Does vote tying energy bill to suicide prevention violate SC Constitution?
A South Carolina House vote Wednesday, tying together unrelated legislation, was allowed under House rules. But a local lawyer questions the legality of the action under the state constitution.
House lawmakers voted to attach the South Carolina Energy Security Act, H. 5118, to a Senate bill involving suicide prevention, S. 408. The move was allowed by an obscure House rule, 4.7B, which, under certain circumstances, allows lawmakers to circumvent germaneness in attaching any bill to a Senate bill the House has already passed. While the state constitution grants the legislature absolute authority in enacting rules relating to the legislative process, it prohibits any law from containing more than one subject, bringing into question the legality of the House’s action.
Article 3, section 17 of the South Carolina Constitution provides that, “Every Act or resolution having the force of law shall relate to but one subject, and that shall be expressed in the title.” Among lawyers, the provision is known as the “one subject rule.”
In response to several challenges by Democrats on Wednesday, state Rep. Bill Sandifer, R-Seneca, who led in tacking H. 5118 onto S. 408, and three other Senate bills, acknowledged that the bills involved unrelated subject matters. He maintained, however, that House rule 4.7B justified it.
But House rules don’t trump the state’s constitution, a Columbia area attorney said.
“This legislature appears to believe their power is limited only by their imagination,” said Chris Kenny, a litigation attorney with experience in several areas of law. “The constitutional provision is a higher authority than any rule of one chamber of the legislature. So, it just cannot be correct that one body of the legislature can pass a rule that overrules or trumps a constitutional provision.
“What (the House) attempted to do yesterday is about as blatant a violation of that constitutional provision as you can have,” he said.
The South Carolina Attorney General’s office, which would be tasked with defending the state in a lawsuit citing violation of the one subject rule, said they don’t comment on pending legislation when asked about the potential conflict with the state’s constitution.
House Speaker Murrell Smith, R-Sumter, and Sandifer did not respond to requests for comment, but other lawmakers said they have the power to pass legislation regardless of its constitutionality. Whether a measure is unconstitutional, they say, is solely for the state Supreme Court to decide.
“Presumptively, actions taken by legislative bodies are constitutional until a court says otherwise,” said House Minority Leader Todd Rutherford, D-Richland, a prominent criminal defense lawyer. “And although many members pointed out there are problems with attaching (H. 5118) to (S. 408), that does not determine the outcome of its constitutionality.”
State Rep. Chris Hart, D-Richland, also a lawyer, and who spoke adamantly against Sandifer’s ploy to combine energy and suicide prevention legislation, echoed Rutherford while acknowledging the apparent constitutional violation.
“The (House) rules are a moving target,” Hart said. “When they want something passed, they’ll just move the goalposts. They’re going do something until it’s challenged, and they know there’s a very slim chance to none that any citizen is going to file a lawsuit to challenge it.”
In effect, some lawmakers contend that as a co-equal branch of government, the legislature can pass anything it wants, regardless of its potential constitutionality. Lawmakers each take an oath of office, which involves preserving, protecting and defending the constitution of this state.
In addition to protecting the public, Kenny said the one subject rule serves to prohibit log rolling, where a number of unrelated measures get rolled together. Specifically, the term is defined as a “legislative practice of including several propositions in one measure . . . so that the legislature . . . will pass all of them, even though these propositions might not have passed if they had been submitted separately,” according to Black’s Law Dictionary.
“If they pass (H. 5118), and I think it’s a big if, because you don’t go through these sort of desperate machinations if you have a bill that is capable of passing, but if they were to pass this bill, I guarantee you there will be litigation,” Kenny said.
