Source: http://www.chanrobles.com/usa/us_supremecourt/451/355/case.php
Timestamp: 2019-10-21 05:47:05
Document Index: 95001352

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 371', '§ 3467', '§ 4909', '§ 4902', '§ 40', 'Art. 13', '§ 7', 'Art. 15', '§ 2']

As early as 1867, farmers in the Salt River Valley attempted to irrigate their lands with water from the Salt River. In 1895, concerned with the erratic and unreliable flow of the river, they formed a "Farmers Protective Association," which helped persuade Congress to pass the Reclamation Act of 1902, 32 Stat. 388, 43 U.S.C. § 371 et seq. Under chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
The Association faced serious financial difficulties during the Depression as it built new dams and other works for the project, and it sought a means of borrowing money that would not overly encumber the subscribers' lands. The means seemed to be available in Arizona's Agricultural Improvement District Act of 1922, which authorized the creation of special public water districts within federal reclamation projects. Ariz.Rev.Code of 1928, § 3467 et seq. Such districts, as political subdivisions of the State, could issue bonds exempt from federal income tax. Nevertheless, many Association members opposed creating a special district for chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
the project, in part because the state statute would have required that voting power in elections for directors of the district be distributed per capita among landowners, and not according to the acreage formula for stock assessments and water rights. In 1936, in response to a request from the Association, the state legislature amended the 1922 statute. Under the new statutory scheme, which is essentially the one at issue in this case, the legislature allowed the district to limit voting for its directors to voters, otherwise regularly qualified under state law, who own land within the district, and to apportion voting power among those landowners according to the number of acres owned. Ariz.Rev.Stat.Ann. §§ 4909, 4983 (Supp. 1981981). [Footnote 2] The Salt River Project Agricultural Improvement and Power District was then formed in 1937, its boundaries essentially the same as the Association's. Under the 1937 agreement, the Association made the District its contracting agent, and transferred to the District all its property, and the Association, in turn, agreed to continue to operate and maintain the Salt River Project. Under the current agreement, the District itself manages the power and water storage work of the project, and the Association, as agent for the District, manages water delivery. As for financing, the statute now permits the special districts to chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
On cross-motions for summary judgment and on stipulated facts, the District Court for the District of Arizona held the District voting scheme constitutional, and dismissed the complaint. A divided panel of the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit reversed. 613 F.2d 180. Noting this Court's repeated application of the one-person, one-vote principle established in Reynolds v. Sims, 377 U. S. 533, the Court of Appeals turned its attention to the case in which this Court marked a significant exception to that principle by upholding a state law permitting only landowners to vote in the election of directors of a water district: Salyer Land Co. v. Tulare Lake Basin Water Storage District, 410 U. S. 719. The decision chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
in Salyer resulted from this Court's examination of the nature of the services provided by the water district in that case, and its conclusion that, "by reason of its special limited purpose and of the disproportionate effect of its activities on landowners as a group," the water district there was not subject to the strict one-person, one-vote demands of the Reynolds decision. 410 U.S. at 410 U. S. 728. Accordingly, the Court of Appeals considered the constitutionality of the Salt River District's electoral system by comparing the purposes and effects of the activities of the Salt River District with those of the Tulare Lake Basin Water Storage District.
The Court of Appeals stressed that the water district in Salyer covered a sparsely populated area of wholly agricultural land. 613 F.2d 183. It also noted that the primary function of the Tulare Lake Basin Water Storage District had remained the storage and delivery of water for agriculture, and that the district did not provide such other general public services as utilities. Ibid. Finally, the Court of Appeals pointed out that the income for the district in Salyer came completely from assessments against the landowners. 613 F.2d 183. The Court of Appeals found the Salt River District, at least in its modern form, very different. It pointed out that the Salt River District is a major generator and supplier of hydroelectric power in the State, and that roughly 40 of the water it delivers goes to urban areas for nonagricultural uses. Id. at 183-184. The court therefore concluded that the Salt River District does not serve the sort of special, narrow purpose that proved decisive in Salyer. 613 F.2d 183-184. Moreover, though it recognized that the District has $290 million of general obligation bonds outstanding that are secured by a lien on lands owned by the voting members, the Court of Appeals found it significant that all the general obligation bonds have so far been serviced out of the District's electricity revenues, and that all capital improvements have been financed by revenue bonds, which have been issued in the amount of $600 million, and chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
which are junior to the general obligation bonds. Id. at 184. The court thus concluded that the actual financial burden of running the District has not fallen primarily on the voting landowners, and therefore that the activities of this water district, unlike those of the district in Salyer, do not disproportionately affect landowners as such. 613 F.2d 184-185. [Footnote 3]
Reynolds v. Sims, supra, held that the Equal Protection Clause requires adherence to the principle of one-person, one-vote in elections of state legislators. Avery v. Midland County, 390 U. S. 474, extended the Reynolds rule to the election of officials of a county government, holding that the elected officials exercised "general governmental powers over chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
the entire geographic area served by the body." 390 U.S. at 390 U. S. 485. [Footnote 4] The Court, however, reserved any decision on the application of Reynolds to
The Court found such a case in Salyer. The Tulare Lake Basin Water Storage District involved there encompassed 193,000 acres, 85% of which were farmed by one or another of four corporations. Salyer Land Co. v. Tulare Lake Basin Water Storage District, 410 U.S. at 410 U. S. 723. Under California law, public water districts could acquire, store, conserve, and distribute water, and though the Tulare Lake Basin Water chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
Storage District had never chosen to do so, could generate and sell any form of power it saw fit to support its water operations. Id. at 410 U. S. 723-724. The costs of the project were assessed against each landowner according to the water benefits the landowner received. Id. at 410 U. S. 724. At issue in the case was the constitutionality of the scheme for electing the directors of the district, under which only landowners could vote, and voting power was apportioned according to the assessed valuation of the voting landowner's property. The Court recognized that the Tulare Lake Basin Water Storage District did exercise "some typical governmental powers," including the power to hire and fire workers, contract for construction of projects, condemn private property, and issue general obligation bonds. Id. at 410 U. S. 728, and n. 7. Nevertheless, the Court concluded that the district had "relatively limited authority," because
Id. at 410 U. S. 728 (footnote omitted). The Court also noted that the financial burdens of the district could not but fall on the landowners in proportion to the benefits they received from the district, and that the district's actions therefore disproportionately affected the voting landowners. Id. at 410 U. S. 729. [Footnote 7] The Salyer Court thus held that the strictures of Reynolds did not apply to the Tulare District, and proceeded to inquire simply whether the statutory voting scheme based on land valuation at least bore some relevancy to the statute's objectives. [Footnote 8] chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
The Court concluded that the California Legislature could have reasonably assumed that, without voting power apportioned according to the value of their land, the landowners might not have been willing to subject their lands to the lien of the very assessments which made the creation of the district possible. 410 U.S. at 410 U. S. 731.
As noted by the Court of Appeals, the services currently provided by the Salt River District are more diverse and affect far more people than those of the Tulare Lake Basin Water Storage District. Whereas the Tulare District included an area entirely devoted to agriculture and populated by only 77 persons, the Salt River District includes almost half the population of the State, including large parts of Phoenix and other cities. Moreover, the Salt River District, unlike the Tulare District, has exercised its statutory power to generate and sell electric power, and has become one of the largest suppliers of such power in the State. Further, whereas all the water delivered by the Tulare District went for agriculture, roughly 40% of the water delivered by the Salt River District goes to urban areas or is used for nonagricultural purposes in farming areas. [Footnote 9] Finally whereas all operating costs of the Tulare District were born by the voting landowners through assessments apportioned according to land value, most of the capital and operating costs of the Salt River District have been met through the revenues generated chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
by the selling of electric power. [Footnote 10] Nevertheless, a careful examination of the Salt River District reveals that, under the principles of the Avery, Hadley, and Salyer cases, these distinctions do not amount to a constitutional difference.
First, the District simply does not exercise the sort of governmental powers that invoke the strict demands of Reynolds. The District cannot impose ad valorem property taxes or sales taxes. It cannot enact any laws governing the conduct of citizens, nor does it administer such normal functions of government as the maintenance of streets, the operation of schools, or sanitation, health, or welfare services. [Footnote 11] chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
Second, though they were characterized broadly by the Court of Appeals, even the District's water functions, which constitute the primary and originating purpose of the District, are relatively narrow. The District and Association do not own, sell, or buy water, nor do they control the use of any water they have delivered. The District simply stores water behind its dams, conserves it from loss, and delivers it through project canals. [Footnote 12] It is true, as the Court of Appeals noted, that as much as 40% of the water delivered by the District goes for nonagricultural purposes. But the distinction between agricultural and urban land is of no special constitutional significance in this context. The constitutionally relevant fact is that all water delivered by the Salt River District, like the water delivered by the Tulare Lake Basin Water Storage District, is distributed according to land ownership, [Footnote 13] and the District does not and cannot control the use to chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
which the landowners who are entitled to the water choose to put it. As repeatedly recognized by the Arizona courts, though the state legislature has allowed water districts to become nominal public entities in order to obtain inexpensive bond financing, the districts remain essentially business enterprises, created by and chiefly benefiting a specific group of landowners. Niedner v. Salt River Project Agricultural Improvement and Power Dist., 121 Ariz. 331, 590 P.2d 447; Uhlmann v. Wren, 97 Ariz. 366, 374, 401 P.2d 113, 124; Local 266, I.B.E.W. v. Salt River Project Agricultural Improvement and Power Dist., 78 Ariz. 30, 41-42, 275 P.2d 393, 402. As in Salyer, the nominal public character of such an entity cannot transform it into the type of governmental body for which the Fourteenth Amendment demands a one-person, one-vote system of election. [Footnote 14]
Finally, neither the existence nor size of the District's power business affects the legality of its property-based voting scheme. As this Court has noted in a different context, the provision of electricity is not a traditional element of governmental sovereignty, Jackson v. Metropolitan Edison Co., 419 U. S. 345, 419 U. S. 353, and so is not, in itself, the sort of general or important governmental function that would make the government provider subject to the doctrine of the Reynolds case. [Footnote 15] In any event, since the electric power functions were stipulated to be incidental to the water functions which are the District's primary purpose, they cannot change chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
the character of that enterprise. [Footnote 16] The Arizona Legislature permitted the District to generate and sell electricity to subsidize the water operations, which were the beneficiaries intended by the statute. [Footnote 17] A key part of the Salyer decision was that the voting scheme for a public entity like a water district may constitutionally reflect the narrow primary purpose for which the district is created. In this case, the parties have stipulated that the primary legislative purpose of the District is to store, conserve, and deliver water for use by District landowners, that the sole legislative reason for making water projects public entities was to enable them to raise revenue through interest-free bonds, and that the development and sale of electric power was undertaken not for the primary purpose of providing electricity to the public, but
The appellees claim, and the Court of Appeals agreed, that the sheer size of the power operations and the great chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
number of people they affect serve to transform the District into an entity of general governmental power. But no matter how great the number of nonvoting residents buying electricity from the District, the relationship between them and the District's power operations is essentially that between consumers and a business enterprise from which they buy. [Footnote 18] Nothing in the Avery, Hadley, or Salyer cases suggests that the volume of business or the breadth of economic effect of a venture undertaken by a government entity as an incident of its narrow and primary governmental public function can, of its own weight, subject the entity to the one-person, one-vote requirements of the Reynolds case.
The functions of the Salt River District are therefore of the narrow, special sort which justifies a departure from the popular election requirement of the Reynolds case. And as in Salyer, an aspect of that limited purpose is the disproportionate relationship the District's functions bear to the specific class of people whom the system makes eligible to vote. The voting landowners are the only residents of the District whose lands are subject to liens to secure District bonds. Only these landowners are subject to the acreage-based taxing power of the District, and voting landowners are the only residents who have ever committed capital to the District through stock assessments charged by the Association. [Footnote 19] chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
The Salyer opinion did not say that the selected class of voters for a special public entity must be the only parties at all affected by the operations of the entity, or that their entire economic wellbeing must depend on that entity. Rather, the question was whether the effect of the entity's operations on them was disproportionately greater than the effect on those seeking the vote. [Footnote 20]
As in the Salyer case, we conclude that the voting scheme for the District is constitutional because it bears a reasonable relationship to its statutory objectives. Here, according to the stipulation of the parties, the subscriptions of land which made the Association and then the District possible might well have never occurred had not the subscribing landowners been assured a special voice in the conduct of the District's business. Therefore, as in Salyer, the State could rationally limit the vote to landowners. Moreover, Arizona could rationally make the weight of their vote dependent upon the number of acres they own, since that number reasonably reflects the relative risks they incurred as landowners and the distribution of the benefits and the burdens of the District's water operations. [Footnote 21] chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
613 F.2d 184-185.
The Court of Appeals slightly misconstrued the facts in stating that a significant portion of water delivered by the District "is used and paid for in a manner unrelated to agriculture or land ownership." 613 F.2d 184 (emphasis added). Though some landowning city residents have designated their cities as contracting agents to receive their water allotments, see n 9, supra, the stipulated facts show that all entitlement to water in the District derives from land ownership, whether rights to surface water appurtenant to land or acreage-based entitlements to stored water.
The Court of Appeals found it significant that 98% of the District's revenues come from sales of electricity, and only 2% from charges assessed for water deliveries. 613 F.2d 184. This fact in no way affects the constitutionality of the voting scheme. When the consumers of electricity supply those power revenues, they are simply buying electricity; they are neither committing capital to the District nor committing any of their property as security for the credit of the District.
The Court previously has held that, when a governmental entity exercises functions that are removed from the core duties of government and disproportionately affect a particular group of citizens, that group may exercise more immediate control over the management of the entity than their numbers would dictate. Salyer Land Co. v. Tulare Lake Basin Water Storage District, 410 U. S. 719 (1973). See Hadley v. Junior College District, 397 U. S. 50, 397 U. S. 56 (1970); Avery v. Midland County, 390 U. S. 474, 390 U. S. 483-484 (1968). This rule is consistent with the principle of "one person, one vote" applicable to the elections of bodies that exercise general governmental powers. Reynolds v. Sims, 377 U. S. 533 (1964). The Salt River District is a governmental entity only in the limited sense that the State has empowered it to deal with particular problems of resource and service management. The District does not exercise the crucial powers of sovereignty typical of a general purpose unit of government, such as a State, county, or municipality. [Footnote 2/1] chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
The Court's opinion convincingly demonstrates that the powers exercised by the Salt River District are not powers that always must be exercised by a popularly elected body. Ante at 451 U. S. 366-371. Both storage and delivery of water are functions that, in other areas of the Nation, are performed by private or administrative bodies. These tasks sometimes are performed by an elected government entity, because of the aridity of the Southwest, federal water policy, and the historical chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
The Court deprecated the significance of control of voting requirements for a special purpose election by a fairly elected legislature in Kramer, supra, at 395 U. S. 628. See also Avery v. Midland County, 390 U. S. 474, 390 U. S. 481, n. 6 (1968). The holding in Kramer is affected neither by Salyer nor by the decision of the Court today, see 451 U. S. 364-365, n. 8.
In concluding that the District's "one-acre, one-vote" scheme is constitutional, the Court misapplies the limited exception recognized in Salyer Land Co. v. Tulare Lake Basin Water Storage District, 410 U. S. 719 (1973), on the strained logic that the provision of water and electricity to several hundred thousand citizens is a "peculiarly narrow function." Because the Court misreads our prior cases and its opinion is conceptually unsound, I dissent. chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
This fundamental principle has been applied in a variety of contexts to invalidate discriminatory election schemes limiting the franchise, in whole or in part, to property owners. In Kramer, the Court found invidious a system for local school district elections which limited eligibility to those who either (1) owned or leased taxable realty in the locality; or (2) were parents or custodians of children enrolled in the local public chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
schools. In Cipriano v. City of Houma, 395 U. S. 701 (1969), a case with particular relevance to the present action, the Court invalidated a state law which limited participation in a bond election for the support of a municipal utility system to property holders. The revenue bonds, secured by funds generated by the utility system itself, did not create any enforceable lien against any property in the city. Id. at 395 U. S. 705. Noting that the impact fell on property and nonproperty owners alike, since all persons "use the utilities and pay the rates," the Court rejected the voting classification scheme disenfranchising nonproperty owners. Nor may the vote be limited to property owners in bond issuance elections with respect to general obligation bonds secured by property tax revenues. Phoenix, supra, at 399 U. S. 209-213. See also Police Jury of Parish of Vermilion v. Hebert, 404 U. S. 807 (1971), summarily rev'g 258 La. 41, 245 So.2d 349 (cannot limit vote for road improvement bonds to property holders). The Court has thus rejected the view that, simply because property is directly burdened because of some governmental action, that fact alone justifies limiting the franchise to property owners where nonowners are also substantially affected. Hill, supra, at 421 U. S. 299.
To be sure, the Court approved limiting the vote to landowners in electing the board of directors of a Water Storage District in Salyer Land Co. v. Tulare Lake Basin Water Storage District. [Footnote 3/2] See 410 U. S. 728 (emphasis supplied). Although the water district there involved exercised certain governmental authorities, its purposes were quite narrow. The Water Storage District was also found to have only an insubstantial effect on nonvoters. Only 77 persons lived within its boundaries, and most worked for one of the four corporations which owned 85% of the land within the District. On the other hand, the burdens of the District fell entirely on landowners, since all of the costs associated with the District's projects were assessed against landowners in proportion to the benefits received. There was "no way that the economic burdens of district operations can fall on residents qua residents. . . ." [email protected] at 410 U. S. 729.
Ariz.Rev.Stat.Ann. § 4902 (1956). [Footnote 3/3] The District's bonds are tax-exempt, and its property is not subject t;o state or local property taxation. This attribute clearly indicates the governmental nature of the District's function. The District also has the power of eminent domain, a matter of some import. The District has also been given the power to enter into a wide range of contractual arrangements to secure energy sources. [Footnote 3/4] Inherent in this authorization is the power to control the use and source of energy generated by the District, chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
Like most "private" utilities, which are often "natural monopolies," see Otter Tail Power Co. v. United States, 410 U. S. 366 (1973), private utilities in Arizona are subject to regulation by public authority. The Arizona Corporation Commission is empowered to prescribe "just and reasonable rates," as well as to regulate other aspects of the business operations of private utilities. See Ariz.Rev.Stat.Ann. § 40-321 (1974). The rate structure of the District now before us, however, is not subject to control by another state agency, because the District is a municipal corporation, and itself purports to perform the public function of protecting the public interest that the Corporation Commission would otherwise perform. See Ariz. Const., Art. 13, § 7, Art. 15, § 2. See also Rubenstein Construction Co. v. Salt River Project Agricultural Improvement Power Dist., 76 Ariz. 402, 265 P.2d 455 (1953) (Salt River Project is not a public service corporation, and therefore statute forbidding certain business practices did not apply). Its power to set its own rates and other conditions of service constitutes important attributes of sovereignty. When combined with a consideration of the District's wide-ranging operations which encompass water for agricultural and personal uses, and electrical generation for the needs of hundreds of thousands of customers, it is clear that the District exercises broad governmental power. With respect to energy management and the provision of water chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
395 U.S. at 395 U. S. 629. In Hadley v. Junior College District, 397 U. S. 50 (1970), the Court applied Kramer despite the fact that the powers exercised by the trustees of a Junior College District were substantially less significant than those exercised in Avery v. Midland County, 390 U. S. 474 (1968). It was sufficient that the trustees performed important governmental functions with sufficient impact throughout the District. chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
The area within the District, once primarily rural, now encompasses eight municipalities and a major part of the city of Phoenix. Its original purpose, the supply of irrigation water, now provides only a tiny fraction of its gross income. For the fiscal year ending April 30, 1980, the District chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
With these facts in mind, it is indeed curious that the Court would attempt to characterize the District's electrical operations as "incidental" to its water operations, or would consider the power operations to be irrelevant to the legality of the voting scheme. [Footnote 3/5] The facts are that, in Salyer, the burdens chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
of the Water District fell entirely on the landowners who were served by the District. Here the landowners could not themselves afford to finance their own project and turned to a public agency to help them. That agency now subsidizes the storage and delivery of irrigation water for agricultural purposes by selling electricity to the public at prices that neither the voters nor any representative public agency has any right to control. Unlike the situation in Salyer, the financial burden of supplying irrigation water has been shifted from the landowners to the consumers of electricity. [Footnote 3/6] At the very least, the structure of the District's indebtedness, together with the history of the District's operations, compels a finding that the burdens placed upon the lands within the District are so minimal that they cannot possibly serve as a basis for limiting the franchise to property owners.
613 F.2d 184. In Cipriano, the only item at issue was an election concerning bonds to be used solely for the improvement of the municipally owned utility system. Of substantial importance to the resolution of this case, the Court said:
It is apparent in this case that landowning irrigators are getting a free ride at the expense of the users of electricity. It would also seem apparent that, except for the subsidy, utility rates would be lower. Of course, subsidizing agricultural operations may well be in the public interest in Arizona, but it does not follow that the amount of the subsidy and the manner in which it is provided should be totally in the hands of a select few. [Footnote 3/8] chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
410 U.S. at 410 U. S. 729. In short, there was nothing in the Water Storage District for its operations to affect except the land itself. The relationship between the burdens of the District and the land within the District's boundaries was strong. Here, the District encompasses one of the major metropolitan areas in the country. The effects of the provision of water and electricity on the citizens of the city are as major as they are obvious. There is no strong relationship between the District's operation and the land qua land. The District's revenues and bonds are tied directly to the electrical operation. Any encumbrance on the land is, at best, speculative. Certainly, any direct impact on the land is no greater than in Phoenix v. Kolodziejski, 399 U. S. 204 (1970), where we rejected the same argument presented today. Simply put, the District is an integral governmental actor providing important governmental services to residents of the District. To conclude otherwise is to ignore the urban reality of the District's operations. [Footnote 3/9] chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
Underlying the Court's conclusion in this case is the view that the provision of electricity and water is essentially private enterprise, and not sufficiently governmental -- that the District "simply does not exercise the sort of governmental powers that invoke the strict demands" of the Fourteenth Amendment because it does not administer "such normal functions of government as the maintenance of streets, the operation of schools, or sanitation, health, or welfare services." Ante at 451 U. S. 366. This is a distinctly odd view of the reach of municipal services in this day and age. Supplying water for domestic and industrial uses is almost everywhere the responsibility of local government, and this function is intimately connected with sanitation and health. Nor is it any more accurate to consider the supplying of electricity as essentially a private function. The United States Government and its agencies generate and sell substantial amounts of power, and, in view of the widespread existence of municipal utility systems, it is facetious to suggest hat the operation of such utility systems should be considered as an incidental aspect of municipal government. Nor will it do, it seems to me, to return to the proprietary-governmental dichotomy in order to deliver into wholly private hands the control of a major municipal activity which acts to subsidize a limited number of landowners. [Footnote 3/10] chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
In Salyer, the Court nowhere suggested that the provision of water for agricultural purposes was anything but governmental action for a public purpose. The Court expressly recognized that the Water District was a public entity. The question presented, in part, was whether its operations and authority were so narrow as not to require application of the Kramer rule. In Cipriano, the Court necessarily held chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
that the provision of electrical, water, and gas utility services was a sufficiently important governmental service to require application of the Fourteenth Amendment's strict scrutiny safeguards. 395 U.S. at 395 U. S. 705. If the provision of electrical and other utility services by a municipal corporation was so "proprietary" or "private" as not to require application of the stricter standards of the Fourteenth Amendment, Cipriano could not have been decided as it was. The Court's facile characterization of the electrical service provided by the municipal corporation in this case as essentially a private function is a misreading of our prior holdings.
The purpose and authority of the Salt River District are of extreme public importance. The District affects the daily lives of thousands of citizens who, because of the present voting scheme and the powers vested in the District by the State, are unable to participate in any meaningful way in the conduct of the District's operations. [Footnote 3/11] In my view, the Court of Appeals properly reasoned that the limited exception recognized chanroblesvirtualawlibrary