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Laney v. Fairview City8/9/2002
that permitting a trial court to fix a bond in accordance with an indigent plaintiff's circumstances would "allow him access to the court to seek justice, as assured by Sec. 11 of Article I of our State Constitution . . . ." Id.
Even cases since Berry have suggested that the Open Courts Clause is a procedural guarantee, a guarantee of "reasonable access to judicial review."
Legislation limiting or impairing the right to file a petition for a writ of habeas corpus has been declared unconstitutional based, in part, on the Open Courts Clause. See, e.g., Julian v. State, 966 P.2d 249, 253 (Utah 1998); Frausto v. State, 966 P.2d 849, 850-51 (Utah 1998) (discussing Julian); see also Currier v. Holden, 862 P.2d 1357, 1372 (Utah Ct. App. 1993) (declaring Utah Code Ann. § 78-12-31.1 (1992) to be unconstitutional solely under article I, section 11). This court has even used the Open Courts Clause to guarantee citizens a procedural right to access to the courts to protect certain individual rights. See, e.g., Jenkins v. Percival, 962 P.2d 796, 799 (Utah 1998) (suggesting a right of access to the courts and a constitutional guarantee of "a day in court"); Jensen v. State Tax Comm'n, 835 P.2d 965, 969 (Utah 1992) (finding that "to the extent that [Utah Code Ann.] § 59-1-505 precludes reasonable access to judicial review, it violates the open courts provision"); Maryboy v. Utah State Tax Comm'n, 904 P.2d 662, 670-71 (Utah 1995) (finding that petitioners constitutional right of open access to the courts was not violated because petitioners had the ability to pay the alleged tax deficiency); Indus. Comm'n v. Evans, 52 Utah 394, 174 P. 825 (Utah 1918).
In Julian, we held that the four-year catch-all statute of limitations provision for post-conviction relief violated article V, section 1, the separation of powers provision, and article I, section 11, the Open Courts Clause. 966 P.2d at 253. Julian arose after the legislature enacted a one-year statute of limitations in response to the ninety-day statute of limitations being declared unconstitutional. Id. at 251. After asserting that " he separation of powers provision, Article V, Section 1 of the Utah Constitution, requires, and the Open Courts Provision of the Declaration of Rights, Article I, Section 11, presupposes, a judicial department armed with process sufficient to fulfill its role as the third branch of government," id. at 253, the lead opinion announced that "[to apply] the catch-all statute to bar habeas petitions not only violates the Utah Constitution's open courts provision in article I, section 11, but also violates the separation of powers provision in article V, section 1." Id. Inasmuch as this court has adamantly insisted that the legislature "may not impose restrictions which limit the writ [of habeas corpus] as a judicial procedure, except as provided in the constitution," we should also refrain from placing ourselves in a legislative role, imposing our policy judgments upon the legislature, except as clearly provided in the constitution, which the Open Courts Clause, in my mind, does not. If we hold that "the legislature may not impose restrictions which limit the writ as a judicial rule of procedure, except as provided in the constitution" because "'the Writ belongs to the judicial branch of government'" and "'is one of the most important of all judicial tools for the protection of individual liberty,'" Julian, 966 P.2d at 253 (quoting Hurst v. Cook, 777 P.2d 1029, 1033-34 (Utah 1989)), we should also respect the constitutional role of the legislature and no longer read the Open Courts provision as limiting the prerogative of the legislature to change the law as to what remedies are available to injuries.
In
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