Court Opinion

ID: 9849567
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 04:42:41.154696+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:20:18.161696
License: Public Domain

Finley, J.
(dissenting) — With a preponderant majority of the court apparently for affirmance of the trial court, it may seem a waste of time and effort and rather futile to dissent, even briefly. However, my convictions conflict strongly with those expressed in the majority opinion. I am unable to sign it or to simply concur in the result reached. Consequently, I must indicate disagreement and dissent, stated briefly I trust, but as strongly as possible in the following several paragraphs:
First, article 28, section 1 of the state constitution provides, among other things: “The compensation of any state officer shall not be increased or diminished during his term of office, . .
Second, members of the legislature are state officers within the purview of the language of article 28, section 1 of the state constitution.
Third, in chapter 3, section 1 at page 12 of the Laws of 1969, the legislature stated a well known economic fact of life, that the purchasing power of the dollar has decreased and that the cost of living has increased. Thereupon, the legislature stated two resounding generalizations: namely, that a $25 per diem allowance in lieu of subsistence and lodging is inadequate to cover necessary expenses incurred by legislators while attending sessions, but that $40 per day is a fair and adequate allowance. The statement as to a $40 per day allowance is then followed by a somewhat strange reference to reimbursement. This reference to reimbursement is clearly inconsistent with the basic thesis of the statute — namely, an allowance of $40 per day in lieu of auditing and accounting in relation to reimbursement for expenses actually in fact incurred.
*176Fourth, a fair and reasonable reading of the opinion of this court in State ex rel. Todd v. Yelle, 7 Wn.2d 443, 110 P.2d 162 (1941), holds that reimbursement for living expenses incurred by legislators when away from home attending a legislative session at the seat of government in Olympia does not constitute an increase in compensation during a term of office within the prohibition of article 28, section 1 of the state constitution. Thus, reimbursement for living expenses actually incurred and paid by members of the legislature while attending a session of the legislature is the theme, the thesis, and the holding of the Todd case. This, in my judgment, simply stated, means that a member of the legislature who incurs and actually pays $5 or $50 per day for living expenses (food and lodging and other incidental personal maintenance expenses), or if his conscience permits or necessity requires incurring and paying out-of-pocket $100 or even more per day, the two houses of the legislature could appropriate funds and provide for reimbursement of any such living expenses reported as incurred and actually paid by members of the legislature. The Todd case does not mean, and article 28, section 1 does not permit, the legislature nor members of this court to indulge in generalities, to guess and speculate as to what constitutes a reasonable allowance or per diem in lieu of “reimbursement.” In other words, I have no doubt that the legislature legally and constitutionally can provide funds and authorize reimbursement for living expenses actually incurred and, in fact, paid by members while away from home attending sessions of the legislature at the state capital. I would have no hesitation in judicially approving this kind of straightforward, definite and clearcut provision by the legislature for personal maintenance expenses as being within the constitutional authority of the state legislature. It is crystal clear to me that the key words are and should be “reimbursement for living expenses actually incurred and paid.” Anything else paid to legislators from the public treasury is clearly income or additional salary or compensation. In my judgment, any such payment is not only subject to the federal income tax laws, but also is imper*177missible under the impact of the Todd case and under the provision of article 28, section 1 of the state constitution prohibiting an increase in the salary or compensation of legislators during a term of office.
There is no doubt in my mind that legislators, as well as many other individuals, have been seriously and adversely affected by the constantly rising cost of living. Several remedies or avenues of relief are available to legislators to resolve their problem of not being able to make ends meet in the performance of their official duties on the basis of existing salaries: (a) legislators’ salaries can, and, I personally think, should be increased to a reasonably appropriate level considering the present and increasing demands upon legislators’ time and the escalating personal living or maintenance expenses incurred in the performance of their official duties during legislative sessions in Olympia; (b) an amendment could be submitted to the people of this state to revise article 28, section 1 to permit an increase in the salary of legislators during their terms of office (a similar problem and long-standing inequity regarding other elected officials, including members of the judiciary, was recently resolved by a constitutional amendment submitted to and approved by the voters); (c) adequate provision can be made for the payment of public funds to reimburse legislators for expenses actually incurred and paid while attending sessions of the legislature.
No legal gymnastics or judicial juggling of the English language can change, in my judgment, this basic fact of life, logic, and economics: any payment of public funds to a legislator in addition to the salary regularly established by law, not in fact expended for personal maintenance expenses actually incurred is income and constitutes an increase in compensation within the prohibition of article 28, section 1 of the state constitution. I cannot, and certainly do not, fault other members of the court for saying otherwise. One of the difficulties, yet one of the gre.at strengths, of a mul-ti-judge appellate court is that inevitably there will be honest differences. However, regardless of whether I apply a so-called strict, literal, or liberal judicial reading and *178interpretation of our constitution, I cannot reach a conclusion which differs from that which I have stated. As for me, the meaning of article 28, section 1 together with the import of the Todd case, supra, seem so very clear that the legal premises and legal logic applicable in this case are well nigh inexorable. Thus, as I see it, my role or function as a member of this court is preordained in dissent — expressed as strongly as possible. So be it.
Hill, J. Pro Tern., concurs with Finley, J.