Opinion ID: 1191734
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: The Act judged against constitutional standard

Text: This constitutional exception to the popular right of referendum on its face conditions the exception by imposing three mandatory requirements: (1) the necessity must be immediate; (2) the statute must be necessary to solve the problem; and (3) the problem must be of a particular kind, i.e., a disruption of the public peace, health, or safety. However, this Act satisfies none of the mandatory criteria. Collection of the tax is not so immediate that the ordinary 90-day delay in the effective date of the statute matters. The majority admits the date the tax becomes effective is really insignificant. Majority at 1068. Nor does this statute preserve the public peace, health, or safety in any sense other than Orwellian. Further, even if we were to assume that the purpose of the Act is to finance a stadium on an emergent basis, the Act would still not otherwise qualify for referendum exception because the Act in no way legally obligates anyone to build a stadium, nor does it lawfully require such a stadium to be built, nor does it lawfully require a professional team to remain to play in it. Although not in the record, if it were necessary to pass the Act for some reason prior to October 30 (see Majority at 1068), the Legislature accomplished that by special session. However that is certainly not justification under the constitution for an emergency clause which is wholly a different issue. Common sense interpretation is not and should not be foreign to judicial decisionmaking. In fact, this court has always said the first rule of constitutional construction is We will presume the language carries its ordinary and popular meaning.... Westerman v. Cary, 125 Wash.2d 277, 288, 892 P.2d 1067 (1994); see Robert F. Utter, Freedom and Diversity in a Federal System: Perspectives on State Constitutions and the Washington Declaration of Rights, 7 U. Puget Sound L.Rev. 491 (1984). We have also held constitutional clauses such as the referendum power must be read as the average informed lay voter would read it because the State Constitution and all subsequent amendments were ratified by popular vote, not by the Legislature alone. [4] Washington State Motorcycle Dealers Ass'n v. State, 111 Wash.2d 667, 674, 763 P.2d 442 (1988) (quoting Estate of Turner v. Department of Revenue, 106 Wash.2d 649, 654, 724 P.2d 1013 (1986)).