Opinion ID: 2633581
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Initiative petitions must contain legislative, or policy proposals, and certain of the initiative's provisions violate this threshold requirement

Text: In Citizens for Train Trench Vote v. Reno, [56] this court broadly stated that regardless whether an initiative proposes enactment of a new statute or ordinance, or a new provision in the constitution or city charter, or an amendment to any of these types of laws, it must propose policy  it may not dictate administrative details. Similarly, in Garvin v. District Court , we reaffirmed that the initiative and referendum powers reserved to the people, although broad, are limited to legislation and do not extend to administrative matters. [57] Although the initiative's proponents correctly note that the administrative/legislative distinction has as its genesis local government initiatives, since local government bodies perform both administrative and legislative functions, [58] the proponents fail to recognize the point of this distinction's existence and the requirement that all proposed laws be policy oriented. The very existence of the administrative/legislative distinction rests on the dual function of local government bodies. Unlike the Legislature, which performs strictly legislative functions, a local government body performs administrative functions as well. Consequently, although Article 19, Section 4, pertaining to local government initiatives, includes legislation language to clarify that the people are not permitted to interfere with local government's administrative functions, Article 19, Section 2, which governs initiatives concerning statutes and amendments to the Constitution, does not need to include any legislation language. Outside of the initiative power, statutes and constitutional amendments are proposed by the Legislature, a non-administrative body. In Nevada, as in most states, we have an administrative code, which governs administrative issues and is created not by the Legislature but by entities with rule-making authority, which fill in administrative details pertaining to the policy articulated in legislation. The people's initiative power is coequal, coextensive, and concurrent with that of the Legislature; [59] thus, the people have power that is legislative in nature. That the people have only legislative power, by definition, explains why Article 19, Section 2 does not include any legislation language  it would be redundant. By concluding that our Constitution may include administrative, non-policy matters, we would defy the very nature of the Constitution itself. As courts have recognized, [t]he written constitution in this nation has always enjoyed a status superior to legislative enactments and has been variously portrayed as `original legislation,' `organic law,' or `fundamental law.' [60] One court in particular has explained that a state constitution is basically legislation that the people enact directly: A state constitution may aptly be likened to a legislative act enacted directly by the people themselves in their sovereign capacity as a political entity ... and therefore is the fundamental, extraordinary act by which the people establish the structure and mechanism of their government. Essentially, a constitution is fundamental legislation directly by the people acting politically in their sovereign capacity.... [61] We have also determined that the Constitution has been very properly defined to be a legislative act of the people themselves in their sovereign capacity. [62] Consequently, as we recognized in Train Trench, an initiative intending to amend our Constitution must propose policy  it may not dictate administrative details. [63] Including administrative details in the Constitution would impermissibly ignore its very definition as original legislation and would effectively turn on its head the fundamental concept of the Constitution as organic law. Initiatives proposing constitutional amendments therefore must propose policy and not administrative details, and we have recognized that preelection intervention is warranted when an initiative fails to meet the threshold requirement that it propose policy. [64] We now turn to the initiative's remaining sections. As set forth in Train Trench, legislation originates or enacts a permanent law or lays down a rule of conduct or course of policy for the guidance of the citizens or their officers, whereas impermissible administrative matters simply put into execution previously-declared policies or previously-enacted laws or direct[] a decision that has been delegated to [a governmental body with that authority]. [65] Here, most of the initiative's remaining provisions appear to dictate policy, as they at least arguably pertain to substantive changes in eminent domain law. Three of the initiative's provisions, however  sections 3, 9, and 10  dictate administrative details in clear contravention of the threshold requirement, as these rule making decisions have been delegated to a governmental body with that authority  the courts. In particular, the initiative's section 3 states that [u]npublished eminent domain judicial opinions or orders shall be null and void. Section 9 declares that [n]o Nevada state court judge or justice who has not been elected to a current term of office shall have the authority to issue any ruling in an eminent domain proceeding. And finally, section 10 provides that [i]n all eminent domain actions, a property owner shall have the right to preempt [sic] one judge at the district court level and one justice at each appellate court level. Upon prior notice to all parties, the clerk of that court shall randomly select a currently elected district court judge to replace the judge or justice who was removed by preemption [sic]. These provisions concern the day-to-day operations of Nevada's court system and therefore direct decisions that have been delegated to the judiciary. [66] They do not propose policy but instead are distinctly administrative; consequently, they must be stricken.