Court Opinion

ID: 9631734
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 10:47:54.082147+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:08:00.141929
License: Public Domain

ELLETT, Justice
(concurring in the result).
I concur in the holding that Chapter 138, Laws of Utah 1969, is not unconstitutional. *115' Our duty is to hold an ■ act of the legislature valid if it is possible so to do.1
The legislature might enact an unconstitutional statute and the same not be challenged for many years. However, it is for the court to interpret the meaning of a constitutional provision as it applies to a legislative enactment when and only when it is presented for determination. The same decision should be made whether the question is raised early or late.
To ascribe a meaning to a provision 'of the Constitution based upon long acquiescence rather than on its plain language is to amend' it in an unconstitutional manner.
I, therefore, do not concur in the last paragraph of the prevailing opinion insofar as it bases the constitutionality of the statute on long acquiescence. I prefer to limit the holding to say that insofar as the statute in question transfers to the State Board of Higher Education all of the powers heretofore vested by statute in the Boards of Regents of the various schools of higher education, it is constitutional. .The authority of the various Boards of Regents was given by statute and, of course, that authority can by statute be taken away from them and given to another board, without conflicting with any constitutional provision.
The State Board of Education as set up by Article X, Sections 2 and 8, is still vested with the general control and supervision of the public school system. When and if a conflict of authority arises between the two boards, we will decide it, but we do not now need to decide matters which may never arise.

. Trade Commission v. Skaggs Drug Centers, Inc., 21 Utah 2d 431, 446 P.2d 958 (1968) ; Gubler v. Utah State Teachers’ Retirement Board, 113 Utah 188, 192 P.2d 580 (1948).