Sonneman v. Hickel

• Decision Date: 14 August 1992
• Docket Number: No. S-4372,S-4372
• Parties: Joseph SONNEMAN, Appellant, v. Governor HICKEL, the State of Alaska, and other State Officers and Employees, Appellees.
• Court: Alaska Supreme Court

Page 936

836 P.2d 936

Joseph SONNEMAN, Appellant, v. Governor HICKEL, the State of Alaska, and other State

Officers and Employees, Appellees.

No. S-4372.

Supreme Court of Alaska.

Aug. 14, 1992.

Rehearing Filed August 24, 1992.

Joseph A. Sonneman, pro se.

Jack B. McGee, Asst. Atty. Gen., Charles E. Cole, Atty. Gen., Juneau, for appellees.

Before RABINOWITZ, C.J., and BURKE, MATTHEWS, COMPTON and MOORE, JJ.

OPINION

MATTHEWS, Justice.

This case challenges the act which created the Alaska Marine Highway System Fund, ch. 193, § 1, SLA 1990, AS 19.65.050-100, on the grounds that the fund is dedicated to a special purpose in violation of article IX, section 7 of the Alaska Constitution. The trial court ruled that the act was constitutional because it merely " 'allows' the legislature to appropriate funds from the fund to the Alaska Marine Highways but does not require it." We conclude that most of the act is constitutional, that the limitation on departmental power to request that the fund be appropriated for capital improvements violates article IX, section 7, and that this section is severable from the rest of the act.

Briefly, the act ¹ establishes the Alaska Marine Highway System Fund as a special account in the general fund. AS 19.65.060(a). The Alaska Marine Highway System, the entity responsible for the state's ferries, must deposit the gross revenue obtained from operating the ferry system into this account. The legislature "may appropriate" amounts from the fund back to the Alaska Marine Highway System. AS 19.65.080(a). In addition, the Department of Transportation and Public Facilities (DOTPF), within which the Marine Highway System is contained, may request that the legislature appropriate money from the fund to the Marine Highway System for capital improvements if certain conditions are met. First, the legislature must have made an annual appropriation from the fund. Second, the fund, without regard to the appropriation, must exceed the total of gross revenues plus non-lapsable general fund appropriations by ten percent. Finally, the request for capital appropriations may not exceed fifty percent of the balance remaining after the annual appropriation is made. AS 19.65.080(a) & (b).

The stated purposes of the fund are to "enhance performance and accountability," "provide the management tools necessary to efficiently operate" and, "within constitutional constraints, provide for a predictable funding base for system operations." AS 19.65.050(b). The legislature evidently intended that the Marine Highway System operate under constraints and incentives based partially on the revenues generated by the Marine Highway System. In order for this to work, there must be a reasonable expectation that the revenues generated by the system can be used by the system.

Section 7 of article IX of the Alaska Constitution provides: "The proceeds of any state tax or license shall not be dedicated to any special purpose...." ² The question is whether the act violates this constitutional prohibition. ³

The constitutional convention committee which drafted the prohibition on the dedication of funds commented that the reason for the prohibition is to preserve control of and responsibility for state spending in the legislature and the governor.

Even those persons or interests who seek the dedication of revenues for their own projects will admit that the earmarking of taxes or fees for other interests is a fiscal evil. But if allocation is permitted for one interest the denial of it to another is difficult, and the more special funds are set up the more difficult it becomes to deny other requests until the point is reached where neither the governor nor the legislature has any real control over the finances of the state. In one Rocky Mountain state the legislature is free to appropriate only 17 per cent of the tax collections; the rest are dedicated. In Alaska at present, 27 per cent of territorial funds are earmarked, primarily for school construction and roads.

6 Proceedings of the Alaska Constitutional Convention (PACC) Appendix V at 111 (Dec. 16, 1955).

Without earmarked funds, the constitutional framers believed that the legislature would be required to decide funding priorities annually on the merits of the various proposals presented. Delegate Barrie White, the spokesman for the committee which drafted section 7, stated in the convention debates:

[t]he Committee feels that if you accept the principle of not earmarking, it puts everyone in the same position and that the legislature will then be in the position being able to decide each case on its merits. If you go the other route and allow for earmarking or start drawing up all the exceptions that everybody would want to have drawn up, you are then back to the situation that most states now find themselves in, where an ever-increasing percentage of their revenues are earmarked for special purposes and an ever-decreasing amount is available to the general fund.

4 PACC 2364 (Jan. 17, 1956). Delegate White was then engaged in a colloquy about the appropriation of funds collected through licenses to agencies which had collected them:

Delegate Gray: "It doesn't earmark it but the talking point that these organizations have for the use of this money that is rightfully theirs, why, they haven't been precluded, they just have to sell their viewpoint to the legislature and if they need the money, why they probably could get it if they could talk them into it."

Delegate White: "They have to sell their viewpoint along with everybody else."

Id. at 2367.

The principle on which the act is based, that the administrators of the Alaska Marine Highway System and the legislature will treat the fund as if the Marine Highway System had a right to its proceeds, is inconsistent with the model contemplated by the anti-dedication clause, under which the disposition of all revenues will be decided anew on an annual basis. Nevertheless, the expectations created by the act are merely a "talking point" because they impose no legal restraint on the appropriation power of the legislature.

The act clearly states that the fund is part of the general fund and it may not be spent until and unless it is appropriated by the legislature. AS 19.65.060(b). ⁴ However, Sonneman argues that the act prohibits the legislature from appropriating money from the fund to government purposes other than the Marine Highway System. Although there is no explicit prohibition, Sonneman contends that there is an implicit one based on a maxim of statutory construction and on various expressions of intent found in the legislative history. The State contends that the act does not prohibit the legislature from using money in the fund for any purpose and, more generally, that the act is basically only an accounting tool designed to give a clear picture of Marine Highway System revenues to the legislature and to the Marine Highway System administrators. We turn first to Sonneman's statutory construction argument.

Since the act states that "the legislature may appropriate amounts from the ... fund to the ... marine highway system," AS 19.65.080(a), Sonneman argues that by implication the legislature may not appropriate amounts from the fund for any other purpose. This argument is based on the maxim expressio unius est exclusio alterius, meaning the expression of one thing implies the exclusion of others. While this maxim is often a useful and logical guide to the meaning of an enactment, it does not always apply. We declined to apply it in Chevron USA, Inc. v. LeResche, 663 P.2d 923, 930-31 (Alaska 1983), finding that the limitation which would result if the maxim were utilized was contrary to the purpose of the statute. Similarly, in the present case it seems clear that the enactment was not intended to legally restrict the power of the legislature to appropriate money from the fund for any purpose. Such a restriction would amount to a dedication of the fund for a special purpose, and given the holding in Alex, the fund would be in violation of the anti-dedication clause. Alaska Statute 19.65.060(b), however, states that nothing in the act "dedicates [Fund money] for a specific purpose." Therefore AS 19.65.080(a) is best read as not implying a prohibition on legislative appropriation of fund money to other than Marine Highway System purposes. This conclusion is bolstered by the rule of interpretation that statutes should be construed if reasonably possible so as to avoid a conclusion that they are unconstitutional. State v. Fairbanks North Star Borough, 736 P.2d 1140, 1142 (Alaska 1987).

Sonneman also argues that various comments made by legislators in the process of enactment of the act indicate an intent to use fund revenues only for marine highway purposes. See AS 19.65.050(b)(1), infra note 1. While there are many such comments, ⁵ there are also a number of statements that the fund would be legally unrestricted and could be appropriated by the legislature for any purpose. ⁶ As noted, the act expressly states that it does not dedicate money for a specific purpose. The mixed legislative history is insufficiently persuasive to require a construction of the act at variance with its apparent plain meaning. See Alex, 646 P.2d at 208-09 n. 4 ("the plainer the language, the more convincing contrary legislative history must be").

While the act as we construe it does not restrict the authority of the legislature to appropriate money from the fund, the act is more than merely a legislatively mandated system of accounting. It does restrict executive authority to seek appropriations from the fund. See AS 19.65.080(b). This restriction on DOTPF's authority to request the appropriation of money for capital improvements violates article IX, section 7.

One method of dedicating funds is to preclude the legislature from appropriating designated funds for any reason other than a designated purpose. Another less direct...