Court Opinion

ID: 9718545
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 07:27:01.318332+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:24:00.318106
License: Public Domain

*749RICHARD B. TEITELMAN, Judge,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent. For well more than 100 years, and continuing to this day, the Missouri Constitution, without exception, has classified compensation and pensions as separate items. It is the Missouri Constitution, not the division of marital property in a dissolution action or various generic definitions and synonyms, that provides the context for understanding the meaning of the phrase “compensation of county officers” as used in article VI, section 11. This context, as well as the plain language of article VI, section 13, demonstrates that the phrase “compensation of county officers” does not refer to pension contributions or benefits.
Article VI, section 11 does not define the term “compensation of county officers.” The word “compensation” means “payment for value received or services rendered.” Webster’s Third New International Dictionary (1993). Neither this definition, nor the similar dictionary definitions of compensation and its synonyms cited by the principal opinion, specifically include an employer’s pension contributions as part of compensation. As the principal opinion states, therefore, reference to context is important to the interpretation of uncertain constitutional language. A contextual analysis will reach the correct result only if the reference point is the context in which the uncertain term is used. Reference to an inapposite context will result in an incorrect interpretation. It is for this reason that the cases counsel courts to interpret ambiguous terms in harmony with related provisions.
The principal opinion begins its contextual analysis by citing a number of dissolution cases for the proposition that pension benefits are a form of deferred compensation and, therefore, are included within the meaning of “compensation” under article VI, section 11. In a dissolution case, the issue is whether an asset is considered marital property, not whether that property is classified as compensation, savings, a pension benefit or any other particular kind of asset. Section 452.330. The dissolution statutes governing the classification and distribution of marital property are irrelevant to the meaning of “compensation” under article VI, section 11 of the Missouri Constitution. The relevant context is the Missouri Constitution.
The principal opinion undertakes a contextual analysis but does not analyze related constitutional provisions or account for the fact that the Missouri Constitution never has equated compensation and pensions. Instead, the principal opinion maintains that the context of the passage of article VI, section 11 leads to no other conclusion than that the phrase “compensation of county officers” includes pension benefits. There are three significant problems with this analysis.
First, the principal opinion places article VI, section 11 in context by noting that the amendment was intended to overrule Boone County v. State, 631 S.W.2d 321, 326 (Mo. banc 1982), which held that a statute requiring a salary increase violated the Hancock Amendment. If the meaning of article VI, section 11 is to be derived from its context, then the context should be defined by the specific facts and holding of Boone County. The facts of Boone County involved a salary increase, and the holding was that the salary increase violated the Hancock Amendment. Accordingly, to the extent that article VI, section 11 was intended to overrule Boone County, the contextual interpretation of the phrase “compensation of county officers” supports nothing more than the conclusion that it refers to salary. Nothing in the context of the passage of article VI, section 11 indicates that it was intended to blur the long*750standing constitutional distinction between compensation and pensions.
Second, the principal opinion asserts that the legislature interpreted article VI, section 11 as the constitutional authorization for enacting the PACARS statutes without violating the Hancock Amendment. The enactment of the statutes creating the PACARS fund was simply an exercise of legislative prerogative specifically authorized by article VI, section 25. Moreover, when the PACARS system was established in 1989, three years after the adoption of article VI, section 11, the state provided reimbursement to counties. As the principal opinion acknowledges, it was not until 1995 that the PACARS statutes were amended to require counties to contribute to the fund without state reimbursement. All this history indicates is that, in 1989, the legislature concluded that the amendment to article VI, section 11 was not applicable because pensions were not compensation. Subsequently, in 1995, the legislature may have reached the opposite conclusion. Ultimately, however, this legislative history is irrelevant for the simple fact that it is the courts, not the legislature, that interprets the constitution. The enactment of an unconstitutional statute does not serve as a basis for arguing that a statute is constitutional.
Finally, the principal opinion does not account for the fact that at no point, past or present, has the Missouri Constitution equated pensions and compensation. Both history and the current structure of the Missouri Constitution establish this fact. In State ex rel. Heaven v. Ziegenhein, 144 Mo. 283, 45 S.W. 1099 (1898), a retired police officer sought to enforce his statutory right to pension benefits. At the time, the state constitution provided that “the general assembly shall have no power to authorize any county, city, town or township or other political subdivision of the state now existing, or that may hereafter be established, to grant public money in aid of or to any individual, association or corporation whatsoever.” Id. at 1099-1100. The retired officer argued that the pension payments were not a grant of public money in aid of individuals but, instead, were part of his compensation for police work. The court rejected this argument because the pension was not compensation:
The act, however, is in all essential features simply a “pension law,” and is properly so called. It cannot be treated merely as providing compensation for services rendered before retirement, and as part of the salary therefore. A salary, payable from time to time during active service, is received by each police officer, and the amount is fixed according to rank. The man who serves 20 years is entitled to no less during that period than he whose tenure is shorter. The policeman who remains on the force for 20 years less 5 days, and the one who retains his office for the full term, are paid during active service precisely the same sum, if they are of like rank. This must be deemed proper compensation for the time actually devoted to the public service. Nothing is withheld from the person who may serve 20 years, to be paid to him after he may be placed upon the “retired list”; and, after such retirement, he is no longer subject to police duty, and cannot be earning a salary.
The Ziegenhein case illustrates the longstanding distinction between “compensation” and pension benefits in the Missouri Constitution.
The principal opinion acknowledges Ziegenhein but asserts that State ex rel. Emmons v. Farmer, 196 S.W. 1106 (Mo. banc 1917), broadens the meaning of the term “compensation” to an all-encompassing term for “salary, fees, pay, remunera*751tions for official services performed, in whatever form or manner or at whatsoever periods the same may be paid.” Id. at 1108. The issue in Emmons was whether paying court clerks by salary rather than by fee constituted a change in the method of compensation under a constitutional provision that barred an increase in the “compensation or fee” of a county officer during the term of office. In light of the specific issue presented, the holding of Emmons is simply that the term “compensation” includes both a salary and a fee. Id. The treatment of pensions under the Missouri Constitution was not and could not have been at issue in Emmons because there was no constitutional authorization for pensions until 1966, nearly 50 years after Emmons was decided. As such, the holding in Emmons — that “compensation” includes both a salary and a fee — has no bearing on the issue in this ease.
The consistent distinction between pensions and compensation, expressly recognized in Ziegenhein, was carried forward with the adoption of the 1945 Missouri Constitution and subsequent amendments.1 As illustrated in Ziegenhein, the constitution long has provided various limitations on public employee compensation. Notably absent, however, was any constitutional authorization of statutes providing for public employee pensions. It was not until 1966, with the passage of article VI, section 25, that the Missouri Constitution authorized statutes providing pension benefits to local government employees. Kansas City v. Brouse, 468 S.W.2d 15, 16 (Mo. banc 1971).2 If public employee pensions were a just another form of compensation, there would have been no need for the specific authorization of pensions in article VI, section 25. Courts presume every word, clause, sentence and provision of a statute has effect. Civil Serv. Com’n of City of St. Louis v. Members of Bd. Of Aldermen of City of St. Louis, 92 S.W.3d 785, 788 (Mo. banc 2003). The same presumption applies to the state constitution. The specific constitutional authorization of local government pension statutes was not superfluous. Article VI, section 25 was required because the term “compensation” as used in the Missouri Constitution does not include public employee pensions. The principal opinion relegates article VI, section 25, from the status of a substantive amendment to an exercise in redundancy. There is no persuasive reason to do so.
The principal opinion also misinterprets article VI, section 13, which directly addresses the issue and provides as follows:
All state and county officers, except constables and justices of the peace, charged with the investigation, arrest, prosecution, custody, care, feeding, commitment, or transportation of persons accused of or convicted of a criminal *752offense shall be compensated for their official services only by salaries, and any fees and charges collected by any such officers in such cases shall be paid into the general revenue fund entitled to receive the same, as provided by law. Any fees earned by any such officers in civil matters may be retained by them as provided by law. (Emphasis added).
Section 13 plainly provides that salary is the exclusive means of “compensation for county officers involved in the prosecution of criminal offenses.” Prosecutors are county officers responsible for the prosecution of criminal offenses. The plain, unequivocal language of article VI, section 13 establishes that a prosecutor’s compensation does not include pension contributions made on his or her behalf. The principal opinion dismisses article VI, section 13, on the grounds that it was intended to prohibit the older practice of a county officer being paid by fee. The end goal of article VI, section 13, very likely is to curtail the retention of fees for personal use. However, the means for realizing this end is the unequivocal statement that prosecutors shall be compensated “only by salaries.” The language could not be clearer. Applying the plain language of article VI, section 13, as it is written is wholly consistent with the long-standing distinction between compensation and pensions.3 It would create needless conflict between section 11 and section 13 to hold that term “compensation of county officers” as used in section 11 includes pension payments when section 13 provides that the compensation of county officers involved in criminal matters is limited to salary. Consistency demands that the phrase “compensation of county of county officers” is held to refer to remuneration for official services, excluding pensions. The net result of such consistency is nothing more than prohibiting the state from forcing an unfunded mandate on local governments in violation of the Hancock Amendment.
I would hold that the phrase “compensation of county officers” as used in article VI, section 11 does not include the PA-CARS contributions required by section 56.807. Consequently, article VI, section 11 does not exempt PACARS contributions from the Hancock Amendment. While I would affirm the judgment, I also concur in the spirit of Judge Wolffs concurring opinion.

. Of the more than two dozen constitutional provisions relating to compensation, none equates pensions with compensation. To the contrary, several provisions expressly limit "compensation” to salary and expense reimbursement. For instance, Article VI, section 12 provides that "[a]U public officers in the city of St. Louis and all state and county officers in counties having 100,000 or more inhabitants, excepting public administrators and notaries public, shall be compensated for their services by salary only.” Article VI, section 13 provides that "[a]ll state and county officers ... charged with the ... prosecution ... of persons accused of or convicted of a criminal offense shall be compensated for their official services only by salaries ...” Article XIII, section 3.1 provides that state elected officials and judges shall receive compensation through "the salary rate established by law, mileage allowances, [and] per diem expense allowances." Each of these provisions excludes pension benefits from the state constitutional concept of "compensation.”

. In pertinent part, article VI, section 25 provides “that the general assembly may authorize any county, city, or other political subdivision to provide for the retirement or pensioning of its officers and employees...."

. In footnote 7, the principal opinion indicates that applying article VI, section 13 as it is written means that a county officer could not receive a pension as elsewhere authorized. This illustrates the inconsistency of the approach adopted by the principal opinion, for this concern does not arise if, consistent with every compensation and pension-related provision of the constitution, pensions are considered separate from compensation. Under this approach, there is no conflict because compensation does not include the pension benefits expressly authorized in article VI, section 25 and elsewhere.