“due process of law” as judicial remedy
Posted on Sunday, March 23rd, 2014 at 12:33 pmWe allege that defendants’ denied us due process in several ways. One allegation we make is that defendants’s used a species of "forum shopping" to deny us due process.
Black’s Law Dictionary defines "remedy" as follows:
remedy, n. 1. The means of enforcing a right or preventing or redressing a wrong; legal or equitable relief.
Black’s Law Dictionary, pg. 1296, (7th ed. 1999)
At minimum, Alexander Hamilton, considered "due process of law" to include a remedy in court; constitutional rights can not be deprived by the legislature without recourse to the court.
In one article of [the Constitution of New York], it is said no man shall be disfranchised or deprived of any right he enjoys under the constitution, but by the law of the land, or the judgment of his peers. Some gentlemen hold that the law of the land will include an act of the legislature. But Lord Coke, that great luminary of the law, in his comment upon a similar clause, in Magna Charta, interprets the law of the land to mean presentment and indictment, and process of outlawry, as contradistinguished from trial by jury. But if there were any doubt upon the constitution, the bill of rights enacted in this very session removes it. It is there declared that, no man shall be disfranchised or deprived of any right, but by due process of law, or the judgment of his peers. The words “due process” have a precise technical import, and are only applicable to the process and proceedings of the courts of justice; they can never be referred to an act of legislature.
The 13th article of the constitution [of New York] declares, “that no member of this state shall be disfranchised or defrauded of any of the rights or privileges sacred to the subjects of this state by the constitution, unless by the law of the land or the judgment of his peers.” If we enquire what is meant by the law of the land, the best commentators will tell us, that it means due process of law, that is, by indictment or presentment of good and lawful men, and trial and conviction in consequence.
Likewise, at minimum, John Bingham, the principal author of the Fourteenth Amendment, considered "due process of law" to mean a judicial remedy.
No State ever had the right, under the forms of law or otherwise, to deny to any freeman the equal protection of the laws or to abridge the privileges or immunities of any citizen of the Republic, although many of them have assumed and exercised the power, and that without a remedy.
Cong. Globe, 39 Cong., 1 Sess. 2542-3, May 10, 1866.
In Chapter 162 of its statutes, Florida does provide for judicial review in county court of alleged violations of county codes [See §162.21(3)(a), Fla. Stat.]. Florida also gives county government the option to substitute judicial review with local administrative review before a code enforcement board created by the county [See §162.03(1), Fla. Stat.]. Where the county exercises this later option, Florida provides for appellate review in state court of the orders of the code enforcement board [See §162.11, Fla. Stat.]. This appellate review permits the appellant to challenge the constitutionality of the ordinances at issue.
Orange County has created a code enforcement board pursuant Ch. 162, Fla. Stat., and incorporated the appellate review provision of §162.11, Fla. Stat., in its code at §11-40, OCC.
As to "equal protection" the question is which law is to be given equal effect – Orange County’s ordinance or the supremacy of FWC subject matter jurisdiction?