Opinion ID: 1436613
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: the initiative power

Text: This case arises because both the Charter of the City and County of San Francisco and section 9 of article II of the California Constitution exclude tax measures from the referendum power of the voters. [1] There is no express exclusion of tax measures from the initiative, however. (1) Because the role of the court is to apply a statute or constitutional provision according to its terms, not to read into it exceptions or qualifications that are not supported by the language of the provision ( Vallerga v. Dept. Alcoholic Bev. Control (1959) 53 Cal.2d 313, 318 [1 Cal. Rptr. 494, 347 P.2d 909]), we begin with what appears to be the plain language of the constitutional and charter provisions which govern exercise of the initiative power in the City and County of San Francisco. Where the language is clear, it should be followed. ( Droeger v. Friedman, Sloan & Ross (1991) 54 Cal.3d 26, 38 [283 Cal. Rptr. 584, 812 P.2d 931].) (2) These constitutional and charter provisions must be construed liberally in favor of the people's right to exercise the reserved powers of initiative and referendum. The initiative and referendum are not rights granted the people, but ... power[s] reserved by them. Declaring it `the duty of the courts to jealously guard this right of the people' [citation], the courts have described the initiative and referendum as articulating `one of the most precious rights of our democratic process' [citation]. `[I]t has long been our judicial policy to apply a liberal construction to this power wherever it is challenged in order that the right not be improperly annulled. If doubts can reasonably be resolved in favor of the use of this reserve power, courts will preserve it.' ( Associated Home Builders etc., Inc. v. City of Livermore (1976) 18 Cal.3d 582, 591 [135 Cal. Rptr. 41, 557 P.2d 473], fn. omitted; see also Brosnahan v. Brown (1982) 32 Cal.3d 236, 241 [186 Cal. Rptr. 30, 651 P.2d 274].) We examine the constitutional and charter initiative provisions with these principles in mind. Article II, section 8 of the Constitution creates the statewide initiative power. It provides in pertinent part: (a) The initiative is the power of the electors to propose statutes and amendments to the Constitution and to adopt or reject them. (b) An initiative measure may be proposed by presenting to the Secretary of State a petition that sets forth the text of the proposed statute or amendment to the Constitution and is certified to have been signed by electors equal in number to 5 percent in the case of a statute, and 8 percent in the case of an amendment to the Constitution, of the votes for all candidates for Governor at the last gubernatorial election. .... .... .... .... .... .... .... (3) The only express constitutional limitations on the people's exercise of the statewide initiative power are those in sections 8 and 12 of article II. Section 8, subdivision (d) of article II bars initiative measures embracing more than one subject, and section 12 of that article bars constitutional amendments and statutes which name[] any individual to hold any office, or name[] or identif[y] any private corporation to perform any function or to have any power or duty.... [2] Nothing in the constitutional reservation of the initiative power expressly precludes exercise of the initiative to repeal a tax measure. The local initiative power may be even broader than the initiative power reserved in the Constitution. ( Hopping v. Council of City of Richmond (1915) 170 Cal. 605 [150 P. 977]; Spencer v. City of Alhambra (1941) 44 Cal. App.2d 75, 78 [111 P.2d 910].) In Spencer, the power of the voters to establish by initiative the minimum salaries for policemen was in issue. The city charter gave to the city commission the authority to establish those salaries, but in a separate provision the voters had reserved a very broad initiative power. `The qualified electors of the city shall have power through the initiative or otherwise, as provided by this chapter and the general laws of the state, to enact appropriate legislation to carry out and enforce any of the general powers of the city or any of the specified powers of the commission.' (44 Cal. App.2d at p. 78, italics omitted.) That reservation, the court held, overrode the commission's power. When ... the people phrased the foregoing sections pertaining to those powers in such broad, general and unambiguous language, the conclusion seems inevitable that thereby it was intended that legislation on every municipal subject should, unless expressly or by clear and necessary implication excluded by other sections, be subject to initiative actions through the adoption of ordinances by the people. After all, the people through their charter have a right to vest in the voters of the city the right and power to deal through initiative action with any matter within the realm of local affairs or municipal business, whether strictly legislative or not, as that term is generally used ( Hopping v. City of Richmond, 170 Cal. 605 [150 Pac. 977]); and ... the consensus of authority is to the effect that the fixing of salaries of public officers is a legislative function. ( Spencer v. City of Alhambra, supra, 44 Cal. App.2d 75, 78-79.) [T]he charter ... has reserved to the electors the broadest possible powers in the matter of initiative legislation; powers so extensive as to permit adoption by the voters of any ordinance the commission might enact ... as well as to carry out and enforce any of the general powers of the city or any of the specified powers of the commission. ( Id. at p. 80; see also Kugler v. Yocum (1968) 69 Cal.2d 371, 374 [71 Cal. Rptr. 687, 445 P.2d 303].) The reserved initiative power of the San Francisco electorate is also extremely broad. [3] Section 9.108, subdivision (a) of the charter provides: The registered voters shall have the power to propose by petition, and to adopt or to reject at the polls, any ordinance, act or other measure which is within the power conferred upon the board of supervisors to enact, or any legislative act which is within the power conferred upon any other board, commission or officer to adopt, or any amendment to the charter. (Italics added.) Thus it appears that under the plain language of charter section 9.108, subdivision (a), the voters of the City and County of San Francisco had the power to add section 707.1 to the revenue/business regulations of the city.