Court Opinion

ID: 9792595
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 02:31:35.268112+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:37:43.831738
License: Public Domain

BISTLINE, J.,
dissenting.
A beginning point for review should be an examination of the ratio decedendi of Judge Cogswell’s district court opinion, which I see as being for the main part as follows: *59state to the denial of welfare payments to persons who had not established residence as considered in Shapiro v. Thompson, 394 U.S. 618 [89 S.Ct. 1322, 22 L.Ed.2d 600], and the denial of voting rights to persons who had not established residences as considered in Dunn v. Blumstein, 405 U.S. 330 [92 S.Ct. 995, 31 L.Ed.2d 274].
*58“Plaintiff also compares his constitutional right to travel freely from state to
*59“The status of prospective members of a Planning and Zoning Commission is somewhat hybrid in nature. They are not candidates for elected public office, nor can they be considered employees of the County.
“However, under either classification it does not appear to the Court that the Plaintiff’s Constitutional rights have been infringed upon.
“If the Plaintiff’s status is considered closer in nature to a County employee rather than a public official, his right of freedom to travel does not reach the Constitutional protection of the right to vote as in Dunn or the right to receive vital government welfare benefits as in Shapiro.
“McCarthy v. Philadelphia Civil Service Commission, 424 U.S. 645, 96 S.Ct. 1154 [47 L.Ed.2d 366], involved the validity of a municipal ordinance , requiring employees of a city to remain as residents of that city during such employment or be discharged.
“In reviewing Shapiro and Dunn the United States Supreme Court stated:
“ ‘Neither in those cases, nor in any others, have we questioned the validity of a condition placed upon municipal employment that a person be a resident at the time of his application.
“ ‘Nor did any of those cases involve a public agency’s relationship with its own employees which, of course, may justify greater control than that over the citizenry at large.’
“In the event that Plaintiff’s status could be considered closer to that of an elected public official, the authority of Lawrence v. City of Issaquah (Wash. [84 Wash.2d 146], 524 P.2d 1347), decides against Plaintiff’s contention.
“In that case the Washington Supreme Court held that a durational residency requirement of One (1) year to run for city Councilman was not unreasonable to fulfill the compelling state interest of affording candidates for that office the opportunity to be exposed to the needs and problems of the people and at the same time to afford the people the opportunity to observe the candidate.
“The Washington Court relied on Chimento v. Stark, 353 F.Supp. 1211, which was affirmed without opinion by the United States Supreme Court, cited at 414 U.S. 802 [94 S.Ct. 125, 38 L.Ed.2d 39], upholding the Constitutional requirement of a Seven (7) year residence for the office of governor. The reasoning in Lawrence is that the right to public office cannot be equated to the right to vote in relationship to the right to travel. Candidacy for public office is quite different from voting, and one does not travel from one place to another contemplating that he will offer himself to the voters for election to office.
“It is the Court’s conclusion that the relationship between an appointive member of an advisory board and the right to travel is ‘indirect and remote.’ ”
Although the Court’s opinion does declare its approval of the final paragraph above set forth, it has upheld the validity of the statute on a much different basis. My problems with Judge Cogswell’s opinion is for the most part the same problem which I encounter in the Court’s resolution of the issue, five years of non-eligibility for what I perceive to clearly be public office, and which thereby arbitrarily and capriciously deprives the county of the benefits which would derive from the appointment of a highly-qualified person and at the same time deprives the individual of the right to serve the public. As George Washington once wrote:
“No man is a warmer advocate for proper restraints and wholesome checks in every department of government that I am; but I have never yet been able to discover *60the propriety of placing it absolutely out of the power of men to render essential Services, because a possibility remains of their doing ill.”1
In the case at bar, however, there is no suggestion from the record of any possibility of harm resulting from Langmeyer’s appointment. The “ill” which presents itself in the controversy is a statute which sets no standards for office but simply requires five years of residence. Four members of the Court uphold the statute simply because they
“are convinced that the five-year residency requirement for appointment to the planning and zoning board, is not an unreasonable or irrational means to effectuate the State interest of insuring that the potential appointee has been exposed to the issues and problems of planning and zoning and to afford the governing board an opportunity to gain firsthand knowledge about his or her character and expertise.” (Emphasis added.)
for which proposition the Court relies upon the one-year requirement of Lawrence v. Issaquah. First of all, I find nothing in the record to support the supposition that such was the legislative thinking, let alone its intent. Whatever has convinced the Court is nothing more than its excuse for such legislation. More likely, one would surmise, if we are to engage in surmise, that some state legislator’s constituents became disgruntled when his county commissioners seated a foreigner (and perhaps a Californian at that) on a Planning and Zoning board. And, secondly, becoming acutely aware of the short span during which a man walks this earth, and thus aware also of the rapidly diminishing time available in which to satisfy the soul by rendering public service, the five-year Idaho requirement as against the one-year requirement of Issaquah is seen as too large a gap to bridge simply by somehow becoming convinced. Had the legislature set a ten-year requirement I have no doubt that the Court would uphold it — finding itself perhaps doubly convinced.
In my view there is far less reason tor requiring a period of residence for appointive office than there is for elective office. While it remains against the law to bribe oneself into an appointive office, nothing whatever prohibits a candidate from “buying” an elective office, or attempting the purchase. We have just witnessed a general election where some candidates spent millions of dollars in quest of their desire to be of public service — the millions, one would suppose, being spent in adherence to the philosophy that the electorate can thereby gain firsthand knowledge of character or expertise. In practice, however, the electorate may be easily misled or overwhelmed or both. Not so with an appoints ing board. In the first place it has been elected, and can be expected to use good judgment and careful scrutiny in the selection of those who show good qualifications for appointive office.
It comes with little grace upon the part of the legislature to dictate to the forty-four boards of county commissioners in the manner of appointing members to a planning and zoning board. Indeed, I am surprised that it was not Bonner County itself that raised the constitutional challenge. Its lack of active participation in the controversy is highly suggestive that although it might not have desired to appoint Langmeyer, such is not to say that it is enthralled at being told that it cannot do so. That choice should lay with the county commissioners, and in making that choice they should not be hindered with an unreasonable prohibition imposed by the legislature. To be remembered is that there will be other Bonner County residents who, but for a five-year residence requirement, the Commissioners would readily appoint to the Planning and Zoning Commission. What, for instance, of the person who has served for a number of years, and whose employment required his residence in some other state for one or two years — and then he returns to Idaho?
*61Under the unyielding conscienceless statute, such a person would wait out another five years. The statute simply stands at odds with common sense. One would think that the legislature which so prescribed would be more mindful of the residential requirements placed on it, not by itself, but by the Constitution. All that the Framers required — one would suppose “to effectuate the state interest of insuring that the potential appointee has been exposed to the issues and problems of planning and zoning and to afford the governing board an opportunity to gain firsthand knowledge about his or her character and expertise”— was that a senator or representative at the time of his election be a citizen of the United States and an elector of the State of Idaho, and have one year’s residence in the county chosen. Id. Const. Art. 3, § 6. Better-reasoned authority supports the logical view that such a five-year requirement is an unconstitutional penalty for exercising the right to migrate. One might well wonder how many of that distinguished group who comprised our constitutional convention had five years of Idaho residence. Perhaps all did, but they were certainly not demanding of five years in setting Constitutional requirements for public office.
A case particularly on point to the present one is Bay Area Women’s Coalition v. City and County of San Francisco, 78 Cal.App.3d 961, 144 Cal.Rptr. 591 (1978), in which the court addressed the constitutionality of a requirement of five-year residency for appointment to a board or commission of the city. The court there analyzed Dunn v. Blumstein, 405 U.S. 330, 92 S.Ct. 995, 31 L.Ed.2d 274 (1972), which held that:
“ ‘[F]reedom to travel throughout the United States has long been recognized as a basic right under the Constitution.’ ... And it is clear that the freedom to travel includes the ‘freedom to enter and abide in any State in the Union.’ ... Obviously, durational residency laws single out the class of bona fide state and county residents who have recently exercised this constitutionally protected right, and penalize such travelers directly. We considered such a durational residence requirement in Shapiro v. Thompson, ... [where] we concluded that since the right to travel was a constitutionally protected right, ‘any classification which serves to penalize the exercise of that right, unless shown to be necessary to promote a compelling governmental interest, is unconstitutional.’ ” Id. at 339, 92 S.Ct. at 1001 (citations omitted) (emphasis added and in original).
The court then rejected the City’s argument that this type of durational residency laws did not penalize the right to travel.
“The City argues that the right to travel is not impaired by its durational residency requirement because a person’s motive to travel ‘could hardly be affected’ ... and that the present requirement was not intended to prevent respondents from moving from one place to another. This is the precise view which the United States Supreme Court has characterized as ‘a fundamental misunderstanding of the law.’ (Dunn, supra, 405 U.S. at p. 339, 92 S.Ct. at p. 1001.) The court explained that whether a statute seeks to or actually does deter travel is irrelevant: rather, the compelling state interest test is triggered whenever the classification serves to penalize the exercise of that right. [“Penalize” emphasized by the Bay Area court; other emphasis added.] ... In the present case, it is abundantly clear that Section 8.100(a) has a penalizing effect on those who have recently exercised their right to travel by barring them from appointment to public office.
“The test, as it applies to such residence requirements, is well articulated by the United States Supreme Court in Dunn v. Blumstein, supra, 405 U.S. 330 at page 343, 92 S.Ct. at page 1003: ‘It is not sufficient for the State to show that durational residence requirements further a very substantial state interest. In pursuing that important interest, the State cannot choose means that unnecessarily burden or restrict constitutionally pro*62tected activity. Statutes affecting constitutional rights must be drawn with “precision,” and must be “tailored” to serve their legitimate objectives. And if there are other, reasonable ways to achieve those goals with a lesser burden on constitutionally protected activity, a State may not choose the way of greater interference. If it acts at all, it must choose “less drastic means.” ’
“In the instant case, the City sets forth as its interest, to ‘insure that those individuals charged with the administration of public affairs would not only be acquainted with the city and its affairs but also would have a vested interest in the quality of their work product.’
“The argument that a durational residency requirement is necessary to further a compelling governmental interest in insuring a knowledge and understanding of local issues has been repeatedly rejected by the California Supreme Court.... As stated in Johnson, supra, [Johnson v. Hamilton, 15 Cal.3d 461, 470, 125 Cal.Rptr. 129, 134, 541 P.2d 881, 886 (1975)] ‘[i]n terms of the education of the candidate, the argument that an extended residence is necessary for an understanding of local issues, while perhaps appealing in the abstract, nonetheless ignores the hard realities bearing on the relationship of candidate and issue. The knowledge, appreciation, and comprehension of the public issues and problems which a candidate either possesses or may reasonably be expected to acquire are so much the product of the variables of motivation, intelligence, maturity, experience, opportunity, and desire as to make any flat rule of physical residence appear immediately suspect and arbitrary. The congeries of individual capacities for observation, study, exposure, and growth are simply so different as to be inhospitable to a rigid fixed qualification tied to residence.’ ... There is no material distinction in this respect between candidates for elective as opposed to appointive office. ‘The imprecise nature of a durational residence requirement which includes uninformed old time resident candidates but excludes well informed new resident candidates is clear. It is simply too crude and imprecise an instrument to effectuate this state interest.’ ...
“Nor can the five-year residence requirement be justified as necessary to insure that an appointee have a ‘vested interest’ in the performance of his or her job. The concurrent residence requirement already contained in Section 8.100 provides, among other methods, a less drastic means of accomplishing the same objective.
“In summary, it appears that the five-year durational residence requirement of Section 8.100(a) is not justified as furthering any compelling governmental interest, nor does it constitute the ‘ “least restrictive method of achieving the desired purpose.” ’ ... We thus conclude that the provision denies respondents and other candidates for appointive office similarly situated, the equal protection of the laws.” Bay Area Women’s Coalition, 144 Cal.Rptr. at 594-96 (citations omitted).
Bay Area is sound and is not only the authority Idaho residents moving their residence to California or elsewhere would accept as fair and reasonable, but is the authority which this Court today should be following. It is but a logical and proper application and extension of Dunn v. Blumstern, 405 U.S. 330, 92 S.Ct. 995, 31 L.Ed.2d 274 (1972).

. Letter to Bushrod Washington, November 10, 1787 in 29 The Writings of George Washington, (Washington: United States Government Printing Office, 1939), p. 312.