Opinion ID: 2616183
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: When does the reasonable time period begin to run?

Text: Again, we adhere to the answer we stated in Fidanque: such actions must be brought within a reasonable time after preliminary petitions for a ballot measure have first been approved by the Secretary of State and submitted to the Attorney General for a ballot title. There is a season for each kind of challenge to the Secretary of State's administration of the election laws, whether as to the ballot title, the signature gathering process or constitutional evaluation. ORS 250.045(1); 250.065(2), (3) and (4). The Secretary of State makesor fails to makethe constitutional decision at the outset. OEA v. Roberts, supra ; State ex rel. Fidanque v. Paulus, supra ; Holmes v. Appling, supra . Later actions, such as acceptance of a ballot title from the Attorney General, verification of signatures and certification, do not call for her to reassess the original constitutional evaluation that is supposed to be the predicate for placing the entire initiative machinery in operation. It is either done or not at this initial stage. The period of reasonable time commences then. 3. How long does the period of reasonable time extend? We think the answer to this question necessarily must take into consideration the ballot title preparation process. It is only after the Attorney General has prepared a title and certified it to the Secretary of State and the title either has been legally challenged or the time for such a challenge has passed that petitions are actually circulated to the voters at large. Requiring a challenge to the constitutional determination of the Secretary of State prior to the petitions being circulated tends to limit challenges to the cognoscenti; if that were the rule, we might as well reimport laches into the process. We note also that the duty of the Secretary of State to review for compliance with the one subject only rule is not necessarily a brief, self-executing process. She often may need the period of time from initial filing to ballot title certification to determine the acceptability of the measure. The question boils down to this: How long after the ballot title finally is approved and the public at large presumably becomes conversant with the proposed measure is it reasonable to say that actions like the present one reasonably may yet be brought? While many answers can be given and, again, we note that the legislature is free to do as it wisheswe think the answer is 60 days. We identify 60 days by looking to other expressions of legislative policy on questions like this. The Secretary's decision that the proposed measure does not violate the one-subject only rule is, in Administrative Procedures Act terms, an order in other than a contested case. ORS 183.310(5)(a), 183.484. A challenge to an order in other than a contested caselike appeals of all the Secretary of State's actions or failure to act with respect to the election laws, ORS 246.910(1)is taken to the circuit court. ORS 183.484. Such challenges must be brought within 60 days. ORS 183.484(2). This court has, in the mandamus context, similarly used a statute analogous to the case on review to limit the time in which a challenge to a trial court's rulings could be brought. State ex rel. Redden v. Van Hoomissen, 281 Or. 647, 576 P.2d 355, reh. den. 282 Or. 415, 579 P.2d 222 (1978) (time in which state may seek mandamus challenging trial judge's order granting a new trial in a criminal case limited to 30 days, the same length of time in which a criminal appeal could be taken). We find a similar methodology appropriate here. We hold that the reasonable time for challenging the decision of the Secretary of Stateincluding her failure to decide whether a proposed initiative violates the one subject only rule of Oregon Constitution, Article IV, section 1(2)(d), expires on the 60th day following final approval of the ballot title. As previously recited, the challenge in this case was not filed until 11 months after the ballot title was established. It was not timely. The trial court's order dismissing plaintiff's complaint was therefore correct. It is affirmed. [5] Judgment of the trial court affirmed.