Ex parte Stratman

Wallace, J., delivered the following opinion, Rhodes, C. J., and Temple, J., concurring:

The petitioner, John Stratman, is imprisoned in the common jail of the City and County of San Francisco, pursuant to a final judgment rendered against him on August 15th last, in the Municipal Court of said city and county, directing him to be imprisoned for the period of six months as a punishment for the crime of libel.

He prosecutes this writ of habeas corpus to be relieved of the imprisonment, and alleges that his detention is illegal upon two several principal grounds,

One of these concerns the constitutionality of the Act of the Legislature passed at its . last session, to establish the Municipal Criminal Court of the City and County of San Francisco. It is argued in his behalf, that this Court is not an inferior Court within the intent of Section 1, Article "VT, of the Constitution, as amended in 1862, by the terms of which section the Legislature is authorized to establish Pecorders’ and other inferior Cowrts in any incorporated city or toum.

[518]If the question, here made could be regarded as res integra in this State, it might be difficult to maintain that the Municipal Court, as established by the Act in question, is indeed a Court of inferior jurisdiction, at least within the common law definition. But I think that the authority of the Legislature to establish the Municipal Court is not, in view of the provisions of the Constitution, as existing anterior to 1862, and their interpretation by the Supreme Court of the State, open to question now.

■The Constitution, prior to the amendment of 1862, provided in terms that “theLegislature- may also establish such municipal and other inferior Courts as may be deemed necessary. ” The only substantial change appearing to have been effected by that amendment in this respect seems to be that the inferior Court, to be established thereunder, must be an inferior Court established in an incorporated city or town, whereas before that amendment the Legislature had power to establish such Courts without as well as within the limits of any such city or • town. Indeed, it' was understood to be conceded on the argument that the authority of the Legislature to establish the Municipal Court in the incorporated City of San Francisco, under the amendment of 1862, is not substantially different from its power to have established such a Court under the clauses' of the Constitution of 1850. On the 5th day of April, 1850, under the old Constitution, the Legislature did establish a Municipal Court in the City of San Francisco, to be called the Superior Court'of the City of San Francisco. (Acts of 1850, p. 159.) By Section 6 of that Act it was provided that the Court so established should be a Court of Record and have a seal, and should have the same power as the District Courts to regulate' its forms of process and proceedings, and to make rules for its ovn government ; and by Section 4 it was enacted that the Superior Court so established should have the same- original jurisdiction within the limits of the City of San Francisco, in civil cases, as is or may be conferred upon the District Courts.