Title: Bartlett v. Evers

State: wisconsin

Issuer: Wisconsin Supreme Court

Document:

2020 WI 68 
 
SUPREME COURT OF WISCONSIN 
 
 
 
 
 
CASE NO.: 
2019AP1376-OA 
 
 
 
COMPLETE TITLE: 
Nancy Bartlett, Richard Bowers, Jr. and Ted 
Keneklis, 
          Petitioners, 
     v. 
Tony Evers, in his official capacity as Governor 
of the State of Wisconsin, Joel Brennan, in his 
official capacity as Secretary of the Wisconsin 
Department of Administration, Wisconsin 
Department of Administration, Craig Thompson, in 
his official capacity as Secretary of  
the Wisconsin Department of Transportation, 
Wisconsin Department of Transportation, Peter 
Barca, in his official capacity as Secretary of 
the Wisconsin Department of Revenue, and 
Wisconsin Department of Revenue, 
          Respondents. 
 
 
 
 
 
ORIGINAL ACTION 
 
 
OPINION FILED: 
July 10, 2020   
SUBMITTED ON BRIEFS: 
        
ORAL ARGUMENT: 
April 20, 2020   
 
 
SOURCE OF APPEAL: 
 
 
COURT: 
        
 
COUNTY: 
        
 
JUDGE: 
        
 
 
 
JUSTICES: 
 
ROGGENSACK, C.J., filed an opinion concurring in part and 
dissenting in part.  ANN WALSH BRADLEY, J., filed an opinion 
concurring in part and dissenting in part, in which DALLET, J., 
joined.  KELLY, J., filed an opinion concurring in part and 
dissenting in part, in which REBECCA GRASSL BRADLEY, J. joined.   
HAGEGDORN, J., filed a concurring opinion, in which ZIEGLER, J., 
joined. 
NOT PARTICIPATING: 
        
 
 
 
ATTORNEYS: 
 
 
 
 
2 
For the petitioners, there were briefs filed by Richard M. 
Esenberg, Anthony LoCoco, Lucas T. Vebber, Luke N. Berg, and 
Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty, Milwaukee. There was an 
oral argument by Richard M. Esenberg. 
 
For the respondents, there were briefs filed by Colin T. Roth 
and Maura FJ Whelan, assistant attorneys general; with whom on the 
brief was Joshua L. Kaul, attorney general. There was an oral 
argument by Colin T. Roth. 
 
An amicus curiae brief was filed on behalf of The Legislature 
by Misha Tseytlin, Kevin M. LeRoy, and Troutman Sanders LLP, 
Chicago, Illinois. There was an oral argument by Misha Tseytlin.  
 
 
 
 
2020 WI 68 
NOTICE 
This opinion is subject to further 
editing and modification.  The final 
version will appear in the bound 
volume of the official reports.   
No.   2019AP1376-OA 
 
 
STATE OF WISCONSIN  
 
 
   : 
IN SUPREME COURT 
 
 
Nancy Bartlett, Richard Bowers, Jr. and  
Ted Keneklis, 
 
          Petitioners, 
 
     v. 
 
Tony Evers, in his official capacity as 
Governor of the State of Wisconsin,  
Joel Brennan, in his official capacity as 
Secretary of the Wisconsin Department of 
Administration, Wisconsin Department of 
Administration, Craig Thompson, in his official 
capacity as Secretary of the Wisconsin 
Department of Transportation, Wisconsin 
Department of Transportation, Peter Barca, in 
his official capacity as Secretary of the 
Wisconsin Department of Revenue, and Wisconsin 
Department of Revenue, 
 
          Respondents. 
 
FILED 
 
JUL 10, 2020 
 
Sheila T. Reiff 
Clerk of Supreme Court 
 
 
 
 
¶1 
PER CURIAM.   We review the petitioners' original action 
requesting a declaration that Governor Evers exceeded his 
constitutional authority to partially veto appropriation bills.  
The petitioners assert that four series of partial vetoes in 2019 
Wis. Act 9——the state's 2019-21 biennial budget bill——are 
unconstitutional. 
No. 
2019AP1376-OA   
 
2 
 
¶2 
The parties refer to the provisions based on their 
content before the vetoes:  (1) the school bus modernization fund; 
(2) the local roads improvement fund; (3) the vapor products tax 
and (4) the vehicle fee schedule. 
¶3 
The petitioners contend that the four series of vetoes 
are unconstitutional.  Article V, Section 10(1)(b) of the Wisconsin 
Constitution provides that the governor may approve appropriation 
bills "in whole or in part."   
¶4 
No rationale has the support of a majority.  However, a 
majority 
has 
reached 
a 
conclusion 
with 
respect 
to 
the 
constitutionality of each series of vetoes.  Five justices conclude 
that the vetoes to the school bus modernization fund are 
unconstitutional.  The same five also conclude that the vetoes to 
the local roads improvement fund are unconstitutional.1  Four 
justices conclude that the vetoes to the vapor products tax are 
unconstitutional.2  Five justices conclude that the vetoes to the 
vehicle fee schedule are constitutional.3    
¶5 
Chief Justice Roggensack concludes that the vetoes to 
the school bus modernization fund and the local roads improvement 
                                                 
1 Chief Justice Roggensack and Justices Ziegler, Rebecca 
Grassl Bradley, Kelly and Hagedorn conclude that these series of 
vetoes are unconstitutional. 
2 Justices Ziegler, Rebecca Grassl 
Bradley, Kelly and Hagedorn 
conclude that the vetoes to the vapor products tax are 
unconstitutional. 
3 Chief Justice Roggensack and Justices Ann Walsh Bradley, 
Ziegler, Dallet and Hagedorn conclude that the vetoes to the 
vehicle fee schedule are constitutional. 
No. 
2019AP1376-OA   
 
3 
 
fund are unconstitutional because they "resulted in topics and 
subject matters that were not found in the enrolled bill."  Chief 
Justice Roggensack's concurrence/dissent, ¶99.  She also concludes 
that the vetoes to the vapor products tax and vehicle fee schedule 
are constitutional because they did not alter "the topic or subject 
matter of the part approved."  Id., ¶106. 
¶6 
Justice Ann Walsh Bradley and Justice Dallet conclude 
that the four series of vetoes are constitutional because they 
"result[ed] in objectively complete, entire, and workable laws."  
Justice 
Ann 
Walsh 
Bradley's 
concurrence/dissent, 
¶170.  
Consequently, they would not grant relief. 
¶7 
Justice Kelly and Justice Rebecca Grassl Bradley 
conclude that the four series of vetoes are unconstitutional.  
Justice Kelly's concurrence/dissent, ¶230.  They conclude that the 
vetoes violate the Wisconsin Constitution's origination clause, 
amendment clause and legislative passage clause.  Id., ¶¶223, 225-
26, 228. 
¶8 
Justice Hagedorn and Justice Ziegler conclude that the 
vetoes to the school bus modernization fund, the local roads 
improvement fund and the vapor products tax are unconstitutional.  
Justice Hagedorn's concurrence, ¶¶269–75.  They also conclude that 
the vetoes to the vehicle fee schedule are constitutional because 
they merely negated a policy proposal advanced by the legislature.  
Id., ¶268. 
¶9 
Accordingly, rights are declared such that the vetoes to 
the school bus modernization fund, the local roads improvement 
fund and the vapor products tax are unconstitutional and invalid.  
No. 
2019AP1376-OA   
 
4 
 
Relief is granted such that the portions of the enrolled bills 
that were vetoed are in full force and effect as drafted by the 
legislature.  See State ex rel. Sundby v. Adamany, 71 Wis. 2d 118, 
125, 237 N.W.2d 910 (1976).  The vetoes to the vehicle fee schedule 
are constitutional, and no relief is granted with respect to these 
vetoes. 
By the Court.-Rights declared; relief granted in part and 
denied in part. 
 
 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
1 
 
¶10 PATIENCE DRAKE ROGGENSACK, C.J.   (concurring in part, 
dissenting in part).  This is an original action brought by three 
taxpayers, Nancy Bartlett, Richard Bowers, Jr. and Ted Keneklis 
(Taxpayers) against Governor Tony Evers and other government 
officials and agencies.  Taxpayers challenge the validity of 
several vetoes Governor Evers made to the 2019–21 biennial budget.1  
Specifically, they challenge a series of vetoes that changed a 
school bus modernization fund into an alternative fuel fund.  They 
also challenge another series that removed conditions from a local 
road improvement fund, effectively changing it into a fund for 
"local grants" or "local supplements."  Third, they challenge a 
series of vetoes that altered a vehicle fee schedule by changing 
the amount truck owners must pay to register their vehicles.  
Lastly, they challenge one veto that altered a section that imposed 
a tax on "vapor products" by expanding the definition of vapor 
product to include liquid heated by a vaping device.  Taxpayers 
assert that these vetoes went beyond the governor's partial veto 
power, which is provided in Article V, Section 10(1)(b) of the 
Wisconsin Constitution:  "Appropriation bills may be approved in 
whole or in part by the governor, and the part approved shall 
become law." 
¶11 I conclude that the part approved by the governor, i.e., 
the consequences of the partial veto, must not alter the topic or 
                                                 
1 "The Wisconsin budget process covers two fiscal years at a 
time——a biennium."  Benjamin W. Proctor, Comment, Wisconsin's 
Chief Legislator:  The Governor's Partial Veto Authority and the 
New Tipping Point, 90 Marq. L. Rev. 739, 739 n.3 (2007). 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
2 
 
subject matter of the "whole" bill before the veto.2  Stated 
otherwise, such a veto does not alter the stated legislative idea 
that initiated the enrolled bill.  Therefore, Governor Evers could 
not use his partial veto power to change the school bus 
modernization fund into an alternative fuel fund.  Nor could he 
use his partial veto to change the local road improvement fund 
into a fund for local grants or local supplements, devoid of any 
requirements that it be used for local roads.  I partially concur 
with the per curiam opinion that these two series of vetoes are 
invalid and have no effect on the law enacted by the legislature.  
I further partially concur that he lawfully used his partial veto 
power to alter the amount truck owners must pay to register their 
vehicles.  However, I partially dissent from the per curiam opinion 
because he also lawfully used his partial veto to alter the 
definition of vapor product.  This veto should stand. 
I.  BACKGROUND 
¶12 On June 25 and 26, 2019, the Wisconsin State Assembly 
and Senate, respectively, passed the 2019–21 biennial budget bill.  
The enrolled bill was presented to Governor Evers, who signed it 
with several vetoes on July 3, 2019.3  On July 31, 2019, Taxpayers 
filed an original action, which was amended on August 19, 2019.  
We took jurisdiction.  The legislature filed an amicus brief, 
generally supporting Taxpayers. 
                                                 
2 "Once identical versions of a bill pass both the state 
assembly and the state senate, the bill is referred to as an 
'enrolled bill' and is ready for the governor's consideration."  
Id. at 741 n.19. 
3 2019 Wis. Act 9. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
3 
 
A.  The School Bus Modernization Fund 
¶13 The first series of vetoes changed a school bus 
modernization fund into an alternative fuel fund.  For context, 
the State of Wisconsin is a beneficiary of a trust created by a 
consent decree following litigation against Volkswagen.  The terms 
of the trust establish various permissible uses:  
[T]he state could utilize funding from the trust to 
scrap, and then repower or replace certain eligible 
vehicles and equipment, including:  (a) Class 8 local 
freight trucks and port drayage trucks; (b) Class 4 
through 8 school buses, shuttle buses, or transit buses; 
(c) freight switchers; (d) ferries and tugs; (e) ocean 
going vessels shore power; (f) Class 4 through 7 local 
freight trucks; (g) airport ground support equipment; 
(h) forklifts and port cargo handling equipment; and 
(i) light duty zero emission vehicle supply equipment 
(electric or hydrogen vehicle charging stations).[4] 
During the 2017–19 biennium, Wisconsin used the settlement funds 
"for replacing eligible state vehicles and for awarding grants to 
transit systems to replace eligible public transit vehicles."5   
¶14 For 2019–21, Governor Evers proposed a budget that would 
have expanded uses of the settlement funds to include "the 
installation of charging stations for vehicles with an electric 
                                                 
4 Executive Session Record for Paper #505 from the Record of 
Committee Proceedings on 2019 Assembly Bill 56 (Paper #505) at 3 
(June 
6, 
2019), 
https://docs.legis.wisconsin.gov/misc/lfb/budget/2019_21_biennia
l_budget/102_budget_papers/505_volkswagen_settlement_volkswagen_
settlement.pdf. 
5 Joint Committee on Finance Motion #129 (Motion #129) (June 
6, 
2019), 
https://docs.legis.wisconsin.gov/misc/lfb/jfcmotions/2019/2019_0
6_06/008_volkswagen_settlement/002_motion_129_volkswagen_settlem
ent.pdf.  
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
4 
 
motor."6  The Legislature's Joint Committee on Finance rejected 
Governor Evers' proposal, instead opting to create a school bus 
modernization fund to aid school boards in purchasing "energy 
efficient" school buses.7   
¶15 Governor Evers utilized his partial veto power to 
attempt to accomplish his initial proposal.  To do so, he partially 
vetoed § 55c and vetoed the entirety of § 9101(2i). 
¶16 The markup of § 55c reads: 
16.047(4s) of the statutes is created to read: 
16.047 (4s) SCHOOL BUS REPLACEMENT GRANTS.  (a) In this 
subsection: 1.  "School board" has the meaning given in 
s. 115.001(7).2.  "School bus" has the meaning given in 
s. 121.51(4).(b)  The department [of administration] 
shall establish a program to award grants of settlement 
funds from the appropriation under s. 20.855(4)(h) to 
school boards for the replacement of school buses owned 
and operated by the school boards with school buses that 
are energy efficient, including school buses that use 
alternative fuels.  Any school board may apply for a 
grant under the program.  (c) As a condition of receiving 
a grant under this subsection, the school board shall 
provide matching funds equal to the amount of the grant 
award.  (d) A school board may use settlement funds 
awarded under this subsection only for the payment of 
costs incurred by the school board to replace school 
buses in accordance with the settlement guidelines. 
As partially vetoed, the section states: "The department shall 
establish a program to award grants of settlement funds from the 
appropriation under s. 20.855(4)(h) for alternative fuels." 
                                                 
6 2019 Assembly Bill 56, §§ 52, 53 & 54; see also Paper #505, 
at 2 (explaining the governor wanted to "[e]xpand DOA's authority 
to use settlement monies to award grants for the replacement of 
public transit vehicles to also include awarding grants for the 
installation of charging stations for electric vehicles"). 
7 Joint Stipulation of Facts and Joint Statement that There 
Are No Material Disputed Facts (Joint Statement), ¶¶21–22. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
5 
 
¶17 Governor Evers vetoed the entirety of § 9101(2i): 
(2i) VOLKSWAGEN SETTLEMENT FUNDS. Of the settlement 
funds in s. 20.855(4)(h), during the 2019–21 fiscal 
biennium, 
the 
department 
of 
administration 
shall 
allocate $3,000,000 for grants under s. 16.047 (4s) for 
the replacement of school buses. 
B.  The Local Road Improvement Fund 
¶18 The second series of vetoes removed conditions from a 
local road improvement fund, effectively changing it into a fund 
for "local grants" or "local supplements," which did not require 
expenditures for local roads.  For context: "[the Department of 
Transportation] DOT administers the Local Roads Improvement 
Program (LRIP) to assist political subdivisions in improving 
seriously deteriorating local roads by reimbursing political 
subdivisions for certain improvements.  LRIP includes an 
entitlement component and a discretionary component."8 
¶19 Governor Evers partially vetoed §§ 126 and 184s and 
vetoed the entirety of § 1095m.  Section 126, schedule item Wis. 
Stat. 
§ 20.395(2)(fc), 
of 
the 
enrolled 
bill 
appropriated 
$90,000,000 for local road improvement as a discretionary 
supplement.9  The markup reads:  "(fc) Local roads improvement 
discretionary supplement . . . 90,000,000 [and Governor Evers 
wrote in 75,000,000]."  As partially vetoed, the scheduled item 
states:  "Local supplement . . . 75,000,000." 
                                                 
8 Legislative Reference Bureau Analysis of 2019 Assembly Bill 
56 
(Analysis 
of 
Bill 
56), 
at 
90, 
https:// 
docs.legis.wisconsin.gov/2019/related/proposals/ab56.pdf. 
9 Joint Statement, ¶24. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
6 
 
¶20 Governor 
Evers 
also 
partially 
vetoed 
§ 184s: 
"20.395(2)(fc) of the statutes is created to read:  20.395(2) (fc) 
Local roads improvement discretionary supplement.  From the 
general fund, as a continuing appropriation, the amounts in the 
schedule 
for 
the 
local 
roads 
improvement 
discretionary 
supplemental grant program under s. 86.31 (3s)."  As partially 
vetoed, the section states:  "Local supplement.  From the general 
fund, as a continuing appropriation, the amounts in the schedule 
for local grant [sic]." 
¶21 Governor Evers vetoed the entirety of § 1095m: 
86.31 (3s) of the statutes is created to read: 86.31 
(3s) DISCRETIONARY SUPPLEMENTAL GRANTS.  (a) Funds 
provided under s. 20.395 (2) (fc) shall be distributed 
under this subsection as discretionary grants to 
reimburse political subdivisions for improvements.  The 
department shall solicit and provide discretionary 
grants 
under 
this 
subsection 
until 
all 
funds 
appropriated under s. 20.395 (2) (fc) have been 
expended.  (b) 1.  From the appropriation under s. 20.395 
(2) (fc), the department shall allocate $32,003,200 in 
fiscal year 2019–20, to fund county trunk highway 
improvements.  2.  From the appropriation under s. 
20.395(2) 
(fc), 
the 
department 
shall 
allocate 
$35,149,400 in fiscal year 2019–20, to fund town road 
improvements.  3. From the appropriation under s. 20.395 
(2) (fc), the department shall allocate $22,847,000 in 
fiscal 
year 
2019–20, 
to 
fund 
municipal 
street 
improvement projects.  (c) Notwithstanding sub. (4), a 
political subdivision may apply to the department under 
this subsection for reimbursement of not more than 90 
percent of eligible costs of an improvement. 
C.  The Vehicle Fee Schedule 
¶22 A third series of vetoes altered the amount truck owners 
must pay to register their vehicles.  Registration fees had varied 
depending on the weight class of the vehicle.  Section 1988b of 
the enrolled bill would have made the fee for four weight classes 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
7 
 
the same.  In so doing, it would have increased the fee for two 
weight classes and decreased the fee for two others.  Governor 
Evers used his partial veto powers to retain the legislature's 
proposed fee increases and void its proposed decreases.  In the 
marked-up language, italicized words represent deletions by the 
legislature, underlined words represent insertions by the 
legislature and crossed-out words represent partial vetoes by 
Governor Evers: 
341.25(2)(a) to (cm) of the statutes are amended to read: 
341.25 (2)(a) Not more than 4,500 $ 75.00 100.00 (b) Not 
more than 6,000 . . . . . . . . . . 84.00 100.00 (c) Not 
more than 8,000 . . . . . . . . . . 106.00 100.00 (cm) 
Not more than 10,000 . . . . . . . . . . 155.00 100.00 
¶23 The parties stipulated to a table that summarizes the 
changes:10 
 
 
                                                 
10 Id., ¶33. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
8 
 
Maximum 
Gross 
Weight in 
Pounds 
Pre-Act 9 
Annual 
Fee 
Annual Fee 
Approved by 
the 
Legislature 
Annual Fee 
Chosen by 
Governor 
Evers 
Not more 
than 4,500 
$75.00 
$100.00 
$100.00 
Not more 
than 6,000 
$84.00 
$100.00 
$100.00 
Not more 
than 8,000 
$106.00 
$100.00 
$106.00 
Not more 
than 10,000 
$155.00 
$100.00 
$155.00 
D.  The Vapor Products Tax 
¶24 The last challenged veto altered a section that imposed 
a tax on "vapor products" by expanding the definition of vapor 
product to include liquid heated by a vaping device.  For context, 
sometimes vaping fluid is sold separately from vaping devices.  An 
analogy is pipe tobacco, which is sold separately from pipes.  
Section 1754 of the enrolled bill defined vapor products to include 
the hardware that produces vapor from the application of a heating 
element to liquid.  However, the definition did not encompass the 
liquid.  Governor Evers partially vetoed a clause in the 
definition, which expanded it to include the liquid: 
139.75 (14) of the statutes is created to read: 139.75 
(14) "Vapor product" means a noncombustible product that 
produces vapor or aerosol for inhalation from the 
application of a heating element to a liquid or other 
substance that is depleted as the product is used, 
regardless of whether the liquid or other substance 
contains nicotine. 
II.  DISCUSSION 
A.  Standard of Review 
¶25 As this is an original action, we have no lower court 
opinion to review.11  We are required to interpret Article V, 
                                                 
11 Original jurisdiction is proper under Wis. Const. art. VII, 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
9 
 
Section 10(1)(b) to decide the pending controversy, which presents 
a question of law.  Koschkee v. Taylor, 2019 WI 76, ¶9, 387 Wis. 2d 
552, 929 N.W.2d 600. 
¶26 Taxpayers ask us to overturn our precedent in part.  They 
bear the burden of persuading us to do so.  State v. Breitzman, 
2017 WI 100, ¶5 n.4, 378 Wis. 2d 431, 904 N.W.2d 93. 
B.  Overview of the Partial Veto Power 
¶27 Taxpayers argue that some of our decisions have deviated 
from the original meaning of Article V, Section 10(1)(b) and that 
we should return to the original meaning.  They assert, "[a]s 
originally enacted, Article V, Section 10(1)(b) of the Wisconsin 
Constitution authorized the governor to approve or disapprove 
legislative proposals capable of separate enactment but appearing 
in a single bill, nothing more."  Therefore, I thoroughly analyze 
the constitutional text and our precedent.  In addition, I consider 
failed and successful amendments to the governor's partial veto 
power to demonstrate that the people of Wisconsin have actively 
responded to our decisions when they have deemed it proper to do 
so. 
1.  Amendment of Article V, Section 10 
¶28 The Wisconsin Constitution, as originally adopted in 
1848, did not allow the governor to veto less than an entire bill.  
At that time, no state constitution authorized the veto of less 
than an entire bill.  Such authority first appeared in the 
constitution of the Confederate States in 1861 and was limited to 
                                                 
§ 3(2).  We have invoked our original jurisdiction to interpret 
the scope of the governor's partial veto powers on eight prior 
occasions, which are discussed below. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
10 
 
appropriations bills.  Henry Campbell Black, Relation of the 
Executive Power to Legislation 103 (1919).  By 1919, thirty-seven 
states allowed their governor to veto less than an entire 
appropriations bill.  Id.  Notably, these states generally adopted 
"item" vetoes.  For example, the Illinois Constitution authorized 
the governor to disapprove "any one or more items or sections" of 
an appropriations bill.  State ex rel. Wis. Tel. Co. v. Henry, 218 
Wis. 302, 311, 260 N.W. 486 (1935) (quoting Ill. Const. art. V, § 
16 (1935)).  One contemporary source defined an "item" as "any 
part of a bill [making appropriations] which is sufficiently 
distinct that it may be separated without serious damage to the 
essential force of the residue."  John Mabry Mathews, American 
State Government 223 (1926). 
¶29 In 1911, Wisconsinites began debating whether to 
authorize the governor to veto less than an entire appropriations 
bill 
because 
the 
legislature 
started 
"packaging 
multiple 
appropriation measures into larger, omnibus bills."  Richard A. 
Champagne, Staci Duros & Madeline Kasper, The Wisconsin Governor's 
Partial Veto, Reading the Constitution, June 2019, at 1, 3-4.  This 
became known as "logrolling":   
[T]he practice of jumbling together in one act 
inconsistent subjects in order to force a passage by 
uniting minorities with different interests when the 
particular provisions could not pass on their separate 
merits, 
with 
riders 
of 
objectionable 
legislation 
attached to general appropriation bills in order to 
force the governor to veto the entire bill and thus stop 
the wheels of government or approve the obnoxious act.  
State ex rel. Martin v. Zimmerman, 233 Wis. 442, 447-48, 289 N.W. 
662 (1940). 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
11 
 
¶30 Before 1911, the legislative practice was to pass on 
each appropriation in a separate bill.  Champagne et al., The 
Wisconsin Governor's Partial Veto, at 3.  By 1913, Governor Francis 
E. McGovern began to publically complain about the changes to the 
appropriations process.  Id.; State ex rel. Wis. Senate v. 
Thompson, 144 Wis. 2d 429, 438, 424 N.W.2d 385 (1988).  He argued 
that the legislature was passing "omnibus bills" with "fifty to 
one hundred items."  Champagne et al., The Wisconsin Governor's 
Partial Veto, at 3 (quoting Associated Press, McGovern Criticizes 
State Legislature, Janesville Daily Gazette, Sept. 18, 1913, at 
1).  Furthermore, the legislature would wait until the current 
budget was close to expiring.  Champagne et al., The Wisconsin 
Governor's Partial Veto, at 3.  He said this practice "tied the 
hands of the executive, and he practically had no alternative 
except to approve the appropriations as a whole."  Id. (quoting 
McGovern Criticizes State Legislature, at 1).  Ultimately, 
Governor McGovern lost his campaign for increased veto powers.  
Champagne et al., The Wisconsin Governor's Partial Veto, at 4. 
¶31 The next substantial push for increased gubernatorial 
power came in 1925.  That year, two proposals were considered. The 
first never made it out of committee.  Id. at 5 & n.32.  The second 
proposal failed by a vote of 14 to 9 in the Senate.  Id. at 6.  It 
read, in part:  "The governor may disapprove or reduce items or 
parts of items in any bill appropriating money.  So much of such 
bill as he approves shall upon his signing become law."  1925 
Senate Joint Resolution 23. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
12 
 
¶32 In 1927, Senator William Titus introduced a similar 
resolution:  "Appropriation bills may be approved in whole or in 
part by the governor, and the part approved shall become law, and 
the part objected to shall be returned in the same manner as 
provided for other bills."  Champagne et al., The Wisconsin 
Governor's Partial Veto, at 6 (quoting 1927 Senate Joint Resolution 
35; 1927 Enrolled Joint Resolution 37).  The resolution passed 
both houses.  One newspaper explained, "This would allow that 
executive to return unfavored appropriations to the legislators, 
at the same time passing others in the same bill thus speeding the 
legislative work."  Champagne et al., The Wisconsin Governor's 
Partial Veto, at 7 n.38 (quoting Beats Plan for Repeal of Car Tax, 
Capital Times, March 15, 1927).  The resolution again passed both 
houses in 1929, and it was ratified by the people in November 
1930.12  Champagne et al., The Wisconsin Governor's Partial Veto, 
at 7. 
¶33 Both the failed 1925 resolution and the successful 1930 
amendment are believed to have been drafted by Edwin Witte, the 
Chief of the Legislative Reference Library (the predecessor to the 
Legislative Reference Bureau), and drafting files describe an item 
veto.  See Frederick B. Wade, The Origin & Evolution of the Partial 
Veto Power, Wis. Lawyer, Mar. 2008, at 12, 14; Mary E. Burke, 
Comment, The Wisconsin Partial Veto: Past, Present and Future, 
1989 Wis. L. Rev. 1395, 1402 n.44.  The drafting file for the 1927 
resolution indicates that Senator Titus requested the Legislative 
                                                 
12 The Wisconsin Constitution provides that a proposed 
amendment must be approved by two consecutive legislatures and 
then ratified by the people.  Wis. Const. art. XII, § 1. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
13 
 
Reference Library to draft a resolution "to allow the Governor to 
veto items in appropriation bills."  A cover sheet in the drafting 
file reads, "res. to permit Gov. to veto items in app. bills."  
The library wrote to Senator Titus, "Enclosed herewith is a revised 
draft of the Joint Resolution you asked us to prepare, to allow 
the Governor to veto items in appropriation bills."  See John S. 
Weitzer, Comment, The Wisconsin Partial Veto:  Where Are We and 
How Did We Get Here? The Definition of "Part" and the Test of 
Severability, 76 Marq. L. Rev. 625, 631 n.35 (1993) (summarizing 
the drafting file).  The 1929 drafting file has a similar reference 
to "allow[ing] the governor to veto items."  Wade, The Origin & 
Evolution of Partial Veto Power, at 14.   
¶34 The drafting files do not indicate why, if the drafter 
intended an item veto, he used the word, part.  Champagne et al., 
The Wisconsin Governor's Partial Veto, at 6.  Notably though, some 
contemporary sources used the term "partial" veto to describe an 
item veto.  Black, Relation of the Executive Power to Legislation, 
at 101 (chapter titled "The Selective or Partial Veto" describing 
an item veto used in many states). 
¶35 The campaign for ratification of the 1930 amendment also 
described an item veto.  Champagne et al., The Wisconsin Governor's 
Partial Veto, at 5.  For example, Witte——the believed drafter——
wrote a brief supporting its ratification.  Edwin E. Witte, Brief 
in Support of the Proposed Amendment to the Constitution to Allow 
the Governor to Veto Items in Appropriation Bills (1930).  Its 
first 
sentence 
reads:  "The 
governor's 
veto 
of 
items 
in 
appropriation bills is an essential part of an executive budget 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
14 
 
system."  Id.  As one article, published in the Wisconsin Lawyer 
in 2008, summarizes:  "The brief uses the words item and items a 
total of 19 times. . . .  Under these circumstances, it appears 
that Witte viewed the terms part and item as interchangeable 
synonyms for expressing the item veto concept."  Wade, The Origin 
& Evolution of the Partial Veto Power, at 14. 
¶36 Several 
newspaper 
articles 
at 
the 
time 
of 
the 
constitutional amendment described an item veto.  For example, The 
League of Women Voters' "explanation of the proposal" said it would 
"enable the governor to veto single items in an appropriations 
bill without vetoing the entire bill."  A Proposed Amendment, 
Wausau Daily Record-Herald, Oct. 28, 1930, at 8.  A Capital Times 
article quoted Senator Thomas Duncan, who introduced the 1929 
resolution, 
as 
saying, 
"[t]he 
item 
veto 
is 
absolutely 
indispensable."  It would "merely giv[e] back to the governor the 
power" he had when "most appropriations were divided into separate 
bills."  Duncan Tells Need for New Vote Powers, Capital Times, 
Oct. 14, 1930, at 7.  Similarly, the Wisconsin State Journal 
reported him saying the new veto power was "not revolutionary, but 
on the contrary [was] in successful operation in 37 states."  Veto 
Rule Better Law Step, Claim, Wis. St. J., Oct. 13, 1930, at 7. 
¶37 Following the amendment's ratification, sources also 
described it as an item veto.  For example, the 1931–32 Wisconsin 
Blue Book explained the amendment permitted the governor "to veto 
single items in appropriation bills."  The Wisconsin Blue Book 583 
n.1 (1931). 
2.  Our Precedent 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
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¶38 We first interpreted the governor's partial veto power 
in Henry.13  Since then, we have interpreted the governor's partial 
veto powers seven more times.  As our decisions demonstrate, 
governors have become more creative and aggressive with their 
partial vetoes.  Yet, our decisions explain only two relevant 
limits:14  (1) the part approved must be a complete, entire and 
workable law; and (2) the part approved must be germane to the 
topic or subject matter of the enrolled bill before the veto.  
Constitutional amendments also have added:  "In approving an 
appropriation bill in part, the governor may not create a new word 
by rejecting individual letters in the words of the enrolled bill, 
and may not create a new sentence by combining parts of 2 or more 
sentences of the enrolled bill."  Wis. Const. art. V, § 10(1)(c). 
a.  Early Cases 
¶39 In the midst of the Great Depression, Wisconsinites were 
suffering.  The legislature passed an emergency relief package.  
Henry, 218 Wis. at 307–08.  As one comment summarizes, "To raise 
revenue for the relief efforts, the nine-section bill included six 
sections providing authority to impose emergency income taxes.  
Another section of the bill appropriated funds for relief efforts 
                                                 
13 At passage, the provisions now in Article V, Section 
10(1)(b) were not in a subsection, but were italicized and inserted 
into Section 10.  The wording was a bit different:  "Appropriation 
bills may be approved in whole or in part by the governor, and the 
part approved shall become law, and the part objected to shall be 
returned in the same manner as provided for other bills."  Wis. 
Const. art. V, § 10 (1930).   
14 For write-in vetoes, where a governor crosses out a number 
and writes in a lesser number, we have articulated additional 
restrictions, which are described below.   
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
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and specified how the funds were to be distributed.  Two other 
sections stated legislative intent."  Burke, The Wisconsin Partial 
Veto, at 1401.  The governor "when presented with the bill, vetoed 
the legislative intent sections and the distribution subsections 
of the appropriation section."  Id.  The assembly did not override 
his vetoes. 
¶40 The Wisconsin Telephone Co., a taxpayer, commenced an 
original action, arguing: 
[T]he governor's disapproval of parts of the bill, as 
originally passed, by the legislature, and his approval 
of the remaining parts thereof, was unauthorized under 
[Wis. Const. art. V, § 10] because the constitutional 
grant of power to the governor by that section to approve 
parts of an appropriation bill and to disapprove parts 
thereof does not grant power to him to approve the 
appropriation, and disapprove a proviso or condition 
inseparably connected to the appropriation, nor to 
disapprove parts of an appropriation bill that are not 
an appropriation. 
Henry, 218 Wis. at 309.  
¶41 We did not decide whether the governor had the power to 
reject provisos or conditions that are inseparably connected.  Id.  
Instead, we concluded that "the parts which were disapproved by 
the governor were not provisos or conditions which were inseparably 
connected to the appropriation."  Id.  But we acknowledged that 
there was a plausible argument that the governor could not veto 
inseparable provisos or conditions.  Id. at 309–10 (citing State 
ex rel. Teachers & Officers v. Holder, 23 So. 643 (Miss. 1898)). 
¶42 We also concluded that the governor could "pass 
independently on every separable piece of legislation in an 
appropriation bill."  Henry, 218 Wis. at 315.  In our 
interpretation of the term, "part," which was employed in the 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
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amendment of Article V, Section 10, we reasoned that the partial 
veto power must be broader than an item veto.  Id. at 310–14.  We 
also concluded that "part" should be given its "usual, customary, 
and accepted meaning [as] . . . '[o]ne of the portions, equal or 
unequal, into which anything is divided, or regarded as divided; 
something less than a whole.'"  Id. at 313 (quoting Part, Webster's 
New Int'l Dictionary 1781 (2d ed.)).  We observed that the part 
approved constituted a "complete, entire, and workable law, for 
the appropriation for relief purposes, of the money to be raised, 
as tax revenues thereunder, and for the allotment and use of that 
appropriation."  Henry, 218 Wis. at 314.  The vetoes were upheld. 
¶43 In State ex rel. Finnegan v. Dammann, 220 Wis. 143, 264 
N.W. 622 (1936), we were asked to decide whether a bill on which 
the governor asserted a partial veto was an appropriation bill.  
We concluded that the enrolled bill was not an appropriations bill.  
Id. at 148-49.  Therefore, the governor's attempted veto was 
"ineffective because the subject matter of the bill did not fall 
within the constitutional provision authorizing a partial veto."  
Id. at 149.  "Finnegan added nothing to Henry's analysis of the 
definition of 'part' and the test of severability."  Weitzer, The 
Wisconsin Partial Veto, at 637.   
¶44 Four years after Finnegan, we decided Martin.  As one 
comment summarizes, "the legislature enacted a bill changing the 
amount of state funds appropriated as aid for dependent children."  
Burke, The Wisconsin Partial Veto, at 1405.  As with Henry, the 
governor vetoed sections and subsections of the enrolled bill.  
The Secretary of State refused to publish the act on procedural 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
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grounds, which are unimportant for our purposes, as well as 
substantive grounds.  As a substantive matter, he argued that the 
partial 
vetoes 
"so 
changed 
the 
legislative 
program 
or 
policy . . . as to render the parts approved . . . invalid."  
Martin, 233 Wis. at 450.   
¶45 We began by construing Article V, Section 10.  We 
concluded that the partial veto amendment was not ambiguous, and 
as "amended in 1930 it must be construed as a whole."  Id. at 447.  
We explained that the amendment's "purpose was to prevent, if 
possible, the adoption of omnibus appropriation bills, logrolling, 
the practice of jumbling together in one act inconsistent subjects 
in order to force a passage by uniting minorities with different 
interests when the particular provisions could not pass on their 
separate merits."  Id. at 447-48.  We then rejected the Secretary 
of State's argument, relying on Henry: 
It must be conceded that the governor's partial 
disapproval did effectuate a change in policy; so did 
the partial veto of the bill involved in the case of 
[Henry], supra, which this court held to be valid.  The 
question here is whether the approved parts, taken as a 
whole, provide a complete workable law.  We have 
concluded that they do, and we must give them effect as 
such. 
Id. at 450.  
¶46 For the next four decades, "the partial veto was rarely 
used."  Champagne et al., The Wisconsin Governor's Partial Veto, 
at 1.  "Aside from the 1931 and 1933 biennial budget bills, in 
which there were 12 partial vetoes, subsequent governors either 
did not partially veto any provisions or partially vetoed only one 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
19 
 
or two provisions in budget bills until the 1969 legislative 
session."  Id. 
b.  Later Cases 
¶47 We next addressed the partial veto in State ex rel. 
Sundby v. Adamany, 71 Wis. 2d 118, 237 N.W.2d 910 (1976).  As one 
comment explains, "[i]n Sundby, Governor [Patrick] Lucey vetoed 
clauses of sentences.  Previously, partial vetoes involved only 
sections and subsections of appropriation bills."  Weitzer, The 
Wisconsin Partial Veto, at 639 n.89.  "The subject matter of the 
portion of the appropriations bill to which these partial vetoes 
appl[ied] involved tax levy limits imposed on towns, villages, 
cities and counties."  Sundby, 71 Wis. 2d at 121.  The markup read: 
If the [governing body of the political subdivision] 
desires to increase its tax levy above the limitations 
specified in this section, it shall publish such intent 
in a class I notice under ch. 985 in the official town 
newspaper.  The notice shall include a statement of the 
purpose and the amount of the proposed levy and the 
amount by which it wishes to exceed the limits imposed 
by this section.  If, within 20 days after publication 
of the notice, a petition is filed with the town clerk 
signed by a number of electors equal to, or in excess 
of, 5% of the number of electors casting ballots in the 
town in the last gubernatorial election, the question of 
the proposed amount of increase in levy above the 
limitations specified in this section shall be submitted 
to a referendum at a spring election, general election 
or special election. 
Id. at 122–23.  "In substance, the governor's veto made mandatory 
the local referendums which the bill, as passed by the legislature, 
made optional."  Id. at 124. 
¶48 We explained that the constitutions of other states 
focused on item vetoes and limited partial vetoes to "item or 
items."  Id. at 128.  However:  
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
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The Wisconsin Constitution, by way of contrast, 
confers upon its chief executive the power to object to 
"part" of the bill and, in construing this power, this 
court has indicated that the chief executive has a 
greater range of options pursuant to such terminology as 
to the manner in which he may exercise the partial veto 
than he might have if the power were limited to "items." 
Id.   
¶49 We addressed two arguments not thoroughly analyzed in 
our prior decisions for curtailing the governor's partial veto 
power.  First, we considered how separation of powers analysis 
should impact our understanding of the amendment of Article V, 
Section 10.  In particular, we considered that "[t]he legislative 
power is vested by the Wisconsin Constitution in the senate and 
the assembly."  Id. at 131.  But we then explained that the governor 
plays a role in the legislative process.  Id. at 131–34.  Second, 
we addressed whether the partial veto power could "bring about an 
affirmative change in the result intended by the legislature" or 
merely "negative what the legislature has done."  Id. at 134.  We 
rejected the distinction between affirmative and negative changes.  
Id.  We stated: 
Every veto has both a negative and affirmative ring about 
it.  There is always a change of policy involved.  We 
think 
the 
constitutional 
requisites 
of 
[Wis. 
Const.] art. V, [§] 10, fully anticipate that the 
governor's action may alter the policy as written in the 
bill sent to the governor by the legislature. 
Id.  We upheld the vetoes, noting as we had in Henry that the 
provisions were "separable."  Id. at 135. 
¶50 Two years after Sundby, we decided State ex rel. Kleczka 
v. Conta, 82 Wis. 2d 679, 264 N.W.2d 539 (1978).  The governor's 
markup read:  "(1) Every individual filing an income tax statement 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
21 
 
may designate that their income tax liability be increased by $1 
for deposit into the Wisconsin Election Campaign Fund for the use 
of eligible candidates under s. 11.50."  Id. at 685.  The 
consequence of this veto was that taxpayers could choose to provide 
$1 to the campaign fund without increasing their tax liability.  
Id. 
¶51 The petitioners and the legislature's amicus made two 
arguments.  First, the petitioners argued that the partial veto 
"created an appropriation where none existed before."  Id. at 704.  
Second, the petitioners and the amicus argued that "voluntary 
contributions were a proviso or condition upon which the 
appropriation depended and that such proviso or condition were 
ipso facto inseverable from the appropriation itself."  Id. 
¶52 We 
rejected 
the 
first 
argument 
because 
it 
was 
"incorrect, under the facts, for the petitioners to assert that 
the bill as altered by the Governor created an appropriation where 
none existed before. . . .  Rather, it affected the source from 
which the appropriated funds were to be derived."  Id. at 704–05. 
¶53 Next, we acknowledged that "[s]everability is indeed the 
test of the Governor's constitutional authority to partially veto 
a bill."  Id. at 705.  We explained that the test for severability 
is whether the part approved constitutes a complete, entire and 
workable law.  Id. at 705–06.  In Henry, we had suggested that 
some provisos or conditions might be inseparable; in Kleczka, we 
said that discussion in Henry was simply dicta.  Kleczka, 82 
Wis. 2d at 712–14.  Henry did not need to speculate about the 
constitutionality of vetoing provisos or conditions because the 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
22 
 
relevant sections and subsections were not provisos or conditions.  
In Kleczka, we, therefore, upheld the veto. 
¶54 Justice Hansen authored the first separate writing in 
this line of cases, concurring in part and dissenting in part.  He 
noted that "[i]n recent years, partial vetoes have not only 
increased greatly in number; they have been applied to ever smaller 
portions of bills."  Id. at 719 (Hansen, J., concurring in part 
and dissenting in part).  This concerned him, and he stated, "the 
standard adopted by the court poses no discernible obstacle to the 
use of deletions to produce a complete, entire and workable bill 
concerning a subject utterly unrelated to that of the bill as 
passed by the legislature."  Id. at 723.  His separation of powers 
analysis came to the opposite conclusion of the majority:  "At 
some point this creative negative constitutes the enacting of 
legislation by one person, and at precisely that point the governor 
invades the exclusive power of the legislature to make laws."  Id. 
at 720.   
¶55 He stated:  "the partial veto power should be exercised 
only as to the individual components, capable of separate 
enactment, which have been joined together by the legislature in 
an appropriation bill.  That is, the portions stricken must be 
able to stand as a complete and workable bill."  Id. at 726.  
Stated otherwise, Justice Hansen would have applied the complete, 
entire and workable law requirement to both the part approved and 
the part rejected. 
¶56 A few years after Kleczka, in 1983, Governor Anthony 
Earl was the first to veto individual letters, which has since 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
23 
 
become known as the "Vanna White"15 or "pick-a-letter" veto.  
Benjamin W. Proctor, Comment, Wisconsin's Chief Legislator:  The 
Governor's Partial Veto Authority and the New Tipping Point, 90 
Marq. L. Rev. 739, 750 (2007).  In a law review article he later 
authored, he stated: 
In the 1983–85 budget bill, I vetoed letters and digits 
to reduce a paragraph of five sentences into a one-
sentence paragraph of twenty-two words.  This time, the 
legislature was not interested in the political result; 
it looked only at the philosophical question of the 
balance of power between the legislative and executive 
branches. 
 
It 
determined 
decisively 
that 
as 
a 
representative of the executive branch, I had gone too 
far.  The veto was overridden unanimously by the state 
assembly and with only one dissenting vote in the senate. 
Anthony S. Earl, Personal Reflections on the Partial Veto, 77 Marq. 
L. Rev. 437, 440 (1994). 
¶57 Just a few years later, Governor Tommy Thompson utilized 
the Vanna White veto.  He struck "phrases, digits, letters, and 
word fragments in an executive budget bill, so as to create new 
words, sentences, and dollar amounts."  Champagne et al., The 
Wisconsin Governor's Partial Veto, at 12. 
¶58 Governor Thompson's vetoes were not overridden, and the 
constitutionality of some of them came before us in Wis. Senate, 
144 Wis. 2d 429.  In total, thirty-seven vetoes were challenged.  
To give one example: 
[O]ne section of the budget bill would have created a 
statutory provision allowing courts to detain for "not 
more than 48 hours" any juvenile violating a delinquency 
proceeding court order.  Governor Thompson vetoed the 
                                                 
15 Vanna White is a television personality on Wheel of 
Fortune.  James K. Conant, Wisconsin Politics and Government: 
America's Laboratory of Democracy 46 (2006). 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
24 
 
term "48 hours" and creatively substituted "ten days" by 
vetoing individual letters and words from another 
sentence in that section. 
Burke, The Wisconsin Partial Veto, at 1396.  To give another 
example, he reduced a $750,000 appropriation to $75,000 by vetoing 
a "0."  Id. 
¶59 Reiterating our analysis from Kleczka——that the part 
approved must be a complete, entire and workable law——we upheld 
the partial vetoes.  Wis. Senate, 144 Wis. 2d at 449–50. 
¶60 We also explained that the consequences of any partial 
veto must be a law that remains consistent with the topic or 
subject matter of the "whole" bill.  Id. at 437.  "This limit[ed] 
the ability of a governor to strike just any word in a sentence."  
Champagne et al., The Wisconsin Governor's Partial Veto, at 19; 
see also Gordon B. Baldwin, The Partial Veto Power Threatens 
Democracy:  A Rebuttal, 5 Graven Images 267, 268 (2002). 
¶61 There have been two cases regarding the partial veto 
power since Wis. Senate: Citizens Utility Bd. v. Klauser, 194 
Wis. 2d 484, 534 N.W.2d 608 (1995) and Risser v. Klauser, 207 
Wis. 2d 176, 558 N.W.2d 108 (1997).  In Citizens Utility Board, we 
concluded that the governor was permitted "to strike a numerical 
sum appropriated in the bill and to insert a different, smaller 
number as the appropriated sum."  Citizens Utility Bd., 194 Wis. 2d 
at 488.  In Risser, we concluded that the governor's "write-in 
veto may be exercised only on a monetary figure which is an 
appropriation amount."  Risser, Wis. 2d at 181. 
¶62 Notably, in both of these opinions, we reiterated the 
limitation we had described as a "germaneness" limitation.  Id. at 
183; Citizens Utility Bd., 194 Wis. 2d at 506.  In Citizens Utility 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
25 
 
Board, we explained the write-in veto "survives the 'topicality' 
or 'germaneness' requirement set forth in Wis. Senate.  The new 
provision approved by the governor——'$250,000'——relates to the 
same subject matter as the original legislative enactment, viz., 
a money appropriation to be utilized by [Citizens Utility Board] 
as a public interest advocacy entity."  Citizens Utility Bd., 194 
Wis. 2d at 505.  In Risser, while we mentioned a germaneness 
limitation, we did not apply it.  However, we did state that "a 
governor's power to craft legislation necessarily must have 
constitutional limits."  Risser, 207 Wis. 2d at 197. 
3.  Failed and Successful Amendments 
¶63 The executive and legislative branches are acutely aware 
of our decisions in this area.  There have been numerous proposals 
to amend the partial veto power.  Champagne et al., The Wisconsin 
Governor's Partial Veto, at Appendix Tbl. 3 (listing proposals 
from 1935 to 2013).  Indeed, the same year as Henry, "state 
legislators proposed limiting the governor's partial veto 
authority to 'appropriation items.'  The proposal, however, failed 
to pass either the Assembly or the Senate."  Burke, This Wisconsin 
Partial Veto, at 1403.  A similar series of events followed Martin 
and Kleczka.  Id. at 1406 n.77; Proctor, Wisconsin's Chief 
Legislator, at 763 n.156. 
¶64 Twice, the partial veto power has been successfully 
curtailed by amendment, once in 1990 and once in 2008.  Together, 
these amendments are set out at Article V, Section 10(1)(c):  "In 
approving an appropriation bill in part, the governor may not 
create a new word by rejecting individual letters in the words of 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
26 
 
the enrolled bill, and may not create a new sentence by combining 
parts of 2 or more sentences of the enrolled bill."  The 1990 
amendment, which prohibited the creation of words by deleting 
letters, was a response to Wis. Senate.  Burke, The Wisconsin 
Partial Veto, at 1426.  The 2008 amendment was a response to 
partial vetoes made by Governor Jim Doyle and prohibited the 
creation of new sentences by combining parts of two or more 
sentences of the enrolled bill.  Proctor, Wisconsin's Chief 
Legislator, at 752–54. 
C.  Stare Decisis 
¶65 In the case-at-hand, Taxpayers ask us to overturn Henry 
because it adopted, in their view, an overly broad definition of 
"part."  Alternatively, they ask us to overrule Kleczka and "hold 
that the governor may not exercise the partial veto in a way that 
transforms the meaning and purpose of a law into something entirely 
new."  In particular, they ask us to reconsider Kleczka's rejection 
of the suggestion in Henry that the governor cannot veto "provisos 
or 
conditions 
which 
were 
inseparably 
connected 
to 
the 
appropriation."  The Legislature's amicus asks us to adopt the 
test 
proposed 
by 
Justice 
Hansen's 
separate 
writing 
in 
Kleczka:  that both the part approved and the part rejected must 
be complete, entire and workable laws. 
¶66 "We are respectful of the doctrine of stare decisis." 
State v. Roberson, 2019 WI 102, ¶49, 389 Wis. 2d 190, 935 N.W.2d 
813.  As we have explained: 
[Adhering to precedent] ensures that existing law will 
not be abandoned lightly.  When existing law is open to 
revision in every case, deciding cases becomes a mere 
exercise 
of 
judicial 
will, 
with 
arbitrary 
and 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
27 
 
unpredictable results.  Consequently, this court has 
held that any departure from the doctrine of stare 
decisis demands special justification. 
Id., ¶49 (quoting Schultz v. Natwick, 2002 WI 125, ¶37, 257 Wis. 2d 
19, 653 N.W.2d 266) (modifications in the original).   
¶67 Because Taxpayers' argument is grounded in originalism, 
I note that even prominent originalists respect stare decisis.  As 
Justice Scalia once stated:  "You have to make stare decisis an 
exception to any philosophy of judicial interpretation."  Law and 
Justice Scalia, Hoover Institution at 23:30–38 (Mar. 16, 2009), 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zE9biZT_z1k&t=1435s (last visited 
June 
27, 
2020); 
see 
also 
Antonin 
Scalia, 
A 
Matter 
of 
Interpretation:  Federal Courts and the Law 140 (1997) ("[S]tare 
decisis is not a part of my originalist philosophy; it is a 
pragmatic exception to it.").  In one of Justice Scalia's best 
known writings, he explained: 
In [originalism's] undiluted form, at least, it is 
medicine that seems too strong to swallow.  Thus, almost 
every originalist would adulterate it with the doctrine 
of stare decisis——so that Marbury v. Madison would stand 
even if [a prominent legal scholar] should demonstrate 
unassailably that it got the meaning of the Constitution 
wrong. 
Antonin Scalia, Originalism: The Lesser Evil, 57 U. Cinn. L. Rev. 
849, 861 (1989). 
¶68 When we are asked to overturn precedent, we consider 
whether: 
(1) Changes or developments in the law have undermined 
the rationale behind a decision; (2) there is a need to 
make a decision correspond to newly ascertained facts; 
(3) there is a showing that the precedent has become 
detrimental to coherence and consistency in the law; 
(4) the prior decision is "unsound in principle;" or 
(5) the prior decision is "unworkable in practice." 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
28 
 
Roberson, 389 Wis. 2d 190, ¶50 (citing Bartholomew v. Wis. Patients 
Comp. Fund & Compcare Health Servs. Ins. Corp., 2006 WI 91, ¶33, 
293 Wis. 2d 38, 717 N.W.2d 216).  "We also may consider 'whether 
[our past decision] has produced a settled body of law.'"  
Roberson, 389 Wis. 2d 190, ¶50 (quoting Johnson Controls, Inc. v. 
Employers Ins. of Wausau, 2003 WI 108, ¶99, 264 Wis. 2d 60, 665 
N.W.2d 257) (modifications in original). 
¶69 To begin with the request to overturn Henry, Taxpayers 
argue: 
[S]tare decisis is "at its weakest when [this Court] 
interpret[s] 
the 
Constitution 
because 
[its] 
interpretations[s] can be altered only by constitutional 
amendment."  Franchise Tax Bd. of California v. Hyatt, 
139 S. Ct. 1485, 1499 (2019) (quoting Agostini v. Felton, 
521 U.S. 203, 235 (1997)).  Appropriately, then, this 
Court has recognized it need not "retain constitutional 
interpretations that were objectively wrong when made."  
Koschkee, 387 Wis. 2d 552, ¶8 n.5.  And, as already 
explained, Henry's interpretation was "objectively wrong 
when made." 
By "objectively wrong," Taxpayers mean that Henry is not in accord 
with the original meaning of the 1930 constitutional amendment.  
In addition to the history of Article V, Section 10(1)(b), 
Taxpayers refer us to other provisions of the Wisconsin 
Constitution that they assert support their argument.  For example, 
they cite Article VIII, Section 8, which provides:  
On the passage in either house of the legislature of any 
law 
which . . . makes, 
continues 
or 
renews 
an 
appropriation of public or trust money . . . three-
fifths of all the members elected to such house shall in 
all such cases be required to constitute a quorum 
therein. 
Taxpayers further argue that Henry has not created a "reliance 
interest."  They also contend that Henry has proven "unworkable in 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
29 
 
practice" because it has led to, arguably, abusive practices by 
increasingly creative governors. 
¶70 Governor Evers responds with several points.  First, he 
argues that Taxpayers' reliance on Koschkee is misplaced.  Koschkee 
"overruled a single decision from three years earlier that had 'no 
common legal rationale' for its mandate."  He argues that Henry is 
different because of "[t]he near century of consistent partial-
veto decisions" stemming from it.  In essence, Governor Evers 
argues that Henry has produced a settled body of law, and he claims 
a 
reliance 
interest. 
 
Second, 
Governor 
Evers 
cites 
the 
constitutional amendments in 1990 and 2008.  They are, according 
to him, a "part of the corpus of settled law that must be uprooted 
if [Taxpayers] win" because "both amendments presuppose that 
Article V, § 10(1)(b)[] empowers the Governor to veto any 'part' 
of an appropriation bill, no matter how small."  Third, Governor 
Evers contends that partial veto decisions have been workable in 
practice.  He claims we have had "no problem drawing a line between 
valid and invalid vetoes." 
¶71 I reject Taxpayers' request to overturn Henry.  First, 
I cannot say that Henry was objectively wrong.  An objectively 
wrong opinion is not merely an opinion that was "mistaken."  Cf. 
State v. Friedlander, 2019 WI 22, ¶18, 385 Wis. 2d 633, 923 N.W.2d 
849 (explaining the difference between an opinion that is 
objectively wrong and an opinion that is mistaken in the context 
of statutory interpretation); State v. Fuerte, 2017 WI 104, ¶61, 
378 Wis. 2d 504, 904 N.W.2d 773 (same) (Abrahamson, J., 
dissenting).  An objectively wrong opinion is one whose 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
30 
 
interpretation of the law is not plausible.  State v. Lagundoye, 
2004 WI 4, ¶¶72–75, 268 Wis. 2d 77, 674 N.W.2d 526 (Abrahamson, 
C.J., 
dissenting). 
 
That 
cannot 
be 
said 
about 
Henry's 
interpretation of Article V, Section 10(1)(b). 
¶72 As we explained in Henry, the words "item" and "part" 
are not synonyms.  Henry, 218 Wis. at 310–11.  Furthermore, nearly 
every state constitution that authorized an "item veto" at the 
time of the 1930 amendment used the word "item."  Id. at 310–12.  
Indeed, the failed 1925 resolution, likely drafted by the same 
person that drafted the 1930 amendment, used the word "item."  
Therefore, if the intent of the 1930 amendment was to create an 
"item veto," it easily could have been done.  In addition, Henry 
was decided in 1935——a mere five years after the amendment.  
Therefore, as the earliest case interpreting the amendment, to 
some extent, Henry is itself evidence of the original meaning of 
the 1930 amendment. 
¶73 More 
fundamentally, 
the 
successful, 
subsequent 
amendments to Article V, set out in § 10(1)(c), prohibit a governor 
from "creat[ing] a new word by rejecting letters in the words of 
the enrolled bill" and from "creat[ing] a new sentence by combining 
parts of 2 or more sentences of the enrolled bill."  Article V, 
§ 10(1)(c).  If we were to read § 10(1)(b) as permitting the veto 
of only an item, then there would have been no need for § 10(1)(c), 
which prohibits the governor from removing letters to create a new 
word or creating new sentences with words from two or more 
sentences.  Stated otherwise, § 10(1)(c) would have no effect after 
an "item" is vetoed, as nothing of the "item" would have been left.  
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
31 
 
However, § 10(1)(c) has effect because by vetoing "part," smaller 
portions of an enrolled bill can be altered, as shown by Wis. 
Senate, on which § 10(1)(c) placed limits.  
¶74 Taxpayers' references to other constitutional provisions 
are not persuasive; indeed, the references highlight why Taxpayers 
have not established that Henry is objectively wrong.  Taxpayers 
ask us to minimize the role Article V, § 10(1)(c) plays in our 
interpretation, even though it sets out successful amendments, 
which clearly relate to Article V, § 10(1)(b).  Yet, they ask us 
to consider other provisions that are not clearly related.  For 
example, Taxpayers have not explained how Article VIII, Section 8 
supports their argument.  It provides quorum requirements for votes 
on fiscal bills.  What that has to do with the partial veto power, 
which takes place after such a vote, is unclear. 
¶75 Second, our decisions, consisting of eight cases dating 
back eighty-five years, have produced a "settled body of law" 
despite naysayers' attempts to unsettle it.  Roberson, 389 Wis. 2d 
190, ¶50 (quoting Johnson Controls, 264 Wis. 2d 60, ¶99).  Indeed, 
we have previously rejected a similar argument about original 
meaning.  Wis. Senate, 144 Wis. 2d at 461 n.18.  We cannot rehash 
original meaning——and its interaction with stare decisis——every 
time a partial veto comes before us.  There is good reason that 
prominent originalists have recognized stare decisis as an 
exception to their judicial philosophy.  Scalia, Originalism:  The 
Lesser Evil, at 861.  Furthermore, the political branches, as well 
as the media and legal scholars, are aware of our interpretations 
of Article V, Section 10(1)(b), and Wisconsinites actively have 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
32 
 
debated the proper scope of the governor's partial veto power.  As 
already explained, there have been numerous attempts to amend the 
partial veto power, two of which were successful. 
¶76 At bottom, item veto advocates, despite substantial 
effort, have not been able to convince their fellow citizens to 
adopt an item veto.  At this point, as we said in Henry: 
If the legislature and people wish the governor to have 
only the power to veto items in an appropriation bill, 
a constitutional amendment may be desirable.  It should, 
however, be understood that this court has no power to 
toy with the constitutional grant of a partial veto to 
the governor and to replace it with a veto power that 
may be more sensible and palatable.  Any claimed excesses 
on the part of the governor in the exercise of this broad 
partial veto authority are correctable not by this 
court, but by the people, either at the ballot box or by 
constitutional amendment. 
Wis. Senate, 144 Wis. 2d at 465. 
¶77 Third, Taxpayers are incorrect in suggesting that Henry 
has proved unworkable in practice because governors have exercised 
creative partial vetoes which we have evaluated.  An opinion may 
be unworkable in practice when courts have difficulty applying it.  
See State v. Harris, 2010 WI 79, ¶43, 326 Wis. 2d 685, 786 N.W.2d 
409.  We have not had difficulty interpreting challenged vetoes in 
light of our past decisions; therefore, Henry has not proved 
unworkable in practice. 
¶78 Taxpayers alternatively argue we should overturn Kleczka 
because it is "detrimental to coherence and consistency in the 
law."  They assert it is inconsistent with our decisions 
interpreting separation of powers.  They cite League of Women 
Voters of Wis. v. Evers, 2019 WI 75, 387 Wis. 2d 511, 929, N.W.2d 
209, Tetra Tech EC, Inc. v. DOR, 2018 WI 75, 382 Wis. 2d  496, 914 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
33 
 
N.W.2d 21 (lead) and Gabler v. Crime Victims Rights Bd., 2017 WI 
67, 376 Wis. 2d 147, 897 N.W.2d 384.  They also cite Federalist 
No. 58 as authority for a particular model of separation of powers. 
¶79 The Legislature in its amicus brief adds: 
When precedent does "not even discuss" a critical 
aspect of the relevant text, stare decisis does not 
require the [c]ourt to persist in a prior, deficient 
interpretation.  State v. Denny, 2017 WI 17, ¶¶67–70, 
373 Wis. 2d 390, 891 N.W.2d 144.  In the context of 
Article V, Section 10, this [c]ourt has correctly 
interpreted one portion of the text, reading "part 
approved becomes law" to mean "a complete, entire, and 
workable law."  Wis[.] Senate, 144 Wis. 2d at 437.  Yet, 
this [c]ourt has not given attention to another portion 
of the text, which explains when the "rejected part" 
"become[s] law."  This has created a serious separation-
of-powers problem, wherein the Governor can effectively 
enact law by vetoing sentence fragments. 
Legislature Amicus Br. at 3.  To explain, the Legislature makes a 
temporal argument about when the part rejected becomes law.  The 
part approved becomes law when it is signed by the governor; the 
part rejected does not.  The part rejected is returned to the 
legislature and becomes law if and only if it is "approved by two-
thirds of the members present."  Wis. Const. art. V, § 10(2)(b).  
Therefore, the part rejected, according to the Legislature's 
amicus, must be capable of separate enactment at a later date, 
independent of the part approved.   
¶80 Governor Evers responds that no inconsistency has been 
created.  The cases cited by Taxpayers dealt with issues bearing 
no resemblance to the governor's partial veto power.  In League of 
Women Voters, we concluded that "[h]ow the Legislature meets, when 
it meets, and what descriptive titles the Legislature assigns to 
those meetings or their operating procedures constitute parts of 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
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the legislative process with which the judicial branch 'has no 
jurisdiction or right' to interfere."  League of Women Voters, 387 
Wis. 2d 511, ¶37 (internal quotations removed).  In Tetra Tech, we 
concluded that we do not give great weight deference to 
administrative agencies' conclusions of law.  Tetra Tech, 382 
Wis. 2d 496, ¶108.  In Gabler, we concluded that an executive 
agency could not, "acting pursuant to authority delegated by the 
legislature, review a Wisconsin court's exercise of discretion, 
declare its application of the law to be in error, and then 
sanction the judge for making a decision the agency disfavors[.]"  
Gabler, 376 Wis. 2d 147, ¶36. 
¶81 Governor Evers responds that the Legislature's amicus is 
inconsistent with historical practice: 
The phrase "shall become law" simply describes the 
transformation that occurs when a bill is presented to 
the Governor for his approval.  
. . . . 
The Legislature would instead read "shall become 
law" as imposing a complete-and-workable-law test 
wherever the phrase appears.  But that makes no sense 
applied to the rejected part of an appropriation bill.  
Unlike the part approved——which immediately becomes law 
under Article V, § 10(1)(b)——the rejected part never 
needs to function as a stand-alone law.  Either it 
remains rejected and never becomes law, or, upon a 
successful legislative override, it rejoins the part 
approved and "the bill as originally passed by the 
legislature becomes law."  Richard A. Champagne & 
Madeline Kasper, Wis. Legis. Reference Bureau, The Veto 
Override Process in Wisconsin 1 (2019). 
¶82 I reject Taxpayers' request to overturn Kleczka.  Their 
argument presumes that states are obligated to follow a particular 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
35 
 
model of separation of powers that delegates the "power of the 
purse" totally to the legislature.   
¶83 However, our jurisprudence consistently describes the 
governor's role in the budgeting process as "quasi-legislative."  
Wis. Senate, 144 Wis. 2d at 454 (quoting Henry, 218 Wis. 2d at 
314).  In Wis. Senate, we stated: 
[The 
1930 
amendment] 
gave 
the 
governor 
a 
constitutionally recognized role in the legislative 
budgetary function.  The legislature itself has 
recognized the governor's legislative role in the budget 
area 
by 
ceding 
to 
the 
governor 
the 
initial 
responsibility for preparing the biennial budget report 
and requiring him to submit his executive budget bill 
together with suggestions for the best methods for 
raising the needed revenues.  It was no coincidence that 
the same 1929 legislature which passed [ch. 97, Laws of 
1929], adopting the executive budget system for this 
state, thereby creating a statutory role for the 
governor in the budgetary process, also passed——for the 
requisite second time——the [] joint resolution proposing 
the constitutional amendment to [Wis. Const.] art. V, 
[§] 10 to provide for the governor's partial veto 
authority.  These acts were all part of the complete 
overhaul of the budget system in this state that took 
place at that time.  The partial veto power the governor 
may exercise over appropriation bills is simply one tool 
he has for controlling his own executive budget bill. 
Wis. Senate, 144 Wis. 2d at 454–55 (internal citations omitted).  
Taxpayers simply ignore these statements because they do not fit 
their understanding of separation of powers. 
¶84 Furthermore, our jurisprudence is not unique in 
describing a quasi-legislative role for the governor.  A veto 
power, regardless of its contours, is inherently legislative.  The 
United States Supreme Court has said so in a number of cases.  For 
example, it has explained: 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
36 
 
It is said that the approval by the President of a bill 
passed by Congress is not strictly an executive 
function, but is legislative in its nature; in this view, 
it is argued, conclusively shows that his approval can 
legally occur only on a day when both Houses are actually 
sitting in the performance of legislative functions.  
Undoubtedly the President when approving bills passed by 
Congress may be said to participate in the enactment of 
laws which the Constitution requires him to execute.  
But that consideration does not determine the question 
before us.  As the Constitution, while authorizing the 
President to perform certain functions of a limited 
number that are legislative in their general nature, 
does not restrict the exercise of those functions to the 
particular days on which the two Houses of Congress are 
actually sitting in the transaction of public business, 
the court cannot impose such a restriction upon the 
Executive.    
La Abra Silver Min. Co. v. United States, 175 U.S. 423, 453 (1899); 
see also Edwards v. United States, 286 U.S. 482, 490 (1932) ("The 
President acts legislatively under the Constitution, but he is not 
a constituent part of the Congress."); cf. Rateree v. Rockett, 852 
F.2d 946, 951 (7th Cir. 1988) ("[W]hen the Vice President of the 
United States votes in the Senate to break a tie, U.S. Const. art. 
I § III cl. 4, he acts legislatively, not executively.  Similarly, 
the President acts legislatively when he approves or vetoes bills 
passed by Congress."). 
¶85 Taxpayers seem to assume that the governor cannot have 
a quasi-legislative role because creating law is a core power of 
the legislature.  Under this theory, the power to create 
legislation cannot be shared.  At least two problems exist with 
this assumption.   
¶86 First, as demonstrated by rulemaking, and as we have 
long concluded, the legislature may delegate its power to make law 
to the executive.  Martinez v. DILHR, 165 Wis. 2d 687, 697, 478 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
37 
 
N.W.2d 582 (1992) (citing Schmidt v. Local Affairs & Dev. Dep't, 
39 Wis. 2d 46, 56, 158 N.W.2d 306 (1968)) ("Legislative power may 
be delegated to an administrative agency as long as adequate 
standards for conducting the allocated power are in place.").  Such 
a delegation would be impossible if the executive were not 
permitted to have at least a quasi-legislative role in our 
constitutional structure.   
¶87 Second, this theory does not account for the text of the 
Wisconsin Constitution.  As Kelczka said, we must look first to 
the text of the Wisconsin Constitution, not references to 
philosophical works, such as Montesquieu's The Spirit of Law.  
Kleczka, 82 Wis. 2d at 710 n.3 (explaining how Montesquieu and the 
Federalist Papers should impact our understanding of the partial 
veto power).  Taxpayers would have us reverse this by first 
considering 
philosophical 
works 
and 
then 
consider 
the 
constitutional text.  Such an analysis would ignore that 
Wisconsinites are free to assign powers traditional to one branch 
of government to another branch by constitutional amendment.16  I 
also cannot ignore how the constitutional text has been understood 
for nearly a century. 
¶88 In addition, whether the Federalist Papers support 
Taxpayers' position is unclear.  As we explained in Kleczka, the 
                                                 
16 As Judge Posner explained when the partial veto power was 
challenged in federal court:  "That it is unusual, even quirky, 
does not make it unconstitutional.  It violates no federal 
constitutional provision because the [United States] Constitution 
does not fix the balance of power between branches of state 
government."  Risser v. Thompson, 930 F.2d 549, 554 (7th Cir. 
1991). 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
38 
 
Federalist Papers can be read to support an expansive reading of 
the 
partial 
veto 
power. 
 
"The 
authors 
of 
The 
Federalist . . . repeatedly alluded to the tendency, in republican 
forms of government, to the aggrandizement of the legislative 
branch at the expense of the other branches."  Id. (citing 
Federalist No. 73 (Hamilton); No. 49 (Madison); No. 48 (Madison)).  
Indeed, the legislature's practice of logrolling spawned the need 
for Article V, Section 10(1)(b). 
¶89 Moreover, I cannot accept the position of Legislature's 
amicus that we should apply the complete, entire and workable law 
test to the part rejected.  The textual analysis provided by 
Governor Evers fits historical practice: the phrase "shall become 
law" describes the transformation that occurs when proposed 
legislation takes on legally binding force.  It does not indicate 
that the part rejected must be a complete, entire and workable 
law.  Governors and legislatures have long understood that the 
part rejected rejoins the part approved if the legislature 
overrides the governor's veto.  Governor Evers cites a document by 
the Legislative Reference Bureau that says as much.  Champagne & 
Kasper, The Veto Override Process in Wisconsin.  Also, our 
decisions are consistent with this understanding.  Citizens 
Utility Bd., 194 Wis. 2d at 488.  If the governor were to veto 
"$100,000" and write in "$90,000," all would understand that a 
legislative override of the veto would mean that $10,000 is added 
to the $90,000 to return the appropriation to its original number.  
See id. 
D.  Application 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
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¶90 Having broken no new ground, I employ our decisions and 
continue the constitutional analysis of "part" in the four vetoes 
that were challenged.  Taxpayers do not dispute that the "part 
approved" constitutes a complete, entire and workable law.  Rather, 
the dispute before us is whether Governor Evers' partial vetoes 
went too far by altering the topic or subject matter of the 
enrolled bills.  Stated otherwise, we have a dispute over whether 
the parts approved alter the stated legislative idea for which the 
enrolled bill was passed.    
1.  Topic or Subject Matter 
¶91 The legislature controls whether an idea will result in 
an enrolled bill that will be presented to the governor for 
signature.  A veto that does not alter legislative control of the 
topic or subject matter of enrolled bills has been referred to as 
"germane."  Wis. Senate, 144 Wis. 2d at 437.  Stated otherwise, 
such a veto does not alter the stated legislative idea that 
initiated the enrolled bill.  The text of Article V, § 10(1)(b), 
which employs the term, "part," twice in the same sentence and 
connects "part" to the "whole" bill states:  "bills may be approved 
in whole or in part by the governor, and the part approved shall 
become law."  A plain reading of the constitutional text connects 
the "part" approved by the governor to the "whole" bill because it 
is only a "part" of that "whole" bill that is vetoed.  When the 
part approved by the governor does not alter the topic or subject 
matter of the whole bill presented to him for signature, the part 
approved maintains the legislature's choice of topic or subject 
matter that underlies the "whole" bill.  Stated otherwise, when 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
40 
 
legislative topic or subject matter is maintained, the "part" 
approved and the "part" that was not approved remain portions of 
the same "whole" bill, consistent with the constitutional text of 
§ 10(1)(b).  Clearly, the evaluation of "part" and "whole" in 
§ 10(1)(b) depends on how broadly the topic or subject matter is 
defined.     
¶92 For example, we have previously concluded that $250,000 
is a "part" of $350,000, and, therefore, the governor may veto 
$350,000 and write in $250,000.  Citizens Utility Bd., 194 Wis. 2d 
at 505-06.  We explained that "$250,000 is 'part' of $350,000[] 
because $250,000 is 'something less than' $350,000, and $250,000 
goes 'to make up, with others . . . a larger number,' i.e., 
$350,000."  Id. (quoting Part, Webster's New Int'l Dictionary 1781 
(2d ed.)).   
¶93 We also rejected an argument that "part" means only 
"physical part[s] of the bill."  Citizens Utility Bd., 194 Wis. 2d 
at 503–04.  To explain, "[i]f the governor strikes a $100 
appropriation and writes in $80, the amount the governor attempts 
to veto is $20.  However, '$20' does not appear anywhere in the 
bill.  '$20' is not physically part of the bill.  It is part of 
the bill only conceptually."  Id. at 503.   Nevertheless, we have 
permitted write-in vetoes because, conceptually, the amount 
remaining after the veto is a part of the bill.  Id. at 510.  
Stated otherwise, the idea contemplated by the legislature in 
funding an identified entity or described project remains after 
the veto.  If the entity or project is funded to a lesser degree 
because of a write-in veto, the legislative idea that initiated 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
41 
 
the enrolled bill remains after the veto nevertheless.  Similarly, 
an enrolled bill's topic or subject matter is part of its makeup.   
¶94 When the topic or subject matter of a bill is altered 
through veto from that of the whole bill that was presented for 
the governor's signature to a topic or subject matter conceived by 
the governor, the veto is outside of the governor's constitutional 
authority.  When the veto is used in that manner, the "part 
approved" cannot be defined as a "part" of the "whole" bill passed 
by 
the 
legislature 
because 
it 
is 
inconsistent 
with 
the 
constitutional meaning of "part" in Article V, Section 10(1)(b).   
¶95 Secondary sources have discussed the topic and subject 
matter limitation on vetoes.  I note that their understanding, 
which is referred to as germaneness, is consistent with my analysis 
in this case.  In particular, Jack Stark in discussing vetoes made 
by Governor Doyle that triggered the 2008 constitutional 
amendment, stated: 
The case law has recently produced a significant 
restriction, holding that the material left after a veto 
must be germane to (have the same subject matter as) the 
material from which it was fashioned.  If the vetoes of 
the most recent budget bill that got the most attention 
had been challenged, they would most likely have been 
reviewed in light of that principle.  With two related 
vetoes the Governor effected a transfer of several 
hundred million dollars from the transportation fund to 
the general fund.  The money transferred would 
ultimately increase school aid.  In both of those vetoes, 
the germaneness requirement appears to have been 
violated.  Most of the material that was vetoed was about 
particular transportation projects, and some of it was 
about the unfunded liability of the state's retirement 
system. 
Jack Stark, Symposium, Is the Wisconsin Constitution Obsolete? A 
Conference on the Wisconsin Constitution, 90 Marq. L. Rev. 411, 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
42 
 
417-18 (2007); see also Champagne et al., The Wisconsin Governor's 
Partial Veto, at 18–19. 
2.  Application of Topic or Subject Matter Limitation 
a.  School Bus Modernization and Local Road Improvement Funds 
¶96 Taxpayers argue: 
Sections 55c and 9101(2i) of Act 9 allocated $3 
million of certain settlement funds for modernizing 
school buses, with specific conditions as to how that 
program should operate.  Governor Evers transformed this 
into an open-ended grant "for alternative fuels" with no 
conditions, and then directed by fiat that the agency in 
charge spend up to $10 million "for electric vehicle 
charging stations."  This is so far removed from what 
the Legislature intended to create that there is no 
question that the portions Evers' vetoed were non-
severable. 
¶97 As for the local road improvement fund, they state: 
Sections 126, 184s, and 1095m of Act 9 allocated 
$90 million for the improvement of local roads, along 
with specific sub-allocations for county trunk highways, 
town roads, and municipal streets.  Governor Evers used 
the partial veto to transform this into a $75 million 
allocation "for local grant [sic]."  This veto entirely 
eliminated the core purpose of the award (local road 
improvements), instead creating a generic slush fund 
with no meaningful constraints. 
¶98 Governor Evers has made no response to these points. 
Quoting from the dissent in Wis. Senate, he seems to acknowledge 
in a footnote of his brief that "what remains [must] be germane."  
Wis. Senate, 144 Wis. 2d at 474 (Bablitch, J., dissenting).  But 
he does not explain how what he labels as "parts that remain" are 
in accord with their originating actions of the enrolled bill.  
Instead, he argues that he can veto "any part, no matter how small" 
unless prohibited by Article V, Section 10(1)(c). 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
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¶99 I agree with Taxpayers; these vetoes resulted in topics 
and subject matters that were not found in the enrolled bill, i.e., 
they were not a "part" of the enrolled bill.  Stated otherwise, 
the enrolled bill says nothing about an "alternative fuel fund."  
The parts of the enrolled bill that remain after this veto have 
nothing to do with school buses; indeed, the remaining part has 
nothing to do with schools or even education.  Governor Evers has 
publically stated he wants to use the fund for electric charging 
stations, a use not contemplated by any part of the enrolled bill 
and one specifically rejected by the legislature.   
¶100 Notably, 
Governor 
Evers 
vetoed 
the 
entirety 
of 
§ 9101(2i), which "allocate[d] $3,000,000 for grants under 
s. 16.047 (4s) for the payment of school buses." (Emphasis added.)  
Section 9101(2i) further demonstrates that the legislative idea of 
§ 16.047(4s) was to replace school buses.  The legislative idea of 
§ 16.047(4s) was not, for example, limiting carbon emissions.   
¶101 Legislative history confirms that the legislative idea 
was to replace school buses.  Settlement funds in the previous 
biennium were used to replace "eligible state vehicles" and "public 
transit vehicles."17  Governor Evers sought to "[e]xpand DOA's 
authority to use settlement monies to award grants for replacement 
of public transit vehicles to also include grants for the 
installation of charging stations for electric vehicles."18  
Governor Evers' proposed expansion was rejected in favor of one 
more analogous to previous uses of the settlement funds. 
                                                 
17 Motion #129. 
18 Paper #505. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
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¶102 Similarly, the partial vetoes of the local road 
improvement fund, which created a generic fund, are precisely the 
kinds of vetoes commentators have assumed would violate the topic 
or subject matter limitation.  Stark, Is the Wisconsin Constitution 
Obsolete, at 418 ("With two related vetoes the Governor effected 
a 
transfer 
of 
several 
hundred 
million 
dollars 
from 
the 
transportation fund to the general fund.  The money transferred 
would ultimately increase school aid.  In both of those vetoes, 
the germaneness requirement appears to have been violated.").   
¶103 The legislative idea was to fund an ongoing road 
improvement program.19  Section 1095m, vetoed in its entirety by 
Governor Evers, made this clear.  It allocated specific amounts to 
fund "county truck highway improvements," "town road improvements" 
and "municipal street improvements."  A general undirected fund 
was not part of a fund created to improve local roads because a 
general fund can be spent on virtually any subject, i.e., topics 
and subject matters never considered by the legislature.  Indeed, 
a general fund could be used to accomplish goals explicitly 
rejected by the legislature during its deliberative process. 
¶104 I cannot uphold these vetoes.  Accordingly, I partially 
concur with the per curiam opinion that these vetoes have no effect 
on the provisions in the enrolled bills that the legislature 
enacted. 
                                                 
19 Analysis of Bill 56, at 90. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
45 
 
b.  Vehicle Fee Schedule and Vapor Products Tax 
¶105 Taxpayers have not carried their burden with respect to 
the remaining vetoes.  With regard to the vehicle registration 
fees, Taxpayers argue: 
Governor Evers accepted the increases and rejected 
the decreases, creating a new fee schedule that is 
neither graduated nor equalized.  The question, under 
traditional severability analysis, is whether the 
Legislature would have intended the fee increases on 
lighter trucks without the corresponding decreases for 
heavier trucks.  Given that the obvious purpose of the 
statutory change was to equalize the fee schedule, the 
answer is no. 
This is an inherently different argument than what Taxpayers raised 
in regard to the school bus modernization fund and the local road 
improvement fund.  The part approved is clearly related to the 
subject matter of vehicle registration fees.  These vetoes are 
consistent with those that we approved in Wis. Senate and that 
long have been considered within the governor's partial veto power.  
Burke, The Wisconsin Partial Veto, at 1396. 
¶106 A similar analysis applies to the veto that altered the 
definition of vapor product.  The veto expanded the definition of 
vapor product, thereby expanding what could be taxed.  But it did 
not alter the topic or subject matter of the part approved.  
Rather, it would seem all products that would have been taxed under 
the enrolled bill will continue to be taxed.  Furthermore, the 
liquid used in vaping devices is within the scope of the phrase 
vapor product as used in common parlance.  Had the legislature 
left vapor product undefined, reasonable people may have assumed 
it encompassed liquid sold separately.   
E.  Remedy 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
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¶107 The Legislature's amicus has asked us to consider a 
remedy that is purely prospective.  As it explains, while our 
decisions 
"'[n]ormally' 
apply 
'retrospectively,' 
purely 
prospective application——which does not apply a new decision even 
to 
the 
case 
at 
hand——is 
appropriate 
where 
retrospective 
application of a 'new principle of law' would 'unsettl[e]' reliance 
interests."  See State v. Beaver Dam Area Dev. Corp., 2008 WI 90, 
¶¶95–101, 312 Wis. 2d 84, 752 N.W.2d 295.  Had I accepted the 
Legislature's argument and concluded that the part rejected by the 
governor should be a complete, workable law, I might view its 
request differently.  However, I reject this request because I 
break no new ground with this decision.  Indeed, the topic and 
subject matter limitation, sometimes referred to as germaneness, 
has been discussed in three prior cases.  It is not a new principle 
of law.  Risser, 207 Wis. 2d at 183; Citizens Utility Bd., 194 
Wis. 2d at 506; Wis. Senate, 144 Wis. 2d at 451–52. 
III.  CONCLUSION 
¶108 I conclude that the part approved by the governor, i.e., 
the consequences of the partial veto, must not alter the topic or 
subject matter of the "whole" bill before the veto.  Stated 
otherwise, such a veto does not alter the legislative idea that 
initiated the enrolled bill.  Therefore, Governor Evers could not 
use his partial veto power to alter the school bus modernization 
fund into an alternative fuel fund.  Nor could he use it to alter 
the local road improvement fund into a fund for local grants or 
local supplements, devoid of any requirement that it be used for 
local roads.  These two series of vetoes are invalid and have no 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.pdr 
 
47 
 
effect on those laws.  However, Governor Evers lawfully used his 
partial veto power to alter the amount truck owners must pay to 
register their vehicles.  He also lawfully exercised his partial 
veto power in regard to vaping products.  These vetoes stand. 
 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.awb 
 
1 
 
¶109 ANN WALSH BRADLEY, J.   (concurring in part, dissenting 
in part).  In an important case like this, where the people of 
Wisconsin need clarity, we instead sow confusion.  Evidence of the 
lack of clarity is highlighted by the very fact that this case has 
generated four separate writings with various rationales.  And not 
one of them has garnered a majority vote of this court.  Thus, we 
are left with no clear controlling rationale or test for the 
future. 
¶110 I agree with that part of the per curiam opinion that 
upholds the vehicle fee schedule veto.  The Governor lawfully used 
his partial veto power when he altered the amount truck owners 
must pay to register their vehicles. 
¶111 Employing different rationales or tests, the majority of 
justices err, however, by determining that the other three vetoes 
at issue are unconstitutional and must be struck down on the basis 
of arguments neither argued nor briefed by any party.  In doing 
so, Chief Justice Roggensack's concurrence/dissent seeks to create 
a subjective test that unnecessarily inserts the court into policy 
disputes between the other branches of government, and is likely 
to lead to more uncertainty and litigation over partial vetoes by 
future governors of this state.  
¶112 Not only does Chief Justice Roggensack's opinion base 
this decision on a theory that no party has advanced, but it is 
also based on a theory that has never been actually applied.  The 
opinion's proffered "topic or subject matter" test morphs into an 
alternative test as the analysis unfolds.  That test eschews the 
"topic or subject matter" language and instead focuses on an 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.awb 
 
2 
 
amorphous concept of what was the "legislative idea" behind the 
bill.  Both iterations of the test invite manipulation and inject 
subjectivity into what was once a clearly objective test.  Such 
subjective and manipulative determinations have no place in 
addressing the important question of the constitutionality of the 
use of the governor's partial veto power. 
¶113 Justice Kelly's concurrence/dissent suffers from the 
same infirmity as does Chief Justice Roggensack's:  it, too, 
embraces a test neither advanced by any party nor ever applied in 
any case.  Advocating for invalidating all four vetoes at issue, 
Justice Kelly's writing would overrule or modify a multitude of 
cases, spanning 85 years of precedent, and would render two 
constitutional amendments superfluous. 
¶114 Likewise, Justice Hagedorn's concurrence relies on a 
theory not argued by the parties.  The opinion would "revisit" and 
overrule a number of precedential cases.  It also injects 
subjectivity into the determination of the constitutionality of an 
exercise of the partial veto power, ultimately determining that 
three of the four vetoes are unconstitutional. 
¶115 Rather than embrace tests neither previously argued nor 
applied, I would instead turn to and uphold our well-established 
precedent.  It recognizes, time and again, that the Wisconsin 
governor's veto power is incredibly broad.  Contrary to the 
determinations based on untested theories set forth in the various 
separate writings, I conclude that our precedent inexorably leads 
to the determination that all four vetoes at issue, including the 
Governor's vetoes related to the school bus modernization fund, 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.awb 
 
3 
 
local road improvement fund, and vapor products tax are 
constitutionally permissible exercises of the partial veto power. 
¶116 Accordingly, I concur in part and dissent in part to the 
per curiam opinion. 
I 
¶117 Petitioners brought this case as an original action 
against Governor Tony Evers, seeking to invalidate four partial 
vetoes the Governor made to the 2019-21 biennial budget bill.  They 
asked this court to determine whether under the partial veto power 
as granted by the Wisconsin Constitution1 the governor may 
permissibly strike portions of a law that are "essential, integral, 
and 
interdependent 
parts 
of 
those 
which 
were 
approved."  
Additionally, they ask us to address whether the governor may 
strike words so as to transform the meaning and purpose of a law, 
essentially turning it into a different law. 
¶118 The argument petitioners made rested on the assertion 
that this court should overrule a laundry list of longstanding 
precedents regarding the governor's partial veto power.  However, 
they focus their discussion on two specific cases, State ex rel. 
Wisconsin Telephone Co. v. Henry, 218 Wis. 302, 260 N.W. 486 
(1935), and State ex rel. Kleczka v. Conta, 82 Wis. 2d 679, 264 
                                                 
1 Pursuant to Article V, § 10(1)(b) of the Wisconsin 
Constitution, "Appropriation bills may be approved in whole or in 
part by the governor, and the part approved shall become law." 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.awb 
 
4 
 
N.W.2d 539 (1978).  Petitioners readily acknowledge that without 
overruling our long-term precedents, their argument cannot stand.2 
¶119 Chief Justice Roggensack's opinion declines to overrule 
any of our precedents and upholds only two of the vetoes at issue.  
Chief Justice Roggensack's concurrence/dissent, ¶¶71, 82.  In 
contrast, Justice Kelly's concurrence/dissent would affect a sea 
change in the law, overruling or modifying multiple cases and 
upholding none of the four vetoes at issue.  Justice Hagedorn's 
concurrence would "revisit" some of our prior cases (although it 
does not say which ones), and would strike down three of the vetoes 
at issue while upholding one.  I address each opinion in turn. 
II 
¶120 Chief Justice Roggensack's opinion grounds its analysis 
with a citation to State ex rel. Wisconsin Senate v. Thompson, 144 
Wis. 2d 429, 437, 424 N.W.2d 385 (1988), asserting that Wisconsin 
Senate "explained that the consequences of any partial veto must 
be a law that remains consistent with the topic or subject matter 
of 
the 
'whole' 
bill." 
 
Chief 
Justice 
Roggensack's 
concurrence/dissent, ¶60.  The actual language of Wisconsin Senate 
sets forth that "the consequences of any partial veto must be a 
                                                 
2 At oral argument, counsel for Petitioners acknowledged that 
accepting Petitioners' position would require the court to 
overrule several cases, which include:  State ex rel. Wis. Tel. 
Co. v. Henry, 218 Wis. 302, 260 N.W. 486 (1935); State ex rel. 
Martin v. Zimmerman, 233 Wis. 442, 289 N.W. 662 (1940); State ex 
rel. Sundby v. Adamany, 71 Wis. 2d 118, 237 N.W.2d 910 (1976); 
State ex rel. Kleczka v. Conta, 82 Wis. 2d 679, 264 N.W.2d 539 
(1978); State ex rel. Wis. Senate v. Thompson, 144 Wis. 2d 429, 
424 N.W.2d 385 (1988); and Citizens Util. Bd. v. Klauser, 194 
Wis. 2d 484, 534 N.W.2d 608 (1995).  
No.  2019AP1376-OA.awb 
 
5 
 
law that is germane to the topic or subject matter of the vetoed 
provisions."  Wis. Senate, 144 Wis. 2d at 437. 
¶121 In the opinion's view, the vetoes that "change the school 
bus modernization fund into an alternative fuel fund" and "change 
the local road improvement fund into a fund for local grants or 
local supplements" fail this inquiry.  Chief Justice Roggensack's 
concurrence/dissent, ¶11.  The school bus modernization fund veto 
altered the original law's topic or subject matter because, as the 
opinion posits, "the enrolled bill says nothing about an 
'alternative fuel fund.'  The parts of the enrolled bill that 
remain after this veto have nothing to do with school buses; 
indeed, the remaining part has nothing to do with schools or even 
education."  Id., ¶99. 
¶122 Similarly, Chief Justice Roggensack's opinion views the 
local road improvement fund veto as altering the topic or subject 
matter of the original law as passed by the legislature.  It 
contends that "[a] general undirected fund was not part of a fund 
created to improve local roads because a general fund can be spent 
on virtually any subject, i.e., topics and subject matters never 
considered by the legislature."  Id., ¶103.  Consequently, the 
opinion concludes that these two vetoes are an unconstitutional 
use of the governor's partial veto and are thus invalid. 
¶123 The first problem with this approach is that no party 
advocated for it.  Thus, it has not been tested by the rigors of 
appellate advocacy, i.e., briefing and oral argument.  Deciding a 
case based on a theory not argued by any party not only blindsides 
the parties and sidesteps their input, but it also too often 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.awb 
 
6 
 
results in an inadequate guidance and ill-conceived legal 
analysis.  Yet Chief Justice Roggensack's opinion, on its own, 
selects language from the Wisconsin Senate opinion that never 
before has been the basis of a partial veto decision, rewords it, 
and runs with it.  
¶124 In Wisconsin Senate, the court wrote:   
We also accept, and for the first time in this case give 
explicit judicial recognition to, the long-standing 
practical and administrative interpretation or modus 
vivendi between governors and legislatures, that the 
consequences of any partial veto must be a law that is 
germane to the topic or subject matter of the vetoed 
provisions.   
Wis. Senate, 144 Wis. 2d at 437. 
¶125 The opinion claims that it breaks no new ground.  Chief 
Justice Roggensack's concurrence/dissent, ¶107.  But neither 
Wisconsin Senate nor any other case has been explicitly decided 
based on the "topic or subject matter" limitation the Wisconsin 
Senate court referred to as "germaneness."  In other words, no 
veto has ever been struck down because the resulting law is not 
related to the topic or subject matter of the original law. 
¶126 To support its rationale, the opinion cites three 
instances where the topic or subject matter limitation, "sometimes 
referred to as germaneness," has been "discussed" in prior cases:  
Wisconsin Senate, 144 Wis. 2d at 451-52, Risser v. Klauser, 207 
Wis. 2d 176, 183, 558 N.W.2d 108 (1997), and Citizens Utility 
Board v. Klauser, 194 Wis. 2d 484, 506, 534 N.W.2d 608 (1995).  
Chief Justice Roggensack's concurrence/dissent, ¶107.  However, 
none of these cases used topic or subject matter as a reason for 
striking down a partial veto.   
No.  2019AP1376-OA.awb 
 
7 
 
¶127 Although 
the 
Wisconsin 
Senate 
court 
stated 
the 
limitation that "the consequences of any partial veto must be a 
law that is germane to the topic or subject matter of the vetoed 
provisions[,]" 
it 
ultimately 
held 
that 
"the 
governor 
may . . . veto individual words, letters and digits, and also may 
reduce appropriations by striking digits, as long as what remains 
after veto is a complete, entire, and workable law."  Wis. Senate, 
144 Wis. 2d at 437.  Wisconsin Senate does not give any examples 
of what is "germane to the topic or subject matter of the vetoed 
provisions" and what is not.  See id.  It further does not provide 
any guidance in making such a determination.   
¶128 In Risser, the court merely cites in passing that "the 
disapproval of part of an appropriation bill may not result in a 
provision which is 'totally new, unrelated or non-germane' to the 
original bill."  Risser, 207 Wis. 2d at 183 (citing Wis. Senate, 
144 Wis. 2d at 451-53).  However, it did not include any analysis 
of germaneness.   
¶129 In Citizens Utility Board, the court provided a cursory 
analysis of topic or subject matter ("germaneness"), but it was 
limited to the following:   
There also can be no dispute that sec. 15 of 1993 Senate 
Bill 44, as partially vetoed by the governor, survives 
the "topicality" or "germaneness" requirement as set 
forth in Wisconsin Senate.  The new provision approved 
by the governor——"$250,000"——relates to the same subject 
matter as the original legislative enactment, viz., a 
money appropriation to be utilized by CUB as a public 
interest advocacy entity.   
Citizens Util. Bd., 194 Wis. 2d at 505.  Again, little can be 
gleaned from this regarding the meaning of Wisconsin Senate's 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.awb 
 
8 
 
germaneness limitation, which the opinion terms "topic or subject 
matter." 
¶130 Far from supporting the argument presented in the 
opinion, these cases serve to demonstrate the novelty of its 
theory.  Although Wisconsin Senate articulated the "germaneness" 
limitation, no case has rejected a gubernatorial partial veto for 
defying it or even truly defined what it means.  Rather than 
"breaking no new ground," Chief Justice Roggensack's opinion thus 
bases its decision on a scantily referenced limitation, rewords 
it, and attempts to transform it into the dispositive test for a 
partial veto analysis.  If this court is to address the meaning of 
the "germaneness" language in Wisconsin Senate, we should wait for 
a case where the parties present the issue rather than raise it of 
our own accord without the benefit of advocacy.  
¶131 The second problem with the approach advanced in the 
opinion is that it provides no clarity where clarity is sorely 
needed.  The proffered "topic or subject matter" test morphs into 
an alternative test as the analysis unfolds.  The alternative test 
eschews the "topic or subject matter" language and instead focuses 
on an amorphous concept of what was the "legislative idea that 
initiated the enrolled bill."  Chief Justice Roggensack's 
concurrence/dissent, ¶11.  But neither test provides any guidance 
at all.  Further, such alternatives will surely breed more 
litigation regarding what test to apply and the meaning of such 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.awb 
 
9 
 
terms as "topic," "subject matter," or "legislative idea" behind 
an enrolled bill.3   
¶132 Previous cases are clear that in evaluating the 
constitutionality of a governor's exercise of the partial veto, we 
apply an objective test.  Premised on the language of our state 
constitution, this "objective test permit[s] the affirmative use 
of the partial veto power as long as the parts remaining after the 
veto are a complete and workable law."  Wis. Senate, 144 Wis. 2d at 
453.   
¶133 Chief Justice Roggensack's opinion's approach moves away 
from an objective analysis, and exposes determinations on the 
constitutionality of a partial veto to the subjective preferences 
of judges.  To explain, the "topic" or "subject matter" of an 
enrolled bill is subject to manipulation.  It is a function of the 
lens through which the bill is viewed.  As the opinion 
acknowledges, "topic" or "subject matter" can be broadly or 
narrowly viewed.  Chief Justice Roggensack's concurrence/dissent, 
¶91 ("Clearly, the evaluation of 'part' and 'whole' in § 10(1)(b) 
depends on how broadly the topic or subject matter is defined.").   
¶134 Favoring a narrow interpretation of "topic," the opinion 
states with respect to the school bus modernization fund veto:  
"The parts of the enrolled bill that remain after this veto have 
                                                 
3 To further illustrate the amorphous concept of "the 
legislative idea that initiated the enrolled bill," an image comes 
to mind:  two legislators, after hours, are sitting at a local pub 
across the street from the state capitol.  As one drinks a beer, 
he looks at his fellow legislator, announcing, "Hey, I have an 
idea."  Who knows whose idea and what kind of idea will meet this 
amorphous "legislative idea" test, and the opinion fails to 
explain. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.awb 
 
10 
 
nothing to do with school buses; indeed, the remaining part has 
nothing to do with schools or even education."  Id., ¶99. 
¶135 But through a broad lens, the "topic" or "subject matter" 
of the bill changes.  The "topic" or "subject matter" of the 
legislation 
could 
easily 
be 
viewed 
as 
not 
school 
buses 
specifically, but vehicle efficiency generally.  Through this 
lens, the remaining alternative fuel provision is surely "germane" 
to the "topic" or "subject matter" of the legislation. 
¶136 Similarly, the local road improvement fund veto is 
characterized by the opinion as the creation of a "general 
undirected fund" that "was not part of a fund created to improve 
local roads because a general fund can be spent on virtually any 
subject, i.e., topics and subject matters never considered by the 
legislature."  Id., ¶103.  But is the "topic" or "subject matter" 
of the original legislation local road improvement specifically or 
the appropriation of money to localities generally?  Both are 
reasonable readings, and deciding between the two requires a 
subjective determination. 
¶137 The approach of Chief Justice Roggensack's opinion has 
taken an area of Wisconsin law that has been quite clear and based 
on an objective test, and injected it with subjectivity.  Our case 
law clearly indicates that the governor has a constitutional 
partial veto power that is broad, in fact much broader than that 
provided by other states.  Wis. Senate, 144 Wis. 2d at 439-40 
(citing Henry, 218 Wis. at 313); see also John S. Wietzer, The 
Wisconsin Partial Veto:  Where Are We and How Did We Get Here?  
The Definition of "Part" and the Test of Severability, 76 Marq. L. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.awb 
 
11 
 
Rev. 625, 645-46 (1993) (referring to Wisconsin's partial veto 
power as "uniquely broad"); Anthony S. Earl, Personal Reflections 
on the Partial Veto, 77 Marq. L. Rev. 437, 438 (1994) (discussing 
the governor's "broad power to veto parts of appropriation bills").  
¶138 Yet the opinion exposes that broad veto power to the 
serendipity of what lens the judge subjectively chooses.  This 
would have the effect of inevitably inserting the court into policy 
disputes between the other branches of government, a result this 
court has previously considered undesirable.  See State ex rel. 
Sundby v. Adamany, 71 Wis. 2d 118, 134, 237 N.W.2d 910 (1976) 
(rejecting the argument that an affirmative policy change 
constitutes an unconstitutional use of the partial veto power). 
¶139 A commentator has correctly observed three reasons for 
steering clear of subjective considerations in the evaluation of 
the constitutionality of partial vetoes.  See Wietzer, supra, at 
648.  First, "a subjective test for partial veto validity would 
foster uncertainty in the legislative process . . . ."  Id.  
Second, "subjective tests would place the court between the 
executive and the legislature, with the court assuming legislative 
powers . . . ."  Id.  Finally, "a subjective test would involve 
the courts every time a partial veto dispute arose."  Id. 
¶140 These concerns ring true.  Indeed, the budgeting process 
of this state benefits from certainty.  However, Chief Justice 
Roggensack's opinion takes us farther from that goal.  It leaves 
every partial veto subject to challenge by litigation, where 
pursuant to the opinion's approach, judges can manipulate the 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.awb 
 
12 
 
result by injecting their subjective policy preferences into the 
analysis of the constitutionality of a partial veto. 
III 
¶141 I turn next to address Justice Kelly's opinion, which 
invalidates all four vetoes.  It proposes "that we respect the 
constitution's structural limitations on what it means for a bill 
to be approved 'in part.'"  Justice Kelly's concurrence/dissent, 
¶217.  Accordingly, Justice Kelly's writing suggests that we add 
to the current "complete, entire, and workable law" test:  "After 
exercising the partial veto, the remaining part of the bill must 
not only be a 'complete, entire, and workable law,' it must also 
be a law on which the legislature actually voted; and the part of 
the bill not approved must be one of the proposed laws in the 
bill's collection."  Id. 
¶142 This approach suffers from several infirmities.  First, 
it embraces a test not argued or briefed by either party.  Thus, 
it has not had the benefit of being tested by the fires of advocacy. 
¶143 Second, it cavalierly discards and overrules or modifies 
multiple cases constituting 85 years of precedent in derogation of 
the doctrine of stare decisis.4  It would abandon our partial veto 
precedent because Justice Kelly deems our precedent, in his view, 
"wrongly decided."  Id., ¶206.  I would take a more modest 
approach.    
                                                 
4 Justice 
Kelly's 
opinion 
would 
overrule 
Sundby, 
71 
Wis. 2d 118; Kleczka, 82 Wis. 2d 679; Wisconsin Senate, 144 
Wis. 2d 429; Citizens Utility Board, 194 Wis. 2d 484; and Risser 
v. Klauser, 207 Wis. 2d 176, 558 N.W.2d 108 (1997); and would 
modify Henry, 218 Wis. 302.  Justice Kelly's concurrence/dissent, 
¶230 n.14.   
No.  2019AP1376-OA.awb 
 
13 
 
¶144 Stare decisis, the principle that requires courts to 
"stand by things decided," is fundamental to the rule of law.  
Johnson Controls, Inc. v. Emp'rs Ins. of Wausau, 2003 WI 108, ¶94, 
264 Wis. 2d 60, 665 N.W.2d 257.  "This court follows the doctrine 
of stare decisis scrupulously because of our abiding respect for 
the rule of law."  Id. 
¶145 "Fidelity to precedent ensures that existing law will 
not be abandoned lightly.  When existing law is open to revision 
in every case, deciding cases becomes a mere exercise of judicial 
will, with arbitrary and unpredictable results."  Hinrichs v. DOW 
Chem. Co., 2020 WI 2, ¶67, 389 Wis. 2d 669, 937 N.W.2d 37 (quoting 
Schultz v. Natwick, 2002 WI 125, ¶37, 257 Wis. 2d 19, 653 
N.W.2d 266).  As a result, any departure from stare decisis 
requires "special justification."  Id.  Simple disagreement with 
a prior court's rationale is not such a "special justification."  
Progressive N. Ins. Co. v. Romanshek, 2005 WI 67, ¶46, 281 
Wis. 2d 300, 697 N.W.2d 417. 
¶146 Third, the interpretation advanced by Justice Kelly's 
opinion 
would 
render 
constitutional 
language 
superfluous.  
Specifically, the language added to the partial veto provision by 
constitutional amendments in 1990 and 2008 would have no effect 
under the position the opinion takes. 
¶147 The people of Wisconsin have twice limited the partial 
veto power by constitutional amendment.  Enacted in 1990 and 2008, 
the sum total of these amendments is provided in Article V, Section 
10(1)(c) of the state constitution:  "In approving an appropriation 
bill in part, the governor may not create a new word by rejecting 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.awb 
 
14 
 
individual letters in the words of the enrolled bill, and may not 
create a new sentence by combining parts of 2 or more sentences of 
the enrolled bill." 
¶148 Under the interpretation espoused by Justice Kelly's 
opinion, this language has no effect.  If, as the opinion posits, 
the part of the bill not approved must "be one of the proposed 
laws in the bill's collection," then what would be the need to 
proscribe the creation of new words or new sentences as set forth 
in Article V, Section 10(1)(c)?  If Article V, Section 10(1)(b) 
already prohibits the vetoes described in section 10(1)(c), the 
language of section 10(1)(c) is mere surplusage. 
¶149 We are to construe constitutional provisions "to give 
effect to each and every word, clause and sentence" and to avoid 
rendering any language superfluous.  Wagner v. Milwaukee Cty. 
Election Comm'n, 2003 WI 103, ¶33, 263 Wis. 2d 709, 666 N.W.2d 816 
(internal quotation and citation omitted).  The interpretation 
advanced in the opinion runs directly counter to this established 
mode of constitutional interpretation. 
¶150 Finally, Justice Kelly's opinion posits that the court 
has gone astray by "compar[ing] our partial veto to the 'line-
item' vetoes adopted by some of our sister states and, assuming 
the different words meant Wisconsin must have done something very 
much different from the others, we consulted them no further."  
Justice Kelly's concurrence/dissent, ¶182.  Yet there is a 
difference between a "partial" and an "item" veto, as our precedent 
recognizes.  Wis. Senate, 144 Wis. 2d at 439-40 (citing Henry, 218 
Wis. at 313).  The opinion does not account for the difference and 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.awb 
 
15 
 
would, as a practical matter, result in an "item" veto in spite of 
Wisconsin's unique constitutional language.   
IV 
¶151 Next, I turn to address Justice Hagedorn's opinion, 
which concludes that three of the vetoes at issue are 
unconstitutional and that one, the vehicle fee schedule veto, 
passes constitutional muster.  After disavowing each test proposed 
by both the parties and members of this court, the opinion states 
that "[w]hile future litigation will surely provide opportunities 
to refine the analysis, the principles derived from our 
constitutional text, structure, and early cases draw sufficient 
lines to decide this case."  Justice Hagedorn's concurrence, ¶264.   
¶152 Those principles lead Justice Hagedorn's opinion to this 
essential inquiry:  "whether the governor vetoed a policy the 
legislature proposed and passed, which is permissible, or created 
a new policy the legislature did not propose or pass, which is 
not."  Id., ¶263.  "[W]hat the governor may not do is selectively 
edit parts of a bill to create a new policy that was not proposed 
by the legislature.  He may negate separable proposals actually 
made, but he may not create new proposals not presented in the 
bill."  Id., ¶264.  In the opinion's view, all of the subject 
vetoes with the exception of the vehicle fee schedule veto fail 
this inquiry. 
¶153 Justice 
Hagedorn's 
writing 
suffers 
from 
several 
analytical shortcomings.  First, like both Chief Justice 
Roggensack's opinion and Justice Kelly's opinion, it advances a 
theory not specifically argued by any party.  Indeed, the opinion 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.awb 
 
16 
 
explicitly disavows each test proposed by the parties in this case.  
Id., ¶¶259-63.  Thus, the parties are deprived of the opportunity 
to analyze and offer comment on this proposed theory. 
¶154 Second, although the opinion appears reticent to say so, 
it would discard a significant amount of our precedent.  Justice 
Hagedorn's opinion would keep Henry intact, but would "revisit" 
our "later cases . . . insofar as they abandoned the core 
principles undergirding the way laws are made pursuant to our 
constitution."  Id., ¶266.   
¶155 Which of the court's "later cases" must be "revisited?"  
In a footnote, the opinion reveals that Kleczka is one of these 
cases, and that it must be overruled rather than merely 
"revisited."  Id., ¶266 n.11.  But the opinion also calls into 
question the entirety of our partial veto jurisprudence.  It 
asserts that "[i]nsofar as our later decisions have treated Kleczka 
as pronouncing that a veto shall stand simply if it leaves a 
complete, entire, and workable law, these statements too must be 
withdrawn."  Id. 
¶156 Yet, our court has never applied any test other than the 
"complete, entire, and workable law" test.  Thus, although obscured 
in a footnote, Justice Hagedorn's opinion would tear down a 
substantial amount of our precedent.  As explained above, such a 
position disregards the principle of stare decisis, which is 
essential to the rule of law.  Johnson Controls, 264 Wis. 2d 60, 
¶94. 
¶157 Third, Justice Hagedorn's proposed test injects an 
element of subjectivity into partial veto decisions.  In the 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.awb 
 
17 
 
opinion's view, the essential inquiry is "whether the governor 
vetoed a policy the legislature proposed and passed, which is 
permissible, or created a new policy the legislature did not 
propose or pass, which is not."  Justice Hagedorn's concurrence, 
¶263.  As with the test proposed in Chief Justice Roggensack's 
writing, such an inquiry is susceptible to manipulation and to the 
subjective preferences of judges.  The "policy" of a proposed bill 
is just as amorphous as the "topic or subject matter" of the 
proposed bill. 
¶158 For example, with regard to the school bus modernization 
veto, 
Justice 
Hagedorn's 
opinion 
suggests 
that 
"[t]he 
legislature's budget bill did not propose an appropriation in whole 
or in part for alternative fuels generally.  Instead, the 
legislature proposed an appropriation for the replacement of 
school buses."  Id., ¶271.  Again, what the "policy proposal" is 
depends on the lens through which the bill is viewed.  See supra, 
¶¶134-35. 
¶159 By asserting that "future litigation will surely provide 
opportunities 
to 
refine 
the 
analysis," 
Justice 
Hagedorn 
acknowledges the instability in the rule of law that these separate 
writings generated.  Justice Hagedorn's concurrence, ¶264.  
Without a clear rule, how will future courts know how to apply 
this law?  They won't.  How can governors be assured that the 
partial veto they are crafting is constitutional?  They can't.  
What is to happen if money has been paid or contracts signed based 
on the statutory language as it currently exists?  Those who would 
strike down the vetoes provide no guidance. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.awb 
 
18 
 
¶160 Indeed, there will be future cases needed to iron out 
the wrinkled mess we leave to the people of this state as this 
court's partial veto jurisprudence. 
V 
¶161 Instead of Chief Justice Roggensack's approach that 
would inject subjectivity into an objective test, Justice Kelly's 
approach that would discard decades of case law, or Justice 
Hagedorn's approach that would do both, I would apply the time-
honored test informed by our precedent.  That is, we ask whether 
"the part of the bill remaining constitutes a 'complete, entire, 
and workable law.'"  Risser, 207 Wis. 2d at 183 (citing Henry, 218 
Wis. at 314; State ex rel. Martin v. Zimmerman, 233 Wis. 442, 450, 
289 N.W. 662 (1940)); see Wis. Senate, 144 Wis. 2d at 453. 
¶162 The resulting law after the school bus modernization 
veto is clearly complete, entire, and workable.5  As Chief Justice 
Roggensack's opinion sets forth, the law after the veto states:  
"The department shall establish a program to award grants of 
settlement funds from the appropriation under s. 20.855(4)(h) for 
alternative 
fuels." 
 
Chief 
Justice 
Roggensack's 
concurrence/dissent, ¶16.  This resulting sentence is complete and 
workable on its face, providing clear direction on administration 
of the subject grants. 
¶163 Likewise, the local road improvement fund veto leaves a 
complete, entire, and workable law.  After the local road 
improvement veto, § 126 of the budget bill states:  "Local 
                                                 
5 The vehicle fee schedule veto also results in a complete, 
entire, and workable law, a premise that Petitioners do not 
dispute.  See Chief Justice Roggensack's concurrence/dissent, ¶90. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.awb 
 
19 
 
supplement . . . 75,000,000."  Id., ¶19.  Relatedly, § 184s 
provides:  "Local supplement.  From the general fund, as a 
continuing appropriation, the amounts in the schedule for local 
grant."  Id., ¶20.  Although this law does not get high marks for 
grammar, that does not mean it is not complete and workable.  
"Awkward phrasing, twisted syntax, alleged incomprehensibility and 
vagueness are matters to be resolved only on a case-by-case basis 
in which specific challenges to discrete applications of the new 
provisions are raised in a complete factual setting."  Wis. Senate, 
144 Wis. 2d at 463. 
¶164 Similarly, the vapor products tax veto results in a 
complete, entire, and workable law.  After the Governor's veto, 
the definition of "vapor product" is set forth as "a noncombustible 
product that produces vapor or aerosol for inhalation from the 
application of a heating element, regardless of whether the liquid 
or other substance contains nicotine."  Chief Justice Roggensack's 
concurrence/dissent, ¶24.  Again, the veto leaves a coherent 
sentence that is complete, entire, and workable on its face. 
¶165 Rather than embrace the novel and untested approaches 
advanced by each of the other separate opinions, this court should 
tread lightly and act with restraint.  Such approaches foment 
confusion and inevitably will lead to more litigation. 
¶166 The majority of the court likewise engenders more 
litigation with the relief it affords.  The petitioners suggest 
that if this court finds the vetoes unconstitutional, then we 
consider as possible relief "remanding to the Governor to allow 
him to reconsider the relevant sections and either approve them in 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.awb 
 
20 
 
whole, veto them in whole, or veto them in part consistent with 
this Court's opinion."  Such a suggestion for this court, however, 
proves to be much too restrained. 
¶167 Instead, the court grants an alternative relief, 
choosing to do an end run around the Governor.  The per curiam 
opinion announces that the school bus modernization fund, local 
roads improvement fund, and vapor products tax are "in full force 
and effect as drafted by the legislature."  Per curiam, ¶9.   
¶168 Arguably, the constitution requires a remand to the 
Governor.  The Wisconsin Constitution provides for only two ways 
for a bill to become law:  if the governor approves and signs the 
bill, Wis. Const. art. V, § 10(1)(b), or if the legislature 
overrides the governor's veto.  Wis. Const. art. V, § 10(2).  
Neither occurred here. 
¶169 Citing Sundby, 71 Wis. 2d at 125, the per curiam seeks 
support for the action it takes.  Specifically, the Sundby court 
set forth:  "If, in fact, the partial vetoes are invalid, the 
secretary of state has a mandatory duty to publish those sections 
of the enactment as if they had not been vetoed."  Id.  However, 
the statement in Sundby is not accompanied by any constitutional 
analysis and comes in the context of deciding whether the secretary 
of state was a proper party.  That's a pretty slim reed to use as 
support for the constitutionally questionable relief the majority 
grants. 
¶170 The people of this state deserve stability in the law 
and clarity in our opinions.  This court should uphold and follow 
our well-established precedent.  Based on that precedent and the 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.awb 
 
21 
 
test it establishes, I determine that all four vetoes at issue 
should be upheld because they result in objectively complete, 
entire, and workable laws.   
¶171 For the foregoing reasons, I concur in part and dissent 
in part. 
¶172 I am authorized to state that Justice REBECCA FRANK 
DALLET joins this concurrence/dissent. 
  
 
 
 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
1 
¶173 DANIEL KELLY, J.  (concurring in part, dissenting in 
part).  What a vexatious thing the word "part" can be, and indeed 
it has vexed us from the day we encountered it in Article V of our 
constitution.  When we first considered what it means for a 
governor to approve an appropriation bill "in part," we supposed 
the people of Wisconsin had adopted something very much unlike the 
"line-item veto" many of our sister states have adopted.  Our 
supposing caused us to dress up the governor as the people's 
legislative agent (with respect to appropriations bills) and the 
legislature as the owner of an exceedingly difficult to deploy 
veto.  So now appropriation "bills" may originate with the 
governor, and they must surely become law unless a super-majority 
of both legislative houses say otherwise.  Not because the 
constitution says this is how an appropriative law may come to be, 
but because we have said so.  And this we have done in obeisance 
to a single word, a word of merely serviceable merit in the 
ordinary affairs of life, but on which we have conferred the 
gigantic power to swap the governor for the legislature when an 
appropriation is under consideration. 
¶174 The balance of my discourse, I trust, will accomplish 
three things.  First, I mean to describe the mechanism provided by 
the constitution for the enactment of laws.  Second, I will recount 
how our partial-veto jurisprudence has completely disassembled 
that mechanism and reconstructed it with the parts all out of 
place.  And third, I will propose we retire our suppositions and 
instead consult the constitution's actual text to learn what it 
means for a governor to approve an appropriation bill "in part." 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
2 
I.  SCHOOLHOUSE ROCK 
¶175 A law begins as someone's idea.  Somewhere, for some 
often-unknown reason, it strikes someone that something within the 
government's purview ought to be required, or prohibited, or 
changed.  Through whatever pathways the idea might travel, it 
eventually comes to the attention of a legislator.  And if the 
idea finds there a receptive audience, the legislator engages the 
constitutional mechanism for turning the idea into a law.  It must 
be a legislator (as opposed to, say, the governor) because the 
power to make the law is legislative.  Schmidt v. Dep't of Res. 
Dev., 39 Wis. 2d 46, 59, 158 N.W.2d 306 (1968) (The legislative 
power is the power "'to declare whether or not there shall be a 
law; to determine the general purpose or policy to be achieved by 
the law; [and] to fix the limits within which the law shall 
operate[.]'" (quoting State ex rel. Wis. Inspection Bureau v. 
Whitman, 196 Wis. 472, 505, 220 N.W. 929 (1928))); see also Wis. 
Legislature v. Palm, 2020 WI 42, ¶92, 391 Wis. 2d 497, 942 
N.W.2d 900 (Kelly, J., concurring) (describing the legislative 
power as the ability to determine and declare what the laws and 
policy of the state will be).  And according to the unambiguous 
and unqualified command of our constitution, "[t]he legislative 
power [is] vested in a senate and assembly."  Wis. Const. art. IV, 
§ 1. 
¶176 The legislative process must begin with the drafting of 
a bill to contain the championed idea because "[n]o law shall be 
enacted except by bill."  Wis. Const. art. IV, §17(2).  When the 
drafting is done, the bill contains a complete and workable 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
3 
potential law, which is then introduced to the legislature:  "Any 
bill may originate in either house of the legislature . . . ."  
Wis. Const. art. IV, § 19 (the "origination clause").  There is, 
obviously, correspondence between the houses because a bill cannot 
become a law until approved by both:  "Every bill which shall have 
passed the legislature shall, before it becomes a law, be presented 
to the governor."  Wis. Const. art. V, § 10(1)(a) (the first clause 
is the "legislative passage clause," and the second is the 
"presentment clause").  And in that correspondence, each house may 
modify the proposed law considered by the other.  Wis. Const. art. 
IV, § 19 ("[A] bill passed by one house may be amended by the 
other.") (the "amendment clause"). 
¶177 Once both houses have agreed upon a bill, it comes under 
the governor's scrutiny as it passes from the legislative branch 
to the executive branch.  Wis. Const. art. V, § 10(1)(a).  The 
bill becomes a law "[i]f the governor approves and signs the 
bill . . . ."  Wis. Const. art. V, § 10(1)(b).  The process for 
appropriation bills (which is our particular topic of interest 
here) is, however, a little different.  Such bills "may be approved 
in whole or in part by the governor, and the part approved shall 
become law."  Id.  But the governor's disapproval of some part of 
an appropriation bill does not necessarily identify its terminus.  
Instead, the rejected part returns to the legislative branch for 
further consideration.  If two-thirds of the members of both houses 
approve, the rejected part becomes law notwithstanding the 
governor's disapproval.1 
                                                 
1 Wis. Const. art. V, § 10(2)(b): 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
4 
¶178 I beg forgiveness for this pedantry, but I find that our 
partial veto jurisprudence requires recourse to these fundamental 
principles so that we may recover the law-making process provided 
by our constitution.  We have before us two potential 
understandings of what it means to approve an appropriations bill 
"in part."  One is extraordinarily broad, and in consequence of 
its broadness it rejects almost every other piece of the 
legislative machinery described in our constitution.  The other is 
much more modest, but has the benefit of leaving the pieces of the 
legislative machinery where the constitution put them, and in its 
operation it precisely answers the problem it was meant to solve.   
¶179 I believe we should adopt the latter understanding in no 
small part because one of the fundamental rules of textual 
interpretation is that, when given a choice, we do not read one 
constitutional provision to conflict with others.  See Thomas M. 
Cooley, A Treatise on the Constitutional Limitations Which Rest 
upon the Legislative Power of the States of the American Union, 58 
(1868) ("[O]ne part is not to be allowed to defeat, if by any 
                                                 
The rejected part of an appropriation bill, 
together with the governor’s objections in writing, 
shall be returned to the house in which the bill 
originated.  The house of origin shall enter the 
objections at large upon the journal and proceed to 
reconsider the rejected part of the appropriation bill.  
If, after such reconsideration, two−thirds of the 
members present agree to approve the rejected part 
notwithstanding the objections of the governor, it shall 
be sent, together with the objections, to the other 
house, by which it shall likewise be reconsidered, and 
if approved by two−thirds of the members present the 
rejected part shall become law. 
 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
5 
reasonable construction the two can be made to stand together."); 
Antonin Scalia & Bryan A. Garner, Reading Law:  The Interpretation 
of Legal Texts 180 (2012) ("The provisions of a text should be 
interpreted 
in 
a 
way 
that 
renders 
them 
compatible, 
not 
contradictory.").  So we construe constitutional provisions with 
the assumption that they are all supposed to function together in 
concert.  When faced with two permissible constructions of the 
word "part," we must choose the one that harmonizes with other 
relevant text.  A reading that introduces dissonance is a powerful 
hint that we're doing it wrong. 
¶180 The tuning fork by which I will test for harmony and 
dissonance comprises three interrelated propositions called forth 
by our constitution's text.  The first proposition is that the 
most elemental part of a bill is an idea (that is, a proposal for 
a complete, entire, and workable law).  The second is that the 
powers of amending and vetoing are different things, the respective 
exercise of which our constitution commits to different branches 
of government.  And the third is that an idea may not become law 
without the legislature having first voted for it.  It seems 
remarkable to me that I should be offering these as propositions 
rather than as settled descriptions of constitutional principles, 
but our partial-veto jurisprudence is at odds with each of them.  
And that means all I can do is recommend them to the attention of 
future courts who may be called upon to consider the meaning of 
Wis. Const. art. V, § 10.  
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
6 
II.  ON THE JUMBLING OF THE LEGISLATIVE MECHANISM 
¶181 Great variances often begin as minor imprecisions, and 
such is the case with the path we traveled over the years as we 
addressed the partial veto.  I will detail only enough of that 
journey to describe how we disassembled some of the key pieces of 
the legislative mechanism and then reassembled them into something 
that is constitutionally unrecognizable. 
A.  The Disassembly 
¶182 We first entertained a claim that the governor had 
improperly employed his partial veto power in State ex rel. 
Wisconsin Tel. Co. v. Henry, 218 Wis. 302, 260 N.W 486 (1935).  
Having never encountered such a veto before, we sensibly looked 
about for tools to help us understand its telos.  Our first step 
was to compare our partial veto to the "line-item" vetoes adopted 
by some of our sister states and, assuming the different words 
meant Wisconsin must have done something very much different from 
the others, we consulted them no further.  It was certainly fair 
to observe that a partial veto must differ in some measure from a 
line-item veto——the word-choice suggests as much.  But it was a 
mistake to suppose the measure of difference was so great that 
other states' experience with vetoes of less than an entire bill 
could tell us nothing about their impact on the overall law-making 
mechanism.  So we missed out on what we might have learned about 
whether such vetoes have any effect on the vesting of legislative 
authority, or the origination of bills, or the difference between 
amendments and vetoes, or the need for the legislature to vote on 
a proposed law.  Finding no pedagogical value in the partial veto's 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
7 
cousin, we instead consulted a dictionary wherein, unknowingly, we 
found mischief.   
¶183 We learned from Webster's New International Dictionary 
that "part" means  
one of the portions, equal or unequal, into which 
anything is divided, or regarded as divided; something 
less than a whole; a number, quantity, mass, or the like, 
regarded as going to make up, with others or another, a 
large number, quantity, mass, etc., whether actually 
separate or not; a piece, fragment, fraction, member, or 
constituent. 
Henry, 218 Wis. at 313 (quoting Part Webster's New International 
Dictionary 1781 (2d ed. 1934)).  This provided a reasonably 
adequate etymological meaning;2 but what we needed was a 
constitutionally contextualized meaning.  Antonin Scalia & Bryan 
A. Garner, supra at 427 (We consider a word's meaning "in context 
according to a fair reading.").  That is, we needed to discover 
the most elemental part of a bill, the further subdivision of which 
leaves something no longer identifiable as a part of a bill.  If 
we had done this work then, it would have saved us from concluding 
in subsequent cases (which I address below) that the most elemental 
part of a bill is not an idea, but instead a letter or a digit. 
¶184 But we did not know then what would be urged upon us 
later, and so our analysis in Henry was adequate for our immediate 
needs, if not for future cases.  All we needed to do there was 
decide whether the partial veto empowered the governor to unbundle 
what the legislature had bundled——a practice then known as 
                                                 
2 A common, contemporaneous dictionary may provide a word's 
generally understood meaning.  State v. Sample, 215 Wis. 2d 487, 
499–500, 573 N.W.2d 187 (1998). 
 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
8 
"logrolling."  A case we decided a few years later neatly summed 
up the relationship between the problem and the solution provided 
by the partial veto: 
Its purpose [the partial veto] was to prevent, if 
possible, the adoption of omnibus appropriation bills, 
log–rolling, the practice of jumbling together in one 
act inconsistent subjects in order to force a passage by 
uniting minorities with different interests when the 
particular provisions could not pass on their separate 
merits, 
with 
riders 
of 
objectionable 
legislation 
attached to general appropriation bills in order to 
force the governor to veto the entire bill and thus stop 
the wheels of government or approve the obnoxious act. 
Very definite evils were inherent in the law–making 
processes in connection with appropriation measures. 
Both the legislature and the people deemed it advisable 
to 
confer 
power 
upon 
the 
governor 
to 
approve 
appropriation bills in whole or in part . . . . 
State ex rel. Martin v. Zimmerman, 233 Wis. 442, 447-48, 289 
N.W. 662 (1940).  We foreshadowed this conclusion in Henry where 
we observed that "there is nothing in that provision [art. V, § 
10] which warrants the inference or conclusion that the Governor's 
power of partial veto was not intended to be as coextensive as the 
Legislature's power to join and enact separable pieces of 
legislation in an appropriation bill."  218 Wis. at 315.  The rule 
we developed in Henry was sufficient to meet the problem of 
logrolling.  It required that the parts of the bill remaining after 
the partial veto "constitute, in and by themselves, a complete, 
entire, and workable law . . . ."  Id. at 314.  Applied in this 
context, it was a workable rule because its operation reflected 
the partial veto's purpose——separating ideas the legislature had 
joined.  Unfortunately, embedded in this rule is an intrinsic 
deficiency:  We had neglected to say that the "complete, entire, 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
9 
and workable law" remaining after the veto must be one on which 
the legislature had actually voted.  The deficiency was not 
apparent in Henry because the parts of the bill remaining after 
the veto were the same as they had been when transmitted to the 
governor.  What we didn't foresee at the time was that a future 
governor might so employ the partial veto that the remaining parts 
would comprise a law the legislature had never seen. 
¶185 The rule's deficiency bore fruit in State ex rel. Sundby 
v. Adamany, 71 Wis. 2d 118, 237 N.W.2d 910 (1976).  There, the 
bill in question gave local taxpayers the option of calling for a 
public referendum before a municipality increased its tax levy.  
Id. at 121-22.  But the governor vetoed part of one sentence in 
such a way that the remaining language made the referendum 
mandatory.  The legislature, of course, had neither proposed nor 
approved such a thing.  The idea had not been drafted as a bill, 
it did not originate in the senate or assembly, it was not subject 
to amendment in the corresponding legislative house, and no one in 
the legislature had ever voted on it.  And yet we said the 
gubernatorial-authored law was constitutionally permissible.  Why?  
Because, apparently, a veto has affirmative policy-making powers: 
Some argument is advanced that in the exercise of 
the item veto the governor can negative what the 
legislature has done but not bring about an affirmative 
change in the result intended by the legislature. We are 
not impressed by this argued distinction. Every veto has 
both a negative and affirmative ring about it.  There is 
always a change of policy involved.  We think the 
constitutional requisites of art. V, sec. 10, fully 
anticipate that the governor's action may alter the 
policy as written in the bill sent to the governor by 
the legislature. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
10 
Sundby, 71 Wis. 2d at 134 (emphasis added).  Every veto has an 
affirmative "ring" about it?  Well, I suppose so, but only in the 
sense that declining a marriage proposal has the "ring" of a 
wedding about it.  A veto cannot be the genesis of a new policy 
any more than telling an amorous suitor "no" means there is a 
reception to plan.  Vetoes and "noes" are for stopping things, not 
creating them.  See Federalist No. 73, 440-41 (Hamilton) (C. 
Rossiter ed. 1961) (The veto power "is the qualified negative of 
the [executive] upon the acts or resolutions of the two houses of 
the legislature; or, in other words, his power of returning all 
bills with objections, to have the effect of preventing their 
becoming laws[.]"). 
¶186 To Chief Justice Roggensack, however, a veto is an 
invitation to participate in law making rather than just law 
stopping.  She says:  "Furthermore, our jurisprudence is not unique 
in describing a quasi-legislative role for the governor.  A veto 
power, regardless of its contours, is inherently legislative."  
Chief Justice Roggensack's concurrence/dissent, ¶84.  The second 
sentence is certainly true, but it has no connection to what she 
means by a "quasi-legislative role" in the first sentence.  The 
veto is simply one of the instances in which our framers broke off 
a small piece of power that naturally belongs in one branch and 
put it in another.  So, yes, it is quite obviously legislative in 
nature.  But there are no penumbras emanating from the veto power; 
it authorizes the executive to do nothing more than what it says—
—stop a law from coming into being.  In the Chief Justice's hands, 
however, the veto is a clandestine vehicle for smuggling the 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
11 
legislature's law-authoring function into the executive branch 
where, through the power of the word "part," it turns the governor 
into a quasi-legislator (whatever that might be).  If we are to be 
constrained by the words of the constitution, this operation is 
simply impossible.  So the first sentence of the quote above is 
incorrect.  Our misguided jurisprudence might describe the 
governor as having a "quasi-legislative role" beyond merely 
stopping a proposed law, but literally no other authority in these 
United States does.3 
¶187 And that brings us back to Henry's unfinished work——
defining the "thing" that a partial veto may stop.  The rule we 
adopted in that case assumed, but never stated, that it was a 
bundled piece of legislation.  But without a contextualized 
definitional anchor point for "part," we concluded in Sundby that 
the most elemental part of a bill can be something smaller than 
one of the proposed laws bundled into an appropriation bill; we 
said it could be part of a sentence in one of the bundled proposals, 
so long as the resulting document still comprised a "complete, 
                                                 
3 The Chief Justice buttresses the executive's claim to 
legislative powers with reference to its rule-making authority 
(which it borrows from the legislature).  See Chief Justice 
Roggensack's concurrence/dissent, ¶86 ("First, as demonstrated by 
rulemaking, and as we have long concluded, the Legislature may 
delegate its power to make law to the executive."); Koschkee v. 
Taylor, 2019 WI 76, ¶34, 387 Wis. 2d 552, 929 N.W.2d 600 ("The 
source for rulemaking is legislative delegation.").  The nature, 
scope, effect, and validity of administrative rule-making are 
subjects of a continually growing body of literature that is 
enormous both in terms of its volume and potential constitutional 
implications.  So this probably isn't the best reference if the 
goal is to show that executive law-making is a settled and 
universally accepted phenomenon. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
12 
entire, and workable law."  So we accepted the veto of a part of 
a part of an idea even though the result expressed an idea not 
contained in the bill presented to the governor. 
¶188 But wait, there's more.  We've said the most elemental 
part of a bill a veto can stop isn't a sentence, or even part of 
a sentence——it's a letter or a digit: 
Thus, in this opinion, we break no new ground except as 
we now, on the facts before us, have the obligation to 
clarify that the governor may, in the exercise of his 
partial veto authority over appropriation bills, veto 
individual words, letters and digits, and also may 
reduce appropriations by striking digits, as long as 
what remains after veto is a complete, entire, and 
workable law. 
State ex rel. Wis. Senate v. Thompson, 144 Wis. 2d 429, 437, 424 
N.W.2d 385 (1988).  In what came to be known as the Vanna White 
veto, a governor would strike individual letters or numbers to 
create words, sentences, and ideas that appeared nowhere in the 
bill passed by the legislature.4   
 
¶189 We approved this practice in large part because we 
considered it all part of the governor's "quasi-legislative" role.  
Id. at 446.  Warming to our theme a few pages later, we dropped 
                                                 
4 See, e.g., State ex rel. Wisconsin Senate v. Thompson, 144 
Wis. 2d 429, 460 n.15, 424 N.W.2d 385 (1988): 
Governor Lee Sherman Dreyfus used a digit veto to cut 
$8.9 million appropriated for state school aids in the 
1979–81 budget bill. He accomplished this by vetoing the 
decimal point and number 9 from the percentage "96.9%", 
thereby decreasing the percentage used for calculating 
a portion of such school aids. That veto was not 
challenged, and the legislature subsequently failed to 
override it. 
 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
13 
both the "quasi" and any remaining pretense that the legislature 
is the exclusive legislative branch of government:  "This broad 
and expansive interpretation of the governor's partial veto 
authority as mandated by the constitution has, in effect, impelled 
this court's rejection of any separation of powers-type argument 
that the governor cannot affirmatively legislate by the use of the 
partial veto power."  Id. at 453. 
¶190 After releasing our Wisconsin Senate opinion in 1988, 
the court-approved method of enacting appropriation bills no 
longer bore any resemblance to the mechanism described by our 
constitution.  The three propositions I introduced above, and which 
I now address, demonstrate that our experience in reconstructing 
the dismantled legislative process left several of the key pieces 
in the wrong place. 
B.  The Reassembled Legislative Mechanism 
¶191 The first proposition traduced by our partial veto 
jurisprudence is that the irreducible part of a bill is an idea——
that is, a proposal for a complete, entire, and workable law.  This 
is the first because it necessarily informs our understanding of 
the entire legislative mechanism——specifically, it identifies the 
required entry point to the legislative process, where and how the 
idea may be changed, and whose approval is needed before the idea 
may become a law.  However, by treating a bill as a potpourri of 
letters and digits, rather than an expression of one or more 
complete and comprehensible ideas, our reconstruction of the 
legislative 
mechanism 
dramatically 
changed 
the 
legislative 
process. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
14 
¶192 Our refutation of this proposition started when we 
looked to a dictionary to learn what "part" means.  We had recourse 
to that venerable source because, surprisingly, we didn't think 
the context in which the constitution used the word was 
significant: 
As the meaning of that word, as used in section 10, art. 
5, Wis. Const., is not . . . rendered doubtful by reason 
of context, or uncertainty as to application to a 
particular subject–matter, or otherwise, there is 
nothing because of which that word, as used in that 
section, is not to be given its usual, customary, and 
accepted meaning . . . . 
Henry, 218 Wis. at 313.  But it's one thing to understand that a 
"part" is something less than the whole, as the dictionary says; 
it's an entirely different thing to understand what a part of a 
bill might be. 
¶193 As we learned in Schoolhouse Rock, a bill encompasses 
someone's idea.  The purpose of the bill, of course, is to 
introduce the idea it contains to the legislature, where the 
legislators evaluate its merits as a potential law.5  The fate of 
a bill in each legislative house, therefore, is to be the subject 
of debate.  See Wis. Const. art. IV, § 16 (Our constitution 
anticipates a vigorous debate:  "No member of the legislature shall 
be liable in any civil action, or criminal prosecution whatever, 
for words spoken in debate."); Legislature——Public Officers——
                                                 
5 See, e.g., Follow the Process:  The Legislative Process, 
Wisconsin State Legislature (Last Accessed Jun. 13, 2020), 
https://legis.wisconsin.gov/about/follow ("When a legislator gets 
an idea or is prompted by their constituency to make a change, 
they have a drafting lawyer prepare a draft of a bill to see what 
laws will need to change."). 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
15 
Secretary of State——Wisconsin Statutes, 10 Wis. Op. Att'y Gen. 613 
(1921) (Broadly describing the legislative process as an 
introduction of a bill in one house, potential amendment in the 
other, and ultimate agreement between them before presentation to 
the governor).  Debates (proper ones, at least) involve reasoning—
—the setting forth of intelligible arguments for or against a 
rationally comprehensible proposal.  Dividing a bill into anything 
smaller completely destroys its distinctive nature——that is, the 
expression of a proposed law susceptible of debate and adoption.  
This is why the basic part of a bill cannot be a letter or a digit.  
Neither the letter "y" nor the number "5" (nor any of their 
relations) can be, in isolation, a bill because such a thing would 
be incomprehensible in debate or as a law.  So the irreducible 
part of any bill, even the simplest, most uncomplicated, 
inconsequential bill one can imagine, must necessarily be, at a 
minimum, an idea expressing a potential complete, entire, and 
workable law.  This is why Justice Hansen said the partial veto 
"is not a power to reduce a bill to its single phrases, words, 
letters, digits and punctuation marks."  State ex rel. Kleczka v. 
Conta, 82 Wis. 2d 679, 726, 264 N.W.2d 539 (1978) (Hansen, J., 
concurring in part, dissenting in part). 
¶194 The second proposition is that the powers of amending 
and vetoing are different things, the respective exercise of which 
our constitution commits to different branches of government.  
Amending belongs to the legislative houses:  "[A] bill passed by 
one house may be amended by the other."  Wis. Const. art. IV, § 
19.  The power to amend a bill comprehends changing its meaning:  
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
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"When a change is made in a bill, it is said to be amended.  There 
are simple and substitute amendments."6  See also Amend, Black's 
Law Dictionary (11th ed. 2019) ("To change the wording of; specif., 
to formally alter (a statute, constitution, motion, etc.) by 
striking out, inserting, or substituting words.")  An amendment 
may accomplish something as minor as subtracting a penny from an 
appropriation, as major as introducing an entirely new idea, or 
quite literally anything in between.  Our constitution commits the 
power to amend to the assembly or senate; it contains no suggestion 
that the governor might be able to partake of it.  This should 
have given us pause as we were developing our theory of partial 
vetoes, but instead we rejected the idea that "the governor cannot 
affirmatively legislate by the use of the partial veto power."  
Wis. Senate, 144 Wis. 2d at 453.  This is patent error because it 
draws the amending power into the executive branch in direct and 
express contradiction to the constitution.  If we say the 
governor's "veto" may change a bill's idea, then there's really no 
cognizable difference between the concepts of amendments and 
partial vetoes.  Because we failed to keep these concepts distinct, 
our reconstructed legislative mechanism now allows for amendments 
in the assembly, the senate, and the governor's mansion.  
Obviously, we put the power to amend in the wrong place as we were 
reconstructing the legislative mechanism. 
                                                 
6 How a Bill Becomes Law, Wisconsin State Legislature 14 
(available 
at 
http://legis.wisconsin.gov/assembly/acc/media/1106/howabillbecom
eslaw.pdf) (May 2016). 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
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¶195 The third (and perhaps most important) proposition is 
that an idea may not become a law without the legislature having 
voted for it.  But when we finished reassembling the legislative 
mechanism, 
this 
proposition 
was, 
disturbingly, 
no 
longer 
categorically true.  If a bill contains an appropriation, our 
reconstruction allows a new idea to originate not as a bill but as 
a partial veto.  It further allows the idea to originate in the 
executive branch instead of the legislative branch.  And, finally, 
it allows this new idea to become law so long as the legislature 
does not reject it by a two-thirds vote in both houses.  So our 
reconstruction put more legislative pieces in the wrong place——we 
made the governor the author of the law (instead of the 
legislature), and we reduced the legislature to wielding a very 
difficult to deploy veto over the governor's edict.  The net effect 
is that the governor may create a law without ever having to obtain 
legislative approval.  In fact, a majority of both houses' members 
may affirmatively reject the governor's law, yet it is law 
nonetheless unless that majority is super-sized. 
¶196 This reconstructed mechanism violates four specific 
constitutional requirements.  The first is that all bills must 
originate in one of the two legislative houses, the second is that 
they must be subject to amendment in the corresponding house.  Wis. 
Const. art. IV, § 19 ("Any bill may originate in either house of 
the legislature, and a bill passed by one house may be amended by 
the other.").  The third is that "[n]o law shall be enacted except 
by bill," and the fourth is that the bill must be approved by both 
houses of the legislature.  Wis. Const. art. IV, § 17(2); Wis. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
18 
Const. art. V, § 10(1)(a) ("Every bill which shall have passed the 
legislature shall, before it becomes a law, be presented to the 
governor." (emphasis added)).  To the extent a governor's partial 
veto introduces an idea not previously present in the bill, its 
origin is in the executive branch, not the legislature.  And 
because the new idea did not originate in the assembly or senate, 
it was never subject to amendment in the corresponding house.  
Finally——and this should definitively dispose of our partial veto 
jurisprudence——it allows an idea to become a law even though it 
has not "passed the legislature." 
¶197 Now, to be sure, the judicially-engineered executive 
legislative power (how's that for a tri-lateral oxymoron?) is not 
as comprehensive as that belonging to the legislature.  We have 
left some limitations in place, which is encouraging even if they 
have nothing to do with the constitution.  For example, when the 
governor addresses himself to a dollar figure, we allow him to 
make it smaller, not larger.  Citizens Util. Bd. v. Klauser, 194 
Wis. 2d 484, 488, 534 N.W.2d 608 (1995).  Presumably, this limit 
derives from the mathematical principle that $10 is a part of $100.  
But it still allows introduction of an idea different from the one 
to which the legislature assented.  Another limitation relates to 
the letters the governor may use in the creation of new words and 
ideas:  We have never said he may add letters not already present 
in the bill.  I suppose this is an etymological limit based on the 
proposition that a letter (as opposed to an idea) is the 
indivisible part of a bill, and so a new letter cannot be said to 
be a part of the existing potpourri.  Speaking of which, we have 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
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not said (at least not yet) that he may change the order of letters 
in the potpourri.  This limit almost certainly survives because we 
haven't turned our attention to it.  If the governor may create 
new words and ideas not already present in the bill, it seems like 
scrupling at a trifle to insist that the letters he uses to create 
them remain in the order presented.  If a letter really is the 
most elemental part of a bill, it is just as much a "part" if it 
appears before rather than after any of the bill's other "parts."  
Nothing in the dictionary definition of "part" suggests that 
sequencing has anything to do with it.  In any event, aside from 
these few limitations, our cases say the governor is free to draft 
new ideas and we will pretend the resulting document is still a 
bill that has "passed the legislature" when, quite obviously, it 
isn't.  As a consequence, our cases refute the proposition that no 
idea shall become a law without legislative approval. 
¶198 So, as far as the Wisconsin Supreme Court is concerned 
(at least until we were contradicted by a brace of constitutional 
amendments),7 because the most elemental part of an appropriations 
                                                 
7 The people of Wisconsin amended their constitution in 1990 
to prevent a veto from "creat[ing] a new word by rejecting 
individual letters in the words of the enrolled bill[.]"  Wis. 
Const. art. V, § 10(1)(c).  They amended it again in 2008, this 
time to prevent a veto from creating "a new sentence by combining 
parts of 2 or more sentences of the enrolled bill."  Id. 
The Chief Justice and Justice Ann Walsh Bradley treat these 
amendments as though they have something to say about the meaning 
of the original partial veto power.  Chief Justice Roggensack's 
concurrence/dissent, 
¶73; 
Justice 
Ann 
Walsh 
Bradley's 
concurrence/dissent, ¶146.  They don't.  These amendments were 
directed at us; they were meant to rein in our jurisprudential 
excesses, not limit the meaning of the constitution's actual text. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
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bill is a letter, a bill may originate with the governor, it is 
not subject to legislative amendment, and it may become the law of 
Wisconsin even if the legislature has not approved it (or, more 
shockingly, has actually affirmatively voted against it, albeit by 
less than a supermajority).  As Justice Hansen said, 
[i]t appears that we have now arrived at a stage 
where one person can design his own legislation from the 
appropriation bills submitted to him after they have 
been approved by the majority of the legislature. The 
laws thus designed by one person become the law of the 
sovereign State of Wisconsin unless disapproved by two-
thirds of the legislators. I am not persuaded that art. 
V, sec. 10, was ever intended to produce such a result. 
Kleczka, 82 Wis. 2d at 727 (Hansen, J., concurring in part, 
dissenting in part).  I agree.  All of this upending of the 
constitutional order we have done because of the word "part," a 
word so meek and mild that it should be entirely incapable of 
wreaking such havoc on our constitutional order.  This case 
presents an opportunity to return the disordered pieces of the 
law-making machinery to their proper places, and I think we should 
take it.  In fact, I think we are required to take it. 
III.  ON THE DUTY TO RETURN TO THE CONSTITUTIONAL TEXT 
¶199 The majority of the court's members base their analyses 
on two propositions.  The first is that our decision here must 
follow what we have done in our prior cases, even if we were wrong 
before.  And the second is that we must respect the governor and 
legislature's historical practice of allowing partial vetoes so 
long as the resulting legislation is either on the same topic as 
the bill passed by the legislature (according to the Chief 
Justice), or is a "complete, entire, and workable law" (according 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
21 
to other members of our court).  I disagree because I believe our 
obligation to the Wisconsin Constitution supersedes both of them.  
I appreciate the Chief Justice's opinion because she attempts to 
cabin in the governor's use of the partial veto so that the 
resulting law is at least on the same topic, and in doing so she 
moves at least part of the way back to the constitutional 
limitations on the partial veto.  Other members of the court would 
not even attempt that much.  To the extent my opinion responds to 
others, it focuses primarily on the Chief Justice's opinion——not 
because I disagree with her the most (I don't), but because in 
moving closer to the constitution, her opinion helpfully 
illustrates the remaining distance we need to go before we can 
call ourselves constitutionally orthodox.   
A.  What we have done before 
¶200 "We cannot rehash original meaning——and its interaction 
with stare decisis——every time a partial veto comes before us[,]" 
the 
Chief 
Justice 
says. 
 
Chief 
Justice 
Roggensack's 
concurrence/dissent, ¶75.  Maybe.  But if we were to address 
ourselves to the original meaning of the relevant constitutional 
text in this case, we wouldn't be rehashing it, we would be 
analyzing it for the first time.  In our 85 years of experience 
with the partial veto, we have not once asked how it fits with the 
origination clause, the amendment clause, or the legislative 
passage clause.  
¶201 Standing between us and the constitution's original 
meaning, however, is a string of cases stretching back over those 
85 years.  Stare decisis counsels that we tread carefully here, 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
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and that we not upset what has been settled without a good reason.  
This principle rests on the premise that we do not begin every 
analysis ab initio mundi; our work builds on the accomplishments 
of our capable predecessors.  If a court disregards this premise, 
there is a risk that "deciding cases becomes a mere exercise of 
judicial will, with arbitrary and unpredictable results."  State 
v. Roberson, 2019 WI 102, ¶49, 389 Wis. 2d 190, 935 N.W.2d 813 
(quoting Schultz v. Natwick, 2002 WI 125, ¶37, 257 Wis. 2d 19, 653 
N.W.2d 266 (citations and quotations omitted)).  Embedded within 
our commitment to stare decisis is our recognition that "reliance 
interests are real, prior generations of judges did their job with 
wisdom, and efficiency in dispute resolution is important."  Daniel 
R. Suhr & Kevin LeRoy, The Past and the Present: Stare Decisis in 
Wisconsin Law, 102 Marq. L. Rev. 839, 859 (2019).  It is also 
conducive to what others legitimately expect of their judicial 
servants:  "Litigants and the public at large need to know courts 
function as neutral decision makers, delivering equal justice 
under law."  Id.  All of this explains why we must be "'respectful 
of the doctrine of stare decisis.'"  Chief Justice Roggensack's 
concurrence/dissent, ¶66 (quoting Roberson, 389 Wis. 2d 190, ¶49). 
¶202 But we mustn't let this principle capture us, for it 
contains dangers of its own.  To err is human, and judges are 
nothing if not human——especially when the mellifluousness of "your 
honor" makes the humility necessary to recognize mistakes harder 
to maintain.  See generally Marah Stith McLeod, A Humble Justice, 
The Yale L.J. Forum (Aug. 2, 2017).  And the potential for mistakes 
is constantly at hand, because it is tempting for a creative court 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
23 
to reach a decision "by extorting from precedents something which 
they do not contain."  Robert Rantoul, Oration in Scituate (July 
4, 1836) in Antonin Scalia, A Matter of Interpretation 39 (1991).  
Once embarked on this path, it is too easy for the court to "extend 
[its] precedents, which were themselves the extensions of others, 
till, by this accommodating principle, a whole system of law is 
built up without the authority or interference of the [people]."  
Id.  In this way, it is possible for us to "'do more damage to the 
rule of law by obstinately refusing to admit errors, thereby 
perpetuating 
injustice, 
than 
by 
overturning 
an 
erroneous 
decision.'"  Roberson, 389 Wis. 2d 190, ¶49 (quoting Johnson 
Controls, Inc. v. Emp'rs Ins. of Wausau, 2003 WI 108, ¶100, 264 
Wis. 2d 60, 665 N.W.2d 257). 
¶203 We risk this doctrine becoming a mechanism for error-
perpetuation if we don't respect its purpose:  To remind us that 
those who came before were diligent and capable in their work, and 
that in doubtful matters it is best to leave settled things settled 
unless there is a clear and present need to do otherwise. 
In the matter of reforming things, as distinct from 
deforming them, there is one plain and simple principle; 
a principle which will probably be called a paradox.  
There exists in such a case a certain institution or 
law; let us say, for the sake of simplicity, a fence or 
gate erected across a road.  The more modern type of 
reformer goes [happily] up to it and says, "I don't see 
the use of this; let us clear it away."  To which the 
more intelligent type of reformer will do well to answer:  
"If you don't see the use of it, I certainly won't let 
you clear it away.  Go away and think.  Then, when you 
can come back and tell me that you do see the use of it, 
I may allow you to destroy it. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
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G.K. Chesterton, The Thing:  Why I am Catholic 27 (Dodd, Mead and 
Co., Inc. 1930). 
¶204 Most of the members of this court would turn this 
prudential lesson into a permanent fence that would deprive 
Chesterton's reformer of the ability to bring change even after he 
had gained the necessary wisdom.  To fortify this fence, the Chief 
Justice turns to Justice Scalia, who once said:   
"In [originalism's] undiluted form, at least, it is 
medicine that seems too strong to swallow. Thus, almost 
every originalist would adulterate it with the doctrine 
stare decisis——so that Marbury v. Madison would stand 
even if [a prominent legal scholar] should demonstrate 
unassailably that it got the meaning of the Constitution 
wrong." 
Chief Justice Roggensack's concurrence/dissent, ¶67 (quoting 
Antonin 
Scalia, 
Originalism: 
The 
Lesser 
Evil, 
57 
U. Cinn. L. Rev. 849, 861 (1989) (alteration in original)).  But 
if the Chief Justice believes Justice Scalia thought stare decisis 
should unalterably privilege precedent over text, she is mistaken.  
Both Chesterton and Justice Scalia were both consciously 
addressing something that could be described as a paradox, and 
this quote captures only one of its sides.  The other is on display 
in Justice Scalia's many opinions in which he sets the doctrine 
aside in favor of the text.  So, for example, he disregarded 
precedent when it was "wrong and unworkable," or its rationale had 
no support in "history, precedent, or common sense."  See, e.g., 
Witte v. United States, 515 U.S. 389, 406 (1995) (Scalia, J., 
concurring) ("This is one of those areas in which I believe our 
jurisprudence is not only wrong but unworkable as well, and so 
persist in my refusal to give that jurisprudence stare decisis 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
25 
effect."); Dickerson v. United States, 530 U.S. 428, 450, 461-65 
(2000) (Scalia, J., dissenting) (urging the Court to disregard  
Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436 (1966), because its underlying 
rationale had no support in "history, precedent, or common 
sense.").8 
¶205 So when precedent unavoidably collides with the law——
that is, when it is wrong and its rationale has no support in 
history, precedent, or common sense——there must be no doubt about 
which will prevail.  I agree with Justice Clarence Thomas, who 
said that "[w]hen faced with a demonstrably erroneous precedent, 
my rule is simple:  We should not follow it.  This view of stare 
decisis follows directly from the Constitution's supremacy over 
other sources of law——including our own precedents."  Gamble v. 
United States, 139 S. Ct. 1960, 1984 (2019) (Thomas, J., 
concurring).  It also follows from the fact that no amount of 
judicial error can change the constitution, for "[t]he meaning of 
the constitutional provision having been once firmly established 
                                                 
8 The Chief Justice isn't quite as wed to stare decisis as 
her opinion would seem to suggest.  For an abbreviated sample of 
cases in which she wrote an opinion overturning one or more 
precedents, see State v. Roberson, 2019 WI 102, 389 Wis. 2d 190, 
935 N.W.2d 813, abrogating State v. Dubose, 2005 WI 126, 285 Wis. 
2d 143, 699 N.W.2d 582; Koschkee v. Taylor, 2019 WI 76, ¶1, 387 
Wis. 2d 552, 929 N.W.2d 600, overruling Coyne v. Walker, 2016 
WI 38, 368 Wis. 2d 444, 879 N.W.2d 520; Megal v. Green Bay Area 
Visitor & Convention Bureau, Inc., 2004 WI 98, 274 Wis. 2d 162, 
682 N.W.2d 857, abrogating Balas v. St. Sebastian's Congregation, 
66 Wis.2d 421, 225 N.W.2d 428 (1975) and Lealiou v. Quatsoe, 15 
Wis. 2d 128, 112 N.W.2d 193 (1961); State v. Ferguson, 2009 WI 50, 
317 Wis. 2d 586, 767 N.W.2d 187, overruling State v. Mikkelson, 
2002 WI App 152, 256 Wis. 2d 132, 647 N.W.2d 421; State v. Sykes, 
2005 WI 48, 279 Wis. 2d 742, 695 N.W.2d 277, overruling State v. 
Hart, 2001 WI App 283, 249 Wis. 2d 329, 639 N.W.2d 213. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
26 
as of the time of its adoption, such meaning continues forever, 
unless it is changed or modified by the Constitution."  State v. 
Schinz, 194 Wis. 397, 403, 216 N.W. 509 (1927). 
¶206 Justice Thomas's formulation also respects the fact that 
the judiciary's authority to decide cases is dependent upon an 
oath in which we swear to uphold the constitution——an oath that 
makes no reference to our precedents.  "[T]he Constitution does 
not mandate that judicial officers swear to uphold judicial 
precedents.  And the Court has long recognized the supremacy of 
the Constitution with respect to executive action and 'legislative 
act[s] repugnant to' it."  Gamble, 139 S. Ct. at 1985 (Thomas, J., 
concurring) 
(quoted 
source 
omitted; 
second 
alteration 
in 
original)); see also Mayo v. Wis. Injured Patients & Families Comp. 
Fund, 2018 WI 78, ¶91, 383 Wis. 2d 1, 914 N.W.2d 678 (Rebecca 
Grassl Bradley, J., concurring) ("'[T]he Constitution is to be 
considered in court as a paramount law[.]'" (quoting Marbury v. 
Madison, 5 U.S. (1 Cranch) 137, 178 (1803)).  This supreme law is 
the very source of the authority we exercise.  If we used it in a 
manner repugnant to its source, we would break faith with those 
who are the stewards of the document from which that authority 
arises.  This we must avoid at all cost, even should it mean 
abandoning our wrongly decided cases.  We have been equal to the 
task when called upon to do so before, and we must not shrink from 
it now. 
B.  Of the provenance and operation of "topicality" 
¶207 Today's decision expressly carries forward our partial 
veto jurisprudence, along with all of its errors, with the 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
27 
unremarkable consequence that, when we finished our work, pieces 
of the legislative mechanism were still in the wrong place.  The 
Chief Justice says "[h]aving broken no new ground, I employ our 
decisions and continue the constitutional analysis of 'part' in 
the four vetoes that were challenged."  Chief Justice Roggensack's 
concurrence/dissent, ¶90.9  The undisturbed ground on which the 
Chief Justice builds her analysis is the germaneness test we 
adopted in Wisconsin Senate: 
[F]or the first time in this case [we] give explicit 
judicial recognition to[] the long-standing practical 
and administrative interpretation or modus vivendi 
between 
governors 
and 
legislatures, 
that 
the 
consequences of any partial veto must be a law that is 
germane to the topic or subject matter of the vetoed 
provisions. 
Wis. Senate, 144 Wis. 2d at 437.  The Chief Justice's statement of 
the rule is almost identical:  "A veto that does not alter 
legislative control of the topic or subject matter of enrolled 
bills has been referred to as 'germane.'"  Chief Justice 
Roggensack's concurrence/dissent, ¶91.  Whether we call this a 
"germaneness" test (as we did in Wisconsin Senate) or a "topic or 
subject matter" test (as the Chief Justice does) it has nothing to 
do with the constitution, as the Wisconsin Senate quote makes 
clear.  It is, instead, merely descriptive of how the executive 
and legislative branches have conducted themselves.  As I will 
                                                 
9 The "continu[ing] constitutional analysis of 'part[,]'" 
unfortunately, did not extend beyond reciting the partial veto 
language and noting that "part" is something less than the whole.  
Neither the Chief Justice nor Justice Ann Walsh Bradley mention 
any of the constitutional provisions that must be ignored to 
operationalize our historical understanding of "part." 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
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explain below, while this may helpfully guide us to a starting 
point for our analysis, it can never authoritatively establish 
what the judiciary must consider to be constitutionally orthodox.  
Consequently, our analysis ended where we should have just been 
starting, which means we are no closer to a constitutional 
understanding of our subject than we were in Wisconsin Senate.  
I'll say a brief word about the inadequacy of the topicality test 
first, and then address why we shouldn't be in the business of 
blessing the other branches' modi vivendi, as Wisconsin Senate 
says. 
1.  Why "topicality" is an inadequate rule 
¶208 The Chief Justice says a partial veto is appropriate so 
long as it does "not alter the topic or subject matter of the 
'whole' bill before the veto . . . .  [S]uch a veto does not alter 
the stated legislative idea that initiated the enrolled bill."  
Chief Justice Roggensack's concurrence/dissent, ¶11 (footnote 
omitted).  It then repeats the proposition at greater length, but 
without any additional explanatory power: 
When the part approved by the governor does not alter 
the topic or subject matter of the whole bill presented 
to him for signature, the part approved maintains the 
legislature's choice of topic or subject matter that 
underlies the "whole" bill. Stated otherwise, when the 
legislative topic or subject matter is maintained, the 
"part" approved and the "part" that was not approved 
remain portions of the same "whole" bill, consistent 
with the constitutional text of § 10(1)(b).   
Id., ¶91. 
¶209 The problem with the topicality rule is that it does 
nothing to repatriate the law-authoring piece of the legislative 
mechanism to the legislature.  From a constitutional perspective, 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
29 
it really doesn't matter whether the remaining parts of the bill 
speak to the same topic or subject as the bill passed by the 
legislature.  It matters whether they are different from what the 
legislature passed.  The legislature does not pass a topic on which 
the governor may riff, it passes one or more proposed laws that he 
may accept or reject.  And, as the Chief Justice's opinion very 
capably explains, id., ¶29, we understand that the partial veto 
power arose in response to the legislature's practice of bundling 
several proposed laws into one appropriations bill, and that its 
telos was to give the governor the option of severally treating 
each of the proposed laws.  But a bundle of proposed laws is not 
an invitation to bebop.  The topicality rule may keep the 
governor's improvisations attached to the neighborhood of the 
original bill, but it still allows him to change the legislatively 
proposed law into something on which the legislature never voted.  
So the topicality test still leaves law-authoring power where it 
does not belong.  
2.  Why we cannot accede to the other branches' modus vivendi 
¶210 Not only is the topicality rule insufficient to put the 
pieces of the legislative mechanism back where they belong, the 
rationale on which it rests is at odds with our responsibility to 
ensure the branches of government don't barter their powers.  Part 
of the undisturbed ground on which the Chief Justice bases her 
analysis is the executive and legislative branches' "historical 
practice," which we said in Wisconsin Senate was a "modus vivendi" 
that had "achieved the force of law."  Wis. Senate, 144 Wis. 2d at 
453.  But when it comes to the allocation of powers amongst the 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
30 
branches, there is no force of law capable of reallocating them, 
save only a constitutional amendment. 
¶211 I have addressed elsewhere the nature and rough contours 
of how the constitution allocates power amongst the branches of 
government, so I won't belabor them here.  See, e.g., Wis. 
Legislature, 391 Wis. 2d 497, ¶92 (Kelly, J., concurring) ("Powers 
constitutionally vested in the legislature include the powers: 
"'to declare whether or not there shall be a law; to determine the 
general purpose or policy to be achieved by the law; [and] to fix 
the limits within which the law shall operate.'" quoting Schmidt 
v. Dep't of Res. Dev., 39 Wis. 2d 46, 59, 158 N.W.2d 306 (1968) 
(alterations in original)); State ex rel. Wisconsin Dev. Auth. v. 
Dammann, 228 Wis. 147, 159, 277 N.W. 278, on reh'g, 228 Wis. 147, 
280 
N.W. 698 
(1938) 
("It 
is 
fundamental 
that 
under 
our 
constitutional system the governmental power to execute the laws 
is vested in the executive department of the state[.]"); and Gabler 
v. Crime Victims Rights Bd., 2017 WI 67, ¶37, 376 Wis. 2d 147, 897 
N.W.2d 384 ("No aspect of the judicial power is more fundamental 
than the judiciary's exclusive responsibility to exercise judgment 
in cases and controversies arising under the law.").  
¶212 The piece of the doctrine that bears some emphasis in 
this case is that the location of the boundaries between the 
branches is a structural limitation that is beyond the branches' 
power to move, no matter the length of their practice to the 
contrary.  Even if two coordinate branches of government should 
agree that the boundary might lie more comfortably elsewhere, they 
are powerless to affect its actual location.  The importance of 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
31 
constitutional limitations, Chief Justice Marshall once said, is 
that they compel restraint when restraint is not desired:  "To 
what purpose are powers limited, and to what purpose is that 
limitation committed to writing, if these limits may, at any time, 
be passed by those intended to be restrained?"  Marbury, 5 U.S. (1 
Cranch) at 176.  This forbids the voluntary transfer of core powers 
to another branch just as much as it protects one branch from 
encroachment by another.  "It is . . . fundamental and undeniable 
that no one of the three branches of government can effectively 
delegate any of the powers which peculiarly and intrinsically 
belong to that branch."  Rules of Court Case, 204 Wis. 501, 503, 
236 N.W. 717 (1931); see also id. (stating that "'any attempt to 
abdicate [a core power] in any particular field, though valid in 
form, must, necessarily, be held void'" (quoting State ex rel. 
Mueller v. Thompson, 149 Wis. 488, 491, 137 N.W. 20 (1912))).  Even 
the abandonment of a branch's own authority cannot justify a 
coordinate branch taking it up and using it as its own.  "'As to 
these areas of authority, . . . any exercise of authority by 
another branch of government is unconstitutional.'"  Gabler, 376 
Wis. 2d 147, ¶31 (quoting State ex rel. Fiedler v. Wis. Senate, 
155 
Wis. 2d 94, 
100, 
454 
N.W.2d 770 
(1990) 
(ellipses 
in 
original)). 
¶213 The operative principle here is not that the branches 
should not delegate their core authority, it is that they cannot.  
This principle is a matter of power, not of prudence:  the 
constitution's progenitors did not grant the various branches 
permission to shuffle their distinct powers amongst themselves.  
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
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Justice Neil Gorsuch, commenting on this principle in the federal 
context, consulted John Locke ("one of the thinkers who most 
influenced the framers' understanding of the separation of 
powers") for its animating rationale: 
"The legislative cannot transfer the power of making 
laws to any other hands; for it being but a delegated 
power from the people, they who have it cannot pass it 
over to others.  The people alone can appoint the form 
of the commonwealth, which is by constituting the 
legislative, and appointing in whose hands that shall 
be.  And when the people have said we will submit to 
rules, and be governed by laws made by such men, and in 
such forms, nobody else can say other men shall make 
laws for them; nor can the people be bound by any laws 
but such as are enacted by those whom they have chosen 
and authorised to make laws for them." 
Gundy v. United States, 139 S. Ct. 2116, 2133–34 (2019) (Gorsuch, 
J., dissenting) (quoting John Locke, The Second Treatise of Civil 
Government and a Letter Concerning Toleration § 41, p. 71 (1947)).  
¶214 It is for that reason that the several branches of 
government cannot alienate their core powers, even if they 
consciously intend that end.  Not because it would be unwise, or 
imprudent, but because those who created them gave them no power 
to do so.  Therefore, prohibiting the legislature and executive 
from swapping their powers "isn't about protecting institutional 
prerogatives or governmental turf."  Gundy, 139 S. Ct. at 2135 
(Gorsuch, J., dissenting).  Instead, "[i]t's about respecting the 
people's sovereign choice to vest the legislative power in [the 
legislature] alone.  And it's about safeguarding a structure 
designed to protect their liberties, minority rights, fair notice, 
and the rule of law."  Id.  In the constellation of constitutional 
doctrines, this serves as one of the central organizing principles.  
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
33 
Without it, our constitution would be an incomprehensible jumble:  
"If [the Legislature] could pass off its legislative power to the 
executive branch, the '[v]esting [c]lauses, and indeed the entire 
structure of the Constitution,' would 'make no sense.'"  Id. at 
2134-35 (quoted source omitted; second and third alterations in 
original). 
¶215 But just because the legislative and executive branches 
shouldn't pass their powers around doesn't mean they won't 
sometimes try.  Indeed, Wisconsin Senate's recognition that the 
legislative and executive branches have arrived at a "modus 
vivendi" in the allocation of their powers proves not only that 
they are willing to try, but that they sometimes succeed.  This 
would not necessarily come as a surprise to the constitution's 
authors.  They structured it to prevent the shifting of boundaries 
through its internal system of checks and balances, and by arraying 
ambition against ambition, yet they knew these structures wouldn't 
be sufficient to prevent all attempted incursions.  "The framers 
knew . . . that the job of keeping the legislative power confined 
to the legislative branch couldn't be trusted to self-policing by 
Congress; often enough, legislators will face rational incentives 
to pass problems to the executive branch."  Id. at 2135.  When an 
attempted incursion comes before us, we do not have the luxury of 
shrugging off our duty to repulse it.  
[T]he Constitution does not permit judges to look the 
other way; we must call foul when the constitutional 
lines are crossed.  Indeed, the framers afforded us 
independence from the political branches in large part 
to encourage exactly this kind of "fortitude . . . to do 
[our] duty as faithful guardians of the Constitution." 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
34 
Id. (quoting The Federalist No. 78, at 468-469 (C. Rossiter ed. 
1961) (ellipsis in original)). 
 
¶216 The Chief Justice may very well be right that the 
legislative and executive branches have fallen into a comfortable 
partial veto routine in which the legislature allows the governor 
to unilaterally create law so long as it's on the same topic as 
the bill he is reviewing.  But basing our analysis on that practice 
is quite literally the definition of "begging the question."  We 
should not base our analysis on a logical fallacy, especially when 
the assumed conclusion is one our constitution so thoroughly 
rejects.10 
IV.  WHAT WE SHOULD DO 
 
¶217 I propose that we respect the constitution's structural 
limitations on what it means for a bill to be approved "in part."  
As I explained above, the law-making mechanism described by our 
constitution contemplates that the most elemental part of a bill 
can be no less than an idea——that is to say, a proposal for a 
                                                 
10 The Chief Justice finds this constitutional analysis faulty 
because it "does not account for the text of the Wisconsin 
Constitution," and it "ignore[s] that Wisconsinites are free to 
assign powers traditional to one branch of government to another 
branch by constitutional amendment."  Chief Justice Roggensack's 
concurrence/dissent, ¶87.  Well, the people of Wisconsin certainly 
are free to reassign the traditional powers of one branch to 
another.  But whether the people did so by making the governor 
into a one-man legislature requires accounting for all of the 
constitutional provisions relevant to the legislative process.  
Might I remind the Chief Justice that her conclusion that the 
people of Wisconsin did this novel and radical thing is based on 
a single word?  And that her opinion did not even refer to the 
constitutional provisions that define the legislative process even 
once?  The word "part" simply isn't powerful enough to countermand 
all the constitutional text necessary to make the Chief Justice's 
understanding of the partial veto viable. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
35 
complete, entire, and workable law.  This, of course, makes perfect 
sense in light of the partial veto power's purpose, which the Chief 
Justice persuasively described as answering the legislative 
practice of bundling many proposed laws into one bill.11  Therefore, 
because the partial veto power cannot act against any division 
less than the most elemental part, the governor must take the bill 
as he finds it:  as a collection of proposed laws.  So the smallest 
part of a bill against which the partial veto may act is one of 
the proposed laws in that collection.  Consequently, the applicable 
rule guiding the application of the partial veto is as follows:  
After exercising the partial veto, the remaining part of the bill 
must not only be a "complete, entire, and workable law," it must 
also be a law on which the legislature actually voted; and the 
part of the bill not approved must be one of the proposed laws in 
                                                 
11 We have understood this as the rationale for the partial 
veto from the very beginning: 
[T]he Legislature may, if it pleases, unite as many 
subjects in one bill as it chooses. Therefore, in order 
to check or prevent the evil consequences of improper 
joinder, so far, at least, as appropriation bills are 
concerned, it may well have been deemed necessary, in 
the interest of good government, to confer upon the 
Governor, as was done by the amendment in 1930 of section 
10, art. 5, Wis. Const., the right to pass independently 
on 
every 
separable 
piece 
of 
legislation 
in 
an 
appropriation bill. 
State ex rel. Wis. Tel. Co. v. Henry, 218 Wis. 302, 315, 260 
N.W. 486 (1935). 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
36 
the bill's collection.12  Nothing less than this will restore the 
pieces of the legislative machinery to their proper places.13 
                                                 
12 This, of course, is very close to the rule stated in Henry.  
Indeed, the rule, in the main, simply makes Henry's unstated 
assumption explicit in that it requires the remaining parts of the 
bill to contain ideas on which the legislature actually voted. 
13 Justice Ann Walsh Bradley says we should not return to our 
constitution's structural limitations on the partial veto because 
it "embraces a test neither advanced by any party nor ever applied 
in any case."  Justice Ann Walsh Bradley's concurrence/dissent, 
¶113.  I disagree, of course.  But I think a few words on the 
nature of this objection would be appropriate, starting with the 
latter clause.  It is an embarrassment, not a source of authority, 
that our court has never honored the constitution's limitations on 
the partial veto.  Perpetuating an embarrassment is not a judicial 
doctrine to which I subscribe.  Nor is the novelty of applying the 
constitution's terms to this case an argument against doing so.  
There is a first time for everything that happens——including the 
"topicality/germaneness" test, which had never been applied in any 
case in Wisconsin's history until the day it was.  Because 
everything has its genesis, a proscription against doing something 
for the first time——if we were to take it seriously——would be a 
condemnation of everything that has ever been done.  That is not 
a workable standard. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
37 
¶218 Justice Ann Walsh Bradley is concerned that my analysis 
would collapse our constitution's partial veto into something 
indistinguishable from other states' line-item vetoes.  "[T]here 
is a difference," she says, "between a 'partial' and an 'item' 
veto . . . [;] [Justice Kelly's opinion] does not account for the 
difference and would, as a practical matter, result in an 'item' 
veto in spite of Wisconsin's unique constitutional language."  
Justice Ann Walsh Bradley's concurrence/dissent, ¶150.  I do not 
think that is so.  There is no mandatory, single definition for 
what a "line-item veto" might comprise, so its content and 
                                                 
But even more interesting to me, because of its curiousness, 
is the objection that we should not interpret the law in a manner 
not advanced by one of the parties.  That sentiment compasses an 
understanding of the court that is entirely foreign to me.  The 
work of the judiciary is not some glorified form of "baseball 
arbitration" in which we are constrained to choosing one of the 
proposals offered by the competing parties.  The attorneys who 
appear before us are there to help us discover what the law 
requires, not to control us.  It is our job, not theirs, to "say 
what the law is."  Marbury v. Madison, 5 U.S. (1 Cranch) 137, 177 
(1803).  If we should discover, in the course of our research, 
that the parties both mistook it for something other than it is, 
it would be an abdication of our sworn duty to simply adopt 
whichever argument seemed closest to what the law actually says.  
Our responsibility is to determine for ourselves——in every single 
case, without exception——what the law requires.  And there is no 
one to whom we can delegate that responsibility.  So even if 
neither of the parties' arguments were correct, our duty would 
remain the same——to discover and say what the law says, not what 
a party says. 
Happily, Justice Ann Walsh Bradley's concern about whether I 
grounded my analysis in a party's argument is unwarranted here.  
The petitioner's brief and the legislature's amicus brief, in 
combination, either directly or obliquely advance most of the 
analysis in my opinion.  And if the concern is that part of the 
analysis appears in an amicus brief rather than a party brief, 
then I wonder why we allow amici at all. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
38 
operation could vary from state to state.  But generally speaking, 
line-item vetoes operate only on the fiscal elements of an 
appropriation bill.  Corpus Juris Secundum contains the following 
description of such a veto: 
The purposes of an appropriations item or line-item veto 
are to give the executive, who is elected statewide 
rather than from a particular district, the power to 
achieve fiscal constraint and to advance statewide 
rather than parochial fiscal interests by excising 
unneeded "pork barrel" programs or projects from an 
appropriations 
bill 
so 
as 
to 
restrain 
public 
expenditures and to permit the governor to disentangle 
issues so they will be considered on their individual 
merits . . . . 
 . . . Specific 
allocations 
within 
a 
general 
appropriation are subject to separate veto, either 
leaving the general appropriation intact in its full and 
original amount or reduced by a sum less than the 
aggregate of the specific items vetoed. 
82 C.J.S. Statutes § 68 (2020) (footnotes omitted). 
 
¶219 Currently, 43 states have some form of the item/partial 
veto.  Most limit the vetoes to the fiscal elements of an 
appropriation bill.  So Wisconsin's partial veto would not be the 
same as a line-item veto inasmuch as ours could be used as against 
any of the legislative ideas bundled into an appropriations bill, 
even if the vetoed part contained no appropriation. 
V.  APPLICATION 
¶220 2019 Assembly Bill 56 (which became 2019 Wis. Act 9, as 
amended by the governor's "veto") contained a multitude of proposed 
laws, amongst which were a school bus modernization fund, a local 
roads improvement fund, a modified vehicle registration fee 
schedule, and a tax on vapor products.  Here is how a 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
39 
constitutionally-grounded partial veto analysis would address the 
governor's actions. 
A.  School Bus Modernization Fund 
¶221 The first partial veto at issue in this case changed a 
school bus modernization fund into an alternative fuel fund.  
Section 55c established a grant for the replacement of school 
buses.  And § 9101(2i) identified the monies to be used to fund 
the replacement program.  The governor's partial "veto" amended 
§ 55c as follows: 
16.047(4s) of the statutes is created to read: 16.047 
(4s) SCHOOL BUS REPLACEMENT GRANTS. (a) In this 
subsection: 1. "School board" has the meaning given in 
s. 115.001(7).2. "School bus" has the meaning given in 
s. 121.51(4).(b) The department shall establish a 
program to award grants of settlement funds from the 
appropriation under s. 20.855(4)(h) to school boards for 
the replacement of school buses owned and operated by 
the school boards with school buses that are energy 
efficient, including school buses that use alternative 
fuels. Any school board may apply for a grant under the 
program. (c) As a condition of receiving a grant under 
this subsection, the school board shall provide matching 
funds equal to the amount of the grant award. (d) A 
school board may use settlement funds awarded under this 
subsection only for the payment of costs incurred by the 
school board to replace school buses in accordance with 
the settlement guidelines. 
The governor entirely struck § 9101(2i): 
(2i) VOLKSWAGEN SETTLEMENT FUNDS. Of the settlement 
funds in s. 20.855(4)(h), during the 2019–21 fiscal 
biennium, 
the 
department 
of 
administration 
shall 
allocate $3,000,000 for grants under s. 16.047 (4s) for 
the payment of school buses. 
The surviving language reads:  "16.047(4s) of the statutes is 
created to read:  16.047 (4s) GRANTS.  The department shall 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
40 
establish a program to award grants of settlement funds from the 
appropriation under s. 20.855(4)(h) for alternative fuels." 
¶222 The Chief Justice says the result is not on the same 
topic as the original bill.  But "topicality" is an elastic 
measuring tape, as even the Chief Justice recognizes.  Chief 
Justice Roggensack's concurrence/dissent, ¶91 ("Clearly, the 
evaluation of 'part' and 'whole' in § 10(1)(b) depends on how 
broadly you define the topic or subject matter.").  Both before 
and after the veto, this part of the bill created a grant program.  
And the funding would still come from the Volkswagen dispute 
settlement.  The Chief Justice says the "topic" of the provision 
was replacement of buses, not limiting carbon emissions.  Actually, 
it was both.  The legislature wanted school boards to replace 
current school buses not with just any buses, but "with school 
buses that are energy efficient, including school buses that use 
alternative fuels."  So it seems that under the Chief Justice's 
"topicality" test, the constitutionality of a partial veto depends 
on which topic we figure is more important. 
¶223 The resolution called for by the constitution is 
considerably more straightforward.  Here, the legislature bundled 
the creation of a school bus replacement fund into a bill with 
many other proposed laws.  As relevant here, the school bus 
replacement fund is the proposed law, the legislative idea.  The 
governor could approve that part of the bill or he could reject 
it.  What he may not do is turn it into something other than what 
passed the legislature.  This partial "veto" was inappropriate 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
41 
because it violated the origination clause, the amendment clause, 
and the legislative passage clause. 
B.  The Local Road Improvement Fund 
¶224 In another part of 2019 Assembly Bill 56, the legislature 
proposed the creation of a local road improvement fund.  The 
governor amended the proposed law by using his partial "veto" on 
§§ 126, 184s, and 1085m:   
 Section 126:  "(fc) Local roads improvement 
discretionary supplement . . . 90,000,000 [the 
governor replaced it with 75,000,000]."   
 Section 184s:  "20.395(2)(fc) of the statutes is 
created to read: 20.395(2) (fc) Local roads 
improvement discretionary supplement. From the 
general fund, as a continuing appropriation, the 
amounts in the schedule for the local roads 
improvement 
discretionary 
supplemental 
grant 
program under s. 86.31 (3s)." 
 Section 1085m:  "86.31 (3s) of the statutes is 
created 
to 
read: 
86.31 
(3s) 
DISCRETIONARY 
SUPPLEMENT GRANTS. (a) Funds provided under s. 
20.395 (2) (fc) shall be distributed under this 
subsection as discretionary grants to reimburse 
political 
subdivisions 
for 
improvements. 
The 
department shall solicit and provide discretionary 
grants under this subsection until all funds 
appropriated under s. 20.395 (2) (fc) have been 
expended. (b) 1. From the appropriation under s. 
20.395 (2) (fc), the department shall allocate 
$32,003,200 in fiscal year 2019–20, to fund county 
truck 
highway 
improvements. 
2. 
From 
the 
appropriation under s. 20.395 (2) (fc), the 
department shall allocate $35,149,400 in fiscal 
year 2019–20, to fund town road improvements. 3. 
From the appropriation under s. 20.395 (2) (fc), 
the department shall allocate $22,847,000 in fiscal 
year 2019–20, to fund municipal street improvement 
projects. (c) Notwithstanding sub. (4), a political 
subdivision may apply to the department under this 
subsection for reimbursement of not more than 90 
percent of eligible costs of an improvement." 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
42 
The surviving language reads:  "20.395(2)(fc) of the statutes is 
created to read: 20.395(2) (fc) Local supplement. From the general 
fund, as a continuing appropriation, the amounts in the schedule 
for local grant." 
¶225 These, of course, were amendments just as much as the 
partial "veto" of the school bus modernization fund was an 
amendment, not a veto.  The result of these amendments is that the 
new idea introduced by the amendment passed into law without the 
legislature ever voting for it.  This "veto" was inappropriate for 
the same reasons the partial "veto" of the school bus modernization 
fund was inappropriate. 
C.  Vehicle Fee Schedule 
¶226 Section 1988b of the bill would have made the 
registration fee for four truck weight classes identical.  The 
governor amended this section with his partial "veto" as follows: 
341.25(2)(a) to (cm) of the statutes are amended to read: 
341.25 (2)(a) Not more than 4,500 $ 75.00 100.00 (b) Not 
more than 6,000 . . . . . . . . . . 84.00 100.00 (c) Not 
more than 8,000 . . . . . . . . . . 106.00 100.00 (cm) 
Not more than 10,000 . . . . . . . . . . 155.00 100.00 
Prior to the "veto," all registration fees were $100, but what 
remained afterwards was a graduated schedule according to vehicle 
size.  This might be good policy, but it's not a veto. It's an 
amendment, and it fails for the same reason as the others. 
D.  Vapor Products Tax 
¶227 Section 1754 addresses taxation of vapor products.  The 
governor amended it with his partial "veto" as follows:   
139.75 (14) of the statutes is created to read: 139.75 
(14) "Vapor product" means a noncombustible product that 
produces vapor or aerosol for inhalation from the 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
43 
application of a heating element to a liquid or other 
substance that is depleted as the product is used, 
regardless of whether the liquid or other substance 
contains nicotine. 
The surviving language reads:  "139.75 (14) of the statutes is 
created to read: 139.75 (14) 'Vapor product' means a noncombustible 
product that produces vapor or aerosol for inhalation from the 
application of a heating element regardless of whether the liquid 
or other substance contains nicotine." 
¶228 In this part of the bill, the legislature proposed a law 
that would tax "vaping" equipment, but not the liquids used in the 
equipment.  The governor's partial "veto" expanded the tax to 
include the liquids as well, which made it an amendment, not a 
veto.  For anyone even vaguely familiar with our country's history 
and the revolution that brought it into existence, this should 
make you sit up and take notice:  The governor, all by himself, 
imposed a tax on a product without legislative approval.  Taxation 
without representation was once a powerful rallying cry.  See 
Declaration of Independence (U.S. 1776) (One of our grievances 
with the King of England was his habit of "imposing taxes on us 
without our consent[.]"; John Dickinson, Letter's From a Farmer in 
Pennsylvania reprinted in Tracts of the American Revolution 141 
(1763-1776) (Merrill Jensen ed., Hackett Pub. Co. 2003) (1768) 
("That it is inseparably essential to the freedom of a people, and 
the undoubted right of Englishmen, that NO TAX be imposed on them, 
but with their own consent, given personally, or by their 
representatives.").  As with all the other partial "vetoes" in 
this case, this one violated the origination clause, the amendment 
clause, and the legislative passage clause.  It also violated the 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
44 
unwritten, 
but 
only 
slightly 
less 
well-known, 
"don't 
do 
revolution-inciting things" clause. 
VI.  CONCLUSION 
¶229 Because a majority of this court does not favor this 
analysis, our partial veto jurisprudence leaves key pieces of the 
legislative machinery in places where they do not belong.  As a 
direct and unavoidable result, our cases (including this one) 
condone violations of the origination clause, the amendment 
clause, and the legislative passage clause.   
¶230 The proper role of the partial veto is to separate the 
several 
proposed 
laws 
the 
legislature 
bundled 
into 
one 
appropriations bill.  After exercising this veto power, the 
remaining document must comprise one or more "complete, entire, 
and workable laws," all of which must have passed the legislature.  
The corollary to this is that the part or parts of the bill the 
governor did not approve must also comprise one or more "complete, 
entire, and workable laws" that had passed the legislature.  This 
symmetry guarantees that the partial veto does nothing but unbundle 
the proposed laws the legislature had bundled.14  Because the 
                                                 
14 I would overrule State ex rel. Sundby v. Adamany, 71 
Wis. 2d 118, 237 N.W.2d 910 (1976); State ex rel. Kleczka v. Conta, 
82 Wis. 2d 679, 264 N.W.2d 539 (1978); Citizens Util. Bd. v. 
Klauser, 194 Wis. 2d 484, 534 N.W.2d 608 (1995); Risser v. 
Klauser, 207 Wis. 2d 176, 558 N.W.2d 108 (1997); and State ex rel. 
Wisconsin Senate v. Thompson, 144 Wis. 2d 429, N.W.2d 385 (1988).  
Each of these decisions depends on the unconstitutional transfer 
of law-making power to the governor through the use of a partial 
veto. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.dk 
 
 
 
2 
majority of this court does not accurately apply the legislative 
mechanism the constitution created, I cannot join it.  However, I 
concur with that part of the court's judgment that strikes two of 
the vetoes at issue in this case, and respectfully dissent from 
the court's judgment upholding the other two. 
¶231 I am authorized to state that Justice REBECCA GRASSL 
BRADLEY joins this opinion. 
 
                                                 
I would not, however, overrule State ex rel. Wisconsin Tel. 
Co. v. Henry, 218 Wis. 302, 260 N.W. 486 (1935).  Instead, I would 
modify its holding to make its assumption explicit:  The parts of 
the bill remaining after exercise of the partial veto must comprise 
"a complete, entire, and workable law" that was actually voted on 
by the legislature. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.bh 
 
1 
 
 
¶232 BRIAN HAGEDORN, J.   (concurring).  In 1930, the people 
of Wisconsin amended our constitution and gave the governor power 
to veto parts of appropriation bills.  Nonetheless, the 
constitution 
retains 
the 
basic 
structural 
principle 
that 
legislating is the job of the legislature.  The question in this 
case is whether the judiciary will sanction the former swallowing 
the latter. 
¶233 The partial veto power grants the governor the authority 
to disapprove appropriations bills in part——a power that no doubt 
allows the governor to alter the legislature's global policy 
objectives.  The partial veto power in this sense is quasi-
legislative in nature.  But a bill presented to the governor is 
not sand on a seashore from which a governor can construct any 
sandcastle his ingenuity conceives.  A bill is not merely a 
collection of words, letters, and numbers that can be repurposed; 
it is a set of legislatively chosen policies.  A partial veto is 
the power to negate some proposed policies and accept others, not 
the power to unilaterally create new policies never passed by the 
legislature. 
¶234 While the governor's partial veto power is incredibly 
broad, it should not be read to fundamentally upend the overall 
structure of our government embedded in our constitution.  The 
constitution's placement of law-creation in the hands of the 
legislature means we cannot permit a practice that turns the 
governor into a one-person legislature.  Because the constitution 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.bh 
 
2 
 
contains these substantive limitations, we should enforce them, 
even acknowledging the potential difficulty of that project. 
¶235 In this case, the petitioners challenge four sets of 
vetoes in the state's 2019-21 biennial budget bill.  I conclude 
that with three of the challenges——the school bus modernization 
fund, the local road improvement fund, and the vapor products tax—
—the governor's vetoes went beyond negating legislative policy 
proposals; they created brand new ones.  These are in excess of 
the governor's constitutional veto authority.  The fourth 
challenge to the vehicle fee schedule vetoes was properly within 
constitutional boundaries.  Therefore, I respectfully concur. 
 
I.  LEGAL PRINCIPLES 
¶236 Something is amiss in our jurisprudence when a 
constitutional provision allowing the governor to strike parts of 
an appropriation bill has, through creativity and judicial 
acquiescence, turned into a license for an enterprising governor 
to create brand new policies from a proposed package of statutory 
words.  This is a bipartisan affair, of course, as governors for 
decades have been working within the Wild West framework this court 
has established.  But no one conducting a reasonable reading of 
the partial veto provision in its greater constitutional context 
would see it as a fundamental reshaping of our constitutional 
order.  See Justice Kelly's concurrence/dissent, ¶198.  We are 
here because this court has allowed it to be so.  As one former 
justice aptly prophesied, "I fear that the court may now have 
painted itself into a corner, and that a time may come when we 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.bh 
 
3 
 
regret having done so."  State ex rel. Kleczka v. Conta, 82 
Wis. 2d 679, 724, 264 N.W.2d 539 (1978) (Hansen, J., dissenting).  
For me, that time is now. 
¶237 So where do we go from here?  The petitioners candidly 
ask us to start from scratch.  They ask us to overturn or modify 
language in every case that we've ever decided on this significant 
and repeatedly litigated provision.  That's a big ask.  But the 
petitioners come with the right question:  What is the original 
public meaning of the constitutional text?  Our starting point in 
constitutional interpretation must be the original public meaning 
of the constitution's language because this is the law the people 
have enacted.  Attorney Gen. ex rel. Bashford v. Barstow, 4 
Wis. *567, *757–58 (1855) (explaining that because the people 
"made this constitution, and adopted it as their primary law," 
constitutional interpretation rests not in generic theories of 
governance, but on the "true intent and meaning" of the 
"authoritative and mandatory" words of the document itself).  But 
our analysis is informed by, and gives proper deference to, the 
reasoned decisions of those who have come before us. 
 
A.  Lawmaking in the Wisconsin Constitution 
¶238 Three types of government power are described in the 
Wisconsin Constitution, and each power is vested in a corresponding 
branch of government.  Gabler v. Crime Victims Rights Bd., 2017 
WI 67, ¶11, 376 Wis. 2d 147, 897 N.W.2d 384.  The senate and 
assembly are vested with the power to legislate, the governor is 
vested with the power to execute the laws, and the judiciary is 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.bh 
 
4 
 
vested with the power to decide cases based on the law.  Wis. 
Const. art. IV, § 1; id. art. V, § 1; id. art. VII, § 2. 
¶239 The mechanism for exercising legislative power under the 
constitution is the enactment of laws; the legislature is the chief 
lawmaker.  League of Women Voters of Wis. v. Evers, 2019 WI 75, 
¶35, 
387 
Wis. 2d 511, 
929 
N.W.2d 209; 
Justice 
Kelly's 
concurrence/dissent, ¶175.  A law begins with a proposed bill, 
which can originate in either house of the legislature.  Wis. 
Const. 
art. 
IV, 
§ 17(2), 
§ 19; 
Justice 
Kelly's 
concurrence/dissent, ¶176.  Bills may be amended during this 
process, and when a bill is passed by both houses of the 
legislature, it is presented to the governor.  Wis. Const. art. 
IV, 
§ 19; 
id. 
art. 
V, 
§ 10(1)(a); 
Justice 
Kelly's 
concurrence/dissent, ¶¶176-77.  The governor then has four 
potential options:  (1) sign the whole bill into law; (2) do 
nothing and allow the bill to become law on its own after six days 
(Sundays excluded); (3) veto the whole bill; or (4) if the bill 
contains an appropriation, sign the bill into law while vetoing 
part of it.1  Wis. Const. art. V, § 10(1)(b), § 10(2)(a), § 10(3). 
¶240 The fourth option, the partial veto, was added to the 
constitution in 1930.  The relevant constitutional language today 
provides:  "If the governor approves and signs the bill, the bill 
shall become law.  Appropriation bills may be approved in whole or 
in part by the governor, and the part approved shall become law."  
                                                 
1 If rejected in whole or in part, the bill is returned, with 
objections, to the originating house, and that which was rejected 
may nevertheless become law if it garners approval of two-thirds 
of the members of both houses.  Wis. Const. art. V, § 10(2). 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.bh 
 
5 
 
Id. art. V, § 10(1)(b).2  Appropriation bills are required to pay 
money out of the treasury.  Id. art. VIII, § 2 ("No money shall be 
paid out of the treasury except in pursuance of an appropriation 
by law."). 
¶241 This framework deserves a few reflections.  First, the 
constitutional meaning of a "bill" must be rooted in the concept 
of what the legislature is producing when a bill is passed.  A 
bill presented to the governor is not a potpourri of words, 
letters, and numbers that the governor may do with as he wishes.  
See State ex rel. Wis. Senate v. Thompson, 144 Wis. 2d 429, 473, 
424 N.W.2d 385 (1988) (Bablitch, J., dissenting).  As Justice Kelly 
explains, a bill is composed of policy proposals (or as Justice 
Kelly 
calls 
them, 
ideas). 
 
See 
Justice 
Kelly's 
concurrence/dissent, ¶¶175-76, 180.  It is the legislature's 
province to exercise the legislative power to determine and declare 
what the policies of the state shall be.  Wis. Const. art. IV, 
§ 1.  And this is done by passing bills composed of its policy 
choices.  Borgnis v. Falk Co., 147 Wis. 327, 351, 133 N.W. 209 
(1911) ("When acting within constitutional limitations, the 
Legislature settles and declares the public policy of a 
state . . . ."). 
¶242 Second, the veto power is a bit of an aberration from 
the general distribution of constitutional power.  That is, the 
                                                 
2 The amendment as initially adopted provided:  "Appropriation 
bills may be approved in whole or in part by the governor, and the 
part approved shall become law, and the part objected to shall be 
returned in the same manner as provided for other bills."  1927 
S.J. Res. 35. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.bh 
 
6 
 
power to veto, whether in whole or in part, is legislative in 
nature; it is a participation in lawmaking.  Edwards v. United 
States, 
286 
U.S. 482, 
490-91 
(1932) 
(characterizing 
the 
President's 
ability 
to 
approve 
or 
disapprove 
bills 
as 
"legislative" in character); Rateree v. Rockett, 852 F.2d 946, 951 
(7th Cir. 1988) ("[T]he President acts legislatively when he 
approves or vetoes bills passed by Congress."); Chief Justice 
Roggensack's concurrence/dissent, ¶84.  And while a partial veto 
places more quasi-legislative power in the hands of the governor 
than a whole-bill veto, we cannot lose sight of the nature of a 
veto.  A veto is, by definition, the ability to negate, not create.  
This is the plain meaning of the word "veto."  Veto, Black's Law 
Dictionary (11th ed. 2019) ("A power of one governmental branch to 
prohibit an action by another branch." (emphasis added)); The 
Federalist No. 73 (Hamilton) (describing the veto as "the qualified 
negative of the President upon the acts or resolutions of the two 
houses of the legislature"). 
¶243 Finally, the partial veto power must be read in the 
context of the whole constitutional structure and design.  Namely, 
any policy proposal that becomes law must be a policy proposed by 
the legislature——one that originates as a bill that eventually 
passes both houses of the legislature.  Wis. Const. art. IV, 
§ 17(2), § 19; id. art. V, § 10(1)(a).  Partial veto or not, the 
legislature is still the constitutional branch charged with making 
law, not the governor.  See Justice Kelly's concurrence/dissent, 
¶175. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.bh 
 
7 
 
¶244 We must hold all of these lessons from the constitution 
together.  A blind focus on the partial veto power alone at the 
expense of the rest of constitutional text is not constitutional 
faithfulness.  State v. City of Oak Creek, 2000 WI 9, ¶18, 232 
Wis. 2d 612, 605 N.W.2d 526 (we discern the meaning of the 
constitutional text based on the context in which it is used).  
This means any reading of the partial veto power that enables the 
governor to take the raw materials of a bill (words, letters, and 
numbers) and recast them to create a new policy not proposed and 
passed by the legislature contradicts the constitutional design 
for how a bill becomes a law.  And the core negating, not creating, 
concept of a veto must be true if the legislature is still the 
branch authorized by the constitution to make law and appropriate 
funds.  Wis. Const. art. IV, § 1, § 17(2), § 19; id. art. VIII, 
§ 2.  The legislature must be the primary policymaker, and the 
governor cannot usurp that role by creating new policies from the 
reworked language of enacted bills. 
¶245 With this broader constitutional framework in view, we 
turn to a brief overview of how this court has previously handled 
the partial veto power in particular. 
 
B.  The Partial Veto and the Wisconsin Supreme Court 
¶246 Alfred North Whitehead famously said that Western 
philosophy consists of a series of footnotes to Plato.3  In the 
same way, this court's decisions interpreting the governor's 
                                                 
3 Alfred North Whitehead, Process and Reality 39 (The Free 
Press 1978) (1929). 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.bh 
 
8 
 
partial veto power consist largely of a series of footnotes to our 
first case on that matter, State ex rel. Wisconsin Telephone Co. 
v. Henry, 218 Wis. 302, 260 N.W. 486 (1935).  Handed down just 
five years after the ratification of the 1930 amendment, Henry 
presented two questions:  whether the governor could "disapprove 
parts of an appropriation bill that are not an appropriation" and 
whether he could "disapprove a proviso or condition inseparably 
connected to the appropriation."  Id. at 309.  The court engaged 
in a considered plain meaning examination of the text and reached 
several conclusions that establish the framework for the partial 
veto power. 
¶247 Of primary importance, the court reasoned that the 
choice of constitutional language——using "part" and not "item"——
was intentional and must be given meaning.  Id. at 313-14.4  The 
amendment, the court concluded, was not an item veto, but a part 
veto that authorized gubernatorial disapproval of something less 
than an entire legislative policy proposal.  Id.  A governor, then, 
could veto non-appropriation language in appropriation bills.  Id.  
He could also strike portions of a broader policy proposal that 
did not constitute provisos or conditions inseparably connected to 
the appropriation.  Id.  As long as what remained was a complete, 
entire, and workable law, vetoing portions of the proposed law 
                                                 
4 The court in Henry surveyed constitutions of other states 
that permitted some form of partial veto.  State ex rel. Wis. Tel. 
Co. v. Henry, 218 Wis. 302, 310-15, 260 N.W. 486 (1935).  Noting 
that many states used "items" or "any item or items or part or 
parts," the court concluded that our constitution's use of the 
word "part" but not the word "item" was significant and must be 
given meaning.  Id. at 310-11. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.bh 
 
9 
 
that were not "essential, integral, and interdependent parts of 
those which were approved" was consistent with the constitution.  
Id. at 314, 317.  Applying this to the facts before it, the court 
concluded that the vetoed language declaring the purpose for a new 
appropriation and the proposed creation of a new administrative 
apparatus for distribution of that appropriation were not provisos 
or conditions inseparably connected to the remainder.  Id. at 317.  
The governor's veto was therefore within his constitutional 
authority.  Id. 
¶248 From this, we observe that Henry identified both 
procedural and substantive limitations on the partial veto power.  
Procedurally, what is left must be a complete, entire, and workable 
law.  Id. at 314.  This is obviously correct if the part approved 
is actually to become law as the constitution specifies.  Wis. 
Const. art. V, § 10(1)(b).  But the court also recognized 
substantive limitations, unsubtly suggesting that provisos and 
conditions that could not be separated from a policy proposal could 
not be stricken.  Henry, 218 Wis. 2d at 309-10.  The court labelled 
the veto power coextensive with the legislature's power to 
assemble.  Id. at 315.  But this is just as much a limitation on 
the power's reach as it is a recognition of the power's breadth.  
Id. at 315.  The court also discussed how severability principles—
—which include at least some focus on legislative intent——were 
relevant to an inquiry into the scope of the partial veto power.  
Id. at 314-15. 
¶249 The petitioners ask us to overturn Henry.  They argue 
this court misconstrued the original public meaning from the 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.bh 
 
10 
 
beginning, and that the partial veto was intended to be an item 
veto.  Some evidence, including newspaper stories reflecting the 
sponsor's goals and other public discussion on the proposed 1930 
amendment, certainly supports this view.  But plenty of evidence 
goes the other way too.  See Chief Justice Roggensack's 
concurrence/dissent, ¶¶31-36 (summarizing the evidence which 
supports both an item veto and a part veto).  Notably, one draft 
amendment in 1925 would have permitted the governor to disapprove 
"items or parts of items."5  This shows the legislature understood 
the difference between "part" and "item," and that the choice to 
use this language is reasonably read to mean something.  And it is 
not insignificant that Henry, a decision close in time to the 
enactment of the amendment, unanimously rejected the petitioners' 
view.  I accept Henry as a fair, considered, and likely correct 
effort to discern the original public meaning of our constitutional 
text.  At the very least, the petitioners have not demonstrated 
that the original public meaning is clearly otherwise. 
¶250 For the first 45 years of the partial veto power's 
history, 
the 
principles 
announced 
in 
Henry, 
including 
a 
recognition that the broader constitutional context requires both 
procedural and substantive limitations, remained substantially in 
place.  Our veto cases that abided by these principles are, in my 
view, unproblematic and consistent with the constitution's 
meaning.  See State ex rel. Finnegan v. Dammann, 220 Wis. 143, 264 
                                                 
5 See 1925 S.J. Res. 23 (proposing to amend Article V, Section 
10 to allow the governor to "disapprove or reduce items or parts 
of items in any bill appropriating money"). 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.bh 
 
11 
 
N.W. 622 (1936); State ex rel. Martin v. Zimmerman, 233 Wis. 442, 
289 N.W. 662 (1940). 
¶251 The broadly accepted legal framework, however, started 
to drift in the 1970s.  Around that time, governors began to take 
their partial veto power to new artistic heights.6  Rather than 
maintain the twin pillars of both procedural and substantive 
limitations on that power, this court started to jettison its 
commitment to any standard other than the requirement that after 
a partial veto the part approved must be a complete, entire, and 
workable law. 
¶252 This change was explicitly undertaken in Kleczka, 82 
Wis. 2d 679.  There, the legislature had proposed allowing a 
taxpayer to effectively increase her tax liability such that $1 
would be deposited into the Wisconsin Election Campaign Fund.  
Id. at 685.  As partially vetoed by the governor, the published 
law enabled the taxpayer to designate that the campaign fund was 
to receive $1 from the state's general funds.  Id.  We upheld the 
veto, and expressly dispensed with Henry's discussion of 
inseparable provisos or conditions.  Id. at 711-15.  By sanctioning 
this action, we allowed the governor to take a policy proposal 
from the legislature, edit the words, and create a different policy 
that had not been proposed by the legislature. 
                                                 
6 Among other novelties, governors 
started removing 
words such 
as "not" from sentences to reverse the policy enacted by the 
legislature (i.e., an "editing veto").  See Richard A. Champagne, 
Legislative Reference Bureau, The Wisconsin Governor's Partial 
Veto, at 14-15 (2019). 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.bh 
 
12 
 
¶253 Justice Hansen vigorously dissented on the grounds that 
abandoning any substantive limitations on the partial veto 
authority could not possibly be consistent with the constitutional 
design.  "It appears," Justice Hansen observed, "that we have now 
arrived at a stage where one person can design his own legislation 
from the appropriation bills submitted to him after they have been 
approved by the majority of the legislature."  Id. at 727 (Hansen, 
J., dissenting).  Indeed.  As Justice Hansen explained:   
Only the limitations on one's imagination fix the outer 
limits of the exercise of the partial veto power by 
incision or deletion by a creative person.  At some point 
this creative negative constitutes the enacting of 
legislation by one person, and at precisely that point 
the governor invades the exclusive power of the 
legislature to make laws. 
Id. at 720. 
¶254 Justice Hansen's prescience did not stop this court from 
proceeding further down this path, but we have continued to wrestle 
with the implications of our jurisprudence.  In Wisconsin Senate, 
while upholding the most creative uses yet of the partial veto 
power, we recognized as having obtained the "force of law" the 
notion that vetoes cannot change a policy proposal's topic or 
subject matter into something unrelated.  144 Wis. 2d at 452-53.  
This "germaneness" limitation was a clear attempt to acknowledge 
that the constitution must countenance some kind of substantive 
limitation of the governor's partial veto power.  Id.  While we 
have since reaffirmed the germaneness requirement, this court has 
never fleshed out what it means or how it operates in practice.  
See Citizens Util. Bd. v. Klauser, 194 Wis. 2d 484, 505, 534 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.bh 
 
13 
 
N.W.2d 608 (1995); Risser v. Klauser, 207 Wis. 2d 176, 183, 558 
N.W.2d 108 (1997). 
¶255 Finally, it is worth noting that in direct response to 
gubernatorial practice and the outer reaches of our later 
decisions, the people have twice amended the partial veto power to 
prevent the governor from using a partial veto to combine sentences 
or strike letters to make new words.  Wis. Const. art. V, 
§ 10(1)(c).7  These amendments should be given substantive effect, 
but they should not be read as green-lighting everything less than 
the limitations they impose.  While the amendments represent the 
people's 
effort 
to 
rein 
in 
certain 
excesses, 
these 
constitutionally 
prescribed 
procedural 
limitations 
aren't 
particularly instructive regarding whether the constitution still 
contains other substantive limitations on the partial veto power. 
 
C.  Implementing Doctrine 
¶256 The core question presented in this case is whether and 
how this court will enforce substantive limitations on the scope 
of the governor's partial veto power moving forward.  As reflected 
in the multiplicity of writings in today's decision and in the 
tests put forward by the litigants, it is not always easy to 
discern the line between negating some proposed policies in a bill 
                                                 
7 "In approving an appropriation bill in part, the governor 
may not create a new word by rejecting individual letters in the 
words of the enrolled bill, and may not create a new sentence by 
combining parts of 2 or more sentences of the enrolled bill."  Wis. 
Const. art. V, § 10(1)(c). 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.bh 
 
14 
 
and a veto that strategically edits statutory language to create 
a policy that was not in the legislatively passed bill. 
¶257 One response to this dilemma could be to declare that 
line-drawing is too difficult and to surrender that project 
altogether.  Our more recent cases have trended in this direction, 
enforcing only procedural limitations and offering at best a tip-
of-the-cap to future enforcement of substantive limitations.  In 
effect, this leaves the policing of substantive limitations to 
politics rather than constitutional law.  Such an approach is not 
without merit.  Not all constitutional questions need a judicial 
referee.  We must acknowledge that increased judicial patrolling 
of these constitutional borderlands is fraught with some danger.8  
Engaging in this line-drawing may lead to uncertainty for political 
actors and entangle the judiciary in more political and policy 
fights.  And sometimes we make things worse, not better, when we 
attempt to make distinctions that are——let's be honest here——
awfully hard to delineate with precision from the constitutional 
text. 
¶258 That said, giving up on judicial enforcement of 
constitutional limits poses greater dangers, especially in an area 
so central to our constitutional design for how law is made.  We 
swear an oath to uphold the constitution, and it is incumbent on 
                                                 
8 See, e.g., State ex rel. Friedrich v. Circuit Court for Dane 
Cty., 192 Wis. 2d 1, 14, 531 N.W.2d 32 (1995) (per curiam) ("In 
these borderlands it is neither possible nor practical to 
categorize 
governmental 
action 
as 
exclusively 
legislative, 
executive or judicial."). 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.bh 
 
15 
 
us to defend the separation of powers, even if it involves getting 
a little dirt under our nails. 
¶259 If we are to retain judicially enforceable substantive 
limitations on the partial veto power, there remains the difficult 
task of identifying an implementing doctrine, or legal test,9 that 
gets us to the heart of the constitution's meaning.  Several 
options are presented in this case. 
¶260 The petitioners propose a standard severability test.  
Under this test, the inquiry is whether the legislature intended 
for provisions to be severable.  Burlington N., Inc. v. City of 
Superior, 
131 
Wis. 2d 564, 
580, 
388 
N.W.2d 916 
(1986).  
Essentially, we'd have to determine whether the legislature would 
still have wanted the provisions as vetoed to become law.  This 
has the virtue of being grounded in some of the discussion in 
Henry, 
and 
theoretically 
works 
within 
existing 
judicial 
competence.  But it seems difficult, if not impossible, to 
determine the legislature's intent and preferences when reviewing 
discrete proposals in omnibus bills reflecting the whole of state 
government operations.  This test also depends on the petitioners' 
                                                 
9 See Ezell v. City of Chicago, 651 F.3d 684, 700-04 (7th Cir. 
2011) (devising an implementing doctrine for Second Amendment 
litigation based on the Supreme Court's original public meaning 
interpretation of that constitutional provision in District of 
Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570 (2008)).  See generally Lawrence 
B. Solum, The Interpretation-Construction Distinction, 27 Const. 
Comment. 95 (2010) (explaining how authoritative legal texts are 
applied in two stages:  one, the text is interpreted to discern 
its linguistic meaning and semantic context, and two, the text is 
given legal effect by translating that meaning and context into 
implementable legal doctrine). 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.bh 
 
16 
 
request that we overrule Henry, which I do not believe is 
warranted. 
¶261 The legislature proposes a separate test based on 
Justice Hansen's dissent in Kleczka:  the part rejected, as well 
as the part remaining, must be a complete, entire, and workable 
law on its own.  Kleczka, 82 Wis. 2d at 726 (Hansen, J., 
dissenting).  The petitioners also support this as an acceptable 
approach.  This test has the virtue of being an objective inquiry 
that does not entangle the judiciary in subjectively evaluating 
policy proposals.  But as the Chief Justice points out, there is 
no basis in the constitutional text to suggest that the rejected 
part must stand on its own as though it were itself enacted law.  
See Chief Justice Roggensack's concurrence/dissent, ¶89.  Justice 
Hansen's test is at best an indirect way of getting at the core 
constitutional line of demarcation:  allowing the governor to 
create something the legislature has not proposed, rather than 
just approve or veto separable proposals.  In addition, the 
legislature's proposal appears to be a backdoor way to turn the 
part veto into an item veto, or very close to it.  And this too 
does not square with the proposition announced in Henry that the 
constitutional text allows governors to strike portions of 
proposals smaller than an item. 
¶262 The Chief Justice adopts and attempts to breathe life 
into the germaneness requirement discussed in Wisconsin Senate.  
See Chief Justice Roggensack's concurrence/dissent, ¶¶91-94.  This 
test has the virtue of being grounded in our precedent.  Moreover, 
the Wisconsin Senate court adopted the germaneness requirement, 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.bh 
 
17 
 
which focuses on the topic or subject matter of a provision, as a 
nod to the need for some substantive limitation on unadulterated 
gubernatorial creation of legislation.  See Wis. Senate, 144 
Wis. 2d at 451-52.  But this standard suffers from some flaws as 
well.  As to its foundation, the germaneness requirement has not 
been firmly rooted in the constitutional text, but instead in the 
historical practice of the legislative and executive branches.  
Id. at 437, 452-53.  Second, while cited, none of our cases have 
done much to explain what this requirement actually means or how 
it would guide legal analysis going forward.  See Citizens Util. 
Bd., 194 Wis. 2d at 505; Risser, 207 Wis. 2d at 183.  Finally, it 
does not seem to get to the core issue of policy creation by the 
governor.  It is far too underinclusive.  A topicality approach 
would presumably let the governor rewrite laws to create new policy 
based on the same topic as the legislature's proposal, thereby 
allowing the governor to usurp the role of the legislature in 
violation of the structural separation of powers.  In other words, 
as an implementing doctrine, it does not do well in doing what any 
good legal test should do:  allowing the original public meaning 
of the constitutional text to come to life when applied to a new 
set of facts. 
¶263 Justice Kelly proposes yet another way.  His writing 
does an excellent job outlining the separation-of-powers problems 
with our current approach.  Justice Kelly frames his proposed legal 
test as whether the legislature voted on the policy proposal.  At 
a high level, I agree the question is whether the governor vetoed 
a policy the legislature proposed and passed, which is permissible, 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.bh 
 
18 
 
or created a new policy the legislature did not propose or pass, 
which is not.  But in application, Justice Kelly's opinion would 
appear to require sweeping away much if not all of our cases, 
including Henry.  I do not believe the constitutional standard we 
agree upon requires going this far.  I accept Henry's holding that 
something less than a separate item may be vetoed, and this will 
necessarily involve some modification of the legislature's policy 
choice.  So while I agree with Justice Kelly on the core 
constitutional limits, I do not agree with his application of that 
standard. 
¶264 While 
future 
litigation 
will 
surely 
provide 
opportunities to refine the analysis, the principles derived from 
our constitutional text, structure, and early cases draw 
sufficient lines to decide this case.  The partial veto power is 
broad and expansive.  When presented with an appropriation bill 
containing various legislative proposals, the governor can——as a 
general matter——negate some proposals and accept others.  This 
will necessarily effect a partial change in the policy soup 
reflected in the proposed bill.  But what the governor may not do 
is selectively edit parts of a bill to create a new policy that 
was not proposed by the legislature.  He may negate separable 
proposals actually made, but he may not create new proposals not 
presented in the bill. 
¶265 By way of a hypothetical, imagine the legislature 
proposes that $500,000 be appropriated for the building of a house, 
which may be painted white or blue or brown.  Under the principles 
derived from the constitutional text and our early cases, the 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.bh 
 
19 
 
governor could strike the word "brown" so that the house may only 
be white or blue.  But the governor could not strike words to 
create a law that simply appropriates $500,000 to the general 
fund.10  While some policy modification is inherent in striking 
parts of a proposal, a governor may not usurp the legislature's 
lawmaking role by creating a policy proposal that was not 
previously there. 
¶266 Putting this together, I conclude that the petitioners' 
request that we overturn Henry and our early cases should be 
rejected based on the arguments presented in this case.  But I 
agree that later cases must be revisited insofar as they abandoned 
the core principles undergirding the way laws are made pursuant to 
our constitution.11  Rather than simply approving or disapproving 
of proposed policies, the governor's partial veto power cannot be 
converted into a tool for wholesale policy creation.  By turning 
the governor into a one-person legislature subject only to a two-
thirds override vote, our basic constitutional structure is turned 
on its head. 
 
                                                 
10 As discussed further below, this type of gubernatorial 
creation is similar to the local road improvement fund vetoes, 
which were an effective rewriting of specific provisions to create 
a generic appropriation for an undefined local grant. 
11 Accordingly, I agree with petitioners that State ex rel. 
Kleczka v. Conta, 82 Wis. 2d 679, 264 N.W.2d 539 (1978) is "unsound 
in principle" and must be overruled.  Johnson Controls, Inc. v. 
Emp'rs Ins. of Wausau, 2003 WI 108, ¶99, 264 Wis. 2d 60, 665 
N.W.2d 257.  Insofar as our later decisions have treated Kleczka 
as pronouncing that a veto shall stand simply if it leaves a 
complete, entire, and workable law, these statements too must be 
withdrawn. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.bh 
 
20 
 
II.  APPLICATION 
¶267 Applying those principles to this case, three of the 
four sets of partial vetoes challenged by the petitioners go beyond 
what the constitution permits. 
¶268 We begin with the sole veto challenge that survives in 
light of our constitutional framework.  In 2019 Wis. Act 9, 
§ 1988b, the legislature sought to amend the registration fees 
assessed to truck owners based on vehicle weight.  The preexisting 
fees for vehicles weighing not more than 4,500 pounds, 6,000 
pounds, 8,000 pounds, and 10,000 pounds respectively were $75, 
$84, $106, and $155.  § 1988b.  The legislature proposed 
modifications to make each of them $100.  Id.  The governor 
accepted the increased fee for the lighter weight classifications, 
but rejected the reduction of the fee for the heavier vehicles. 
Id.  This rejection of the proposed decreases in two registration 
fees may not reflect the uniform schedule the legislature was 
apparently intending.  But the governor here chose a partially 
uniform fee schedule by accepting part of the proposed fee schedule 
and rejecting part of the new fee schedule.  These partial vetoes 
served to negate parts of the broader policy proposal.  In 
rejecting this proposal in part, the governor did not cobble 
together words or phrases to create a new policy or fee.  Rather, 
he declined to adopt part of a policy change advanced by the 
legislature.  See Wis. Stat. § 341.25(2)(a)-(cm) (2017-18).12 
                                                 
12 All subsequent references to the Wisconsin Statutes are to 
the 2017-18 version. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.bh 
 
21 
 
¶269 The other three sets of partial vetoes, however, cannot 
be upheld.  All three exceed the governor's constitutional power 
to partially veto appropriation bills. 
¶270 First, faced with an appropriation for the replacement 
of school buses, the governor used multiple vetoes to create an 
appropriation for alternative fuels.  Wisconsin is a beneficiary 
of the Environmental Mitigation Trust created by a partial consent 
decree in In re Volkswagen, 2016 WL 6442227 (N.D. Cal. 2016).  In 
Act 9, the legislature enacted two provisions to address the 
allocation of these funds, §§ 55c and 9101(2i).  The governor 
partially vetoed § 55c as follows:   
16.047(4s) of the statutes is created to read:  
16.047(4s) SCHOOL BUS REPLACEMENT GRANTS. (a) In this 
subsection:  
1. "School board" has the meaning given in s. 115.001 
(7).  
2. "School bus" has the meaning given in s. 121.51 (4).   
(b) The department [of administration] shall establish 
a program to award grants of settlement funds from the 
appropriation under [Wis. Stat. §] 20.855(4)(h) to 
school boards for the replacement of school buses owned 
and operated by the school boards with school buses that 
are energy efficient, including school buses that use 
alternative fuels. Any school board may apply for a grant 
under the program.  
(c) As a condition of receiving a grant under this 
subsection, the school board shall provide matching 
funds equal to the amount of the grant award.  
(d) A school board may use settlement funds awarded under 
this subsection only for the payment of costs incurred 
by the school board to replace school buses in accordance 
with the settlement guidelines. 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.bh 
 
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2019 Wis. Act 9, § 55c.  Removing the vetoed words, Wis. Stat. 
§ 16.047(4s) now reads:  "The department shall establish a program 
to award grants of settlement funds from the appropriation under 
[Wis. Stat. §] 20.855(4)(h) for alternative fuels."  The governor 
also vetoed in full a nonstatutory provision regarding the 
allocations of these funds.  2019 Wis. Act 9, § 9101(2i).13 
¶271 The legislature's budget bill did not propose an 
appropriation in whole or in part for alternative fuels generally.  
Instead, the legislature proposed an appropriation for the 
replacement of school buses.14  While both proposals may have 
similar green energy goals, the governor's partial vetoes created 
an entirely new policy proposal that spends money in ways not 
proposed in the legislature's bill.  This gubernatorial-created 
policy sidestepped the constitutionally mandated procedures 
governing how a bill becomes a law. 
¶272 Second, the governor used a trio of vetoes to rewrite an 
appropriation for local road funding into an appropriation for 
some other undefined local grant.  The governor began with a 
partial veto of Act 9, § 126 (schedule item Wis. Stat. 
                                                 
13 The legislature's proposal stated:  "Of the settlement 
funds in [Wis. Stat. §] 20.855(4)(h), during the 2019-21 fiscal 
biennium, the department of administration shall allocate 
$3,000,000 for grants under [Wis. Stat. §] 16.047(4s) for the 
replacement of school buses." 
14 The governor's budget had proposed utilizing these funds 
to allow for "the installation of charging stations for vehicles 
with an electric motor," which the legislature rejected in favor 
of creating a school bus modernization fund.  See Chief Justice 
Roggensack's concurrence/dissent, ¶14 & n.6-7.  In effect, the 
governor's vetoes could allow for something the legislature 
considered but rejected in enacting its own policy proposal. 
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§ 20.395(2)(fc)) as follows:  "(fc) Local roads improvement 
discretionary supplement . . . 90,000,000[inserting 75,000,000]."  
Next, the governor partially vetoed Act 9, § 184s as follows:  
"20.395(2)(fc) of the statutes is created to read:  20.395(2)(fc) 
Local roads improvement discretionary supplement.  From the 
general fund, as a continuing appropriation, the amounts in the 
schedule 
for 
the 
local 
roads 
improvement 
discretionary 
supplemental grant program under s. 86.31 (3s)."  Wisconsin Stat. 
§ 20.395(2)(fc) now reads:  "Local supplement.  From the general 
fund, as a continuing appropriation, the amounts in the schedule 
for local grant."  Finally, the governor vetoed in full Act 9, 
§ 1095m, which detailed how the Department of Transportation was 
to structure and allocate the discretionary grants for local road 
improvements.15 
                                                 
15 Prior to the governor's veto of this provision in full, it 
provided:   
86.31(3s) of the statutes is created to read:   
86.31(3s) DISCRETIONARY SUPPLEMENTAL GRANTS. (a) Funds 
provided under [Wis. Stat. §] 20.395(2)(fc) shall be 
distributed under this subsection as discretionary 
grants 
to 
reimburse 
political 
subdivisions 
for 
improvements.  The department [of transportation] shall 
solicit and provide discretionary grants under this 
subsection 
until 
all 
funds 
appropriated 
under 
[§] 20.395(2)(fc) have been expended.  
(b)1. From the appropriation under [§] 20.395(2)(fc), 
the department shall allocate $32,003,200 in fiscal year 
2019−20, to fund county trunk highway improvements. 
2. From the appropriation under [§] 20.395(2)(fc), the 
department shall allocate $35,149,400 in fiscal year 
2019−20, to fund town road improvements.  
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¶273 The legislature did not propose a broad and vague 
appropriation for local grants in whole or in part.  Rather, the 
legislature detailed a grant program for the express purpose of 
improving local roads.  By clever editing, the governor created a 
new appropriation out of thin air.  But again, appropriations must 
originate in the legislature, which has the power to enact such 
laws in the first instance.  Wis. Const. art. IV, § 17(2), § 19; 
id. art. VIII, § 2.  While the governor may generally accept or 
reject appropriations proposed to him, he cannot through creative 
editing author a new appropriation never proposed to him. 
¶274 Finally, the governor created a new vaping-related tax 
not proposed by the legislature.  The vetoed provision reads:   
139.75 (14) of the statutes is created to read:   
139.75 (14) "Vapor product" means a noncombustible 
product that produces vapor or aerosol for inhalation 
from the application of a heating element to a liquid or 
other substance that is depleted as the product is used, 
regardless of whether the liquid or other substance 
contains nicotine. 
2019 Wis. Act 9, § 1754.  As enacted by the legislature, this 
section taxed the hardware that produces vapor as a result of 
applying the heating element to the liquid.  Through his vetoes 
                                                 
3. From the appropriation under [§] 20.395(2)(fc), the 
department shall allocate $22,847,400 in fiscal year 
2019−20, to fund municipal street improvement projects. 
(c) Notwithstanding sub. (4), a political subdivision 
may apply to the department under this subsection for 
reimbursement of not more than 90 percent of eligible 
costs of an improvement. 
2019 Wis. Act 9, § 1095m. 
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the governor created a new tax on the liquid which goes inside the 
device, often sold separately. 
¶275 Once more, a tax on the liquid inside a vaping device 
was not proposed to the governor.  His veto went beyond negating 
a proposal; he created a new tax on a product.  Because the 
legislature did not propose this new tax, the governor did not 
have the power to rewrite language to create it.  This kind of 
editing exceeds the governor's partial veto power. 
 
III.  CONCLUSION 
¶276 Faithfulness to the whole constitution and the structure 
it establishes means our partial veto jurisprudence needs a partial 
reset.  We cannot myopically focus our attention on the words of 
the partial veto provisions in our constitution at the expense of 
the rest of the document's text.  Early cases established 
principles outlining a broad and expansive partial veto power that 
is no doubt legislative in nature.  I accept those cases and the 
basic framework they outlined.  But more recent cases, in 
combination with gubernatorial creativity, have upset the 
constitutional order and allowed governors to invade the lawmaking 
powers of the legislature.  It is time to reestablish these core 
constitutional principles.  I conclude that three sets of vetoes 
No.  2019AP1376-OA.bh 
 
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challenged here go beyond what the constitution permits.16  For 
these reasons, I respectfully concur. 
¶277 I am authorized to state that Justice ANNETTE KINGSLAND 
ZIEGLER joins this concurrence. 
 
                                                 
16 A compelling case can be made that prospective application 
of the new rule announced in this case is warranted here.  See 
State v. Beaver Dam Area Dev. Corp., 2008 WI 90, ¶¶95-96, 312 
Wis. 2d 84, 
752 
N.W.2d 295 
(explaining 
when 
prospective 
application is warranted).  However, under the circumstances, I 
join the court's mandate that grants the relief requested for all 
vetoes we determine are unconstitutional. 
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