearwater Timber Protective Ass’n v. Dist. Court, 84 Idaho 129, 369 P.2d 571 (1962); Smith v. Young, 71 Idaho 31, 225 P.2d 466 (1950). Where an order is appealable, mandamus will not lie. Aker v. Aker, 51 Idaho 555, 8 P.2d 777 (1932). “Mandamus will not be permitted to supplant the function of an appeal or a writ of review.” Felton v. Prather, 95 Idaho 280, 282, 506 P.2d 1353, 1355 (1973). Where appeal to this Court is available, the writ of mandate is not available. St. Michaels Monastery v. Steele, 30 Idaho 609, 167 P. 349 (1917).
The law in this regard is well summarized in Gropp v. Huyette, 35 Idaho 683, 688-689, 208 P. 848, 850 (1922):
“It is elementary that an appellate court may not in this summary manner, by a resort to the extraordinary remedy of prohibition, interfere with inferior courts who are regularly exercising the judicial power reposed in them,.... The power of courts to hear and determine controversies properly before them implies also the right to decide all questions growing out of the same, either right or wrong, and appellate courts are created for the purpose of reviewing such actions after the trial court has heard and determined the controversy. Appellate courts cannot anticipate that error will be committed, or that a trial court will exceed its jurisdiction, and thereupon take jurisdiction before that court has heard and determined a matter which it has jurisdiction to hear and determine, and where it appears that the act sought to be prohibited may speedily be reviewed in the supreme court by appeal from the order of the inferior tribunal, or if an appeal will not lie, then upon a writ of error or certiora-ri, the writ of prohibition will not issue.” (Emphasis added.)
In the instant case, both the order at issue and any other actions taken would be appealable once there was a final judgment. In following Idaho precedent Judge Young did not exceed his jurisdiction, abuse his discretion, or commit any error. But even if he had erred, an adequate remedy at law in the form of a right to appeal was available. Accordingly, the writ was improvidently issued.
IV
The majority opinion does not challenge the unwavering line of decisions of this Court, rendered since the Idaho Constitution was adopted, in which this Court repeatedly held that “Article 1, section 7 of the Idaho constitution, guaranteeing the right to trial by jury, does not refer to equitable actions.” Morton v. Morton Realty Co., 41 Idaho 729, 735, 241 P. 1014, *2551015 (1925). “[T]he rule is too well settled to require the citation of authorities, that a mortgage foreclosure is an equitable proceeding, in which neither party is entitled to a jury trial.” Rees v. Gorham, 30 Idaho 207, 212, 164 P. 88, 89 (1917).1
In an equally long line of cases, this Court has held that once equity has obtained jurisdiction of a dispute, equity will proceed, without a jury, to settle all controversies between the parties with respect to the initial dispute. As early as 1898, in Christensen v. Hollingsworth, 6 Idaho 87, 93, 53 P. 211, 212 (1898), this Court stated that “[t]he guaranty that ‘the right to trial by jury shall remain inviolate’ has no reference to equitable cases.” Shortly thereafter in 1900, in Burke Land & Livestock Co. v. Wells, Fargo & Co., 7 Idaho 42, 56, 60 P. 87, 91 (1900), this Court stated:
“A court of equity, having obtained jurisdiction of a cause for any purpose, may retain it for all purposes, and proceed to a determination of all of the matters in issue.”
Then, after quoting the above language from the Burke case, the Court in Johnson v. Niichels, 48 Idaho 654, 659, 284 P. 840, 842 (1930), added the following:
“We conclude, therefore, that appellants’ contention in this respect is without merit, and that this was primarily an equity action and appellants were not entitled to a jury trial upon counterclaims of a legal nature.”
Specifically, in the context of a proceeding in equity to foreclose a mortgage, this Court in Dover Lumber Co. v. Case, 31 Idaho 276, 170 P. 108 (1918), stated:
“The next question presented is whether the court erred in denying a trial by jury of Case’s counterclaim [for damages for breach of contract]. It is said in 24 Cyc., pp. 126, 127: ‘The fact that defendant sets up a legal defense to an equitable cause of action does not change the character of the proceedings or entitle him to demand a jury trial. ...In the absence of a statute a defendant who pleads a counterclaim in an equitable action is not entitled to a jury trial of the issues arising thereon, notwithstanding the cross-demand constitutes an independent cause of action upon which a separate action might have been brought and a jury trial demanded.’ ” 31 Idaho at 284, 170 P. at 110 (emphasis added).
The rule announced in the Christensen, Burke, and Dover Lumber Co. cases has been followed consistently by this Court since the first decision on that issue in 1898.2 Johnson v. Niichels, 48 Idaho 654, 284 P. 840 (1930); Fogelstrom v. Murphy, 70 Idaho 488, 222 P.2d 1080 (1950); *256Anderson v. Whipple, 71 Idaho 112, 227 P.2d 351 (1951); Boesiger v. Freer, 85 Idaho 551, 381 P.2d 802 (1963); Carpenter v. Double R Cattle Co., Inc., 108 Idaho 602, 701 P.2d 222 (1985).
The most recent recognition of the principle that once equity has obtained jurisdiction of a dispute, equity will proceed, without a jury, to settle all the controversies between the parties with respect to the initial dispute, came earlier this year in Nash v. Overholser, 114 Idaho 461, 757 P.2d 1180 (1988). In Nash this Court acknowledged the rule that in an equitable action (in Nash it was a divorce proceeding) a litigant is not entitled to a jury trial on a legal counterclaim. The Court in Nash held that the wife was not required to join a legal tort claim against her husband in their equitable divorce action because, if the wife was required to join the tort claim, she would have to “waive the right to a jury trial on the tort claim.” Now, three months later, the majority has turned 180°, holding that joining a legal counterclaim to an equitable cause of action does not “waive the right to a jury trial on the [legal] claim.” Today the Court has also overruled the rationale for our recent decision in Nash v. Overholser, supra.
With one stroke of the pen, contained in a remote footnote on the last page of its opinion, the majority overrules this ninety-year-old line of Idaho cases which held that once equity has obtained jurisdiction of a dispute, equity will proceed, without a jury, to settle all of the controversies between the parties with respect to the initial dispute. Two explanations are given for the majority’s action.
The first is that “[cjonstitutional provisions should be construed so as to give them practical affect according to the intention of the framers. (Citing cases.)” Ante at 249, 766 P.2d 719. However, after setting out this “intention of the framers” rule, the majority makes no analysis of what the intention of the framers was. However, this Court has held, on innumerable occasions, that the “intention of the framers” in adopting Article 1, § 7, of the Idaho Constitution was to codify the common law right to trial by jury as it existed at the time of the adoption of the Constitution. As this Court stated in its earliest case on the subject, Christensen v. Hollingsworth, 6 Idaho 87, 93, 53 P. 211, 212 (1898),
“It is the settled doctrine in a number of states having constitutional provisions similar to those above cited [including Art. 1, § 7, of the Idaho Constitution, “the right of trial by jury”] that those provisions must be read in the light of the law existing at the time of the adoption of the constitution.”
Again in Portneuf Irrigating Co., Ltd. v. Budge, 16 Idaho 116, 125, 100 P. 1046, 1049 (1909), the Court stated:
“The constitutional guaranty of the right to trial by jury is clearly a guaranty of the right that existed at the time of the adoption of the constitution; that right was the common-law right.”
Recently, in Rudd v. Rudd, 105 Idaho 112, 666 P.2d 639 (1983), we stated:
“The Idaho Constitution guarantees the right to a jury trial in cases arising at common law. See Idaho Const, art. 1, § 7.
“This provision's 'function is to preserve the right [to a jury trial] as it existed at the date of the adoption of the Constitution.’ Anderson v. Whipple, 71 Idaho 112, 227 P.2d 351 (1951). Historically, the right to trial by jury existed only in cases at common law, not in cases triable in a court of equity. Thus, by preserving the right as it existed, this constitutional provision merely preserves the right to a trial by jury in cases at common law. ‘Th[is provision was] not intended to and do[es] not extend the right of trial by jury to suits in equity.’ Anderson v. Whipple, supra.” 105 Idaho at 115-116, 666 P.2d at 642-643 (bracketed material in original, emphasis added).
The common law right to a jury trial in existence at the time that Article 1, § 7, of the Idaho Constitution was adopted, did not permit a jury trial on a legal counterclaim filed in an equitable action for the fore*257closure of a mortgage.3 Accordingly, had the majority made an analysis of the “intention of the framers,” it would recognize how egregiously it errs when it overrules all of our prior cases (each making such an analysis) clear back to the time of the adoption of the Constitution itself.
The second justification made in the majority opinion is Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 13(a) and the decision of the United States Supreme Court in Beacon Theaters, Inc. v. Westover, 359 U.S. 500, 79 S.Ct. 948, 3 L.Ed.2d 988 (1959). The majority opinion states: “We abide in the authority and the clear analysis of the Court in Beacon Theaters, Inc.,” without recognizing that just this year we rejected the pleading rationale of the Beacon Theaters case in Nash v. Overholser, 114 Idaho 461, 757 P.2d 1180 (1988).
The United States Supreme Court has never held that the right to jury trial in the seventh amendment of the United States Constitution is binding upon the states through the fourteenth amendment. Rudd v. Rudd, 105 Idaho at 115, 666 P.2d at 642. Therefore the Beacon Theaters case is not binding upon this Court. This Court has just recently held that we are not reluctant to interpret our Constitution differently from the United States Constitution. State v. Thompson, 114 Idaho 746, 760 P.2d 1162 (1988). We have done so for over ninety years on this issue of the right to a jury trial on counterclaims in equitable foreclosure proceedings. The majority opinion has failed to explain why ninety years of Idaho precedent should be overruled, particularly in a case such as this where the issue is totally premature. The majority opinion has failed to demonstrate that the “intentions of the framers” is anything different than the common-law rule which existed at the time the Idaho Constitution was adopted, which provided that “a defendant who pleads a counterclaim in an equitable action is not entitled, as a matter of right, to a jury trial of the issues arising thereon.” Johnson v. Niichels, 48 Idaho 654, 659, 284 P. 840, 842 (1930); Christensen v. Hollingsworth, 6 Idaho 87, 53 P. 211 (1898).
Thus, our decision and analysis in Rudd v. Rudd, supra, applies with equal force to the instant action. As has been established above, a foreclosure action is an action in equity. “Thus, the right to a jury trial does not exist ... [and] [s]ince no right existed, [petitioners were] not denied any constitutional rights under Article 1, § 7, of the Idaho Constitution.” Rudd v. Rudd, 105 Idaho at 116, 666 P.2d at 643. Accord Skelton v. Spencer, 102 Idaho 69, 76, 625 P.2d 1072, 1079 (1981), cert. denied, 454 U.S. 894, 102 S.Ct. 390, 70 L.Ed.2d 208 (1981), quoting with approval Fein v. Schwartz, 404 S.W.2d 210, 228 (Mo.Ct.App.1966) (“The instant suit is one in equity in which a trial by jury did not exist at common law and never has as a matter of right in this state.”).
In Johnson v. Niichels, 48 Idaho 654, 284 P. 840 (1930), a case almost exactly like the present case, appellants were asserting a cross complaint and counterclaims using legal defenses in which they claimed they were entitled to a jury trial. This Court stated, quoting from Christensen v. Hollingsworth, supra, that it is settled doctrine in Idaho that the Idaho right to jury trial provision must be “read in the light of the law existing at the time of the adoption of *258the constitution.” 48 Idaho at 660, 284 P. at 842. The Court also noted that, “It is the settled rule of this court that a defendant who pleads a counterclaim in an equitable action is not entitled, as a matter of right, to a jury trial of the issues arising thereon. (Citing cases.)” Id. at 659, 284 P. at 842. The Johnson Court quoted from the very early case of Burke Land & Livestock Co. v. Wells, Fargo & Co., 7 Idaho 42, 56, 60 P. 87, 91 (1900), and then concluded as follows:
“ ‘A court of equity, having obtained jurisdiction of a cause for any purpose, may retain it for all purposes, and proceed to a determination of all of the matters in issue.’
“We conclude, therefore, that appellants’ contention in this respect is without merit, and that this was primarily an equity action and appellants were not entitled to a jury trial upon counterclaims of a legal nature.”
Thus, while the majority correctly states the rule to be that Article 1, § 7, the constitutional right to a jury trial provision, “should be construed so as to give [it] practical effect according to the intention of the framers,” the majority then makes no analysis of the intention of the framers of the Idaho Constitution. The majority does not mention the fact that this Court, on numerous prior occasions, has made that analysis and concluded that the framers intended that once “[a] court of equity, [has] obtained jurisdiction of a cause for any purpose, [the court] may retain it for all purposes, and proceed to a determination of all of the matters in issue.” Burke Land & Livestock Co. v. Wells, Fargo & Co., supra at 56. Accord Anderson v. Whipple, 71 Idaho 112, 227 P.2d 351 (1951); Fogelstrom v. Murphy, 70 Idaho 488, 222 P.2d 1080 (1950); Finlayson v. Waller, 64 Idaho 618, 134 P.2d 1069 (1943); Johnson v. Niichels, 48 Idaho 654, 284 P. 840 (1930); Gillette v. Oberholtzer, 45 Idaho 571, 264 P. 229 (1928). Without explaining how the court erred in its earlier intent analysis, the majority arbitrarily overrules nearly 90 years of precedent in order to reach its result in this case. The majority opinion ignores the prior efforts of numerous distinguished justices of this Court who have stated that the framers intended that “a defendant who pleads a counterclaim in an equitable action is not entitled, as a matter of right, to a jury trial of the issues arising thereon.” Johnson v. Niichels, 48 Idaho at 659, 284 P. at 842.
Finally, the majority opinion laments that “judges and legislators in the United States in general, and in Idaho in particular, have evidenced an increasing tendency to arrogate power unto themselves by constricting and usurping the jury system.” Ante at 248, 766 P.2d 718. The majority opinion then admonishes “[t]hose who believe in strict construction of our Constitution [to] recognize that the judiciary’s oath to ‘support and defend the Constitution’ requires that we resist the temptation to enhance judicial power through encroachment into the provinces constitutionally delegated to the jury.” Ante at 249, 766 P.2d 719. Those preachments, high sounding as they may be, will be recognized as empty rhetoric when compared to the decisions and opinions of this Court, rendered in just the last few months, which have overruled jury verdicts and deprived litigants of their constitutional right to a jury trial. See, e.g., Harvey v. F-B Truck Line Co., 115 Idaho 411, 767 P.2d 254 (1988); and Ross v. Coleman Co., Inc., 114 Idaho 817, 761 P.2d 1169 (1988) (Huntley, J., dissenting). Such contradictions, together with the overruling of a long line of Idaho precedent without explanation, have a seriously unsettling effect on the law, and leave the bench and bar with little direction in these matters. Neither obscure footnotes devoid of reasoning and analysis, nor high sounding phrases, appealing to the ear but concealing this Court’s inconsistencies, advance either the cause of justice or the rational development of the law.
In sum, the petition for writ of mandamus should never have been entertained because: (1) the petitioner’s claim is premature since the trial court has not made a final decision regarding whether it will allow the petitioners a jury trial on their legal counterclaims; (2) even assuming the *259trial judge had made a final decision, his decision would be supported by nearly a dozen prior Idaho cases, and therefore it can hardly be said that he has exceeded his jurisdiction, abused his discretion, or committed any legal error; (3) the right to appeal, in any event, is an adequate remedy at law which, under all our cases, and I.C. § 7-303, precludes the issuance of the writ of mandate; and (4) 90 years of consistent precedent of this Court has correctly held that once an equity court has “obtained jurisdiction of the subject matter of a dispute, [it] will retain it for the settlement of all controversies between the parties....” Boesiger v. Freer, 85 Idaho 551, 563, 381 P.2d 802, 809 (1963) (emphasis added). That was the,common law rule at the time the Idaho constitutional right to jury trial, Article 1, § 7, was drafted and adopted, and the clear intention of the framers was that Article 1, § 7, would codify the existing common law rule.
Accordingly, the petition for writ of mandamus should be dismissed.
SHEPARD, C.J., concurs.

. In addition to the above quoted cases, the rule has been followed in the following cases: Brady v. Yost, 6 Idaho 273, 283, 55 P. 542, 545 (1898) ("In equitable actions in this state neither party is entitled to a jury as a matter of right.”); Shields v. Johnson, 10 Idaho 476, 79 P. 391 (1904); Johnson v. Niichels, 48 Idaho 654, 659-661, 284 P. 840, 842 (1930) ("It is the settled rule of this court that a defendant who pleads a counterclaim in an equitable action is not entitled, as a matter of right, to a jury trial of the issues arising thereon. ... [I]t will not now be said by this court that the right to trial by jury is guaranteed in equity cases as well as law, but that defendant in an equity case is not entitled to a jury trial as a matter of right.”); Tomita v. Johnson, 49 Idaho 643, 290 P. 395 (1930); Fogelstrom v. Murphy, 70 Idaho 488, 492, 222 P.2d 1080, 1083 (1950) ("The constitutional guarantee that 'the right to trial by jury shall remain inviolate’ has no reference to equitable cases.”); and Anderson v. Whipple, 71 Idaho 112, 120, 227 P.2d 351, 355 (1951) ("These provisions [Idaho Const, art. 1, § 7, and art. 5, § 1] were not intended to and do not extend the right of trial by jury to suits in equity. Their function is to preserve the right as it existed at the date of the adoption of the constitution.”).

. The Court in the Dover Lumber Co. case recognized and overruled the dicta in Robertson v. Moore, 10 Idaho 115, 77 P. 218 (1904), and Sandstrom v. Smith, 12 Idaho 446, 86 P. 416 (1906), which the majority opinion uses as its justification in overruling nearly a dozen Idaho cases. The Court in Dover Lumber Co. stated:
“In Johnson Service Co. v. Kruse, 121 Minn. 28, Ann.Cas. 1914C, 850, 140 N.W. 118, the law as above quoted was followed, and there is appended to that case an exhaustive note showing it to be supported by the great weight of authority. By an expression, which was obiter dictum, in Robertson v. Moore, 10 Ida. 115, 77 P. 218, and again in Sandstrom v. Smith, 12 Ida. 446, 86 P. 416, this court seems to have announced a contrary doctrine, and these cases, so far as they conflict with the rule above quoted, are hereby overruled." 31 Idaho at 284, 170 P. at 110.

. Stevens v. Home Savings & Loan Ass’n, 5 Idaho 741, 51 P. 779 (1898), is distinguishable. There, the trial court denied plaintiffs a jury trial on their complaint against a mortgage company for the $100 penalty provided for in R.S. § 3364 (now codified at I.C. § 45-915) for the mortgage company’s failure to record a satisfaction of the mortgage. In narrowly tailored language, the Stevens Court granted a jury trial only on the suit to recover the statutory $100 penalty. 5 Idaho at 748. Jury trial was ordered only because the penalty was penal in nature, Harding v. Home Investment & Savings Co., 49 Idaho 64, 286 P. 920 (1930), and this Court has previously recognized that sanctions "such as fines ... if serious and substantial enough, can rise to the level of criminal sanction.” State v. Bennion, 112 Idaho 32, 44, 730 P.2d 952, 964 (1986). In 1898, when the Stevens case was decided, the $100 penalty was “serious and substantial enough [to] rise to the level of criminal sanction. ... In such a case, Article 1, § 7, would apply.” Id. There has never been any question that at the time the Constitution was adopted a jury trial was allowed in all criminal proceedings. The counterclaim raised by Steed here, however, hardly fits that category. Accordingly, Stevens is inapplicable.