Hunt v. City of Jacksonville

Citations

• 34 Fla. 504

Syllabus

<p>MUNICIPAL LAW — JURY TRIAL IN MUNICIPAL COURT — MUNICIPAL ORDINANCE CHEATING OEEENSE OUT OF ACT MADE PENAL BY STATE LAW— CERTIORARI WHEN GRANTED.</p> <p>1. Séction 3 of the Declaration of Rights in our Constitution providing that “the right of trial by jury shall be secure to all, .and remain inviolate forever,” was never intended t'o extend the right of jury trial, but merely secures it in the cases in which it was matter of right before the adoption of the constitution Trials in municipal courts for infractions of municipal ordinances were conducted generally without juries prior to the adoption of our Constitution, and, therefore, do not fall within the constitutional guaranty; and offenders against such ordinances are not entitled to a jury tidal in such courts.</p> <p>Municipal governments, when clothed with the requisite legislative authority, may, by ordinance, create an offense, as against municipal law, out of the same act that constitutes an offense already against State law: and, in such cases, the two offenses are distinct and separate, and may be punished by both the municipality and by the State; and the conviction or acquittal by the one will be no bar to prosecution and punishment by the other.</p> <p>3. The common-law writ of certiorari is never permitted to sei’vo the purpose of a writ of error or appeal with bill of exceptions; and the granting of such writ is not a matter of right, but rests in the legal discretion of the court. In order to review and quash the proceedings of an inferior court upon such writ, it must appear that the inferior court has proceeded in the cause without jurisdiction, or its procedure must have been clearly illegal, or unknown to the law, or essentially irregular.</p>