Court Opinion

ID: 9548501
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 18:04:31.01474+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:19:03.490209
License: Public Domain

OPALA, Justice,
with whom LAVENDER, Justice, joins, concurring in judgment.
The object of this original proceeding, brought here by a legislator whose standing to institute it is not challenged, is to invalidate “as null and void” by operation of Art. 5, § 26, Okl.Const.,1 all those acts of the Second Regular Session of the 40th Legislature which were passed by the House of Representatives after that session is claimed to have ended at the stroke of midnight on June 12, 1986. It is not disputed that on the day in question the House of Representatives convened at 9:30 a.m. and continued in session until 10:27 a.m. on June 13, the following calendar day, when the last bill under challenge here was passed. The court assumes its original cognizance over the dispute and denies the writ. Its pronouncement holds that the Legislature “has the power ... to determine for itself ..., subject to the rule of reason” how long it must remain in session on the last day to wind up its business.
*795I
While I- concur in the court’s decision to invoke its original cognizance of the case and to deny the petitioner’s plea for invalidation of the challenged bills, I must categorically recede from that part of its pronouncement which declares that, under the terms of Art. 5, § 26, Okl.Const., either House of our Legislature may conclude its regular session at a point later than the stroke of midnight marking the end of the ninetieth legislative day.
The issue to be resolved is not whether in the course of a session a legislative day may come to be formed from parts of more than a single calendar day. We are not concerned here with the precise date of some bill’s passage. The task before us is rather to decide whether the length of the last day of the session — its ninetieth legislative day — is to stand limited by a precise measure of time or be left to the perceived needs of each House. The court opts for the latter approach, while I am firmly of the view that our fundamental law has provided us, in Art. 5, § 26, with a textually demonstrable intent to effect every regular session’s conclusion at a fixed point in time — the end of the ninetieth legislative day. Only the day the session is to commence may be changed by the Legislature. The framers’ intent — plainly apparent from the text of § 26 — was thus to permit statutory regulation of the annual session’s beginning but not of its ending day. What so clearly stands beyond the reach of legislation may not be invaded by a parliamentary ruling in either House.
No day, calendar or legislative,2 may be regarded as utterly open-ended or extending beyond twenty-four hours. Since the Legislature has no power to call itself into session on the ninety-first legislative day, it follows that neither of its Houses may indirectly do that which may not be done directly — i.e. continue in session beyond the end of the ninetieth day.3 Inasmuch as the Constitution does not define a legislative day’s length in terms different from the 24-hour boundary of a calendar day and the Legislature, by consistent and unbroken practice since the 1966 adoption of Art. 5, § 26, has treated every legislative day to be coextensive with a calendar day, I would declare the end of each regular session to be effected by force of our fundamental law at the stroke of midnight marking the conclusion of the 90th legislative day.
II
Although I would declare the challenged bills to have been passed after the end of the regular session, the offending legislation need not be invalidated. Constitutional pronouncements which operate to disrupt the effective functioning of day-to-day government activities are frequently given prospective application to avoid needless hardship and expenditures of public funds. While I would accede to the petitioner’s view that the session ended at midnight marking the conclusion of the last legislative day, I would decline to issue the writ that would render the challenged acts unenforceable or inefficacious.4

. The terms of Art. 5, § 26, Okl.Const., provide as follows:
"The Legislature shall meet in regular session at the seat of government on the first Tuesday after the first Monday in January of each year, beginning at twelve o’clock noon, or upon such other day as may be provided by law. Each regular session of the Legislature shall be limited to ninety legislative days." [Emphasis supplied.]

. A legislative day is one during any portion of which the legislature is in session. Shaw v. Carter, 148 Okl. 57, 297 P. 273 [1931]. The legislature is not required to sit on consecutive work days, but neither House may, during the session, adjourn for more than three days without the consent of the other. Art. 5, § 30, Okl. Const.

. Simpson v. Hill, 128 Okl. 269, 263 P. 635, 56 A.L.R. 706 [1927].

. Kramer v. Union Free School District, 395 U.S. 621, 89 S.Ct. 1886, 23 L.Ed.2d 583 [1969]; Cipriano v. City of Houma, 395 U.S. 701, 89 S.Ct. 1897, 23 L.Ed.2d 647 [1969] and City of Phoenix, Arizona v. Kolodziejski, 399 U.S. 204, 90 S.Ct. 1990, 26 L.Ed.2d 523 [1970]. See also. Great Northern Railway Co. v. Sunburst Oil & Refining Co., 287 U.S. 358, 53 S.Ct. 145, 77 L.Ed. 360 [1932].