Art. 4848.Contempt Power

The jurisdictional limits set out in the preceding articles govern what civil claims a parish or city court can hear in the first place. Article 4848 addresses something different: the court's power to enforce its own authority once a case is before it, or once someone disrupts its proceedings.

That power is contempt, and Article 4848 gives parish and city courts the same contempt power a district court holds, whether the contempt happens directly in front of the judge or arises from disobeying a court order outside the courtroom. Neither the dollar caps in Articles 4842 and 4843 nor the subject-matter exclusions in Article 4847 cut into this authority; it applies at full strength regardless of how modest the underlying civil case might be.

Giving these courts full contempt power matters for their day-to-day function. A judge presiding over a docket of eviction cases, small claims, and city-ordinance enforcement suits needs the same tools available to keep order and secure compliance with the court's own orders as a judge in district court, even though the cases themselves are smaller in scale.