Section 789

Citation: Section 789
Parent Document: Hale v. Morgan, 584 P.2d 512 (1978)
Jurisdiction: California (state)
Effective Date: 1978-09-28
Original Source: https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/1160324/hale-v-morgan/ ↗

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Section 789.3 requires such cumulation; it measures penalties not on a “per-violation” basis, but strictly by the day, leaving little room for that form of narrow interpretation of the penalty’s scope and reach, such as we applied in Younger, Jayhill and Walsh. The exercise of a reasoned discretion is replaced by an adding machine. The challenged statute mandates essentially that a single wrongful act by the landlord, if not corrected, will subject him to potentially infinite penalties, regardless of the circumstances of the violation, the offender, the victim or the damage caused. Unlike the environmental and public utility regulations discussed above, the section’s impact extends beyond sizeable and well established business organizations to individuals of extremely modest means. Though the Legislature need not, of course, precisely adjust its regulatory efforts to ensure exact justice in every case, neither may it, in defiance of due process requirements, compel the exaction of penalties which, in a *403particular case, demonstrably overbalance and outweigh reasonable goals of punishment, regulation and deterrence.

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