Court Opinion

ID: 9518494
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 00:54:38.219139+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:29:21.824913
License: Public Domain

BIEGELMEIER, J.
(dissenting). In 1889 the people of this state adopted a Constitution which in Art. IY, Sec. 12, provided for one Attorney General. That he was and is the legal advisor for all state officers, departments and commissions has been both asserted and maintained since its adoption. In 1921 this court said:
“The Attorney General is a constitutional officer, the title designates him as the attorney for the state, and his duties, independent of the statute, are those of a law officer. This section of the Code in its specific enumeration of the functions of his office, recognizes the fact that the scope of his duties does not extend beyond law matters.”
State ex rel. McMaster v. Reeves, 44 S.D. 612, 621, 184 N.W. 1007, 1009. This statement and others in that opinion, compel the conclusion that his duties are those embraced within “the professional learning of' a lawyer”, words used therein. On March 26, 1925, Buell F. Jones, then At*402torney General, issued an opinion disapproving payment of a voucher to Julius H. Johnson as Assistant Counsel for the Rural Credit Board, wherein he said as to several acts of the legislature purporting to give authority to certain boards to employ legal counsel “I believe that these enactments should not be construed to mean that such departments may employ legal counsel without the consent and approval of the Attorney General. Any such interpretation of these legislative enactments would render such acts unconstitutional and void. * * * In my opinion, therefore, the employment * * * is in violation of the constitutional provision of this state which creates the office of Attorney General * * 1926 A.G.R. 269. In his Nov. 1, 1926 Letter of Transmittal to Governor Carl Gunderson he said: “The Attorney General is the legal advisor of all departments, officers, boards and commissions of the State.”
On August 12, 1925, this court announced the decision in a mandamus action resulting from the position taken by the Attorney General on the Rural Credit Board employment of Johnson. Johnson v. Jones, 48 S.D. 397, 204 N.W. 897. Section 15 of the original Rural Credit Act stated the Attorney General was the general legal ad-visor of the board and its officers; Section 21 provided in case of foreclosure it was the duty of the Attorney General to render all services needed in connection therewith. In 1919 an amended section authorized the board to “employ, by and with the approval of the governor, such assistants * * * attorneys and other employees as it may deem necessary to conduct its business” and gave it further authority to fix their salaries and define their duties. [Laws 1919, c. 304]. This court speaking through Judge Campbell said:
<<* * * we are 0f the opinion that said board had no authority to create an independent legal department, or to employ any ‘assistant counsel,’ or to seek its legal advice and opinions from any source other than the Attorney General. Viewing *403all said sections together, we believe the most liberal construction that c'ould be placed upon the authority granted by section 5 of the original act ‘to employ attorneys’ would be to hold the board authorized to employ attorneys for mere routine matters requiring the services of an attorney, but not requiring the rendering of legal advice or opinions upon points of law, or matters of legal right or policy of the board, and we think that any such attorneys so* employed would be under the supervision, control, and direction of the Attorney General as general legal adviser of the board, and therefore, as a practical matter to promote harmony and efficiency, and avoid friction, the wisdom of securing his approval before making even such appointment is obvious, whether or not the statute expressly requires it.
‘That the Attorney General is the general legal adviser of such board has been recognized by this court in the case of Hughes County v. Henry, [48 S.D. 98,] 202 N.W. 286, at page 289. If the Attorney General should be derelict in the performance of such duties, there is a proper remedy therefor.
“The briefs submitted by respective counsel on this proceeding have argued at some length the question of whether the statute, if in fact it authorized the appointment here attempted to be made, would be unconstitutional; it being the contention of the Attorney General that under the Constitution he is the chief law officer of the state and as such the legal adviser of the officers and boards thereof, and that the Legislature cannot constitutionally authorize the employment of attorneys for state officers or boards without the approval of the Attorney General.”
The court thought the constitutional question was “not involved”.
*404On March 5, 1926, this court again had before it a mandamus action to require payment to this same attorney. Johnson v. Jones, 49 S.D. 549, 207 N.W. 550. He alleged he was employed as “attorney and assistant to the rural credit board”, which had a “very large amount of legal business requiring the services of an attorney, not only in matters of litigation pending, but also' in the routine matters requiring the assistance and service of said attorney”. It can be plainly seen that Johnson, undaunted by failure in his first try, placed himself within the confines of handling “routine matters” referred to in Judge Campbell’s opinion. He claimed that under subdivision (1) of section 3 of chapter 266, Laws of 1925, authorized the Rural Credit Board to employ him, as it gave the board power to employ legal counsel. Defendant contended this violated the constitution for two reasons in that the title was defective and it was an attempt to change and diminish the duties and powers of the Attorney General. This court said:
“There is nothing in the title to chapter 266 to indicate or give notice that the law contains anything that changes, or attempts to change or affect,, the powers or duties of the Attorney General, and for that reason the provisions of subdivision (1) are invalid, and it is not necessary to give consideration to the second proposition.” 49 S.D. 549, 551, 207 N.W. 550.
This statement may be subject to some scrutiny for in order to declare that the act changed or attempted to change the powers or duties of the Attorney General (and thus be invalid) it was necessary to decide that these powers and duties, including “routine matters” belonged to the Attorney General. In any event this court held employment of legal counsel invalid even though it be for “routine matters”. The legislature then, by enacting Ch. 187, Laws of 1927, agreed with the Attorney General and this court that legal advice to and legal counsel for the various officers, boards and commissions of the state, *405was within the control of the Attorney General and provided that the appointment of attorneys be made by the Attorney General, with the approval of the Board, and that they be Assistant Attorneys General. Attorneys for all boards and commissions have been so carried and listed ever since.
On February 5, 1938, a different Attorney General wrote an opinion which reviewed and adhered to the principles recognized by this and other courts. 1938 A.G.R. 112. Coincidentally that opinion related to the power to appoint an attorney for the Unemployment Compensation Commission the same department referred to in the present litigation. See generally SDC 17.08. This opinion cited and quoted from Ex parte Corliss, 16 N.D. 470, 114 N.W. 962, 976. The North Dakota legislature passed a statute authorizing the appointment of a commissioner, granting him powers of a state’s attorney limited to enforcement of laws against the manufacture and sale of intoxicating liquors. That act, as the one now before this court, required the commissioner to be an attorney and his appointment to be made by the governor. The North Dakota Supreme Court held the act as unconstitutional and void, even with another constitutional provision authorizing the legislature to prescribe regulations for the enforcement of the prohibition law, saying “To say that under the power to prescribe regulations the legislative assembly may create new offices in contravention of the whole scheme of government provided for by other provisions of the Constitution is, we think, doing unwarranted violence to the obvious intent of the framers of that instrument”. An attempt to partially quote from the extensive opinion by Justice Fisk may lose its continuity, yet having in mind that Art. IV, Sec. 13 of our Constitution provides the powers and duties of the “attorney general shall be as prescribed by law”, the following extracts from the opinion are applicable here.
“* * =1= y. argue¿[ that under the power to prescribe such duties the legislative assembly may *406take them away, or a portion thereof, and confer them upon other officers not elected by the people, just as is attempted to be done by the act in question. Such argument, carried to its logical and inevitable result, would lead to the monstrous doctrine that the Constitution means nothing, and, notwithstanding its plain provisions, the legislative assembly may provide that the duties pertaining to all these offices shall be discharged by officers appointed in some manner prescribed by them. The act in question does not purport to prescribe the duties of these constitutional officers, but it attempts to vest in other persons not elected the power to perform such duties, and to this extent supplant these constitutional officers. Such legislation, in our opinion,, cannot be sustained. It strikes a blow at the very foundation principles of our form of government. * * *
. “If the offices mentioned in section 173, which includes those of state’s attorney and sheriff, ‘are imbedded in the Constitution,’ it inevitably follows that they cannot be stripped by the legislature of the important duties inherently connected therewith, for if this can be done, then these offices were ‘imbedded in the Constitution’ for no purpose. We do not deny the power of the Legislature to prescribe duties for these officers, which power carries with it by implication the right to change such duties from time to time as the public welfare may demand; but we deny its power to strip such offices, even temporarily, of a portion of their inherent functions and transfer them to officers appointed by central authority. This, as we view it, is a plain violation of the Constitution, and is subversive of the obvious intent of its framers to reserve to the people * * * to perform other functions of government by them so long performed and so well understood. * * * it is c'ompetent for the legis*407lative assembly to provide by law for removals in case of malfeasance or misfeasance in office, and to provide a method of filling such vacancies. But it is an entirely different proposition to say that the legislative assembly may go further and create a new office to be filled by central authority, and transfer to such appointive officer the duties essentially and constitutionally belonging to the county office.”
The court said that if the legislature could create new offices of enforcement sheriffs or enforcement state’s attorneys, then
“* * * why has it not the power to provide for the appointment of a special enforcement Gov'ernor, or a special enforcement Attorney General, or a special enforcement court? The Governor, Attorney General, and (the judges are no more constitutional officers than are state’s attorneys and sheriffs. It seems too obvious for discussion that the framers of the Constitution, in providing for the election of these officers by the people, thereby reserved unto themselves the right to have the inherent functions theretofore pertaining to said offices discharged only by persons elected as therein provided. The naming of these officers amounted to an implied restriction upon legislative authority to create other and appointive officers for the discharge of such functions. If this is not true, then of what avail are the provisions of the Constitution above referred to? If these constitutional offices can be stripped of a portion of the inherent functions thereof, they can be stripped of all such functions, and the same can be vested in newly created appointive officers, and the will of the framers of the Constitution thereby thwarted.”
That such is not a speculative situation is shown from the quotation from a Wisconsin case where an act creating *408a comptroller whose duty was to audit ac'counts after the Secretary of State (made exofficio Auditor under the Constitution) had done so. That court wrote:
‘“The result is that we have two auditors instead of one * * * the functions of that officer cannot, in whole or in part, be transferred to, or be exercised * * * by, any other person. * * A constitution * * * (is) designed to separate the powers of government and to define their extent and limit their exercise by the several departments * * *. Every positive delegation of power to one officer or department implies a negation of its exercise by any other officer, department or person. If it did not, the whole constitutional fabric might be undermined and destroyed”’.
Referring to a New York decision the question “is not whether the Legislature can abolish, but whether it can retain, those powers and duties (of a sheriff), and give them to an officer not elected”. Continuing, the North Dakota court opinion said:
“The foregoing opinion fully sustains what we have heretofore said to the effect that, the Constitution having named certain officers,, the functions essentially and inherently connected with such offices must be discharged by these constitutional officers and none others.”
The following statements are in acc'ord:
“The Attorney General is vested with many •powers and duties, and these appertain to his office under the Constitution. He cannot be deprived of these common-law functions by the Legislature * *". People ex rel. v. McCullough, 254 Ill. 9, 98 N.E. 156, 159, Ann.Cas. 1913B 995.
“* =1= * Attorney General * * * is the sole 'Official advisor of the executive officers, and of all boards, commissions, and departments of the state *409government, and it is his duty to conduct the law business of the state, both in and out of courts. The appropriation to the insurance superintendent for legal services and for traveling expenses of attorneys * * * is unconstitutional and void”. Fergus v. Russel, 270 Ill. 304, 110 N.E. 130, 145.
“It often has been recognized that the powers of the Attorney General are not circumscribed by any statute, but that he is clothed with certain common-law faculties appurtenant to the office”. Commonwealth v. Kozlowsky, 238 Mass. 379, 131 N.E. 207, 210.
An analysis of the Employment Security Law reveals some situations not easily reconcilable as to plaintiff relator’s employment. Apparently the agency to administer the law is the Employment Security Department,, which means the Commission or Unemployment Compensation Commission, which in turn means the Employment Security Commissioner. SDC 1960 Supp. 17.0801, SDC 1960 Supp. 17.0803-2. The result of the interplay of words and statutes is that there is an Employment Security Commissioner. He is the Commission, Department and Commissioner. He administers thé chapter, has power to adopt rules, employ persons, make expenditures, reports, investigations and take such other action as he deems advisable; he determines his own organization and methods of procedure. SDC 1960 Supp. 17.0807. He may also appoint and fix the compensation of, prescribe the duties and powers of such officers, accountants, attorneys, experts and other persons as may be necessary in the performance of his duties. SDC 1960 Supp. 17.0805 as amended by Ch. 104, Laws of 1961. These and other sections seem to give him power without end; at least the statutes so read. SDC 1960 Supp. 17.0835. Fortunately, judicial review is allowed but only on disputed claims. Within the Department, which is the Commissioner, he is .monarch of all he surveys. As the majority points out,, civil actions may be brought in the name of the state for amounts due (SDC 1960 Supp. *41017.0825) but in judicial actions involving his decisions he may either call upon the Attorney General or his own salaried employee attorney. In this maze SDC 1960 Supp. 17.0803-3, which created the office of Employment Security Commission, was amended. The words “and Counsel” were added to the officer’s title. He is required to be a member of the South Dakota State Bar with at least five years active legal practice, “who, in addition to all other duties, shall perform legal services for the Employment Security Department.” He therefore is to advise himself, conduct which this court has not especially favored. Kirby v. First National Bank, 64 S.D. 404, 266 N.W. 883. The duties are not specified to be routine duties. It must be assumed that the Legislature would not idly use the term legal services or add the requirement that he be a member of the Bar of five years active legal practice unless they had a meaning. Legal services could not be performed for compensation in the state without such membership nor can we assume the state expected to pay for services not to be fairly rendered. From this wording the conclusion is they required all the legal services and advice from a lawyer necessary except in the case of a suit by the state and would not have passed part of the statute as to Bar membership without the legal service requirement. In doing so, the statute unconstitutionally attempts to diminish the duties of the Attorney General and should not be sustained. Even though the Attorney General has now taken a view contrary to- his predecessors and Consented to this partial encroachment in the body of the act, this court should not approve it. Nothing in the title indicates this change of duties and under the second Johnson opinion the act itself is invalid. The majority opinion may well rise up to trouble the court if a future legislature pass an act creating an office, to be filled by it, to perform routine duties of a governor or other constitutional officer. For the above reasons I dissent.