Colorado Common Cause v. Bledsoe
| Decision Date | 15 April 1991 |
| Docket Number | No. 89SC465,89SC465 |
| Parties | COLORADO COMMON CAUSE, the Colorado affiliate of Common Cause, a District of Columbia nonprofit corporation, Wayne N. Knox, a member of the House of Representatives of the Fifty-Seventh General Assembly of the State of Colorado, and Renita Greenberg, a citizen and taxpayer of the State of Colorado, Petitioners, v. Carl B. "Bev" BLEDSOE, Paul D. Schauer, Chris Paulson, Carol Taylor-Little, Jeanne M. Adkins, Don Ament, Norma V. Anderson, Steve Arveschoug, Charles E. Berry, Ken Chlouber, Mike Coffman, Charles Duke, Lewis H. Entz, Mary Ellen Epps, Jeanne Faatz, Marleen Fish, Faye Fleming, Tim Foster, Elwood Gillis, Tony Grampsas, Patrick A. Grant, John J. Irwin, William H. Jerke, Stanley F. Johnson, Bill Martin, Margaret Masson, Scott McInnis, Richard F. Mutzebaugh, Betty Neale, David T. Owen, Phil Pankey, Barbara Philips, Tom Ratterree, Jeff Shoemaker, Betty Swenson, Shirleen Tucker, John Ulvang, Dan Williams, and Kathi Williams, as members of the House of Representatives of the Fifty-Seventh General Assembly of the State of Colorado, Respondents. |
| Court | Colorado Supreme Court |
Hill & Robbins, Robert F. Hill, Ronald L. Wilcox, David R. Fine and Rothgerber, Appel, Powers & Johnson, James M. Lyons, Patrick M. Flaherty, Denver, for petitioners.
Welborn, Dufford, Brown & Tooley, P.C., Philip G. Dufford, Gregory A. Ruegsegger, Scott J. Mikulecky, Denver, for respondents.
In this C.A.R. 50 certiorari proceeding, the petitioners--a member of the General Assembly's house of representatives, a Colorado citizen, and Colorado Common Cause, a non-profit corporation organized as a "watchdog" for the stated purpose of improving governmental institutions (hereinafter "Common Cause")--seek review of a district court's order dismissing their complaint, which alleged that the respondents, caucus members of the majority party in the house of representatives, violated article V, section 22a, of the Colorado Constitution. Common Cause asserts that the district court erred in dismissing its complaint on the ground that the caucus members-legislators were absolutely immune from suit under the state constitution's speech-or-debate clause, Colo. Const. art. V, § 16. We affirm in part, reverse in part, and remand with directions.
In November 1988 the voters of the State of Colorado adopted article V, sections 22a and 22b, of the Colorado Constitution, effective January 3, 1989. See 1989 Colo.Sess.Laws 1664-65. Section 22a, the so-called "GAVEL amendment," an acronym for "Give A Vote to Each Legislator," prohibits members of the General Assembly from committing themselves, or requiring other members to commit themselves, "through a vote in a party caucus or any other similar procedure[ ] to vote in favor of or against any bill ... or other measure or issue pending or proposed to be introduced in the general assembly." Section 22b, the enforcement provision for the GAVEL amendment, provides that any action taken in violation of the GAVEL amendment shall be null and void. A General Assembly publication analyzing the initiative proposing the GAVEL amendment stated that the amendment was intended to address alleged problems associated with the caucus system used in the General Assembly:
Party caucuses meet, most often, to consider a position on a bill of major importance, usually involving taxation or expenditures of state funds. Party caucus members often feel compelled to vote with the position decided upon in the party caucus in order to form a majority vote block regardless of personal philosophy. Whether caucus members have been bound to a certain vote or subject to pressure from leadership is a matter of debate. Regardless, the effect of a party caucus position is that floor debate becomes a formality and the arguments of minority party members are rarely given consideration. The result is legislators in the minority party do not have a significant part in the decision-making process.
Legislative Council of the General Assembly, An Analysis of 1988 Ballot Proposals, at 20 (1988). The GAVEL amendment became effective January 3, 1989.
On April 3, 1989, the house of representatives received for its consideration Senate Bill No. 245, the so-called "long appropriations bill," which was titled "A Bill for an Act to Provide for the Payment of the Expenses of the Executive, Legislative and Judicial Departments of the State of Colorado, and of Its Agencies and Institutions, for and during the Fiscal Year Beginning July 1, 1989, Except as Otherwise Noted." The majority-party caucus of the house deliberated the appropriations bill from April 4, 1989, through April 12, 1989. 1
On numerous occasions during the majority-party caucus's deliberations, the caucus recessed and commitments were required and given by majority-party caucus members regarding how they would vote on portions of the appropriations bill when it was considered before the entire house of representatives. Initially the vote commitments were given in the hallway outside the caucus room; subsequently, the commitments were given in the caucus room itself. The appropriations bill was held in caucus until a number of caucus members sufficient to ensure passage on the house floor committed themselves to vote in favor of the bill. The bill became law on April 26, 1989.
From April 27, 1989, through May 2, 1989, the majority-party caucus members deliberated a transportation bill and again sought and obtained vote commitments. This bill, like the appropriations bill, was held in caucus until a number of caucus members sufficient to ensure passage on the house floor committed themselves to vote in favor of the bill. The bill did not become law. Another transportation bill, as well as other items, was scheduled to be considered on June 21, 1989, in a special session convened by the governor.
On May 24, 1989, Common Cause filed a complaint against the majority-party caucus members, seeking a declaratory judgment that the members' vote-commitment activities violated the GAVEL amendment, and an injunction prohibiting the members from further violating the GAVEL amendment. Common Cause also moved for a preliminary injunction prohibiting caucus members from violating the GAVEL amendment during the June 21, 1989, special session or any other session prior to the resolution of the lawsuit. In a brief in support of the motion for preliminary injunction, Common Cause argued that "a real and immediate danger" existed that the caucus members at the June 21, 1989, special session would continue to deprive Common Cause of its constitutional rights under the GAVEL amendment by continuing to seek and obtain vote commitments. Common Cause then served subpoenas on at least six caucus members, requiring that they appear as witnesses at a hearing on Common Cause's motion for a preliminary injunction. The caucus members moved to quash the subpoenas, and to dismiss the complaint pursuant to C.R.C.P. 12(b)(1) and (6).
In ruling on the motions, the district court "emphasize[d] that it [was] not deciding the validity of any legislative action," and ruled that the caucus members, as members of the General Assembly, were entitled to "absolute immunity from this lawsuit" by virtue of the Colorado Constitution's speech-or-debate clause. The district court dismissed the complaint, granted the motion to quash the subpoenas, and denied the motion for a preliminary injunction. Common Cause appealed to the court of appeals and filed pursuant to C.A.R. 50 a petition for certiorari, which we granted before the court of appeals rendered a decision. 2
We must first determine whether, as the caucus members suggest, the controversy in this case presents the kind of nonjusticiable "political question[ ] the resolution of which should be eschewed by the courts," Colorado General Assembly v. Lamm, 704 P.2d 1371, 1378 (Colo.1985).
The judiciary's avoidance of deciding political questions finds its roots in the Colorado Constitution's provisions separating the powers of state government, see, e.g., Colo. Const. art. III, and recognizes that certain issues are best left for resolution by the other branches of government, or "to be fought out on the hustings and determined by the people at the polls." People ex rel. Tate v. Prevost, 55 Colo. 199, 212, 134 P. 129, 133 (1913); accord People ex rel. Attorney General v. Tool, 35 Colo. 225, 232, 86 P. 224, 226 (1905); Whipple v. Hartzell, 25 Colo. 481, 483, 55 P. 186, 187 (1898); cf. Lamm, 704 P.2d at 1378-79 (). The "features" that may characterize a case raising a nonjusticiable political question have been most clearly identified in Baker v. Carr, 369 U.S. 186, 217, 82 S.Ct. 691, 710, 7 L.Ed.2d 663 (1962), quoted in United States v. Munoz-Flores, --- U.S. ----, 110 S.Ct. 1964, 1968, 109 L.Ed.2d 384 (1990):
"Prominent on the surface of any case held to involve a political question is found a textually demonstrable constitutional commitment of the issue to a coordinate political department; or a lack of judicially discoverable and manageable standards for resolving it; or the impossibility of deciding without an initial policy determination of a kind clearly for nonjudicial discretion; or the impossibility of a court's undertaking independent resolution without expressing lack of the respect due coordinate branches of government; or an unusual need for unquestioning adherence to a political decision already made; or the potentiality of embarrassment from multifarious pronouncements by various departments on one question."
See Wechsler, Toward Neutral Principles of Constitutional Law, 73 Harv.L.Rev. 1, 7-8 (1959) (...
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