Posted on 05/06/2010 10:45:27 AM PDT by Son House
Minnesota risks running out of money if those affected by overturned budget cuts seek immediate back pay.
A spokesman for Republican Gov. Tim Pawlenty said Thursday the state doesn't have the money on hand to cover $2.7 billion in cuts thrown into doubt by a Supreme Court ruling. The spokesman, Brian McClung, says while the ruling was tailored to a special nutrition program others hit by Pawlenty's 2009 cuts may ask to have state allowances restored.
Legislative leaders met for an hour with Pawlenty and members of both parties emerged to describe the fiscal crisis.
Pawlenty has asked lawmakers to pass a bill ratifying the earlier cuts. On Wednesday, the Supreme Court ruled that he overstepped his authority by making the spending reductions on his own after negotiations with the Legislature reached impasse.
Of course the 'special nutrition program' will be touted, as the rest of the budget outflows will not be itemized for all to see.
Judges aren’t suppose to be writing state budgets.
IT seems more likely each day that the only way states are going to come to grips with their debt problem is through default. Legislatures don’t want to rock the boat and the courts are siding with unions.
Once again the Minnesota court demonstrates a complete contempt for the rule of law and an arrogant willingness to impose their own political dogma by judicial fiat.
It does not appear the judges are doing so in this case. I take it as strictly a ruling that the Governor does not have arbitrary budgeting authority, and that the power rests solely with the legislature.
That is how SC Governor Sanford's refusal to accept federal stimulus money was over turned. Only the legislature has the authority to appropriate funds.
The DFL(Democrat Farm Labor party-for those out of the know) are seething to raise taxes, Mark Dayton and the DFL endorsed candidate Margaret Anderson Kelliher just had a tiff;
Dayton, Kelliher spar over taxes in MN gov’s race
http://www.wqow.com/Global/story.asp?S=12384303
House Speaker Margaret Anderson Kelliher (KEL’-uh-her) says Dayton is “out of touch” and “not up to speed” because the Legislature has approved higher income taxes for the wealthy multiple times, only to have Pawlenty block the legislation.
The State of Minnesota is required to have a balanced budget. If the Legislature fails to act, which it did in this case, the Gov has the constitutional authority to balance the budget. Pawlenty is completly correct, the court wholly wrong. As with it's decision in he Coleman Vrs Frankin case, this is partisan politics trumping the rule of law.
The MN court here felt that the funding should be restored for no other reason then partisan ideological dogma. Their decision is without any reasonable base in Minnesota law. It was a purely ideological, not legal, decision.
want to bet we’ll have ANOTHER “special session” ??
It’s amazing and appalling that the DFL has yet to unveil a comprehensive budget that solves the current $1 billion budget deficit. Then again, it’s really not surprising when you consider that asking the DFL to reduce spending is a bit like asking Tiger Woods to stay faithful.
By the same token, it’s amazing to consider that the media has given the liberal legislative majority in Saint Paul a free pass on this issue. We have known since early December of 2009 that the state faced a $1 billion shortfall. Within 2 months of that news, Governor Pawlenty published a supplemental budget solution that solved the budget deficit by cutting spending and not raising taxes.
Since the session began in early February, the DFL has sat around and collected pay, mileage, per diem, and lodging while doing virtually nothing to solve this fiscal crisis. Yes, Governor Pawlenty did manage to bring them to the negotiating table to agree on $312 million worth of the solution, but we’re still hundreds of millions short.
The hypocrisy is overwhelming. Senate DFL Majority Leader Larry Pogemiller demanded that the Governor produce a budget plan immediately last December so the legislature could get to work... Pawlenty’s plan has now been on the table for nearly 3 months.
http://www.senate.leg.state.mn.us/members/member_bio.php?mem_id=1048&ls=
These DFL leaders have been in office for decades and know how the legislative process works. Like college students with a paper due tomorrow, they are procrastinating and hoping that somehow tax money will fall out of the sky and save them from cutting spending.
The DFL’s lack of a budget solution isn’t the only shirking of obligations they’ve been thinking about lately. Last week, the aforementioned DFL Senator Pogemiller mentioned in a press conference that he thought it would be acceptable if the legislature took a two-week break from mid to late April since “there wasn’t much left to do.” Capitol sources corroborated this plan, saying that DFL legislative leadership had reached out to GOP leadership to gauge their interest in going along with the plan. The GOP said no. It’s especially outrageous to think that the DFL was talking about a spring break when they JUST TOOK ONE! The legislature was on break from March 30 to April 6.
How much time off do these people want? If any of us in the private sector thought about this much time off, especially when our work wasn’t done, we’d be fired.
At least Mee Mou and Large Marge can eat their weight in per diem food...
He should ignore the court if he can withstand impeachment.
Yes, Obama could do that too, but so can the next Republican.
Of the 7 Justices, 4 were appointed by Pawlenty. One (P. Anderson) was appointed by Carlson (IR), one (Meyer) was appointed by Ventura, and one (Page) was elected in a non-partisan election for an open seat (although he is clearly DFL). Disagreement with the Court’s decision is rational — it was a difficult and close case as can be discerned from reading the lengthy majority opinion, concurring opinion and dissent. Attributing the decision to partisan politics, however, makes no sense. A majority of the Justices were appointed by the Governor.
Reagan Appointed O’Conner. Bush 1 Appointed Souter. That Palwenty appointed them indicates nothing about their ideological makeup as Judges.
The Legislature, in failing to act, abrogated it's authority to the Governor. For the court to rule as it did indicates that the laws of the State Of Minnesota were not considered at all germane in the Court's mind. Since they choose to ignore the rule of law, the only logical conclusion is that the Court reached it's decision based on some other criteria then the rule of law.
Have you read the opinions?
At issue is the unallotment statute, found in the law books at Chapter 16A.152 (Subd.4).
https://www.revisor.mn.gov/statutes/?id=16A.152
This law allows the governor to take solo action to address budget shortfalls.
Pawlenty did this at the start of the current state budget cycle when he unalloted a $2.7 billion budget shortfall in June of 2009 (the budget cycle starts on July 1). The shortfall occurred when the legislature sent Pawlenty spending bills that didn’t balance, which he signed into law. The legislature then sent a massive tax
increase bill to address the shortfall, which Pawlenty vetoed.
One group sued, claiming that the unallotment statute was effective only for “unanticipated” budget shortfalls. The group claimed that the shortfall wasn’t unanticipated because Pawlenty vetoed a tax increase that would have addressed the issue AND because this
was done just before the whole budget cycle started.
Ramsey County District Court Jude Gearin essentially agreed with the complainant,invalidating the June 2009 unallotments.
Gearin herself made law by reading into the statute certain preconditions on the use of unallotment that are not found in the text of the statute.
It is vital to remember, however, that Gearin did not invalidate the law, she only limited the use of it to situations arising after the budget cycle starts. That means that there was unallotment power available immediately to the Governor because the state faced an ADDITIONAL shortfall based on the November 2009 budget
forecast. In other words, there was additional deficit discovered after the budget cycle started. Today, that deficit stands at $536 million.
And here is where the Supreme Court’s decision gets so bad by being so activist. The majority wrote:
“The unallotment statute provides the executive branch with authority to address an unanticipated deficit that arises after the legislative and executive branches have enacted a balanced budget. The statute does not shift to the executive branch a broad budget-making authority allowing the executive branch to address a deficit that remains after a legislative session because the legislative and executive branches have not resolved their differences.”
Carefully read that first sentence. There is absolutely nothing in the plain text of the unallotment law that states that the power is available to the governor only after the executive and legislative branches have enacted a balanced budget. Here, the four justices who wrote for the majority clearly rewrote the law to state that
the enactment of a balanced budget was a prerequisite to the use of the unallotment power.
Since the legislature and governor never enacted a balanced budget at the start of this budget cycle, the Supreme Court took the unallotment power away from the governor for every last dollar of the current $3 billion deficit.
That is what the Judges did here. They simply imposed their emotional whimsy by fiat not on the base of law. There is no rational way to interpret this law the way these Judges did. This is a transparent attempt to strip the Governor of his legitimate powers out of petty partisan political bigotry. What this Judge rules is "hey screw the balance of Powers concept, the Governor has to do what the Legislature wants. Screw the constitutional requirement to balance the budget.
Obviously the concepts of separation of powers and co equal branches of Government are no longer taught at law schools.
Once again the Legal guild is circling the wagons out of petty professional ego to try and defend the indefeasible actions of one of it's guild members.
This is not the rule of law, this is the rule of men.
As Wobbly Bob posted
At issue is the unallotment statute, found in the law books at Chapter 16A.152 (Subd.4). https://www.revisor.mn.gov/statutes/?id=16A.152 This law allows the governor to take solo action to address budget shortfalls. Pawlenty did this at the start of the current state budget cycle when he unalloted a $2.7 billion budget shortfall in June of 2009 (the budget cycle starts on July 1).
The shortfall occurred when the legislature sent Pawlenty spending bills that didn’t balance, which he signed into law. The legislature then sent a massive tax increase bill to address the shortfall, which Pawlenty vetoed. One group sued, claiming that the unallotment statute was effective only for “unanticipated” budget shortfalls. The group claimed that the shortfall wasn’t unanticipated because Pawlenty vetoed a tax increase that would have addressed the issue AND because this was done just before the whole budget cycle started.
Ramsey County District Court Jude Gearin essentially agreed with the complainant,invalidating the June 2009 unallotments. Gearin herself made law by reading into the statute certain preconditions on the use of unallotment that are not found in the text of the statute. It is vital to remember, however, that Gearin did not invalidate the law, she only limited the use of it to situations arising after the budget cycle starts.
That means that there was unallotment power available immediately to the Governor because the state faced an ADDITIONAL shortfall based on the November 2009 budget forecast. In other words, there was additional deficit discovered after the budget cycle started. Today, that deficit stands at $536 million.
And here is where the Supreme Court’s decision gets so bad by being so activist. The majority wrote: “The unallotment statute provides the executive branch with authority to address an unanticipated deficit that arises after the legislative and executive branches have enacted a balanced budget. The statute does not shift to the executive branch a broad budget-making authority allowing the executive branch to address a deficit that remains after a legislative session because the legislative and executive branches have not resolved their differences.”
Carefully read that first sentence. There is absolutely nothing in the plain text of the unallotment law that states that the power is available to the governor only after the executive and legislative branches have enacted a balanced budget. Here, the four justices who wrote for the majority clearly rewrote the law to state that the enactment of a balanced budget was a prerequisite to the use of the unallotment power.
Since the legislature and governor never enacted a balanced budget at the start of this budget cycle, the Supreme Court took the unallotment power away from the governor for every last dollar of the current $3 billion deficit.
In our constitution, the people of Minnesota restricted the ability of the state government to deficit spend. The political branches have agreed on a process in the unallotment statute for ensuring that the government meets this obligation. Whether that process is the wisest or most prudent way to avoid deficit spending is not an issue for judicial review. That question should be left to the people themselves to debate and resolve through the political process.
The judiciary's duty is simply to apply the law as written by the legislature --Int'l Bhd. of Elec. Workers, Local No. 292 v. City of St. Cloud, 765 N.W.2d 64, 68 (Minn. 2009) (Magnuson, C.J., for a unanimous court). The majority is unable to do so because the language the Legislature used in the unallotment statute leaves the majority with uncertainty and ambiguity. The majority therefore rewrites the statute to insert additional conditions, and then finds that the Commissioner of Minnesota Management and Budget(Commissioner) violated the statute because he did not comply with the conditions the majority has added.
I do not find the language the Legislature used uncertain or ambiguous as applied to the unallotment at issue in this case. I would not re-write the statute; I would apply the language as written.
There is no rational way to read that to mean what the Judges ruled.
The Judges simply decided "We don't want this Governor to have this power so we simply will rule he does not have it." Wonder what these Judges think the VETO is for. Unallotment was a rational way to balance the Legislative and Executive branches powers. NOW, thanks to these judges, i suppose what ever the Legislature wants will have to become law since we HAVE to have a balanced budget.
Frankly Pawlenty should just veto everything that includes any tax or fee increases this bunch of clowns sends him.
The Minnesota Progressive clowns in the Judiciary wants all power in the hands of their do-nothing-but-draw-their- wildly-inflated-per-deium, incompetentants at the Legislature, let make them figure out how to balance the budget.
I suppose the next step these clowns in robes will decide is the Governors veto is illegal.
You must not have read the opinions. The strained interpretation was determined to be that offered by the Governor who, as noted, appointed the author of the majority opinion (his close friend and former law partner).
“The temporal limitations implicit in the common meaning of the words ‘less than anticipated’ and ‘remainder of the biennium’ constrain the statute‘s use to circumstances consistent with the distinct powers and roles conferred on the legislative and executive branches in the constitution. Those circumstances do not include use of unallotment authority to address a deficit known to exist but not resolved by the legislative and executive branches using their constitutionally specified powers to enact spending and revenue legislation. The unallotment statute provides the executive branch with authority to address an unanticipated deficit that arises after the legislative and executive branches have enacted a balanced budget. The statute does not shift to the executive branch a broad budget-making authority allowing the executive branch to address a deficit that remains after a legislative session because the legislative and executive branches have not resolved their differences.”
As I noted earlier, this was a close case, involving a use of the unallotment statute which was without precedent. The majority imposed no limitation at all on the Governor’s use of either line-item or general veto power. Neither did the majority find any constitutional violation (unlike Judge Gearin). The case was decided on the basis of the statute only. There was nothing partisan about it.
Reasonable minds can differ on this one. The 4-3 decision indicates just that.
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