Court Opinion

ID: 9694325
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 17:37:28.113405+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:19:59.502384
License: Public Domain

NEWMAN, Justice,
dissenting.
While the majority acknowledges that laches cannot bar a “substantive” constitutional challenge to a statute, it concludes that laches may apply to a “procedural” constitutional challenge like the one at bar. Because I reject the majority’s distinction between “substantive” and “procedural” constitutional provisions in this context, I respectfully dissent.
Appellants allege that Act 12 was enacted in violation of Sections 1, 2, and 4 of Article III of the Pennsylvania Constitution. These sections provide, respectively, that “[n]o law shall be passed except by bill, and no bill shall be so altered or amended, on its passage through the House, as to change its original purpose;” “[n]o bill shall be considered unless referred to a committee, printed for the use of the members and returned therefrom;” and “[e]very bill shall be considered on three different days in each House.... ” In dismissing these claims as mere “procedural” challenges, the majority disregards the fundamental principles of democratic government that these sections embody.
A leading commentator has noted that:
The Pennsylvania Constitution of 1874 ... was drafted in an atmosphere of extreme distrust of the legislative body and of fear of the growing power of corporations, especially the great railroad corporations. It was the product of a convention whose prevailing mood was one of reform ... and, overshadowing all else, reform of legislation to eliminate the *137evil practices that had crept into the legislative process. Legislative reform was truly the dominant motif of the convention and that purpose is woven into the very fabric of the constitution.
R. Beanning, Pennsylvania Constitutional Development 56 (1960). See also Robert F. Williams, State Constitutional Limits on Legislative Procedure: Legislative Compliance and Judicial Enforcement, 48 U. Pitt. L.Rev. 797, 810-11 (1987) (“Legislative abuses led to the specific limitations on legislative procedure inserted into the Pennsylvania Constitution of 1874.”); David B. Snyder, The Rise and Fall of the Enrolled Bill Doctrine in Pennsylvania, 60 Temp. L.Q. 315, 321 (1987) (“In 1874, Pennsylvania adopted what has been referred to as the ‘Reform Constitution.’ This constitution included a variety of new safeguards aimed at eliminating corruption in the legislative process. These constitutional provisions delineated specific procedures for the enactment of bills, and were designed to prevent legislative abuse.”)
This Court, as well, has recognized that, “Article III was adopted to correct the evil of unwise, improvident and corrupt legislation which had become rampant at the time of its passage.... Section 1 of Article III, as well as the other provisions adopted in 1874 to prevent legislative corruption, have served well in achieving that objective.” Consumer Party of Pennsylvania v. Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, 510 Pa. 158, 178, 507 A.2d 323, 333 (1986). See also Perkins v. City of Philadelphia, 156 Pa. 554, 565, 27 A. 356, 360 (1893) (“It is certainly not forgotten that the well-nigh unanimous demand which brought the convention of 1873 into existence was prompted by the evils springing from local and special legislation. That convention ... framed this article 3 on legislation.... [T]hey set about embodying in that law prohibitions which should in the future effectually prevent the evils the people complained of.”) While the provisions of Article III are “procedural” in form, they nevertheless constitute the essential checks on legislative power that are the heart of the Constitution of 1874. Thus, contrary to the majority’s implica*138tion, they are of no less consequence than the “substantive” constitutional provisions to which laches may never apply.
One of the judiciary’s paramount responsibilities is “to insure that government functions within the bounds of constitutional prescription.” Consumer Party of Pennsylvania, 510 Pa. at 177, 507 A.2d at 333. “While it is appropriate to give due deference to a co-equal branch of government as long as it is functioning within constitutional constraints, it would be a serious dereliction of duty on our part to deliberately ignore a clear constitutional violation.” Id. at 178, 507 A.2d at 333. In holding that courts may dispose of constitutional challenges on grounds of laches, and thereby avoid considering their merits, this Court has created law that will allow courts to abdicate their duty. The result, as this Court warned in Wilson v. School District of Philadelphia, 328 Pa. 225, 195 A. 90 (1937), may be that future legislative abuses will go unchecked:
We have not been able to discover any case which holds that laches will bar an attack upon the constitutionality of a statute as to its future operation, especially where the legislation involves a fundamental question going to the very roots of our representative form of government and concerning one of its highest prerogatives. To so hold would establish a dangerous precedent, the evil effect of which might reach far beyond present expectations.
Wilson, 328 Pa. at 242, 195 A. at 99 (emphasis added).
Furthermore, the fact that an alleged constitutional violation is raised many years after the enactment of the statute is of no moment. As this Court held in Kucher v. Sunlight Oil & Gasoline Co., 230 Pa. 528, 533, 79 A. 747, 749 (1911):
While a court should hesitate to declare a statute unconstitutional until clearly satisfied of its invalidity, and where it has been on the statute books for many years the hesitation should be all the greater, yet, if such an act is plainly in conflict with the organic law of the state, old age cannot give it life, and, when the issue of its constitutionality is properly raised, it must be declared void. We have never ruled to the contrary.
*139See also Water & Power Resources Board, Department of Forests and Waters v. Green Springs Company, Inc., 394 Pa. 1, 6, 145 A.2d 178, 181 (1958) (“[T]he fact that [a] statute has remained on the statute books unassailed for many years does not in itself justify a court in reaching an interpretation favorable to its validity for ‘old age cannot give it life.’ ”); Page v. Carr, 232 Pa. 371, 377, 81 A. 430, 432 (1911) (“If a statute is plainly in conflict with the organic law, mere lapse of time cannot cure the defect.”) In short, “this [C]ourt must perform its duty, in spite of the delay.” Wilson, 328 Pa. at 242, 195 A. at 100. Thus, I would reverse the Order of the Commonwealth Court and remand the case for trial.
FLAHERTY, C.J., joins in this dissenting opinion.