Title, Ballot Title and Submission Clause, and Summary for 1999-2000 No. 25, In re, 98SA388

• Decision Date: 22 February 1999
• Docket Number: No. 98SA388,98SA388
• Citation: 974 P.2d 458
• Parties: 1999 CJ C.A.R. 1014 In the Matter of the TITLE, BALLOT TITLE AND SUBMISSION CLAUSE, AND SUMMARY FOR 1999-2000 # 25, John S. Outcelt, Petitioner, v. Douglas Bruce and Jeffrey Wright, Respondents, and Rebecca Lennahan and Richard Westfall, Title Board.
• Court: Colorado Supreme Court

Page 458

974 P.2d 458

1999 CJ C.A.R. 1014

In the Matter of the TITLE, BALLOT TITLE AND SUBMISSION

CLAUSE, AND SUMMARY FOR 1999-2000 # 25, John S. Outcelt, Petitioner, v. Douglas Bruce and Jeffrey Wright, Respondents, and Rebecca Lennahan and Richard Westfall, Title Board.

No. 98SA388.

Supreme Court of Colorado,

En Banc.

Feb. 22, 1999.

Susan E. Burch, Denver, Colorado, Attorney for Petitioner.

Douglas Bruce, Pro Se, Colorado Springs, Colorado.

No appearance on behalf of Respondent Jeffrey Wright.

Ken Salazar, Attorney General, Michael E. McLachlan, Solicitor General, Barbara McDonnell, Chief Deputy Attorney General, Paul Farley, Deputy Attorney General, Maurice G. Knaizer, Deputy Attorney General, State Services Section, Denver, Colorado, Attorneys for Title Board.

Justice RICE delivered the Opinion of the Court.

Petitioner, John S. Outcelt, brought these original proceedings under section 1-40-107(2), 1 C.R.S. (1998). Petitioner seeks review of the Title Board's (Board) September 2, 1998 action in fixing the titles, ballot titles and submission clauses, and summaries (titles and summaries) for three proposed ballot initiatives designated "1999-2000 # 25" (Initiative # 25), "1999-2000 # 26" (Initiative # 26), and "1999-2000 # 27" (Initiative # 27). ¹ Because these initiatives are nearly identical, we consolidated the proceedings for review in this court. ²

Petitioner argues that these initiatives are unconstitutional because: (1) the initiatives contain more than one subject; (2) the titles and summaries fail to express the true intent and meaning of the initiatives; (3) the titles and summaries are misleading and fail to reflect the true fiscal impact of the proposals; (4) the titles and summaries fail to conform with Article X, section 20(3)(c) of the Colorado Constitution; and (5) the titles and summaries contain a prejudicial catch phrase.

We agree with the first and second of the foregoing contentions because the Board has acknowledged that it cannot comprehend the initiative well enough to state its single subject in the title. Accordingly, we reverse the Board's action.

I.

Each of the initiatives at issue proposes to add a new paragraph (d) to subsection (8) of section 20 of Article X of the Colorado Constitution, which is commonly known as Amendment 1. Under Initiative # 25, the new paragraph (d) would read as follows:

A $25 tax cut, increased $25 yearly (to $50, $75 ...), shall lower each tax bill for each 2001 and later district: utility customer tax and franchise charge; vehicle ownership tax; yearly income tax; property tax spent on human and health services, economic development, retirement benefits, enterprises, authorities, courts, jails, libraries, schools, elections and district attorney, assessor, financial, and legal offices combined; income or property tax equal to the combined yearly cost of lease-purchases, unbonded obligations not paid or offset by a pledged cash reserve in the year created, tax-increment financing, tax and spending and future local debt increases voter-approved after 1992 that last more than 10 years after approval, excess revenue for more than one year per election, revenue increases voter-approved after 2000 above a fixed tax rate and a fixed maximum number of dollars yearly, and tax credits and rebates unless voter-approved, for overpayment, or for general refunds of excess or illegal revenue; income or property tax equal to prior year revenue above 99% of its spending limits; income or property tax equal to yearly revenue from a tax rate increased or a spending limit percentage, computed since 1992, exceeded from 1993 through 2000, except by a fixed tax rate and a voter-approved fixed maximum number of dollars yearly; income or property tax equal to yearly revenue of each authority wholly or partly created by or related to the district but outside fiscal year spending limits, computed since 1992, and yearly cost of all state and local tax and business charge exemptions related to each authority and enterprise; and remaining business personal property tax. (8)(d) does not require specific ballot issue titles or content, does not apply to impair those binding contracts or debts existing in 2000, and does not increase state or local tax or spending limits; the state shall replace local tax cut revenue when the state has a fiscal year revenue increase from all sources of $200 million or more above that year's increase in local replacement, and shall audit each limit yearly; (8)(d) shall be strictly construed--substantial compliance is insufficient--and not balanced or harmonized with existing provisions; and all attorney fees and costs to enforce (8)(d) shall always be paid to successful plaintiffs only.

(Emphasis in original.)

The only difference in the new paragraph (d) under Initiative # 26 is that it contemplates an initial thirty dollar tax cut, increased by an additional thirty dollars each year thereafter. Initiative # 27 differs only insofar as it contemplates an initial twenty-five dollar tax cut, increased by an additional twenty-five dollars the next year, and increased by fifty dollars each year thereafter.

Under the instant initiatives, the new paragraph (d) would progressively lower various state and local taxes. This tax reduction would, in turn, reduce the revenue which municipalities, school districts, and various special districts depend upon to fund local programs such as human and health services, retirement benefits, district attorney and assessors offices, schools, libraries, courts, and jails. Under the terms of the instant initiatives, the state would only be required to replace the resultant shortfall in revenue for local programs in years when the state's fiscal year revenue exceeded the amount of the shortfall by $200 million or more.

II.

The petitioner's first contention is that the instant initiatives contain multiple subjects in violation of Article V, section 1(5.5) of the Colorado Constitution. See also § 1-40-106.5, 1 C.R.S. (1998). Specifically, the petitioner contends that the initiatives include the following subjects: (1) the implementation of various state and local tax cuts; (2) a corresponding transfer of funding responsibility from the local government to the state government, which will result in the reduction of state spending on state programs; (3) the requirement to set ballot titles which fix maximum tax rates; and (4) the implementation of franchise fee cuts. The petitioner also contends that the titles and summaries set by the Board are misleading because they do not clearly express the single subject of the proposed initiatives. Given the interdependent nature of these arguments, we address them together.

A.

A brief historical review of the single-subject and clear title requirements provides the necessary background for our decision. The single-subject and clear title concepts first arose in the context of bills proposed by the General Assembly and were a part of our state's first constitution. Article V, section 21 of the Colorado Constitution provides:

No bill, except general appropriation bills, shall be passed containing more than one subject, which shall be clearly expressed in its title; but if any subject shall be embraced in any act which shall not be expressed in the title, such act shall be void only as to so much thereof as shall not be so expressed.

Thus, the express language of Article V, section 21 embraces two interdependent mandates: one forbidding the union of separate and distinct subjects in the same legislative bill, and the other commanding that the single subject treated in the body of the bill shall be clearly expressed in its title. See In re Breene, 14 Colo. 401, 404, 406, 24 P. 3, 3-4 (1890); see also Research Memorandum No. 2, "Bills to Contain Single Subject: No Change of Original Purpose," Colorado Legislative Drafting Office, Dec. 1971, at 6 (discussing how Article V, section 21 addresses these two separate, but related, requirements). As the Breene court held:

[the constitutional provision] embraces two mandates, vis.: one forbidding the union in the same legislative bill of separate and distinct subjects, and the other commanding that the subject treated in the body of the bill shall be clearly expressed in its title. Each of these mandates is designed to obviate flagrant evils connected with the adoption of laws. The former prevents joining in the same act disconnected and incongruous matters. The purpose of the latter is ... "to prevent the passage of unknown and alien subjects, which might be coiled up in the folds of the bill."

In re Breene, 14 Colo. at 404, 24 P. at 3-4 (citation omitted).

We first addressed the single-subject aspect of this constitutional provision in a trio of cases decided around the turn of the century. In 1890, we interpreted this provision to prohibit a single legislative act from addressing "disconnected and incongruous matters." Id. at 404, 24 P. at 3. Three years later, we held that the requirement that a bill be limited to a single subject serves the beneficent purpose of making each legislative proposal depend upon its own merits for passage and, therefore, forbids a bill from containing "subjects having no necessary or proper connection." Catron v. Board of County Comm'rs, 18 Colo. 553, 557, 33 P. 513, 514 (1893). Finally, we held in People ex rel. Elder v. Sours, 31 Colo. 369, 403, 74 P. 167, 177 (1903), that in order for the text of a bill to constitute more than one subject, it "must have at least two distinct and separate purposes which are not dependent upon or connected with each other."

Although we have not been frequently presented with the issue of whether proposed legislation contains more than one subject, ³ we have had occasion to apply the foregoing legal standard in two recent cases. In Parrish v. Lamm, 758 P.2d 1356, 1360 (Colo.1988), we reviewed a statute which sought to prohibit health care providers from...