Opinion ID: 1321543
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: The Requirement of Objections

Text: Article VI, § 51, of the Constitution of West Virginia outlines the procedure to be followed for the making of the annual budget for the state government of West Virginia. That constitutional provision as presently written was ratified in 1968 and is known as the Modern Budget Amendment. [6] The provision states generally that during the Regular Session of the West Virginia Legislature, the governor shall submit to the legislature a budget for the next ensuing fiscal year. That budget shall be known and considered by the legislature as the Budget Bill and, upon passage, shall be presented to the governor. The governor may then veto the bill, or he may disapprove or reduce items or parts of items contained therein. Such action by the governor, if taken, and the requirements and effects of such action are prescribed by Subsection D(11) of the Modern Budget Amendment. Subsection D(11) provides as follows: [7] Every budget bill or supplementary appropriation bill passed by a majority of the members elected to each house of the legislature shall, before it becomes a law, be presented to the governor. The governor may veto the bill, or he may disapprove or reduce items or parts of items contained therein. If he approves he shall sign it and thereupon it shall become a law. The bill, items or parts thereof, disapproved or reduced by the governor, shall be returned with his objections to each house of the legislature. Each house shall enter the objections at large upon its journal and proceed to reconsider. If, after reconsideration, two thirds of the members elected to each house agree to pass the bill, or such items or parts thereof, as were disapproved or reduced, the bills, items or parts thereof, approved by two thirds of such members, shall become law, notwithstanding the objections of the governor. In all such cases, the vote of each house shall be determined by yeas and nays to be entered on the journal. A bill, item or part thereof, which is not returned by the governor within five days (Sundays excepted) after the bill has been presented to him shall become a law in like manner as if he had signed the bill, unless the legislature, by adjournment, prevents such return, in which case it shall be filed in the office of the secretary of state, within five days after such adjournment, and shall become a law; or it shall be so filed within such five days with the objections of the governor, in which case it shall become law to the extent not disapproved by the governor. The word objections appears four times in W.Va. Const., art. VI, § 51 D(11). [8] Therefore, it is clear, and this Court holds, that pursuant to W.Va. Const., art. VI, § 51, the Modern Budget Amendment, the governor's disapproval or reduction of items or parts of items contained within the budget bill is void unless the governor returns to each house of the legislature or files in the office of the secretary of state, as the case may be, objections for such disapproval or reduction. [9] In State ex rel. Brotherton v. Blankenship, 157 W.Va. 100, 207 S.E.2d 421 (1973), several issues were before this Court concerning the budget for fiscal year 1973-74, and in describing at the end of the opinion the various rulings of this Court, it was stated that where the Governor disapproved items or parts of items in an account, but failed to present reasons therefor, the account shall be published as passed by the Legislature. 157 W.Va. at 126, 207 S.E.2d at 436. The requirement that the governor return or file objections or reasons for the disapproval or reduction of items or parts of items contained within the budget bill finds support in the following general rule expressed in Annot., 119 A.L.R. 1189, 1190 (1939): Constitutional and statutory provisions to the effect that the President, Governor, or mayor, when returning a bill without his approval, shall give his reasons for the veto or his objections to the bill vetoed are generally regarded as mandatory. See also 82 C.J.S. Statutes § 55 (1953). That general rule, however, merely directs us to make inquiry into the purpose to be served by the objections or reasons required to be given by the governor.