Opinion ID: 2277556
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 8

Heading: Kraus v. Kentucky State Senate.

Text: As stated, § 93 of our current Constitution, as originally enacted, was silent on whether the Senate or even the House had the power to confirm inferior state officers. This constitutional silence resulted in a landmark decision from this Court. In 1990, David Kraus was appointed to be an administrative law judge (ALJ) in the Kentucky Workers' Compensation system. [53] The Senate, however, rejected Kraus's nomination. [54] Kraus then filed an action challenging the constitutionality of the statute that granted the Senate the right to confirm nominees such as he. In 1991, the circuit court ruled that the statute was constitutional. Kraus appealed to the Court of Appeals. [55] Ultimately, late in 1992, the Court of Appeals affirmed the circuit court's decision. This Court granted discretionary review and eventually affirmed the Court of Appeals. Kraus had argued on appeal, as the Governor argues in this case, that the Senate does not have the authority to advise and consent because the [1890] constitutional convention amended and deleted mandatory `advice and consent' language from Section 76 of the Constitution. [56] We ultimately rejected Kraus's argument, just as we now reject the Governor's argument in the case at hand, because the proposed mandatory confirmation language had to be changed into the general terms which permitted Senate consent to any inferior state official that the General Assembly determined by legislative enactment should be subject to such [S]enate consent. [57] In other words, as stated before, the proposed mandatory confirmation language was deleted in 1890 in order for the General Assembly to preserve its discretion to determine precisely which inferior state officersinstead of all state officersit wanted to be subjected to a confirmation vote. This Court took definite note in Kraus of the fact that numerous statutes provide for executive appointment of state officers subject to Senate and/or House approval. [58] And we relied in Kraus upon the fact that this Court or its predecessor had issued many decisions acknowledg[ing] that the Senate has the power to consent to the appointment of inferior state officers. [59] So this Court rejected Kraus's arguments and affirmed the lower courts because we had reached a conclusion that the Senate has the inherent power to advise and consent on executive branch appointments of inferior state officers. [60] But during the length of the 1992 General Assembly's regular session, the separation of powers questions raised by Kraus awaited a final answer in the appellate courts. And it requires no blind leap of faith to infer that securing the Senate's role in the confirmation process was the context from which some relevant part of SB 226 arose. This logical inference did not escape the Governor's notice in the case at hand: he mentions it in his brief. [61] So we agree with the Governor's conclusion that the relevant amendment to § 93 was offered to prospectively settle ... [Kraus's] separation-of-powers question and to remove[ ] all doubt that the `manner' of appointing inferior officers to be `prescribed by law' `may include a requirement of consent by the Senate.' [62] Acceptance of this premise, however, actually undermines the Governor's position in the case. If we accept the premise that the framers of the revisions to § 93 were motivated to amend the constitution to thwart Kraus's constitutional challenges, then the framers should only have logically been concerned with the Senate's power to confirm nominees because Kraus's lawsuit did not present any issue involving the House in the confirmation process because Kraus was not subject to confirmation in the House. In other words, the deliberate words chosen by the General Assembly in SB 226, which became the proposed amendments to § 93, reflected concern about senatorial confirmation rights because that was all that was at issue in Kraus. So the Governor's argument is unpersuasive to the extent that it relies upon the then-unresolved Kraus appeal to prove that the General Assembly intended the amendments to § 93 to permit the House constitutionally a role in confirming executive appointments. Kraus is important to the case at hand for reasons beyond supplying the historical context for SB 226 and the 1992 amendments to § 93. First, as previously discussed, our decision in Kraus provides compelling precedent for us to reject the Governor's argument that the constitutional convention's decision to delete proposed language requiring mandatory confirmation by the Senate for all appointees means that the House is constitutionally authorized to have a role in the confirmation process. Second, analysis of our decision in Kraus affords us the opportunity to correct some unfortunately imprecise language in that opinion. Specifically, we stated in a clause the Governor relies upon that for more than the last one hundred years, the independent branches of government have recognized that the General Assembly has authority to confirm nominations from other branches of government. [63] To be accurate, what we should have said was that history shows that the Senate's right to confirm nominees has long been recognized. Toward the beginning of our opinion, we noted that the House is not involved in the confirmation process for Kraus. [64] It is clear that the issue in Kraus involved only whether the Senate had the inherent authority to confirm (or reject) certain executive appointments. The question of whether the House was constitutionally permitted to play any role in confirming nominees such as Kraus was not at issue. Even the first sentence of our opinion in Kraus says that David L. Kraus challenges the authority of the Kentucky State Senate to grant to itself the power to consent to the employment ... of an Administrative Law Judge.... [65] It is obvious, therefore, that we painted with too broad a brush in Kraus when we referred to a purported historical recognition of the General Assembly's authority to confirm nominees. To the contrary, Fox has ably and conclusively shown in this case that Kentucky's history provided for confirmation by the Senate alone. [66] So, in Kraus, we did not need to discuss what role the House could, or could not, play in confirming nominees. Close scrutiny of our opinion in Kraus reveals that we did not intend to confer confirmation rights upon the House, our unfortunately broad language notwithstanding. Instead, when our opinion is examined carefully, it appears evident that we mentioned the House in Kraus in passing only to point out, without comment, that some statutes then-existing provided for executive appointments subject to Senate and/or House approval. [67] We used imprecise language when we stated that other branches of Government have historically recognized the General Assembly's right to confirm nominees. To our knowledge, Fox's action is the first challenge to the recently enacted statutes purporting to give the House a role concomitant with the Senate's role in the confirmation process. The question of what role, if any, the House may permissibly take in the confirmation process was not before us in Kraus; and nothing in that opinion should be interpreted to stand for a ruling by us that the House is constitutionally entitled to play a role in the confirmation process.