Court Opinion

ID: 9630066
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 09:59:08.914935+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:32:40.686278
License: Public Domain

ROSSMAN, J.,
dissenting.
The prayer of the complaint follows:
“Plaintiffs pray that the court declare the rights, status and other legal relations of plaintiffs and defendants under Oregon Constitution, Article XI, Section 11, with respect to the amount of taxes which plaintiff district is empowered to levy for the fiscal year 1955-1956, and that it be declared and decreed that the tax base of plaintiff district for the fiscal year 1955-1956 and the amount of taxes which may be levied by and on behalf of plaintiff district for said fiscal year for the maintenance and operation of the district’s school system without further authorization from the electorate of said district is the sum of $12,704,644.”
Oregon Constitution, Art. XI, § 11, and the tax base election which was held May 21, 1954, render valid, in my opinion, the contemplated levy of $12,704,644 for the fiscal year 1955-1956. That is my answer to the question submitted by the complaint and its prayer.
Although the single issue suggested by the above-quoted prayer inaugurated this lawsuit, it now develops, as often happens in the course of litigation, that the battle lines have spread out and new dissensions have appeared upon the field of action. In that way there entered this ease the question as to whether a tax base established by a vote of the people, acting under the provisions of Oregon Constitution, Art. XI, § 11 (1) (b), is static in amount or whether it increases if it develops that a levy made under it, plus six per cent thereof, is greater in amount than the voter-established tax base.
*614This is a suit for declaratory relief, and, although the issue just stated is not submitted by the pleadings, it is our duty to resolve it. But in making answer we must bear in mind that Art. XI, § 11, is a part of Oregon’s Constitution. Therefore, this suit does not call upon us to state the effect of a norm, transient in nature, like a statute or municipal ordinance, but of a constitutional provision. Legislative enactments may readily be repealed or amended, but constitutional provisions generally remain unaltered for long periods of time. They govern matters fundamental in character and are adopted only after the people have debated their merits in protracted discussion. Since constitutional provisions yield law basic in character, those who draft them select their words deliberately and bestow painstaking care upon the important task of writing the measure. The manner in which the provision under analysis was written, as I shall presently show, illustrates the truth of the statement just made. Therefore, in construing Art. XI, § 11, we must give heed not only to the fact that its meaning is important to the taxing units, but we must bear in mind that we are called upon to construe a provision of our Constitution. If we interpret it as though it is of transitory nature only, the precedent we today establish may cause constitutional law to suffer from our work.
The part of Art. XI, § 11, which governs the issue under analysis was adopted by the people in the general election which was held November 4, 1952, as an amendment to that provision of our Constitution. I indicated that the amendment was carefully drafted. Senate and House Journal, 1951, warrants the statement just made. According to the entries of the Journal, the measure was presented by a member of the House and two members of the Senate. The member of the House is an Oregon newspaper publisher whose *615writings have been widely quoted; the two members of the Senate have served in the latter for several sessions and have often made valuable contributions to our tax laws. After the measure was introduced in the House, it was referred to that body’s committee on taxation. The Journal indicates that the committee just mentioned recommended the passage of the bill, subject to some amendments which the committee proposed. The amendments were made and thereupon the committee’s recommendation was adopted. After the measure made its way to the other house, it was referred to the Senate’s committee on taxation. That committee sponsored several amendments, one of which rephrased the very part of the constitutional provision with which this suit is concerned. After the Senate had voted in favor of the amendments it then adopted the measure. Subsequently the House concurred in the Senate’s action. Still later the bill was signed by the Speaker of the House and the President of the Senate. Accordingly, the statement is warranted that this measure was written with deliberation and care. The action which I have so far mentioned was taken in the early part of 1951. The measure was submitted to the people at the general election November 4, 1952. Thus, ample time elapsed between the drafting of the measure and its submission to the people so that all could study it.
Anyone who reads Oregon Constitution, Art. XI, § 11, will have no trouble in arriving at a conclusion upon the issue stated in the second paragraph of this opinion. The part of Art. XI, § 11, bearing upon the issue is clear and incapable of misunderstanding. I will demonstrate the statement just made by quoting the pertinent part of Art. XI, § 11. In order to focus attention upon the words which are controlling, I shall omit, in making my quotation, all words which are *616irrelevant to the issue awaiting answer. Stripped of immaterial words, the part reads:
“* # * no taxing unit * * * shall in any year so exercise that power as to raise a greater amount of revenue, * # * than its tax base as hereinafter defined. The tax base * * * shall be: * * * (b) an amount approved by a majority of the legal voters voting upon the question of establishing a tax base.”
Thus, when a taxing unit submits to the voters the question as to how much its tax base shall be, it is the voters who determine the amount. They fix the maximum. The amount in favor of which they cast their ballots is the greatest amount of tax which the tax levying officials can require the taxpayers to pay. The language just quoted is incapable of misunderstanding. It is as clear as the meaning of statutes which we frequently encounter, and which run something like this: No judge shall ever impose a sentence greater than the limits herein fixed. If anyone entertains any doubt upon the subject, his doubts will be quickly dispelled when he observes that the words “an amount approved by a majority of the legal voters voting upon the question of establishing a tax base” are not followed or augmented by any phrase such as “plus six pereentum of said total amount” which accompanies and forms a part of alternative (a). The conclusion is inescapable that when a taxing unit chooses alternative (b) it rejects alternative (a), including the phrase “plus six pereentum of said total amount”. I am satisfied that the meaning of Art. XI, § 11, is clear, unambiguous and self-evident. Doubt cannot be imported into it through attempts to infuse into it the contents of the voters ’ pamphlet of the issue of 1952. It is our duty to construe Art. XI, § 11, and not the voters’ pamphlet.
*617Before going on, it may be well, in behalf of clarity, to return to the year 1916. In 1916 the people of Oregon, in response apparently to Chief Justice Marshall’s axiom, “The power to tax is the power to destroy”, adopted the original version of Art. XI, § 11. The essence of that early effort to reserve to the people control over the size of their taxes was this: the current levy plus six per cent thereof established the limit of the next levy, unless the people who lived in the taxing unit by ballot expressly authorized an additional levy. Such was the fiat of the people when they, in 1916, adopted Art. XI, § 11. In 1932 the people amended Art. XI, § 11, by providing that the next levy could be in the amount of the highest levy which had been made in the last triennium, plus six per cent thereof. Obviously, the purpose of the amendment was to enable the public officials to be economical without losing thereby an adequate tax base. In the provisions so far mentioned the term “tax base” did not appear, but in popular discussion of this unique constitutional provision the levy, which, together with six per cent thereof, marked the meridian of the next levy, was spoken of as the tax base. It will be noticed that the effective limitation upon the size of the next levy is not the six per cent clause, but the amount of the current levy. The latter is 94 per cent of the control which Art. XI, § 11, places upon succeeding levies. The six per cent feature is purely minor. Yet, since the terminology “plus six per centum of said total” lent itself readily to appellation purposes, Art. XI, § 11, became known as the six per cent provision. "When one reads statements quoted from the voters’ pamphlet which appear in the briefs and which speak of “six per cent limitation”, it is well to bear in mind that the words just quoted refer to Art. XI, § 11, in its entirety; they employ the term “six per cent limita*618tion” as synonymous with Art. XI, § 11. The articles themselves make that clear; one of them says: “The amendment to the Oregon Constitution known as the six per cent limitation was passed in * * *.” The reference could just as well have been to Art. XI, § 11, but the constitutional provision under analysis never was known by that cumbersome title. Common parlance, in using the appellation “six per cent limitation” did not refer only to the six per cent clause, but to the fact that Art. XI, § 11, subjected levies to the control of the people. The clause of Art. XI, § 11, which restricted the next levy to the amount of the current one (apart from a permissible six per cent increase) was the phase of Art. XI, § 11, which put the real bite upon the taxing unit. It was that feature which endeared Art. XI, § 11, to the tax-conscious voter. Accordingly, I repeat that sentences in the voters’ pamphlet, such as “This measure would permit a new tax base to be voted, after which the six per cent limitation would apply”, were intended to assure the voter that the protective provisions of popular Art. XI, § 11, would remain unimpaired if he voted for the amendment.
We come now to the amendment to Art. XI, § 11, which was made by popular vote November 4, 1952. Until the amendment was made, a tax base could be established in one way only. I have described that way. Under it the highest levy in the triennium, plus six per cent thereof, established the tax base for the next levy. We are told that recent rapid increase in population and inflated costs of performing governmental service rendered inadequate in many taxing units an annual increase in levies of only six per cent. Some taxing units, according to counsel, were compelled year by year to go to the voters and ask for special levies supplementary to those which were authorized by Art.. *619XI, § 11. Those were the conditions which prevailed when the amendment to Art. XI, § 11, was submitted to the voters November 4, 1952. The amendment afforded taxing units an alternative to the triennium method for establishing a tax base. Its essence was that the voters could disregard the existing tax base and vote a new one. The old method, which had been in use for 36 years, was retained when the 1952 amendment was made and was identified in amended Art. XI, §11, as alternative (a). The amendment couched the new alternative in these words: “Or (b) an amount approved by a majority of the legal voters voting upon the question of establishing a tax base.” Alternative (a) [the old method] concluded with these words: “plus six per centum of said total amount”. Neither that clause nor any corresponding provision was employed in the writing of alternative (b). Thus, after the voters had cast their ballots in favor of the amendment which incorporated in Art. XI, § 11, alternative (b), all taxing units were afforded a choice between two methods of establishing a tax base. A unit could remain under the method which it had followed for 36 years and thereby have a tax base capable of expansion at the rate of six per cent annually, or it could ask the voters to establish for it a larger and “more realistic” [quoting one of the briefs] tax base. But alternative (b) made no provision for the tax base established under it to enlarge.
The method whereby taxing units were afforded alternative means of establishing tax bases is couched in Art. XI, § 11, in this form:
“* * * The tax base of each said taxing unit for any given year shall be: (a) The total amount of tax lawfully levied by it in any one of the three years immediately preceding for purposes other than the payment of bonded indebtedness or the interest thereon and exclusive of any levy specifi*620eally authorized as aforesaid in excess of the tax base, plus six percentum of said total amount; or, (b) an amount approved by a majority of the legal voters voting upon the question of establishing a tax base.”
I repeat the statement previously made: neither the clause “plus six percentum of said total amount” or any variation thereof was included in alternative (b).
When the draftsmen of the amendment to Art. XI, § 11, wrote the amendment there lay before their eyes in plain view the clause, “plus six percentum of said total amount”. It formed a part of alternative (a). Those words could not have escaped the attention of the amendment’s draftsmen, for the latter appended alternative (b) immediately following the words “plus six per centum of said total amount”. Hence, they must have had those words in mind. The inference is unavoidable that the draftsmen intentionally rejected the clause. Likewise, the taxation committees of both the House and the Senate, as well as both of the houses, concurred in the rejection of that clause. The rejection, obviously, is significant. Had the clause also been omitted from alternative (a), a tax base under that method [that is, the highest levy in the triennium] could not increase year by year; it would be static. Since the use of the clause was essential to enable the tax base created by the triennial method to expand, it is impossible to know how a voter-approved tax base, from which the clause “plus six percentum of said total amount” was intentionally omitted, can enlarge. Certainly this court cannot write into the amendment the provision which the draftsmen omitted and in behalf of which no voter has ever been afforded an opportunity to cast a ballot. The revision of constitutional provisions is not one of the duties which have been entrusted to this court by the Constitution.
*621It is argued, however, that a levy made under a voter-approved tax base can be included in the triennial tax base and that after it has been so included its amount expands six per cent annually under alternative (a). An irrefutable answer to that argument is the fact that (a) and (b) are alternatives. When one is chosen, the other is rejected. When a taxing unit selects the manner in which its tax base is to be established, it must select either alternative (a) or alternative (b). It cannot pick both nor can it take parts of both. It is like asking an individual whether he wishes coffee or tea. If he makes coffee his selection, he does not expect to receive a full cup of coffee plus some of the choicer ingredients of tea. When alternative (b) is selected—and bear in mind that the selection is made by the voters—Art. XI, § 11, declares that the taxing unit shall not in any subsequent year “raise a greater amount of revenue than its tax base”; that is, greater than the amount fixed by the voters. Of course, if the voters later rescind the action previously taken whereby they established the tax base, the levies previously made under it could be deemed levies of the ldnd to which alternative (a) is applicable. But that would be true only because the taxing unit had rescinded and was no longer restricted by the voter-established tax base.
It must be plain that Art. XI, § 11, is free from ambiguity. When the meaning of any writing is reasonably clear and certain, no court is at liberty to resort to the rules of construction. A court, confronted with a writing which is nonambiguous, must give to the paper its normal effect. An effort is made, however, in this case to find ambiguity in Art. XI, § 11, by resort to the articles which appeared in the voters’ pamphlet. In fact, those who wish to construe Art. XI, § 11, appear to center their attention upon the voters’ *622pamphlet and wish to interpret it rather than bother themselves with the carefully chosen words of Art. XI, § 11. As we have seen, allusions in the voters’ pamphlet to the “six per cent limitation” referred in the main to nothing more than the popular appellation of Art. XI, § 11. They assured the voters that if they cast their ballots for the proposed amendment, the protective features of Art. XI, § 11, which for 36 years had gratified the taxpayers, would remain in effect. It is our duty to construe Art. XI, § 11.
However, it is argued that Art. XI, § 11, was adopted so that taxing units which found it impossible to function within a tax base fixed by the highest levy of the triennium, plus six per cent thereof, would not have to ask the voters to grant them special levies. Art. XI, § 11, does not proclaim the purpose just mentioned. Those who urge us to rewrite Art. XI, § 11, however, vouch for that professed purpose. In passing, let us remind ourselves that even minor documents which govern small matters are protected by this court against corresponding attacks. In repelling such attacks, we cite in cases of that kind the Parol Evidence Rule and other rules which deem the writing as the sole source of its meaning. But let us nevertheless consider the argument just mentioned. From their springboard that Art. XI, § 11, was intended to obviate the necessity for special levies, those who advance the argument under consideration leap to the conclusion that a voter-established tax base expands six per cent annually. Let us see whether or not the supposition in which they engage supports the views which they proclaim. The school district’s most recent levy was $11,-190,000. If we assume that the levy of $11,190,000, plus six per cent thereof, established the tax base for the next levy, then we have a tax base of $11,861,400, constituting the maximum levy which can be made for *623the fiscal year 1955-1956. But official action taken by the directors of the school district makes it a matter of record that the school district’s need for 1955-1956 is a levy of $12,704,644. Accordingly, the school district will be compelled to ask its voters for a special levy in the sum of about $850,000. Thus, the contention that a voter-approved tax base was intended to eliminate the need for special levies fails. The argument, if carried to its logical conclusion, would require us, not only to write into Art. XI, § 11, the clause which its draftsmen rejected, but also to substitute in the rejected clause 12 per cent for six per cent. By holding that a tax base established under alternative (b) may be prospective in its scope, the school district may levy a tax for 1955-1956 in the sum of $12,704,644 without going to the voters for a special levy.
A ruling that a voter-approved tax base cannot be prospective in nature, but must be limited to the amount of the next levy, would leave the school district in a crippled predicament. If the voters who reside in a taxing unit cannot adopt a tax base prospective in nature, then the election which gave the plaintiff school district a tax base of $12,704,644 was an unlawful one. If it was an unlawful one, that is, if Art. XI, § 11, does not authorize taxing units to hold elections for the purpose of adopting tax bases prospective in nature, then the levy of $11,190,000, which was made shortly after the voters had cast their ballots, was also unlawful. Clearly, that levy cannot be sustained by the previous tax base of the school district, for the amount of the latter was only $7,419,476. Alternative (a) of Art. XI, § 11, in making provision for the triennial method of fixing tax bases, says, “the total amount of tax lawfully levied # * Accordingly, we see that if the tax base established by the voters cannot be prospective in nature, the levy of $11,190,000, which *624was the last that the district made, cannot under any circumstances affect the levy for 1955-1956. Therefore, the next levy which the school district can lawfully make will be only $7,419,476.
Since the above was written, one member of the court claims that he has found an ambiguity; he claims that it lurks in the word “apply” which appears in subsection 2 of Art. XI, § 11. It is apparent, however, that the word “apply” is used in subsection 2 in order to render certain the time when a voter-established tax base becomes effective. It is intimated that provision for that purpose was unnecessary in the constitutional provision. I do not concur in that view. "Words which achieve clarity in meaning are not unnecessary. It is impossible to understand how an ambiguity in the word “apply” (assuming that one there exists) can have any bearing upon any issue submitted by the petition for a rehearing. Moreover, before we attribute to the authors of the amendment of Art. XI, § 11, a purpose to use the word “apply” as the means of rendering a voter-adopted tax subject to expansion, we must believe that the responsible men who wrote the amendment wished to achieve their purpose in a most novel, devious and bizarre manner. They could readily have added to alternative (b) a clause similar to that which forms a part of alternative (a), but if we think that they seized upon the word “apply” as the medium for accomplishing their purpose, we must hold that they preferred legerdemain to direct open dealing. Finally, if a provision of our Constitution can be revised by this court through the process of saying that the word “apply” is ambiguous, then constitutions, federal and state, which are lauded on Constitution Day as the palladiums of our liberties, are in reality nothing but jumbles of words.
For the foregoing reasons, I am convinced that Art. *625XI, § 11, is free from ambiguity. Its meaning is clear and certain. A voter-established tax base does not expand at the rate of six per cent per annum. It may be prospective in nature. I believe that our original opinion was free from error. Such being its nature, we should not retreat from it, but affirm it.