Green v. Rawls

• Decision Date: 22 June 1960
• Citation: 122 So.2d 10
• Parties: Ray E. GREEN, as Comptroller of the State of Florida, Appellant, v. John S. RAWLS, Appellee.
• Court: Florida Supreme Court

Page 10

122 So.2d 10

Ray E. GREEN, as Comptroller of the State of Florida, Appellant, v. John S. RAWLS, Appellee.

Supreme Court of Florida.

June 22, 1960.

Richard W. Ervin, Atty. Gen., Ralph M. McLane and Joseph C. Jacobs, Asst. Atty. Gen., and Robert R. Crittenden and Gerald Mager, Sp. Asst. Attys. Gen., for appellant.

Leo L. Foster, W. J. Oven, Jr., John D. Moriarty and Caldwell, Parker, Foster, Madigan, Oven & Moriarty, Tallahassee, for appellee.

PER CURIAM.

This suit began in the Circuit Court of Leon County, Florida, with the filing by appellee of a complaint in which he sought to enjoin the appellant-comptroller from issuing and delivering warrants for salary to the Director of the Division of Corrections and to the State Forester in excess of the annual salary fixed by the legislature in ch. 59-500, Laws of Fla.1959, F.S.A. § 282.01, the general appropriations bill for the 1959-61 biennium.

The chancellor entered a final decree in which he granted the injunction and this appeal followed.

The facts leading up to this controversy are simple. As recited here they are taken from the final decree under attack, unless otherwise noted.

The general appropriations bill enacted by the 1959 Legislature, ch. 59-500, contained the following items:

"13. Corrections, Division Of

"a. General office

                        "1. Salaries-including salary
                             ____________________of $12,000 per annum
                             for the director and salaries
                             of 25 employees .......................... $  143,580  $  143,580
                        "2. Expenses ...................................... 53,739      53,779
                        "3. Operating capital outlay ...................... 12,816       7,100
                        "4. Special-discharge pay
                             of inmates in an amount
                             not exceeding $15 per
                             inmate and transportation
                             at not exceeding $25
                             per inmate, as provided
                             by law ....................................... 78,900       85,850
                                                                        ----------  -----------
                        "Subtotal (a) ................................. $  289,035  $  290,309"
                (Underscoring added.)
                "23.    Forestry, Florida Board of
                        "a. Salaries-including salary
                             ____________________of $10,000 per annum
                             for the state forester
                             and salaries of 890 employees
                             in 1959/60 and
                             891 employees in 1960/61 ................. $1,014,794  $1,005,004
                        "b. Expenses ..................................... 952,013     921,542
                        "c. Operating capital outlay ..................... 466,704     216,774
                                                                        ----------  -----------
                      "Total of Item No. 23 ........................... $2,433,511  $2,143,320"
                

(Underscoring added.)

When the general appropriation bill was presented to the Governor he disapproved and vetoed that portion of item 13(a)(1), underscored above, which reads 'of $12,000 per annum', and that portion of item 23(a), underscored above, which reads 'of $10,000 per annum.' The Governor left undisturbed the remainder of items 13 and 23.

In each instance the Governor gave as his reasons for vetoing the subject portions of the two items that the salaries so fixed were too low for the positions involved and stated that with the quoted language removed from each item the Budget Commission could, acting under general law, fix a larger salary for each such employee.

The bill of complaint shows that the general appropriations bill was passed by the legislature on May 28th, 1959, eight days before adjournment of that body, and that the Governor filed the bill with his veto message in the Office of the Secretary of State on June 19, 1959, fourteen days after adjournment of the legislature. As a result the plaintiff-appellee complained that '* * * since the biennium for which the appropriations were made will have practically expired before the ligislature convenes again, the legislature has been prevented from exercising its constitutional right to override the said purported 'veto', and the Executive Department has been enabled to thwart, evade, and ignore the authority, will, purpose and intent of the Legislature. * * *'

According to the complaint, following the veto by the Governor, the State Budget Commission on June 23, 1959 adopted a motion fixing the salary of the Director of the Division of Corrections at $13,000 per annum and fixing the salary of the State Forester at $12,000.

The chancellor determined that the settlement of this cause turned solely upon whether the language 'of $12,000 per annum' and 'of $10,000 per annum' as used in items 13 and 23 of the general appropriations bill were 'items' as the term is used in Art. IV, § 18, Fla.Const., F.S.A., which is the provision in our constitution which empowers the Governor to exercise the veto power over appropriations made by the legislature. This section reads as follows:

' § 18. Veto of Appropriations.---- The Governor shall have power to disapprove of any item or items of any bills making appropriations of money embracing distinct items, and the part or parts of the bill approved shall be the law, and the item or items of appropriation disapproved shall be void, unless repassed according to the rules and limitations prescribed for the passage of other bills over the Executive veto.'

The chancellor held that the legislature was '* * * within its constitutional powers when it submitted to the Governor a bill in which the salary of the Director of the Division of Corrections in a specified amount and the salaries of other employees of the general office of that department were submitted as a single item, dubject to veto as a whole, but not subject to veto in parts. The action of the Governor in disapproving a part only of an item of the appropriation bill was unauthorized by the constitution and ineffectual.'

As pointed out by the chancellor in his decree, two basic principles of our system of government are involved in the issue before us. The first is that no public money may be expended except after appropriation by the legislature. The second is that under our tripartite division of the powers of government, and the checks and balances designed to be accomplished thereby, the chief executive must have the power and the opportunity to veto legislative action, subject to the power of the legislature to override the executive veto by the vote of a specified number of the legislature.

The following constitutional history indicates the great effort expended by the people of this state in seeking to make effective in practice the power of veto of the chief executive over legislative action.

Our first three constitutions were so written as not to require the legislature to limit the number of subjects included in a single act of the legislature. The result was 'logrolling', a practice under which the legislature could include in a single act matters important to the people and desired by the Governor and other matters opposed by the Governor or harmful to the welfare of the state, with the result that in order to obtain the constructive or desired matter the Governor had to accept the unwanted portion. The veto power of the chief executive was thereby severely limited if not destroyed and one of the intended checks on the authority of the legislature was able to be negated in practice.

The constitution adopted in 1868 sought to and did overcome this for legislation other then appropriations bills through the inclusion of Art. IV, § 14, which now appears as Art. III, § 16 of our present constitution. This section provides that 'Each law enacted in the Legislature shall embrace but one subject and matter properly connected therewith * * *.'

Art. IV, § 30, Constitution of 1868, now Art. III, § 30, was designed to accomplish in appropriations bills what the provision recited in the foregoing paragraph required to be done in other laws. The present Art. III, § 30, requires that 'Laws making appropriations for the salaries of public officers and other current expenses of the state shall contain provisions on no other subject.'

Despite the salutary improvements brought about by the adoption of § 14 and § 30 Art. IV, Constitution of 1868, the legislature still retained almost unrestricted power in the field of appropriations and it was possible for the legislature to include in its appropriations bills allotments in amounts or for purposes not satisfactory to the Governor or in the public interest, and the Governor was forced either to veto the whole bill or accept the undesirable aspects of it. Thus insofar as appropriations bills were concerned the evil of 'logrolling' was not yet corrected.

In 1875 our state constitution was amended adding a section which in our present constitution appears as Art. IV, § 18.

This section, quoted earlier, gives the chief executive the power to veto 'items' in an appropriation bill and obviously was intended to further assist in eliminating 'logrolling' in appropriations bills.

With this history of the evolution of the power of the veto as granted the chief executive in Art. IV, § 18, Fla.Const., F.S.A., we can better understand and interpret the intent of the framers thereof and its meaning as it must be applied in the case before us.

The able chancellor pointed out in his decree that the pertinent constitutional provision, Art. IV, § 18, does not specifically require the legislature to divide an appropriations bill into 'items.' Said the chancellor:

'A literal application of the words used [in said Sec. 18] would limit the power of the Governor to veto 'items' to those bills in which the Legislature has actually made such a division of the subject matter of the appropriations. But this construction would enable the Legislature to defeat the obvious purpose of a constitutional provision by the form in which it prepares legislation, and for that...