Opinion ID: 1292234
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 7

Heading: Substantive due process claims pertaining to the Borough Assembly's passage of the rezoning.

Text: Balough claims that the Borough Assembly violated her right to substantive due process concern[ing] the validity of an enactment of a legislative body, rather than a decision of a zoning board. [62] We, therefore, should independently consider the legal conclusions which led the superior court to reject Balough's claims that the ordinance is invalid and uphold the superior court's findings of fact unless they are clearly erroneous. [63] Article I, section 7 of the Alaska Constitution states that [n]o person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law. [64] We have stated that [s]ubstantive due process is denied when a legislative enactment has no reasonable relationship to a legitimate governmental purpose.... The constitutional guarantee of substantive due process assures only that a legislative body's decision is not arbitrary but instead based upon some rational policy. [65] The burden of demonstrating that there is no rational basis for the challenged legislation is on the party claiming to have been denied substantive due process. [66] Furthermore, this burden is a heavy one, for if any conceivable legitimate public policy for the enactment is apparent on its face or is offered by those defending the enactment, the opponents of the measure must disprove the factual basis for such a justification. [67] When we inquire into arbitrariness, we must begin with the presumption that the action of the legislature is proper. [68]