O.C.G.A.

O.C.G.A. § 15-16-4 (2019)

Oath of office

✓ O.C.G.A. — 2019 edition (Public.Resource.Org Release 73)

Code text and O.C.G.A. statutory annotations on this page reflect the 2019 Official Code of Georgia Annotated (Public.Resource.Org Release 73, 2019-08-21; public domain per Georgia v. Public.Resource.Org, 2020). The Syfert case-law annotations in Notes of Decisions, below, are current.

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Before entering on the duties of their office the sheriffs shall take and subscribe, in addition to the oath required of all civil officers, the following oath before the judge of the superior court or the judge of the probate court: ‘‘I do swear that I will faithfully execute all writs, warrants, precepts, and processes directed to me as sheriff of this county, or which are directed to all sheriffs of this state, or to any other sheriff specially, which I can lawfully execute, and true returns make, and in all things well and truly, without malice or partiality, perform the duties of the office of sheriff of County, during my continuance therein, and take only my lawful fees. So help me God.’’ (Laws 1799, Cobb’s 1851 Digest, p. 574; Laws 1803, Cobb’s 1851 Digest, p. 199; Laws 1845, Cobb’s 1851 Digest, p. 217; Code 1863, § 323; Code 1868, § 384; Code 1873, § 348; Code 1882, § 348; Civil Code 1895, § 4371; Civil Code 1910, § 4905; Code 1933, § 24-2804.)

Annotations

JUDICIAL DECISIONS Any judge may administer oath if more than one. - In this section, the article ‘‘the’’ is used before the noun ‘‘judge.’’ It would not be a proper construction of the language, ‘‘the judge of the superior court,’’ to hold that in a county, such as Fulton, where there are five superior court judges, this oath could not be administered to the sheriff by any one of these judges, for the reason that the statute requires this oath to be administered by ‘‘the judge,’’ when in fact there was no such judge in Fulton County. This is a familiar illustration of the fact that the

article ‘‘the,’’ as used in statutes, is often used in the sense of any. Howell v. State, 164 Ga. 204, 138 S.E. 206, appeal dismissed, 275 U.S. 576, 48 S. Ct. 114, 72 L. Ed. 435 (1927). Cited in Daniel v. State, 187 Ga. 411, 1 S.E.2d 6 (1939); Johnson v. United States Fid. & Guar. Co., 93 Ga. App. 336, 91 S.E.2d 779 (1956); Hannah v. State, 212 Ga. 313, 92 S.E.2d 89 (1956); Ga. Peace Officers Stds. & Training Council v. Anderson, 290 Ga. App. 91, 658 S.E.2d 840 (2008).

OPINIONS OF THE ATTORNEY GENERAL Qualification of emergency deputies with proper oath. - If a number of emergency deputies are to be appointed, the emergency deputies may all be qualified at a joint meeting by a superior court

judge if all counties involved are within the judge’s circuit; if, however, other counties are to be served, proper oath must be taken within each such county. 1971 Op. Att’y Gen. No. U71-84.

RESEARCH REFERENCES Am. Jur. 2d. - 70 Am. Jur. 2d, Sheriffs, Police, and Constables, § 14. C.J.S. - 80 C.J.S., Sheriffs and Constables, § 7.

ALR. - Propriety and prejudicial effect, in criminal case, of placing jury in charge of officer who is a witness in the case, 38 ALR3d 1012.

Notes of Decisions

Cited in 6 cases (2 in the last 5 years), 1994–2026 · leading case: Jowers v. State, 484 S.E.2d 803 (Ga. Ct. App. 1997).

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Jowers v. State, 484 S.E.2d 803 (Ga. Ct. App. 1997). · cites it 4× “Compare OCGA § 15-16-4. Pursuant to OCGA § 45-3-7 this same oath of office also is prescribed by law to be taken by a deputy sheriff, such oath being the same as prescribed by law for the sheriff who is a deputy sheriff’s principal within the meaning of this statute.”

Smith v. Deering, 880 F. Supp. 816 (S.D. Ga. 1994). · cites it 2× “The relevant Georgia statutes read as follows: O.C.G.A. § 15-16-4 Oath of office. Before entering on the duties of their office the sheriffs shall take and subscribe, in addition to the oath required of all civil officers, the following oath before the judge of the superior…”

Georgia Peace Officers Standards & Training Council v. Anderson, 658 S.E.2d 840 (Ga. Ct. App. 2008). · cites it 2× “The ALJ found that Anderson had violated the sheriffs oath codified in OCGA§ 15-16-4, “obstructed the truth[,] and failed to perform his statutory duties in violation of Georgia law.”

Pierson v. The State., 824 S.E.2d 657 (Ga. Ct. App. 2019). · cites it 8× “SO HELP ME GOD! The first paragraph of the oath is almost identical to the oath that sheriffs are required to take, pursuant to OCGA § 15-16-4. 37 Thus, the oath fulfilled the requirement, under OCGA § 45-3-7, that the Appellant "take the same oath[ ] as [his] principal[,]" i.”

State v. Phillips (Ga. 2025). · cites it 3× “765 , 774–76 (2019) (holding that there was “sufficient evidence to show that the terms of the oath taken by the [defendant] were ‘prescribed by law,’ as required by OCGA § 16- 10-1” where the oath was “almost identical to the oath that sheriffs are required to take, pursuant to…”

Clayton Watkins v. State (Ga. Ct. App. 2026). · cites it 2× “” OCGA § 15-16-4, in turn, sets out the sheriff’s — or “principal’s” — oath of office: Before entering on the duties of their office the sheriffs shall take and subscribe, in addition to the oath required of all civil officers, the following oath before the judge of the superior…”

Annotations are extracted automatically from the opinions in the Syfert caselaw corpus and ranked by authority, recency, and treatment. Dots show Syfertize treatment of the citing case itself.