Board of Ed. of City School Dist. of City of New York v. City of New York

• Decision Date: 05 April 1977
• Citation: 362 N.E.2d 948,394 N.Y.S.2d 148,41 N.Y.2d 535
• Parties: , 362 N.E.2d 948 In the Matter of the BOARD OF EDUCATION OF the CITY SCHOOL DISTRICT OF the CITY OF NEW YORK, Appellant, v. CITY OF NEW YORK et al., Respondents.
• Court: New York Court of Appeals Court of Appeals

Page 148

394 N.Y.S.2d 148

41 N.Y.2d 535, 362 N.E.2d 948

In the Matter of the BOARD OF EDUCATION OF the CITY SCHOOL DISTRICT OF the CITY OF NEW YORK, Appellant, v. CITY OF NEW YORK et al., Respondents.

Court of Appeals of New York.

April 5, 1977.

Larry M. Lavinsky, Jeffrey A. Mishkin and Minna J. Kotkin, New York City, for appellant.

W. Bernard Richland, Corp. Counsel, New York City (Stanley Buchsbaum, James G. Greilsheimer, L. Kevin Sheridan, Alexander Gigante, Jr., and Diane R. Eisner, New York City, of counsel), for respondents.

JONES, Judge.

We hold that chapter 132 of the Laws of 1976 (commonly known as the Stavisky-Goodman Law) was duly enacted over the Governor's veto. The Assembly voted to override the veto on March 31, 1976. We conclude that the veto was likewise overridden in the Senate on April 13, 1976, in conformity both with the provisions of section 7 of article IV of the New York State Constitution and with the rules of the Senate. We also reject the other challenges to the validity of the chapter raised by respondents.

In October and November, 1975 the Education Committee of the New York State Assembly conducted a series of public hearings in New York City to evaluate the impact on the quality of education of the existing financial emergency in the State and City of New York. On the basis of those hearings and ancillary studies, the committee reported to the Assembly in February, 1976 that the New York City school system was bearing a disproportionate share of the budget reductions necessitated by the city's financial plight, that education, not inherently a municipal service but a State responsibility, was suffering from the fact that it was funded through the municip budget, and that the city's school system needed guaranteed support in the municipal budgetary process, which could be provided by State legislation requiring a minimum appropriation for the system within the city's budget. The committee's chairman, Assemblyman Leonard P. Stavisky, introduced a bill which, as adopted by the Assembly on January 21, 1976, amended section 2576 of the Education Law to require that annually there be appropriated for public elementary and secondary education in the City of New York "an amount equal to the average proportion of the total expense budget of such city, as amended, appropriated for the purposes of the city school district of such city in the three fiscal years of such city immediately preceding the (current) year". On February 2, 1976 the bill, introduced by Senator Roy M. Goodman, passed the Senate.

On March 18 the bill as adopted by both houses of the Legislature was vetoed by the Governor. In compliance with the mandate of section 7 of article IV of the Constitution ¹ it was thereon returned with the Governor's objections to the Assembly, the house in which it had originated.

On March 31 the veto was overridden by the Assembly by the required two-thirds vote. When the bill was sent to the Senate, however, on April 8 the motion to override failed to garner the necessary two-thirds support in that house. Immediately after the result of the vote was announced, a motion to reconsider the defeated motion to override was carried by a roll call ballot, but consideration was deferred when the Senate then promptly passed a motion to table the revived motion to override.

On April 13, after favorable action on a motion to take from the table and extended debate, the motion to override the Governor's veto was passed by two thirds of the Senate. The principal question on this appeal is whether by that action the Stavisky-Goodman bill was effectively enacted over the Governor's veto.

In this article 78 proceeding by the Board of Education of the New York City School District to compel respondents, the City of New York, its Mayor, Board of Estimate, City Council and Comptroller, to modify the city's 1976-1977 expense budget to increase the appropriation to the Board of Education to no less than 21 1/2% of the total expense budget (which petitioner contends is the proportion required by the Stavisky-Goodman Law) the courts below have held that the vote in the Senate on April 13, 1976 overriding the Governor's veto was a nullity, classifying it as a second reconsideration of the Stavisky-Goodman bill not permitted under the Constitution and the Senate rules.

We reach a contrary conclusion.

At the very threshold we confront the fundamental question whether, under our polity of distribution of powers, the judiciary may inquire into the propriety or legality of the internal procedures by which the Legislature enacted chapter 132 of the Laws of 1976. We have only recently explicitly recognized in another context that the courts should be hesitant to intervene in the internal affairs of the Legislature (New York Public Interest Research Group v. Steingut, 40 N.Y.2d 250, 257, 386 N.Y.S.2d 646, 649, 353 N.E.2d 558, 561). In some situations the judiciary has no power to intrude on the legislative process; in others, while it has the power, its exercise of such authority should be marked by respectful constraint in recognition of the status of the Legislature as one of the other two branches of State government. We conclude that in this instance the judiciary has and may properly exercise authority to determine the effectiveness of the legislative action of the Senate, as a component of the constitutionally prescribed process for overriding an executive veto. While in general the courts will not interfere with the internal procedural aspects of the legislative process, judicial review may be undertaken to determine whether the Legislature has complied with constitutional prescriptions as to legislative procedures (Norwick v Rockefeller, 33 N.Y.2d 537, 347 N.Y.S.2d 435, 301 N.E.2d 422; Matter of Schneider v. Rockefeller, 31 N.Y.2d 420, 434, 340 N.Y.S.2d 889, 900, 293 N.E.2d 67, 74; Finger Lakes Racing Assn. v. New York State Off-Track Pari-Mutuel Betting Comm., 30 N.Y.2d 207, 219-220, 331 N.Y.S.2d 625, 630, 282 N.E.2d 592, 595; People v. Devlin, 33 N.Y. 269; Franklin Nat. Bank of Long Is. v. Clark, 26 Misc.2d 724, 212 N.Y.S.2d 942). ²

Proceeding then to consideration of the merits of the present appeal, we note first that section 9 of article III of the Constitution vests in each house of the Legislature the power to determine the rules of its own proceedings and that, in the exercise of that power, the Senate by resolution number nine adopted rules for the year 1976, including section 8 of rule V, "Proceedings", which provided in relevant part: "Reconsideration. a. When a question has once been put and decided, it shall be in order for any Senator to move for the reconsideration thereof; but no motion for the reconsideration of any vote shall be in order after the bill, resolution, message, report, amendment, nomination or motion, upon which the vote was taken, shall have gone out of the possession of the Senate; nor shall any motion for reconsideration be in order unless made on the same day on which the vote was taken, or within the next three days of the actual session of the Senate thereafter. Nor shall any question be reconsidered more than once." By the adoption of this rule the Senate determined that all substantive questions to be acted on in the 1976 session were subject to a single motion to reconsider.

We turn then to section 7 of article IV of the Constitution (n. 1, supra, p. 151), which both courts below held was violated by the Senate override vote of April 13, 1976. That section expressly provides that after executive veto a bill shall be returned to the house in which it originated with a statement of the Governor's objections, and that that house shall " proceed to reconsider it". If two thirds of the originating house shall vote to override, the bill then goes to the other house by which it shall likewise be " reconsidered". It is apparent that by the use of the verb "reconsider" in this constitutional provision it was not intended to refer to the familiar parliamentary procedure (here embodied in Senate rule V, § 8) by which a deliberative assembly again takes up action it has previously effected, to confirm, to amend or to nullify that action; in short, to "reconsider" in the constitutional sense is not the same as to reconsider in parliamentary usage. In the case of an executive veto, the previous action of the legislative houses in passing the particular bill has already been effective nullified by the action of the Governor; it is only in consequence of the constitutional provision that the bill comes before the Legislature again. What is assured by the constitutional mandate of "reconsideration" is that the Legislature shall address the bill a second time, with the possibility, after review of the bill and the Governor's objections, of new legislative action by which the two houses may by a two-thirds vote in each override the veto of the Governor. The Constitution provides that in such event the bill shall "become a law (notwithstanding the objections) of the governor". In both political and legislative reality the issue as to whether to override is discrete and quite different from the earlier question as to whether to enact the legislation in the first place.

Thus, on April 8, 1976, the question before the Senate, as phrased by its presiding officer, was, "ought (the Stavisky-Goodman bill) become a law notwithstanding the veto of the Governor". The motion that initiated this item of legislative business and brought on the question was an original main motion "that the veto of the Governor be overridden". As would be true of any other main motion bringing an item of substantive legislative business before the house, this motion was subject to all the procedural steps available under the applicable rules of the Senate. Thus, the legislative address to the question before the house included, inter alia, the possibility of one motion for reconsideration after the...