Court Opinion

ID: 9652273
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 17:21:36.549332+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:12:49.797592
License: Public Domain

Smith, J,

dissenting:

I dissent because I believe we should decide the very-important matter raised in this appeal, an issue which I regard as vital to the future fiscal well-being of this State. However, I agree that this case is moot because the controversy concerns the budget for the fiscal year beginning July 1, 1976, which fiscal year has now ended.
I hope a declaratory judgment action will be instituted forthwith if any Governor of Maryland again sends a budget to the General Assembly subject to attack on a basis similar to the issue raised here. With the research done in this case and the cooperation of the parties, it is possible that a final appellate decision could be rendered prior to the deadline for the adoption of a budget. The courts would then be dealing with a really live controversy. The Congress did finally enact legislation which had the effect of supplying the money counted upon in the budget here under attack. That enactment did not come, however, until some months after the beginning of the fiscal year and a good eight months after the submission of the budget. Prompt action to secure an adjudication of the matter would not present the temptation to decide the question of whether revenues were “available” within the meaning of the Maryland Constitution upon the basis of that which ultimately took place rather than upon the basis of the factual situation existing at the time of the submission of the budget. I am not to be understood by this comment as criticizing the plaintiffs here since there was an indication at the argument before us that their reason for not pushing for an earlier hearing was to accommodate what was conceived by them and the Attorney General to be the best interest of the State.
There have been a number of instances within the last 20 or 25 years in which Governors of Maryland in order to *527achieve a balanced budget have resorted to some ingenious bookkeeping measures such as a shift in the calculated time for receipt of certain revenues. Accordingly, I believe it possible that the problem represented in this case may well recur. For that reason I regard this case as one of such public importance that we should consider the matter for the purpose of providing guidance for future conduct in similar circumstances.
Reyes v. Prince George’s County, 281 Md. 279, 380 A. 2d 12 (1977), was decided but four days prior to the argument in this case. In it Judge Digges referred for the Court to the statement in Hammond v. Lancaster, 194 Md. 462, 471-72, 71 A. 2d 474 (1950), relative to deciding moot or abstract questions, “or, in the absence of constitutional mandate, render[ing] advisory opinions.” The Court said in Reyes:
“We think that the constitutional limitations we have just described are those to which the Court in Hammond referred when it indicated that advisory opinions would not be rendered without constitutional mandate. It is apparent to us that those limitations are not applicable to prevent our decision in a moot case where the requisite extraordinary circumstances exist.... We are loath to conclude that, simply because a judgment of this Court can no longer affect the rights of the parties who have brought the dispute before us for adjudication, it is necessarily beyond the judicial function without regard to the public importance of the issues, the likelihood of recurrence, and other similar factors. Particularly where a controversy is live when appealed to this Court and the opposing positions are vigorously presented, so that the action is clearly suitable for resolution through the judicial process, in the absence of a clear. constitutional prohibition, either express or reasonably implied, we decline to infer that it may never be judicially resolved. We emphasize, however, that we will exercise this authority only in rare instances which *528demonstrate the most compelling of circumstances.” (Footnotes omitted.) 281 Md. at - 296-97.
In Reyes we laid down certain procedures to be followed when an “action involves the validity of a statute or governmental regulation having the force of statute, or an urgently needed . determination affecting future governmental conduct, and in which the public’s concern is both imperative and manifest” in order that such a case “not hereafter necessarily be dismissed as collusive by a court of this State....” By footnote, after the reference to the public’s concern as “both imperative and manifest,” the Court said in Reyes:
“In this regard it may be helpful to recall the language of the Court in Lloyd v. Supervisors of Elections, 206 Md. 36, 43, 111 A. 2d 379, 382 (1954), where we noted circumstances under which the decision of issues moot as to the parties might be appropriate:
[T]he better considered and reasoned cases take the view that only where the urgency of establishing a rule of future conduct in matters of important public concern is imperative and manifest, will there be justified a departure from the general rule and practice of not deciding academic questions. They hold that if the public interest clearly will be hurt if the question is not immediately decided, if the matter involved is likely to recur frequently, and'its recurrence will involve a relationship between government and its citizens, or a duty of government, and upon any recurrence, the same difficulty which prevented the appeal at hand from being heard in time is likely again to prevent a decision, then the Court may .find justification for deciding the issues raised *529by a question which has become moot, particularly if all these factors concur with sufficient weight.” Id. at 300 n. 18.
It is because I believe this case fits squarely within what we said in Reyes and what Judge Hammond said for our predecessors in Lloyd that I would consider this case upon its merits.
I am concerned lest revenue estimates based upon a hope, rather than an actual belief (there is a difference) may ultimately place the State in as precarious a financial position as it was when Governor Emerson C. Harrington appointed the Goodnow Commission more than 60 years ago.