Court Opinion

ID: 9558232
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 17:04:54.818187+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:08:30.027222
License: Public Domain

QUINN, Justice,
dissenting in part:
I respectfully dissent from that part of the court’s opinion holding the budgetary transfers violative of the legislative power of appropriation. As a preliminary matter, I view the General Assembly’s challenge to the facial constitutionality of the transfer statutes, §§ 24-30-201(l)(b) and 24-37-405(l)(k), 10 C.R.S. (1982), as not presenting a justiciable claim for which a court can grant relief in the form of a judgment declaring the statutes unconstitutional. With respect to the merits of this case, although I agree with the court’s holding that the transfer statutes do not unconstitutionally abridge the legislative power of appropriation, I cannot accept the rigid limitations which the court has placed on the Governor’s power to make budgetary transfers within the executive department of government. I believe that the proper resolution of the constitutional validity of the Governor’s budgetary transfers requires the application of standards different from those employed by the majority. Application of these other standards leads me to conclude that the only appropriate disposition of this case is to reverse that part of the judgment which invalidates the *526budgetary transfers and to remand the case to the trial court for a new trial.
I.
In declaring the transfer statutes unconstitutional, the trial court expressly acknowledged the General Assembly’s right to challenge the facial validity of the statutes upon which the Governor relied in making the budgetary transfers in question. Although the majority does not address this aspect of the case, I believe the declaration of unconstitutionality made by the trial court is fundamentally flawed.
Judicial principles of standing are calculated to ensure not only that the party seeking judicial relief has a sufficient legal stake in the outcome of the controversy, L. Tribe, American Constitutional Law 79 (1978), but also to guard against the judicial assumption of power that has been constitutionally vested in another department of government. As this court observed in Conrad v. City and County of Denver, 656 P.2d 662, 668 (Colo.1982):
The “injury-in-fact” requirement is dictated by the need to assure that an actual controversy exists so that the matter is a proper one for judicial resolution, for consistent with the separation of powers doctrine embodied in Article III of the Colorado Constitution, “[cjourts cannot, under the pretense of an actual case, assume powers vested in either the executive or the legislative branches of government.” [Wimberly v. Ettenberg, 194 Colo. 163, 16.7, 570 P.2d 535, 538 (1977).] The requirement that the interest injured be of a type legally protected by statutory or constitutional provisions is a prudential rule of standing based on judicial self-restraint.
I have no problem with the General Assembly’s right to challenge the validity of the Governor’s actions as violative of the separation of powers doctrine, Colo.Const, art. Ill, or as violative of the transfer statutes themselves, §§ 24-30-201(l)(b) and 24-37-405(l)(k), 10 C.R.S. (1982). Deciding whether the actions of the Governor exceeded whatever authority has been committed to the Governor in the matter of budgetary transfers, while itself a delicate exercise in constitutional and statutory interpretation, is nonetheless the responsibility of the judicial department as the ultimate interpreter of the law bearing on an actual controversy. The trial court, however, did not resolve the case on this basis. Instead, the court accepted the claim of the General Assembly that, even if its own statutory law authorizes the Governor to make the budgetary transfers, the statutes themselves are facially unconstitutional as violative of the separation of powers doctrine.
Although the General Assembly’s claim of unconstitutionality was raised only as a rejoinder to the Governor’s reliance on the transfer statutes as one of the sources of his authority to make the budgetary transfers, it was this claim of facial unconstitutionality that provided the basis of the trial court’s judgment. If indeed, as the trial court ruled, the legislative enactments are unconstitutional, the only recourse contemplated under the Colorado Constitution, in my view, is for the General Assembly to remedy the constitutional infirmity by amending or repealing its own enactments. Whether the General Assembly chooses or has the necessary votes to effectuate an amendment to or repeal of the transfer statutes is essentially a nonjusticiable political issue, the resolution of which should be remitted to the interplay of the political process. See generally Goldwater v. Carter, 444 U.S. 996, 1002, 100 S.Ct. 533, 536, 62 L.Ed.2d 428 (1979) (plurality opinion); Baker v. Carr, 369 U.S. 186, 217, 82 S.Ct. 691, 710, 7 L.Ed.2d 663 (1962); Holtzman v. Schlesinger, 484 F.2d 1307, 1309-10 (2d Cir.1973), cert. denied 416 U.S. 936, 94 S.Ct. 1935, 40 L.Ed.2d 286 (1974).
When a court refuses to entertain a request by the General Assembly to declare a legislative enactment unconstitutional, it does no more than place the General Assembly in the position of resorting to the very process which the Colorado Constitution demonstrably and exclusively commits to that body — the process of changing the *527statutory law. Colo.Const. art. V, § 1. In short, any injury that arguably might have been suffered by the General Assembly in its official capacity as a result of the claimed unconstitutionality of its own statutes is much too speculative in nature and certainly not the type which our traditional rules of standing are designed to address.
I would hold that when, as here, the General Assembly requests a court to declare legislative enactments unconstitutional, a nonjusticiable issue is presented that does not lend itself to judicial relief. This resolution of the standing issue would dictate that the ease be returned to the trial court to resolve the validity of the Governor’s budgetary transfers under appropriate standards of constitutional adjudication. Because the majority, however, has resolved the issues relating to the budgetary transfers on a basis different from that relied on by the trial court, I address this latter aspect of the case.
II.
The court concludes that the transfers involved here impermissibly infringed on the General Assembly’s power of appropriation. This conclusion, in my view, proceeds from an unduly restrictive view of the Governor’s inherent authority as the state’s chief executive officer responsible for the administration and management of the executive branch of government. I accordingly register my dissent to Part IV of the court’s opinion.
A.
Article III of the Colorado Constitution divides the powers of government into three separate, co-equal departments — the legislative, executive, and judicial — and, under the rubric of the separation of powers doctrine, expressly prohibits any “person or collection of persons charged with the exercise of powers properly belonging to one of these departments” from exercising “any power properly belonging to either of the others, except as in this constitution expressly directed or permitted.” The supreme executive power of the state is vested in the Governor, who is charged with the responsibility of faithfully executing the laws of this state. Colo.Const. art. IV, § 2. The legislative power of the state is vested in the General Assembly consisting of a senate and house of representatives. Colo.Const. art. V, § 1. This legislative power includes the power to appropriate money “for the expense of the executive, legislative and judicial departments of the state.” Colo.Const. art. V, § 32.
While the separation of powers doctrine codified in Article III divides the allocation of power between three separate and coequal departments of government, it does not expressly prescribe the exact limits of each department’s respective powers, nor can it reasonably be expected to do so. The purpose of the separation of powers doctrine is not to create three mutually exclusive, watertight compartments of government, but rather to prevent one department from exercising power that is essential to another department’s proper exercise of its constitutionally assigned functions. Nixon v. Administrator of General Services, 433 U.S. 425, 442-43, 97 S.Ct. 2777, 2789-90, 53 L.Ed.2d 867 (1977); see also People v. McKenna, 196 Colo. 367, 373, 585 P.2d 275, 279 (1978). The constitution, while diffusing the power among three branches of government in order to protect against the tyrannical accumulation of power in one, contemplates that “practice will integrate the dispersed powers into a workable government”; and to this end it enjoins upon the three branches “separateness but interdependence, autonomy but reciprocity.” Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer, 343 U.S. 579, 635, 72 S.Ct. 863, 870, 96 L.Ed. 1153 (1952) (Jackson, J., concurring). As one court succinctly observed:
Under our system of government the absolute independence of the departments and the complete separation of powers is impracticable. We must maintain in our political system sufficient flexibility to experiment and to seek new methods of improving governmental efficiency. At the same time we must not *528lose sight of the ever-existing danger of unchecked power and the concentration of power in the hands of a single person or group which the separation of powers doctrine was designed to prevent.
State ex rel. Schneider v. Bennett, 219 Kan. 285, 288-89, 547 P.2d 786, 791 (1976).
Thus, the phrase “separation of powers,” no matter how solemnly reiterated, provides no talismanic solution to issues of unconstitutional usurpation of power by one department of government. Resolution of such issues requires an analysis of the functions delegated to the competing departments with a view toward developing adjudicatory standards that effectively accommodate the constitutional missions granted to each of the competing departments. An indispensable component of that analysis is the concept of implied or inherent power.
The idea that expressly granted constitutional powers carry with them implied or inherent powers necessary to their execution is not novel. As one commentator has noted:
[Although not conferred expressly by the Constitution, [such powers] are derived from the express powers by reasonable implication. One cannot question the validity, indeed necessity, of drawing reasonable implications from the constitutional text in this area, as in all others, for the implied authority provides the means whereby the express powers are carried into execution.
Winterton, The Concept of Extra-Constitutional Executive Power in Domestic Affairs, 7 Hastings Const.L.Q. 1, 9 (1979) (footnotes omitted); see Marshall v. Gordon, 243 U.S. 521, 537, 37 S.Ct. 448, 451, 61 L.Ed. 881 (1917) (principle of implied or inherent power — power that is reasonably appropriate and relevant to the exercise of a granted power is to be considered as accompanying the grant — “has been so universally applied that it suffices merely to state it”); Kolkman v. People, 89 Colo. 8, 33-34, 300 P. 575, 584-85 (1931) (power to promulgate rules of procedure recognized as inherent in constitutional functions assigned to judicial department of government). The principle of inherent power, therefore, is simply a recognition of the fact that the separation of powers doctrine must be understood in a sense that recognizes the multi-faceted nature of governmental power delegated to each department of government by the Colorado Constitution.
The legislative power of appropriation, which consists of setting aside a certain amount of money for a particular purpose, People v. Kennehan, 55 Colo. 589, 136 P. 1033 (1913), represents an expression of legislative intent that a particular result, the object of the appropriation, be attained through the expenditure of an amount up to the limit of the appropriation. The amount of the appropriation is based on the General Assembly’s projection of the amount necessary to accomplish the governmental mission for which a particular agency of government is responsible. Although the appropriation may represent the general level of activity which the legislature intends the particular agency to engage in, it is at best no more than an estimate and may well be greater than or less than the amount necessary and sufficient to achieve the desired result. An appropriation, therefore, is not to be viewed as a directive to the funded agency to spend all of the appropriation but, rather, as a legislative authorization to use so much of the specified sum as necessary to achieve the purpose of the appropriation.
While the power of appropriation is constitutionally vested in the General Assembly, the Governor is constitutionally empowered to faithfully execute the laws of the state. Colo. Const, art. IV, § 2. Indeed, this court has recognized that the Governor has the inherent authority to administer funds appropriated by the legislature as an incident to his constitutional responsibility as the chief executive officer of the state. Anderson v. Lamm, 195 Colo. 437, 442, 579 P.2d 620, 623-24 (1978). The General Assembly’s exercise of the appropriation power is complete once the appropriation has been made and, there*529fore, does not carry with it the authority “to interfere with the executive’s power to administer appropriated funds.... ” Id.
It is in light of the respective constitutional functions delegated to both the executive and legislative departments of government, including the inherent or implied powers necessary to carry out those functions, that particular standards must be developed to permit a principled resolution of whether the Governor’s budgetary transfers in this case violated the separation of powers doctrine by usurping the legislative power of appropriation.
B.
I believe the resolution of the separation of powers issue raised in this case requires a court to make in sequential order three separate inquiries. The initial inquiry is whether the Colorado Constitution, by either express provision or clear implication, grants the power in question to a department of government other than the one exercising it. If, for example, the only reasonable construction of the constitution is that the transfer power is expressly granted to the General Assembly or is clearly necessary to the proper exercise of those powers expressly delegated to the General Assembly, then the Governor’s budgetary transfers must be deemed to violate the separation of powers doctrine. No further inquiry would be necessary under such circumstances.
If, however, the constitution neither expressly nor by clear implication assigns the power of budgetary transfer to the General Assembly, a court should then ask whether such power may reasonably be implied from the constitutional role delegated to the Governor as chief executive officer of the state. In making this determination, it is appropriate to consider not only the significance of the challenged power to the Governor’s constitutional mission, but also whether and to what extent the legislative department has historically recognized or acquiesced in the exercise of the challenged power by the Governor. This latter factor may involve a review of applicable statutes, legislative resolutions, and the past conduct of the General Assembly, all as indicative of its respective interpretation of the constitutional allocation of power in the matter of budgetary transfers within the executive branch of government. Although the exercise of executive power may not be legitimized by the mere acquiescence of the General Assembly, especially since authoritative interpretation of the state constitution ultimately rests with the judiciary, e.g., People ex rel. Julian v. District Court, 165 Colo. 253, 260, 439 P.2d 741, 745 (1968); People v. Nothaus, 147 Colo. 210, 215, 363 P.2d 180, 182 (1961), statutory enactments of the General Assembly may nevertheless inform the judicial interpretation under appropriate circumstances. If, after appropriate inquiry, it is determined that the transfer power is not reasonably necessary to the proper exercise of the Governor’s constitutional authority to administer and manage the executive department, then the exercise of that power must be viewed as beyond the scope of the Governor’s inherent constitutional authority.
Finally, if the transfer action is found to be reasonably necessary to the proper exercise of the Governor’s constitutional power to administer and manage the executive department of government, it must then be determined whether the transfer power prevents or significantly interferes with the exercise of the General Assembly’s power of appropriation. This last inquiry should be made in light of the basic purpose of the separation of powers doctrine— that is, to prohibit one department of government from accumulating and exercising power in a manner that prevents another department from accomplishing its constitutionally assigned functions. E.g., Administrator of General Services, 433 U.S. at 442-43, 97 S.Ct. at 2789-90. The separation of powers doctrine contemplates that, to the extent constitutionally permissible, each department should be accorded the necessary flexibility to effectively address the complex and ever-increasing range of problems that are placed at the government’s doorstep for solution. E.g., *530Bennett, 219 Kan. at 288-89, 547 P.2d at 791. In making this third and final inquiry, a court should consider the extent to which the challenged action fosters or inhibits the accomplishment of those governmental functions for which the legislature appropriated funds to the executive agencies involved in the transfers. If, for example, both the transferor and transferee agencies have been initially funded by the General Assembly for the purpose of accomplishing their legal responsibilities, and if the transfers would not impair the ability of the transferor agencies to accomplish their legitimate objectives and would also enhance the functional ability of the transferee' agencies to achieve their legitimate objectives, and, finally, if the cumulative effect of the transfers would not increase the overall level of appropriations made to the executive department of government, see Colo. Const, art. X, § 16, then it would follow that the power of budgetary transfer, far from usurping the legislative power of appropriation, would actually further the ability of the executive department to accomplish those missions for which the legislature has appropriated funds in the first instance.
C.
Application of the foregoing mode of analysis leads me to conclude that the proper disposition of this case is to reverse that part of the judgment invalidating the budgetary transfers and to remand the case to the trial court for a new trial on this aspect of the controversy. I am led to this conclusion for the following reasons. First, the Colorado Constitution does not expressly grant to the General Assembly the power to make budgetary transfers within the executive department of government. Nor, for that matter, does the constitutional text relating to the General Assembly’s power of appropriation, Colo. Const, art. V, § 32, clearly imply that the power of budgetary transfer was intended as a necessary or significant attribute of the power of appropriation. It is necessary, therefore, to determine whether the Governor’s transfer power may reasonably be implied as inherent in his constitutionally assigned function of administering and managing the executive department of government.
I conclude as a matter of law that the power to make budgetary transfers within the executive department is, under limited circumstances, an inherent attribute of the Governor’s constitutional role as chief executive officer of the state under article IV, section 2 of the Colorado Constitution. As chief executive officer of the state, the Governor has ultimate responsibility for the operation of the executive department of government. Anderson, 195 Colo. at 442, 579 P.2d at 623-24. The executive department consists of twenty separate units which were created pursuant to article IV, section 22 of the Colorado Constitution and the Administrative Organization Act of 1968, §§ 24-1-101 to -136, 10 C.R.S. (1982 & 1984 Supp.). See Colorado State Civil Service Employees Association v. Love, 167 Colo. 436, 448 P.2d 624 (1968). These governmental units have been delegated a vast array of responsibilities vital to the citizenry of this state. To posit in the office of Governor a limited power to make budgetary transfers is to do no more than recognize what is reasonably necessary to the proper execution of the constitutional role assigned to that office. Moreover, as I discuss in Part IV, infra, the General Assembly has itself acquiesced in the Governor’s exercise of this power for many years, as evidenced by its incorporation of the transfer statutes, §§ 24-30-201(l)(b) and 24-37-405(l)(k), 10 C.R.S. (1982), into the Administrative Organization Act of 1968. This legislative acquiescence, in my opinion, is at least some evidence of the General Assembly’s own interpretation of the type of authority that is reasonably necessary to the proper exercise of the Governor’s constitutionally assigned functions.
I am thus satisfied that the first two inquiries required by the analysis set forth in Part IIB of this dissent can be answered on the basis of the record on appeal. The third and final inquiry, however, is whether the budgetary transfers in issue prevented *531or significantly interfered with the exercise of the General Assembly’s power of appropriation. This question, in my view, should not be determined on the basis of the record before us, but rather should be resolved only after the parties to this controversy have been afforded an adequate opportunity to present evidence bearing on the issue. Such evidence should focus on whether and to what extent the transfers impaired the functional ability of the trans-feror agencies, whether and to what extent the transfers actually enhanced the functional ability of the transferee agencies, whether the transfers permitted the executive department to accomplish those missions for which the legislature appropriated funds in the first instance, and whether the transfers were achieved within the overall level of appropriations made by the General Assembly to the executive department.
D.
The conclusion reached by the majority— that the executive transfers involved here violated the separation of powers doctrine by directly contravening major legislative budgeting objectives, supra at 522, —proceeds from assumptions which I find unacceptable on several counts. First, the majority assumes that the scope of the Governor’s inherent power to administer appropriations made to the twenty departments of the executive branch of government is quite narrow and is subordinate to the General Assembly’s power to appropriate. This assumption is obvious from the majority’s statement that the Governor’s authority to control how executive appropriations are to be allocated is limited “by the principle that the constitution vests the General Assembly with authority to determine ‘the amount of state funds’ to be spent for particular purposes.” Supra at 519 (emphasis in original). The majority’s assumption, in my opinion, ignores the fact that the Governor’s power to administer and manage the twenty departments of the executive branch of government is part and parcel of his constitutionally assigned role as chief executive officer of the state. Colo. Const, art. IV, § 2; Anderson, 195 Colo, at 442, 579 P.2d at 623-24. Subordination of the Governor’s authority to manage and administer the executive department of government to the General Assembly’s power of appropriation is hardly consistent with the notion of coequal status among the three departments of government. Second, the majority assumes that a budgetary transfer necessarily interferes with the power of appropriation because it distorts the purpose for which the funds were appropriated. While it is true that an appropriation at least implicitly involves a legislative choice of purpose for which the appropriated funds will be used, a budgetary transfer by a coordinate department of government might well be made in a manner that is both consistent with the legislative choice of purpose and the executive power of administration and management. Whether the transfers in question can be so reconciled is a matter that should be determined on the basis of a full evidentiary hearing devoted to that issue. Last, the majority assumes that any transfer between appropriations will necessarily frustrate the legislative purpose established by the original appropriation. This assumption fails to take account of the nature of appropriation as an approximate estimate of the costs of governmental services and, instead, views the sum total of dollars appropriated as the indispensable criterion for achieving the governmental function legally assigned the particular governmental agency. Frustration of legislative purpose is basically a factual question which should not be answered without the benefit of a fully developed factual record. The trial court, not this court, is the proper forum to resolve such a factual matter.
III.
My final comments are directed to the construction of section 24-30-201(l)(b), 10 C.R.S. (1982), set forth in Part III of the court’s opinion. Although the trial court struck down the statute as facially unconstitutional, this court finds the statute constitutional but does so by adopting a construction which I view as inconsistent with *532the constitutional principle of inherent power.
While I do not consider the transfer statutes involved here, §§ 24-30-201(l)(b) and 24-37-405(l)(k), 10 C.R.S. (1982), as the ultimate determinant of the scope of the Governor’s inherent authority to transfer funds within the executive branch of government, I do believe that when these statutes are read in the context of the Administrative Organization Act of 1968 (hereinafter the 1968 Act), §§ 24-1-101 to -136, 10 C.R.S. (1982 & 1984 Supp.), of which the transfer statutes are a part, a strong case can be made for construing the statutes as providing the procedural framework to allow the Governor to make transfers in accordance with his constitutional responsibility for the administration and management of the executive department of government. The 1968 Act establishes twenty departments of government within the executive department itself, § 24-1-110, 10 C.R.S. (1982 & 1984 Supp.), one of which is the Department of Administration, § 24-1-116, 10 C.R.S. (1982 & 1984 Supp.). The statutory duties of the executive director of the Department of Administration include eliminating unnecessary governmental functions, increasing the efficiency of governmental services, and improving services to the public. § 24-30-102(1), 10 C.R.S. (1982). The 1968 Act made the Division of Accounts and Controls a division within the Department of Administration, with the controller as head of the division. § 24-30-201(1), 10 C.R.S. (1982). The powers and duties of the controller are set forth in one of the transfer statutes involved here, namely section 24-30-201(l)(b), 10 C.R.S. (1982), which provides as follows:
The powers and duties of the division [of accounts and controls] and of the controller shall be:
* s£ ⅝ sfc ⅜ ⅝
(b) To recommend transfers between appropriations under the provisions of law, to be effective upon approval by the [G]overnor.
The 1968 Act also established the Office of State Planning and Budgeting. § 24-1-128.1, 10 C.R.S. (1982).1 The executive director of this office was delegated the responsibility of developing “the annual executive planning, programming, and budgeting cycle, consistent with the provisions of this article.” § 24-37-102(l)(a), 10 C.R.S. (1982). The Division of Budgeting was made a part of the Office of State Planning and Budgeting in order to integrate the policy level planning, programming, and budgeting functions of the executive department into a cohesive and unified system responsive to the policy-making requirements of the Governor and the General Assembly. § 24-37-402, 10 C.R.S. (1982). The 1968 Act requires the Division of Budgeting to assist the Governor “in his responsibilities pertaining to the executive budget” and specifically, as pertinent here, to “[r]eview for the [Governor all transfers between appropriations and all work programs recommended by the controller.” § 24-37-405(l)(k), 10 C.R.S. (1982). In recognition of the Governor’s constitutionally assigned function relating to the administration and management of the executive department of government, the 1968 Act expressly states that “[t]he final authority and decision in all matters relating to the executive budget is hereby vested in the [Governor.” § 24-37-406, 10 C.R.S. (1982).
The legislative purpose in enacting the 1968 Act was to create a structure of state government which would “be responsive to the needs of the people of the state and sufficiently flexible to meet changing conditions^] to strengthen the powers of the [G]overnor and [to] provide a reasonable span of administrative and budgetary controls within an orderly organizational struc*533ture of state government_” § 24-1-101, 10 C.R.S. (1982). The General Assembly expressly declared in section 24-1-101, 10 C.R.S. (1982), that the 1968 Act “shall be liberally construed to accomplish these purposes.” Construing the transfer statute in a manner designed to effectuate the purposes of the 1968 Act leads me to conclude that the “under the provisions of law” language in section 24-30-201(l)(b) means in a manner consistent with the Governor’s constitutionally assigned functions of administering and managing the twenty departments of the executive branch of government and in accordance with the procedural protocol for transfers set forth in the 1968 Act.2 In contrast to the majority, therefore, I would not read into section 24-30-201(l)(b) a requirement that there be some independent legislative authorization given to the Governor to effectuate interdepartmental transfers within the executive branch of government.
Although, as the majority notes, a 1941 statute authorized the Governor to make interdepartmental budgetary transfers from a department with a surplus to a department with a deficit, ch. 2, sec. 11, 1941 Colo.Sess.Laws 35, 52, and this statute was repealed in 1963, ch. 32, sec. 3, Colo.Sess.Laws 120, 122, the most plausible explanation of the repeal is that the 1941 statute was unnecessary because the Governor already had such transfer power under the provisions of the former version of section 24 — 30—201(l)(b), which was also originally enacted as part of the Administrative Code of 1941, ch. 2, sec. 12, 1941 Colo.Sess.Laws 35, 54. This latter interpretation is confirmed by legislative efforts in 1979 to amend section 24-30-201(l)(b) in a manner that would limit the controller’s authority to recommend transfers to line-item appropriations within a department, which transfers would then become effec-five only upon written approval by the Governor after written notification to the legislative audit committee and the joint budget committee. Senate Bill 412 (1979). The bill, which passed both houses, was vetoed by the Governor, and the General Assembly failed to override the veto. This history, while certainly not controlling, nonetheless dispels any doubt about the General Assembly’s view of the Governor’s transfer authority under the present version of section 24-30-201(l)(b).
The’ construction adopted by the majority virtually equates the legislative power of appropriation with the executive power of transfer. In effect, the majority recognizes the power to transfer but only when authorized pursuant to independent legislative authorization. If, as the majority holds, section 24-30-201(l)(b) authorizes executive transfers only when there is independent legislative authorization for such transfers, the executive department of government is virtually shorn of any inherent transfer authority incident to the Governor’s constitutionally assigned function of administering and managing the executive department. Under the majority’s construction, the power of transfer becomes a particularized form of legislative appropriation. Within this conceptual framework, I fail to see how the General Assembly could constitutionally delegate any transfer authority to the Governor without concomitantly violating the constitutional prohibition against delegating a legislative function to another department of government. Simply stated, I view the holding in this case as a virtual refutation of executive inherent power and as a relegation of the Governor’s constitutionally assigned functions of administration and management to a subordinate status that is irreconcilable *534with the “separate but equal” principle underlying the separation of powers doctrine.
IV.
In summary, I would reverse that part of the judgment holding the transfers constitutionally impermissible and would remand the case to the district court for a new trial on the issue of whether, under the standards set forth herein, the Governor’s budgetary transfers usurped the General Assembly’s power of appropriation in violation of the separation of powers doctrine enunciated in article III of the Colorado Constitution.

. In 1983, the Office of State Planning and Budgeting ceased to be a separate department and was transferred to the Governor's office. Ch. 273, sec. 16, §§ 24-37-101 to -304, 1983 Colo.Sess.Laws 964. This transfer offset the creation of the Department of Public Safety, thus keeping the total number of departments at no more than twenty, as required by article IV, section 22 of the Colorado Constitution.

. Alternatively, the phrase "under provisions of law" might be read as modifying the word "recommend" in section 24-30-201(l)(b). This construction would only allow the controller to make recommendations after determining, pursuant to his duties defined in other subsections of section 24-30-201, that such transfers would not impair the performance of the transferor department and were necessary to the performance of the transferee department’s functions. Again, this interpretation fully accommodates the Governor's inherent power to administer and manage the executive department of government and effectuates the legislative purpose of the Administrative Organization Act of 1968.