Court Opinion

ID: 9856288
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 06:43:55.073621+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:38:32.562364
License: Public Domain

BROTHERTON, Justice
dissenting:
I respectfully dissent from the Court’s opinion in this matter.
I fully support the prevention of corruption and fraud in elections. The cost of running for public office in this State and in the United States is much too high. It is a cancer that could destroy our representative democracy. When the wealthy and those individuals who are able to solicit large monetary contributions are the only candidates who are capable of mounting successful campaigns, it is time to reform the election laws. However, the reformation must be accomplished within the limits of our Constitution and also through the use of common sense. If election law reform efforts run roughshod over our Constitution, the. basic fabric of our government will be destroyed. I dissent because I believe West Virginia Code § 3-1A-6 (1979) is an unconstitutional delegation of legislative power to an executive officer, because I believe the majority improperly invaded the province of the legislature by making election law policy, and because I believe the system advocated by the majority opens the door to abuses of power by the Secretary of State.
West Virginia Code § 3-1A-6 provides that the Secretary of State “shall have authority ... to make, amend and rescind such rules, regulations and orders as may be necessary to carry out the policy of the legislature, as contained in this chapter.” The majority recognizes that this Code provision shifts part of the legislature’s constitutional burden to the Secretary of State. See Maj. op. at 718. Despite this fact, the majority not only condones the legislature’s action, they applaud it. They state that “a detailed system of regulation is essential.” Id. I agree, but regulations may not be promulgated under the authority of an unconstitutional delegation of power.
The Constitution of West Virginia provides:
The legislative, executive and judicial departments shall be separate and distinct, so that neither shall exercise the powers properly belonging to either of the others; nor shall any person exercise the powers of more than one of them at the same time, except that justices of the peace shall be eligible to the legislature.
W.Va. Const, art. V, § 1. This provision is part of the fundamental law of our State and must therefore be strictly construed and closely followed. Syl. pt. 1, State ex rel. Barker v. Manchin, 167 W.Va. 155, 279 S.E.2d 622 (1981). The legislature has violated the separation of powers doctrine by giving the Secretary of State the authority to promulgate regulations concerning elections. The Constitution provides that:
The legislature shall prescribe the manner of conducting and making returns of elections, and of determining contested elections; and shall pass such laws as may be necessary and proper to prevent intimidation, disorder or violence at the polls, and corruption or fraud in voting, counting the vote, ascertaining or declaring the result, or fraud in any manner, upon the ballot.
W.Va. Const, art. IV, § 11 (emphasis added). This Court has previously interpreted this section of the Constitution as follows:
*725This provision is mandatory and plenary, and requires the legislature to prescribe all reasonable laws deemed necessary or proper for the prevention of fraud, securing the priority of elections, and ascertaining the results....
... [A]ll laws, which are deemed not only necessary but, proper for the purpose of fair and honest elections and ascertaining their results, the Constitution commands the legislature to pass.
Halstead v. Rader, 27 W.Va. 806, 808-09 (1886) (emphasis added).
The Constitution and Halstead clearly indicate that the power to prescribe laws regulating elections is the exclusive province of the legislature. The Framers of our Constitution mandated that the power be purely legislative. An official of the executive branch of government may not perform a purely legislative function.1 See State ex rel. County Court of Marion County v. Demus, 148 W.Va. 398, 401, 135 S.E.2d 352, 355 (1964). The Secretary of State is an official of the executive branch. W.Va. Const, art. VII, § 1. By granting the petitioner’s request for a writ of mandamus, the majority has impliedly upheld the constitutionality of a clearly unconstitutional statute.
In addition, the majority has violated the separation of powers doctrine by usurping the authority of the legislature. The majority examined the list of permissible campaign expenditures in W.Va.Code § 3-8-9(a) (Supp.1985) and stated that two categories of expenditures from that list are more susceptible to abuse than the others. The majority targets as abuse areas the distribution of campaign literature, W.Va.Code § 3-8-9(a)(3), and the conveyance of voters to the polls, W.Va.Code § 3-8-9(a)(8). While abuse may exist in these areas, the record provides no evidence of it. In targeting these two areas for special treatment, the majority has impermissibly established legislative policy. This Court recently addressed the issue of judicial policy-making as follows:
This Court does not sit as a superlegis-lature, commissioned to pass upon the political, social, economic, or scientific merits of statutes pertaining to proper subjects of legislation. It is the duty of the legislature to consider facts, establish policy, and embody that policy in legislation.
Boyd v. Commissioner, No. 17061, slip op. at 4 (July 3, 1986) (emphasis added). If the legislature wished to target any specific areas of political campaign activities for special regulation, it would be their duty to do so. This Court has no authority to establish policy within the legislature’s realm of power.
The majority also violates the separation of powers doctrine by, in essence, drafting legislation. They do this by establishing specific criteria for rates of remuneration for campaign workers and by requiring precise reports of services rendered by campaign workers. The majority states that workers should be paid no less than the statutory minimum wage,2 but no more than the fifty dollar per day sum fixed by statute as the minimum payment for poll *726clerks and election commissioners.3 They make one notable exception to this rule by stating that campaign workers who lose a day of work may be paid at their customary rate of compensation. Not only has the majority drafted legislation, they have even fashioned an exception to their legislation. This Court has no authority to do either. We recently noted that “[i]t is not the function of this Court ... to redraft acts of the legislature. That is a legislative function, which this Court is forbidden from exercising.” Starcher v. Crabtree, 176 W.Va. at 709, 348 S.E.2d 293 at 295 (1986).
By placing the duty on the Secretary of State to promulgate rules for elections under W.Va.Code § 3-1A-6, the legislature has given him an incredible amount of power. The rules can be promulgated at the Secretary’s whim because rules relating to public elections are not subject to the West Virginia Administrative Procedure Act. See W.Va.Code § 29A-l-3(c) (Supp.1985). The legislature will only be able to overrule the Secretary’s actions by passing new legislation. Because West Virginia’s Secretary of State is an elected official, it is not unlikely that each new Secretary of State will promulgate an entirely new set of rules. The rules may be manipulated in order to achieve political advantage. Almost seventy years ago, this Court stated that the delegation of power by the legislature cannot be sustained where “the exercise [of the power] is made to depend upon the mere will or caprice of the grantee of the power.” Sutherland v. Miller, 79 W.Va. 796, 803, 91 S.E. 993, 996 (1917). I believe the majority should be just as concerned about possible abuses of power by the Secretary of State as they are concerned about abuses in political campaigns.
This State should strive to insure that elections are free from corruption and fraud. Unfortunately, the majority of this Court has endorsed a system which may produce the same type of political manipulation and corruption it is supposed to prevent. The cancer of election fraud cannot be cured by placing almost absolute control over elections in the hands of one elected public official. I fear that under the white banner of election reform, the majority has created a powerful tool for corruption.
I firmly believe that W.Va.Code § 3-1A-6 is an unconstitutional delegation of legislative power to the executive branch of government and is therefore void. I would deny the writ sought by the petitioner on the ground that rules cannot be promulgated pursuant to an unconstitutional statute. Accordingly, I dissent.
I am authorized to state that Justice NEELY joins me in this dissent.

. The executive branch may make rules and regulations in order to carry out legislative policy under a constitutional delegation of authority from the legislature. “The delegation by the legislature of broad discretionary powers to an administrative body, accompanied by fitting standards for their exercise, is not of itself unconstitutional." Syl. pt. 5, State ex rel. West Virginia Housing Development Fund v. Copenhaver, 153 W.Va. 636, 171 S.E.2d 545 (1969). I do not mean to imply otherwise. A delegation of legislative power to an administrative agency is a violation of the separation of powers doctrine only when such delegation is of a purely legislative power. See Syl. pt. 5, Woodring v. Whyte, 161 W.Va. 262, 242 S.E.2d 238 (1978). The United States Supreme Court recently reaffirmed its disapproval of the comingling of executive and legislative powers in Bowsher v. Synar, 478 U.S. 714, 106 S.Ct. 3181, 92 L.Ed.2d 583 (1986). Bowsher concerned the constitutionality of the Balanced Budget and Emergency Deficit Control Act of 1985, Pub.L. 99-177, 99 Stat. 1038, popularly known as the “Gramm-Rudman-Hollings Act.” The Supreme Court declared the Act unconstitutional because it created a congressional usurpation of executive branch powers. Id. 478 U.S. at 718-19, 106 S.Ct. at 3191-92.

. W.Va.Code § 21-5C-2 (1985).

. W.Va.Code § 3-1-44 (Supp.1985).