EVANS v. SUPERIOR COURT OF CITY AND COUNTY OF SAN FRANCISCO (1939)

The petition filed on May 29th (S. F. No. 16245) sought an alternative writ of prohibition or mandamus to prohibit the Superior Court from issuing any injunction restraining the Building and Loan Commissioner from (1) employing special counsel, or any attorneys other than the attorney-general, or (2) from paying from the funds of the Pacific States Savings and Loan Association for the services of appraisers, certified public accountants, special counsel, other than the attorney-general, or other persons engaged by him to aid in the defense of the proceeding brought by the association. That petition was denied. Subsequently, the Superior Court issued an injunction restraining the Commissioner from paying such persons from the association's funds. At a later date the court ordered that the Commissioner may not appear in the case in propria persona or by any attorney other than the attorney-general, his assistants or deputies. The appropriateness of this later order is challenged in a second petition of the Commissioner (S. F. No. 16268), filed on June 21st.

The injunction which by the first petition the Commissioner sought to prohibit the court from making, having now been signed and filed, the only question which may now be considered in a mandamus or prohibition proceeding, assuming that either of those remedies might properly have been invoked at the time the first petition was filed, is that relating to the right to appear in propria persona or by counsel other than the attorney-general. For these reasons we do not join in the order granting a rehearing in case S. F. No. 16245, but vote for the issuance of the alternative writ of mandamus in case S. F. No. 16268, in order that the matter may be considered on the merits.