Opinion ID: 1905888
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: standards of constitutional scrutiny

Text: We turn now to standards to be applied to our determination of the questions of equal protection and due process. The original plaintiffs are within permissible bonds in asking us to rule on the substantive due process of the statute. As we pointed out in Johnson v. Hassett, 217 N.W.2d 771 (N.D.1974), and Johnson v. Elkin, supra , North Dakota has never renounced substantive due process as a constitutional standard, while the Federal courts had made such a renunciation for a long period after 1937, but seem to be hesitantly returning to the standard of late. See, for example, Quilloin v. Walcott, 434 U.S. 246, 98 S.Ct. 549, 54 L.Ed.2d 511 (1978); Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113, 93 S.Ct. 705, 35 L.Ed.2d 147 (1973); and Moore v. City of East Cleveland, 431 U.S. 494, 97 S.Ct. 1932, 52 L.Ed.2d 531 (1977). In Johnson v. Hassett, supra , we referred to the three standards of scrutiny of equal-protection questions for a judicial adjudication of constitutionality which appeared to have evolved in the Federal courts. One is the traditional reasonable or rational-basis standard under which a statute will be upheld if its classifications are not patently arbitrary and bear a reasonable relationship to a legitimate government interest. However, if the case involves an inherently suspect classification or a fundamental interest, it is subjected to strict judicial scrutiny. A third, less clearly defined, category requires a close correspondence between statutory classification and legislative goals. In Johnson v. Hassett, supra , we said that this latter test closely approximates the substantive due-process test historically used by this and other State courts. It is the test we used in Johnson v. Hassett, supra , which has many similarities to the present case. Johnson v. Hassett involved the constitutionality of the automobile guest statute, which limited recovery in tort for automobile guests by application of a test which was inapplicable to other tort victims, including paying guests riding in automobiles. It is the test we will apply in this case, and it is the test applied by the Idaho court. Just as we will do below, the Idaho court independently examined the basis for the legislative justification for the Act in question. See 555 P.2d pages 407 and 411 of the Idaho opinion. The Wisconsin, Kansas, and Nebraska courts applied the rational-basis test. As to the application of due-process principles in cases where the police power is asserted, the test is whether the State acts in an arbitrary or unreasonable manner. Menz v. Coyle, 117 N.W.2d 290 (N.D.1962); Johnson v. Elkin, supra .