Glanville v. David Hairstylist

Horney, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. When ihe employer (David Hairstylist) moved to dismiss, the appeal of the claimant (Eva Mae Glanville) from the order of the Workmen’s Compensation Commission disallowing a. ¹⁶⁴ claim for compensation on the ground that the claimant had not paid the docketing costs until after the time for taking an appeal had expired, the Circuit Court for Carroll County (Weant, J.) granted the motion to dismiss with the remark that “maybe the Court of Appeals will straighten me out.” We shall do so. The hearing on the claim for injuries sustained while the claimant was working for the employer was heard by Commissioner Brown (Helen Elizabeth) on January 18, 1967. A written decision was filed on February 2, 1967.

The order for and petition to appeal, statement of claimant’s issues and prayer for a jury trial were forwarded to the clerk of court on February 16, 1967, well within the thirty days prescribed by Maryland Rule B4. Copies were also sent to the attorney for the ■employer, who, on February 20, 1967, filed an answer to the petition, the employer’s issues and certain interrogatories to be ■answered by the claimant. Answers to the interorgatories were filed on March 8, 1967. Without indicating whether or not the appeal had been docketed, the clerk mailed the attorney for claimant a bill for ten dollars for “filing fee due” on February 23, 1967.

A second 'bill was mailed on March 7, 1967, with a notice that the appeal had not been filed and a check was mailed forthwith by the ■appellant. The appeal was not docketed until March 9, 1967. ■Claiming that the appeal was filed too late, the employer moved to dismiss it on March 22, 1967. On the appeal to this Court, it is alternatively contended that without having given proper notice, the clerk could not refuse to docket the appeal until the filing fee was paid and that the ■clerk, in the absence of a local rule governing payment of filing costs, should not have refused to docket the appeal. The •appellant is right but for the wrong reason.

The real question is whether a deposit “toward the payment of the costs” due (or to become due) clerks of the circuit courts in the counties is required on appeals from administrative agencies or inferior courts. We think a deposit of costs was not required of the claimant-appellant. ¹⁶⁵ While subsection (a) of § 10 of Article 24 of the Code (1966 Repl. Vol.), which now has statewide application, 1 ’ 2 ’ 3 provides in pertinent part that— “[t]he clerks of the circuit courts of the counties and * * * the civil common-law and equity courts of Baltimore City shall not docket any suit or issue process in any original suit, matter, proceeding or action at law until the plaintiff, * * *, shall first deposit, with the clerk of the court in which such suit, matter or proceeding shall be brought, toward the payment of the costs of the clerk * * * for which plaintiff is liable”, the case at bar, being an appeal from the compensation commission, is not an original suit, matter, proceeding or action at law. Nor is the appellant a plaintiff within the meaning of the section.

An examination of the several public general and local laws on which what is now § 10(a) was based makes it clear that the Legislature never intended to require prepayment of costs on appeals to courts of law from the decisions of administrative agencies and inferior courts. With one exception — a provisory clause in the public local law applicable to Baltimore City — appeals to law courts as courts of review were not even ¹⁶⁶ ■mentioned. Invariably, the requirement as to the prepayment of costs had reference only to cases at law or in equity. 4 Subsection (b) of § 10 permits an exception when the party plaintiff is not able to make a deposit on account of the courts