Court Opinion

ID: 9516458
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-06 23:42:55.214502+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:37:19.316682
License: Public Domain

GARDEBRING, Justice
(dissenting).
I respectfully dissent. To me, the question requires only a short analysis of the applicable state constitutional provisions and of our previous eases. Article XII, Section 3 of the Minnesota Constitution provides:
Local Government; legislation affecting. The legislature may provide by law * * * for * * * elective and appointive officers *310[of local governmental units] including their qualifications * * ⅛.
(emphasis added). The provision is without limitation; it does not say the legislature is limited to considering only educational qualifications, residency requirements or any other specific category. There can be no argument about whether the legislature can establish the qualifications for office of locally elected officials. A “term limit” requirement is a “qualification,” and therefore the legislature would be constitutionally authorized to adopt the proposed term limit ordinance.
Our previous cases extend this authority to home rule cities, such as Minneapolis. In State ex rel. Town of Lowell v. City of Crookston, we said:
[t]he general rule is that, in matters of municipal concern, home rule cities have all the legislative power possessed by the legislature of the state, save as such power is expressly or impliedly withheld. The adoption of any charter provision contrary to the public policy of the state, as disclosed by the general laws or its penal code, is also forbidden. The power conferred upon cities to frame and adopt home rule charters is limited by the provision that “such charter shall always be in harmony with and subject to the constitution of the state.” But these limitations do not forbid the adoption of charter provisions as to any subject appropriate to the orderly conduct of municipal affairs, although they may differ from those of existing general laws.
252 Minn. 526, 528, 91 N.W.2d 81, 83 (1958) (citations omitted).
Thus, the legislative powers of a home rule city are limited as follows:
1) its charter provisions must be consistent with the public policy of the state, and
2) its charter provisions must be in harmony with and subject to the constitution and laws of the state.
The majority does not go so far as to suggest that the proposed “term limits” ordinance is somehow contrary to a plainly understood public policy. Moreover, because Article XII, Section 3 of the Minnesota Constitution authorizes the legislature to establish qualifications for locally elected officials, the proposed ordinance, which establishes a qualification, is in harmony with the constitution. Rather than deal with the plain language of Article XII, Section 3, the majority engages in a convoluted and arcane argument attempting to distinguish “qualifications” from “eligibility requirements.” Nothing in the state constitution itself, nor our previous cases, supports this analysis.
We must afford charter provisions of the kind at issue here the same presumption of constitutionality as we would apply to a duly enacted legislative statute. Guilliams v. Commissioner of Revenue, 299 N.W.2d 138, 142 (Minn.1980). Respondents have not even come close to satisfying the substantial burden of proof applicable to them in this kind of constitutional litigation. Therefore, I would answer the certified question in the negative.