ATTORNEY FOR APPELLANT
Aladean M. DeRose
South Bend, Indiana
ATTORNEYS FOR APPELLEES
Don G. Blackmond
Lynn M. Butcher
South Bend, Indiana
__________________________________________________________________
IN THE
SUPREME COURT OF INDIANA
__________________________________________________________________
THE MUNICIPAL CITY OF )
SOUTH BEND, INDIANA, )
)
Appellant (Defendant Below), )
)
v. )
) Indiana Supreme Court
JOHN KIMSEY and DENISE KIMSEY; ) Cause No. 71S03-0203-CV-183
BRADLEY HALL and CAROLE HALL;)
TERRY TRETHEWEY and CHERYL ) Indiana Court of Appeals
TRETHEWEY; together with the ) Cause No. 71A03-0101-CV-13
remaining property owners who are )
signatories hereto and who are too )
numerous to be included in the caption )
of this remonstrance complaint, )
)
Appellees (Plaintiffs Below). )
__________________________________________________________________
APPEAL FROM THE ST. JOSEPH SUPERIOR COURT
The Honorable William C. Whitman, Judge
Cause No. 71D03-9609-CP-909
__________________________________________________________________
ON PETITION TO TRANSFER
__________________________________________________________________
January 15, 2003
BOEHM, Justice.
Article IV, Section 23 of the Indiana Constitution prohibits special
legislation where a general law can be made applicable. We hold that this
provision is violated by a 1993 law applicable only to St. Joseph County
and permitting a majority of landowners in an affected area of that county
to block annexation by a municipality.
Factual and Procedural Background
Until 1993, if a municipality sought to annex adjacent territory, it
needed to satisfy only the requirements of Indiana Code section 36-4-3-13.
That section, which remains the law today, set forth a list of conditions
ranging from the population and geographic makeup of the area to be annexed
to the details that must be included in a fiscal plan prepared by the
annexing municipality. If these requirements were met, opposition by a
given percentage of landowners was not enough to block annexation.
In 1993, the Indiana General Assembly added a new subsection (g)[1] to
section 13. That subsection applied only to counties with a population
between 200,000 and 300,000, and granted the right to challenge and defeat
annexation if, inter alia, a majority of the landowners in the affected
area opposed it.[2] Ind. Code § 36-4-3-13(g) (2002). At the time this
provision was enacted, and ever since then, only St. Joseph County fell
within these population parameters. As a result, at the time relevant to
this lawsuit, only in St. Joseph County could a given number of affected
landowners block an annexation simply by opposing it. In 1999, a new
subsection was added affecting every county except St. Joseph and requiring
opposition of sixty-five percent, not just a simple majority, to defeat
annexation. The net result is that today the statute requires opposition
of sixty-five percent of the affected landowners to defeat a municipal
annexation in ninety-one of our ninety-two counties, but in St. Joseph
County a simple majority is sufficient.[3]
On July 22, 1996, the City of South Bend, acting through its Common
Council, adopted an ordinance providing for the annexation of the
“Copperfield Annexation Area” in St. Joseph County. Copperfield area
residents filed a remonstrance and presented a petition in opposition to
annexation purporting to contain the signatures of a majority of
Copperfield landowners. After the trial court denied the City’s motion to
dismiss the remonstrance, the City filed a counterclaim seeking a
declaratory judgment that subsection (g) was unconstitutional special
legislation in violation of Article IV, Section 23 of the Indiana
Constitution. That section provides, in relevant part: “[I]n all . . .
cases where a general law can be made applicable, all laws shall be general
. . . .”
The trial court denied the City’s motion, holding that subsection (g)
was constitutional “general” legislation concerning “[t]he loss of rural
land” and “[a]rguably . . . reflects a political decision by the General
Assembly that urbanization in this state should be restricted and that: (a)
counties of more than 300,000 people have already lost their rural
character and (b) that counties of less than 200,000 people are not at
risk.” Because the trial court viewed subsection (g) as “general”
legislation as that term appears in Article IV, it did not address the
question whether, if this were a “special” law, a general law “can be made
applicable.”
The City subsequently filed a unilateral “stipulation of facts,” to
which the remonstrators did not object, and the trial court proceeded to
address the merits of the case without trial. Having determined that the
remonstrators’ petition was sufficient, the trial court blocked the
annexation. The Court of Appeals affirmed the trial court. City of South
Bend v. Kimsey, 751 N.E.2d 805, 812 (Ind. Ct. App. 2001). This Court
granted transfer.
I. Origins of the Ban on “Special Legislation”
Limits on “special legislation” are found, “in some form or other, in
most state constitutions.” Osborne M. Reynolds, Local Government Law 85-86
(1982). Their purpose is “to prevent state legislatures from granting
preferences to some local units or areas within the state, and thus
creating an irregular system of laws, lacking state-wide uniformity.” Id.
at 86. This “irregularity” is not in itself the only perceived evil. In
the view of the proponents of these provisions, if special laws are
permitted, the result is perceived to be “a situation in which it [becomes]
customary for members of the legislature to vote for the local bills of
others in return for comparable cooperation from them (a practice often
termed ‘logrolling’).” Id. In simple terms, these anti-logrolling
provisions are grounded in the view that as long as a law affects only one
small area of the state, voters in most areas will be ignorant of and
indifferent to it. As a result, many legislators will be tempted, some
would say expected, to support the proposals of the legislators from the
affected area, even if they deem the proposal to be bad policy that they
could not support if it affected their own constituents.[4]
In fact, the drafters of the 1851 Indiana Constitution saw one of
their principal challenges to be reining in a “large and constantly
increasing number” of special laws. At the Constitutional Debates, John
Pettit, of Tippecanoe County, described special legislation as “the whole
error—the whole incongruity—the whole oppression of our law, and almost the
whole necessity of calling this Convention.” 2 Reports of the Debates and
Proceedings of the Convention for the Revision of the Constitution of the
State of Indiana 1771 (1850). Others complained of the diversion from
matters of statewide concern generated by an excessive volume of local
legislation. Governor Paris Dunning addressed the General Assembly on this
note:
Special legislation is a growing evil which has attracted much
attention amongst the masses of the people, and to which much well
founded opposition exists in the public mind. Indeed, it has for
years past engaged full three-fourths of the time of the General
Assembly, to the exclusion (from their due consideration) of many
other questions of great importance to the people of the State.
1 Charles Kettleborough, Constitution Making in Indiana 195 (Ind.
Historical Bureau ed. 1971) (1916). The drafters responded to these
concerns by adopting Sections 22 and 23 of Article IV. Article IV, Section
22 prohibits the General Assembly from passing local or special laws to
accomplish certain enumerated results, none of which is relevant here.[5]
In addition to Section 22’s prohibition of “special” legislation on
specified topics, Article IV, Section 23 added a residual demand for
“general” legislation: “In all the cases enumerated in the preceding
section, and in all other cases where a general law can be made applicable,
all laws shall be general, and of uniform operation throughout the State.”
II. Earlier Judicial Review of “Special” Legislation
Although the text of Section 23 has remained unaltered since it was
placed in the Constitution in 1851, it has been subject to a variety of
interpretations over the intervening 151 years. It was initially thought
that Article IV presented no justiciable issue. This view was first
articulated in Gentile v. State, 29 Ind. 409 (1868), and continued through
the nineteenth century and into the early part of the twentieth. As this
Court put it in Bd. of Comm’rs v. Fetter, 193 Ind. 288, 296, 139 N.E. 451,
454 (1923):
Upon the authority of numerous decided cases from this court,
and from the courts of other states which have constitutional
limitations akin to the one here in question, the rule is firmly fixed
that the question whether or not a general law can be made applicable,
or that a special law is in violation of said section of the
constitution because a general law can be made applicable, is
necessarily one of legislative discretion, and not one of judicial
determination.
In Groves v. Bd. of Comm’rs, 209 Ind. 371, 199 N.E. 137 (1936), this
Court moved from the view that Article IV, Section 23 presented no
justiciable issue to the doctrine that statutes general in form were
“general” for purposes of Article IV even if they applied in practical
terms to only one or a few counties. The Court addressed a statute
applying only to counties “having a population of not less than 250,000 nor
more than 400,000, and having three or more cities, each with a population
of 50,000 or more.” Id. at 375, 199 N.E. at 139. Lake County alone met
those criteria. The Court held: “If the act is broad enough to apply to
all counties of the state under the same circumstances, it cannot be
condemned.” Id. at 376, 199 N.E. at 140. Whatever the realistic prospect
that another county might ever meet these parameters and also contain three
cities, each of 50,000 population, there remains at least the theoretical
prospect that smaller counties could over time grow to meet these criteria.
Similarly, Lake County might lose one of its three cities of 50,000, or
fall outside the 250,000-to-400,000 bracket. Based on these logical if
practically remote possibilities, this Court held that “[u]nder such
circumstances, the law is general in its application and not local or
special,” id., and inquired no further.
A variation of complete deference to classification by population
upheld several statutes against Article IV attack on the basis that
singling out the affected areas was “reasonable.” In Long v. State, 175
Ind. 17, 20, 92 N.E. 653, 654 (1910), this Court stated, “Many of our penal
statutes have exclusive application to special localities or objects, and
are nevertheless general and unquestionably valid, because they rest upon
an inherent and substantial basis of classification.” Similarly, in Kelly
v. Finney, 207 Ind. 557, 579, 194 N.E. 157, 166 (1935), this Court cited
Long for the proposition that “[t]he fact that a statute exempts from its
operation certain classes does not render the act local or special as long
as the classification is not unreasonable or arbitrary.” Reflecting the
similarity of equal protection doctrine to this line of reasoning under
Article IV, Section 23, the Kelly Court also cited Continental Baking Co.
v. Woodring, 286 U.S. 352 (1932), and Schwartzman Serv., Inc. v. Stahl, 60
F.2d 1034 (W.D. Mo. 1932), for that proposition. Neither of these federal
court decisions addressed Article IV, or indeed any state constitutional
provision. Continental Baking dealt with state regulations on commercial
highway hauling, and involved only constitutional challenges under the
federal Due Process, Equal Protection, Privileges and Immunities, and
Commerce Clauses. 286 U.S. at 357. Schwartzman addressed the
constitutionality of similar regulations, and although it did not specify
the constitutional provisions on which it based its decision, it presumably
was also decided under federal constitutional law.[6]
The approach of Long and Kelly also appeared in Evansville-Vanderburgh
Levee Auth. Dist. v. Kamp, 240 Ind. 659, 168 N.E.2d 208 (1960), where a
statute allowed the creation of a joint city-county levee authority
district in any city within a county having a population between 160,000
and 180,000. At the time the statute was enacted, only Vanderburgh County
fell within this population bracket. A Vanderburgh County taxpayer filed
suit contending, inter alia, that the statute was unconstitutional special
legislation. This Court upheld the statute, stating, “[T]he presence of
[some arbitrariness due to the use of population classifications] does not
make the legislation special if there still remains some relationship
between such classification and the objective of the law which the
legislature could have considered to exist.” Id. at 663, 168 N.E.2d at
210.
Finally, adopting the same view, Dortch v. Lugar, 255 Ind. 545, 266
N.E.2d 25 (1971), relied on Kamp and Kelly in upholding the Unigov statute
for Marion County. That statute reorganized local municipal and county
government in all counties containing “a city of the first class” and
included a stated purpose “to enable the consolidation of governmental
functions in densely populated metropolitan communities.” Id. at 550, 266
N.E.2d at 30. Unigov, then and now, applied only to Marion County, which
contains Indianapolis, the only Indiana city of the first class. In
upholding the statute, this Court stated, “As a general proposition . . .
it is sufficient for purposes of §§ 22 and 23 of Art. 4 [i]f . . . the
classification is reasonable and naturally inherent in the subject matter.”
Id. at 552-53, 266 N.E.2d at 31. Although these cases were consistent in
their view that reasonableness of the classification validated a law under
Article IV, none of these holdings addressed the history behind Article IV,
Section 23. More importantly, none explained at any length whether the
reasonableness of the classification is a touchstone in determining whether
a law is general or special, or whether it otherwise preserved a statute
attacked under Article IV.
The “reasonableness” approach to Article IV issues is strongly
reminiscent of concepts derived from the “equal privileges and immunities”
clause of Article I, unfortunately also numbered Section 23. That
provision of Article I states, “The General Assembly shall not grant to any
citizen, or class of citizens, privileges or immunities, which, upon the
same terms, shall not equally belong to all citizens.” To comply with that
section, legislation that singles out one person or class of persons to
receive a privilege or immunity not equally provided to others must meet
two requirements. First, it “must be based upon distinctive, inherent
characteristics which rationally distinguish the unequally treated class,
and the disparate treatment accorded by the legislation must be reasonably
related to such distinguishing characteristics.” Collins v. Day, 644
N.E.2d 72, 79 (Ind. 1994). Second, “any privileged classification must be
open to any and all persons who share the inherent characteristics which
distinguish and justify the classification, with the special treatment
accorded to any particular classification extended equally to all persons.”
Id. Although Collins v. Day reformulated the Equal Privileges Clause in
1994, the Collins test is reminiscent of many earlier decisions under the
Special Legislation Clause, including Long, Kelly, and Dortch.
Under this line of cases, and in light of Collins’ restatement of the
Equal Privileges Clause test, there seemed to be little difference between
Article IV special legislation and Article I unequal privileges. So
viewed, the Article IV restraint on “special laws” becomes the reasonable
classification focus imposed by Article I. In other words, for a special
law to be imposed, it must be reasonably related to inherent
characteristics of the territory in which it is applied, and apply equally
to those who share those characteristics. Thus, legislation that applies
in less than the entire state would pass both Article I and Article IV
muster by the same standard.
In the meantime, however, in 1986 this Court returned to complete
deference to population ranges as ipso facto “general” statutes. In N.
Twp. Advisory Bd. v. Mamala, 490 N.E.2d 725, 726 (Ind. 1986), the Court
upheld a statute affecting the operation of parks located “in each township
having a population of not less than one hundred eighty thousand (180,000)
nor more than two hundred four thousand (204,000) that is located in a
county having more than two second class cities.” Only one township in the
state fell within that classification. This Court held the law was general
because the statute did not “contain any provision which would either
preclude other townships from eventually qualifying under the statute or
would prevent North Township from falling outside the parameters of the
statute.” Id. Only the most generous deference to legislative judgment
could uphold this quite particularized legislation, which presented a
classic example of the perceived local legislation that gave rise to
Article IV. Indeed, virtually any geographic area can be uniquely defined
with such very specific population parameters in concert with other
characteristics. Mamala thus represented in practical terms a return to
the view that Article IV presents no justiciable issue at all.
III. Judicial Review of “Special” Legislation Today
A. Identifying General or Special Legislation
It is now clear that although the reasonableness of a population
classification remains relevant under Article I, neither the “per se” nor
“reasonableness” view of population categories is determinative of
constitutionality under Article IV. Rather, the text of Article IV,
Section 23 is controlling here. The terms “general law” and “special law”
have widely understood meanings. A statute is “general” if it applies “to
all persons or places of a specified class throughout the state.” Black’s
Law Dictionary 890 (7th ed. 1999). A statute is “special” if it “pertains
to and affects a particular case, person, place, or thing, as opposed to
the general public.” Id. Most recently, in Williams v. State, 724 N.E.2d
1070, 1085 (Ind. 2000), this Court reiterated the view that the text of
Article IV, Section 23 requires a two-step test that addresses concerns
unique to that section: “In analyzing a law under [Article IV,] Section 23,
we must first determine whether the law is general or special. If the law
is general, we must then determine whether it is applied generally
throughout the State. If it is special, we must decide whether it is
constitutionally permissible.”
Williams followed Ind. Gaming Comm’n v. Moseley, 643 N.E.2d 296, 299-
301 (Ind. 1994), and State v. Hoovler, 668 N.E.2d 1229 (Ind. 1996), on this
point.[7] Williams found that the specific needs of Lake County—a large
county with a larger case docket—supported special legislation providing
for the appointment of magistrates only in Lake County courts. Moseley
upheld a statute that applied only to counties eligible to vote to adopt
riverboat gambling, and provided for city-by-city voting in counties
bordering Lake Michigan with more than 400,000 people, i.e., in Lake
County, while other counties eligible to adopt dockside gambling did so on
a countywide basis. 643 N.E.2d at 301. This Court found this different
treatment for Lake County to be justified:
In Lake County, the whole of the waterfront is covered by substantial
cities, whose residents have the greatest interest in how the shore is
used. In all other counties, however, the shore contains both
incorporated and unincorporated territory. It thus seems sensible to
stage a vote of all persons in the county.
Id.
In Hoovler, this Court followed Moseley and pierced the claim that a
population criteria based statute was “general” legislation, but again
nevertheless found the statute valid. Hoovler dealt with the legislature’s
attempt to help Tippecanoe County handle the financial burden of cleanup
costs at a “Superfund” landfill site. 668 N.E.2d at 1234. The statute
permitted the county council of a qualifying county to impose a higher
county income tax rate than was permitted in other counties in the state.
Only Tippecanoe County qualified under the legislation, but the statute did
not identify Tippecanoe County by name. Rather, it applied only to
counties “having a population of more than one hundred twenty-nine thousand
(129,000) but less than one hundred thirty-thousand six hundred (130,600).”
Id. at 1231.
Rather than validating this legislation on the ground that population
categories per se create general statutes, this Court examined the
“circumstances surrounding [the Act], including language in the Act
itself.” Id. at 1234. The Court held that because the legislature
intended the statute in that case to apply exclusively to Tippecanoe
County, the statute was indeed “special” legislation governed by Article
IV. Id. at 1235. In reaching this conclusion, the Court pointed to the
narrow population range in the statute, the fact that Tippecanoe County was
the only Indiana county with a Superfund site for which local government
entities were designated Potentially Responsible Parties by the EPA, and
the statute’s intent to provide relief to Tippecanoe County from its
potential Superfund liability, reflected in its requirement that the county
council find that money is needed to “fund substance removal and remedial
action.” Id. at 1234-35. All of these factors were signs that the
legislature had indeed “enacted a special law authorizing Tippecanoe County
to enact and administer a special tax rate increase not available to any
other county.” Id. at 1235.
B. “Defining Characteristics” and “Justifying Characteristics”
We agree with the view that a statute with a population category is a
special law if it “is designed to operate upon or benefit only particular
municipalities and thus is essentially no different than if the statute had
identified the particular municipalities by name.” City of Miami v.
McGrath, 824 So.2d 143, 148 (Fla. 2002). Moseley, Hoovler, and Williams
clearly implied that those pieces of legislation would have been
permissible under Article IV if they had identified the affected counties
by name. Indeed, Article IV issues will be simplified if that is done,
accompanied by legislative findings as to the facts justifying the
legislation’s limited territorial application. Legislation applying by its
terms to areas with identified characteristics would be equally permissible
under Article IV.
The statute in Hoovler defined the class of counties to which it
applied in terms of population. The opinion justified the classification
in terms of the presence vel non of a county’s exposure to Superfund
liability. Moseley, on the other hand, addressed a statute whose defining
characteristics were in part those justifying the classification (bodies of
water) and in part population parameters that only Lake County met. Thus
its defining characteristics were only partially those that justified the
classification, and, like Hoovler, judicial notice of the geography and
municipalities in Lake County was necessary to justify the classification.
Finally, in Williams, Lake County was identified by name, and its
characteristics justifying the legislation were judicially noticed.
In some other legislation that has been challenged under Article IV,
the characteristics defining the applicable counties are also those that
justify the legislation. Thus, in Dortch, a city of the first class in a
county was properly thought to justify countywide government. This form of
classification is more elegant because it avoids the messiness created by
potential entrants (new Superfund sites) or exits (park districts in
counties growing out of population parameters) over time. Despite these
potential issues, Hoovler made clear that a defining characteristic (a
population category) that is theoretically unrelated to the justifying
characteristic (Superfund liability) is nevertheless permissible if, under
the facts as they are at the time of passage, only justified areas are
defined into the class. This is defensible because the perceived evils of
special legislation in the absence of special circumstances are largely
avoided if the affected area is indeed the only part of the state where the
statute has practical effect.
In sum, if there are characteristics of the locality that distinguish
it for purposes of the legislation, and the legislation identifies the
locality, it is special legislation. The identification of the locality
may be by name (“Tippecanoe County”), by the characteristic that justifies
special legislation (a unique Superfund liability), or otherwise
(population parameters that include only the locality).
C. Determining Whether a General Law “Can Be Made Applicable”
Moseley, Williams, and Hoovler, were not revolutionary in viewing the
threshold issue as identifying a law as special or general. Gentile v.
State, 29 Ind. 409 (1868), which was decided seventeen years after Article
IV was adopted, included some useful insight on that point:
[Article IV, Section 23] was intended to prohibit the passage of any
law applicable only to one or more counties, or other territorial
subdivisions of the State, where a general law on the same subject
could be made which would properly apply to the entire state. . . . It
is clearly implied by that section, and we know it to be true in fact,
that in many cases local laws are necessary, because general ones
cannot, properly and justly, be made applicable. There are cases
where a law would be both proper and necessary in a given locality or
part of the state, where its subject is local, or where, from local
facts, it is rendered necessary; but which, if made general, would
either be inoperative in portions of the state, or from its
inapplicability to such portions, would be injurious and unjust.
Id. at 411-12. As Gentile reveals, legislation must be classified as
general or special before the focus turns to whether a general law “can
apply,” i.e., whether there are inherent characteristics of the affected
locale that justify local legislation.
Thus, the reasonableness of a classification does not answer whether
the law is general or special in the first place. Nor does it provide a
complete answer to the question whether a general law “can be made
applicable,” although one branch of that inquiry may resemble an Article I
analysis. A statute general in form “can be made applicable” only if it
does not violate Article I, Section 23. Thus, if population
classifications are arbitrary or unrelated to the characteristics that
define the class, a statute general in form is nevertheless
unconstitutional as a violation of Article I. This can be true under
Collins either because there is no defining characteristic of the
classified area, or there is such a characteristic but it is shared with
areas not in the class.
A second consideration in whether a general law “can be made
applicable” is whether in fact it is meaningful in a variety of places or
whether relevant traits of the affected area are distinctive such that the
law’s application elsewhere has no effect. This second consideration turns
on whether “local facts” exist, not on whether those facts are reasonably
related to the particular legislation that is actually imposed, a question
that is left to Article I.
Article IV issues, though distinct from Article I considerations,
remain closely related to them. If special legislation passes the first
test of Collins, i.e., the legislation is reasonably related to “inherent
characteristics” of the affected locale, and it also passes the second by
applying wherever the justifying characteristics are found, then the
statute necessarily passes Article IV muster because the presence of those
“inherent characteristics” means a general law cannot “be made applicable.”
Otherwise stated, if the conditions the law addresses are found in at
least a variety of places throughout the state, a general law can be made
applicable and is required by Article IV, and special legislation is not
permitted. Applying these principles, assuming the facts of the affected
area are distinct, Long, Dortch, and other cases relying on the proposition
that Article IV, Section 23 challenges are resolved by addressing the
reasonableness of the classification embodied in the statute are
nevertheless correct in their ultimate result.
IV. Applying Article IV, Section 23 to Subsection (g)
A. Subsection (g) is Special Legislation
The decisions of the trial court and Court of Appeals in this case
reflected both the “reasonable classification” approach and the view that
population classifications are per se permissible under Article IV as
general legislation. As both courts pointed out, any county could
theoretically move into the 200,000-to-300,000 person population category
defined by subsection (g), from above or below those points, and thus the
statute, being “susceptible of uniform application to any county in the
State meeting the population criteria,” was general, not special,
legislation. Kimsey, 751 N.E.2d at 811-12. The Court of Appeals also
stated: “Notwithstanding Section 23, the legislature may make
classifications of subjects of legislation, provided the classification is
reasonable and the statute operates equally on all within the class. The
statute is then considered to be general.” Id. at 810 (citations omitted).
As explained in Part III, these considerations are relevant if not
controlling on the issue of whether “a general law can be made applicable.”
But neither of these points addresses the threshold issue whether
subsection (g) is general or special under Moseley, Hoovler, and Williams.
As in Hoovler, the circumstances surrounding the enactment of
subsection (g) leads to the conclusion that this statute is “special”
legislation. State v. Hoovler, 668 N.E.2d 1229, 1234-35 (Ind. 1996).
Public Law No. 257 was introduced as amendatory legislation in 1993 by a
Representative from St. Joseph County, and sponsored in the Senate by a
Senator whose district included both St. Joseph and Elkhart Counties. The
bill declared an emergency requiring immediate effect. 1993 Ind. Acts 257
§ 4. Because Section 3 of the bill applied only to St. Joseph County at
the time of its enactment and for the foreseeable future, and immediate
effect was required, the legislature necessarily intended it to address
some issue peculiar to St. Joseph County. Thus the evidence is clear that,
at the time it was enacted, subsection (g)’s population classification
served no purpose other than to identify St. Joseph County. This is no
different than had the legislature simply named St. Joseph County in the
statute, as was the case in Williams, where the statute specifically stated
that it governed the courts of Lake County. Moreover, later amendments did
not change the special status of St. Joseph County. In Moseley, it was
apparent that the statute at issue was special legislation because it
affected Lake County differently from other counties allowed to permit
dockside gambling, and also rendered most Indiana counties unable to
participate in dockside gambling. Ind. Gaming Comm’n v. Moseley, 643
N.E.2d 296, 301 (Ind. 1994). Here, the singling out of St. Joseph County
is just as severe. Section 36-4-3-13 now requires the opposition of sixty-
five percent of landowners to defeat annexation in every other county in
the State, but retains the majority requirement for St. Joseph County.
Ind. Code § 36-4-3-13(e) (2002).
B. Subsection (g) Addresses Conditions Where a General Law Can be
Made Applicable
We agree with the Court of Appeals that the statute is presumed
constitutional. The Court of Appeals noted the general principle that
“[a]ny reasonable interpretation of a statute is sufficient if it evokes a
finding of constitutionality.” 751 N.E.2d at 812. This doctrine calls for
adopting one among multiple meanings of the statute if that interpretation
renders the legislation valid. Here there is no issue as to what the
subsection means. More relevant is the point that the challenging party
must negate “every conceivable basis which might have supported the
classification.” Id. (quoting Am. Legion Post #113 v. State, 656 N.E.2d
1190, 1192 (1995)). This may be done by presenting evidence establishing
the lack of distinct characteristics, or, as in Williams, the relevant
facts may be subject to judicial notice.
In this case, several different explanations were offered to justify
the subsection’s application only in counties of 200,000 to 300,000
population. But these reasons were all couched in terms of characteristics
of St. Joseph County, not necessarily those possessed by a county of this
population size. They ranged from the need to preserve rural land around
urban areas (South Bend), which the trial court “judicially noticed,” to
preventing competing cities (South Bend and Mishakwaka) within the same
county from annexing each other’s land, which the Attorney General advanced
in the trial court. But none of these justifications are inherent in the
population range and none turn on facts unique to St. Joseph County.
Preserving rural land near urban areas or preventing competing annexation
by different municipalities may indeed be legitimate concerns, but there is
no basis to conclude they are unique to St. Joseph County. Although the
trial court took judicial notice of the fact that St. Joseph County is
largely urban but contains significant rural areas, the same is true of
Lake and Allen Counties. Several counties have multiple municipalities
capable of exercising annexation powers. In short, we are directed to
nothing in the record and no relevant facts susceptible of judicial notice
that are unique to St. Joseph County. Accordingly, this legislation is
unconstitutional special legislation.
In contrast to this record, in Hoovler, Tippecanoe County’s unique
Superfund site needs were well-documented. Thus, the proponents of that
special legislation had a factual basis upon which to rest their assertion
that a general statute could not apply.[8] In Moseley, the makeup of Lake
County, where most of the land contiguous to Lake Michigan is occupied by
cities of significant size, justified a voting procedure different from
that employed in other counties eligible to adopt dockside gambling.[9]
Similarly, in Williams, the specific judicial needs of Lake County
supported specific legislation providing for the appointment of magistrates
in that county alone. Thus, the statute in each case was constitutional
special legislation by reason of facts of record or judicially noticeable.
Justice Sullivan is mistaken in claiming that we apply an Article I,
Section 23 equal privileges test to this case. We have noted the
historical similarity of some but not all aspects of Article IV issues to
Article I analysis, but our decision is based on Article IV alone.[10] We
also disagree with Justice Sullivan’s description of this Court’s Article
IV, Section 23 precedent as uniformly deferring to the legislature’s
judgment. Although the cases described by Justice Sullivan all upheld the
legislative action, they did so on the merits. They also plainly found
that the issues presented by an Article IV, Section 23 challenge were
within the province of the judiciary to decide. Indeed that is what
judicial review means.
Justice Sullivan in substance argues for a doctrine of
nonjusticiability of Article IV issues. But for over seventy years
precedent has uniformly rejected that view. We think Article IV presents a
powerful case for judicial enforcement of a constitutional provision.
Forty years ago, judicial intervention was necessary in the area of
legislative reapportionment to correct massive imbalances in representation
occasioned by the legislature’s inability or unwillingness to recognize the
need to redistrict.[11] In simple terms, the legislators and their
constituents who were overrepresented had no interest in remedying the
situation. Special legislation presents a similar issue because it
eliminates the normal pressures of constituent objection to unwise policy.
This is less debilitating than the paralyzing effect of unremedied
malapportionment. But the appropriateness of entertaining claims of
unconstitutional special legislation is fortified by the express
constitutional provision found in Article IV, Section 23. Moreover, both
the 1816 and 1851 constitutions were adopted at a time when judicial review
of legislation for conformity to constitutional text was well established.
As we held in Dawson v. Shaver, 1 Blackf. 204, 206-07 (1822), citing
Marbury v. Madison, 5 U.S. 137 (1803): “The task is delicate and
unpleasant, but the duty of the Court is imperative, and its authority is
unquestionable, to declare any part of a statute null and void that
expressly contravenes the provisions of the constitution, to which the
legislature itself owes its existence.” This case adds no new doctrine to
the analysis of Moseley, Hoovler, and Williams, and the legislature has
taken no steps to eliminate Article IV, Section 23 in the years since those
cases were decided. Because “special legislation” doctrine derives solely
from Article IV, Section 23, it can readily be repealed if two sessions of
the General Assembly approve that decision and the voters ratify it. We
neither advocate nor oppose the wisdom of Section 23. Rather, the
Constitution makes that decision for us.
V. Severability
Public Law No. 257, which contained subsection (g)—at the time,
subsection (e)—did not include a “severability clause,” i.e., a provision
that “keeps the remaining provisions of a . . . statute in force if any
portion of that . . . statute is judicially declared . . .
unconstitutional.” Black’s Law Dictionary 1378 (7th ed. 1999). Thus we
are given no guidance from the legislature as to what portions of Public
Law No. 257, if any, survive subsection (g)’s violation of Article IV.
This Court applies the test for severability stated by the United States
Supreme Court in Dorchy v. Kansas:
A statute bad in part is not necessarily void in its entirety.
Provisions within the legislative power may stand if separable from
the bad. But a provision, inherently unobjectionable, cannot be
deemed separable unless it appears both that, standing alone, legal
effect can be given to it and that the legislature intended the
provision to stand, in case others included in the act and held bad
should fall.
State v. Monfort, 723 N.E.2d 407, 415 (Ind. 2000) (quoting Dorchy, 264 U.S.
286, 289-90 (1924)). The issue is whether the legislature would have
passed the remaining parts of Public Law No. 257 had it been presented
without the invalid features. Id.
A. Subsection 36-4-3-13(g)
The offending portion of Ind. Code § 36-4-3-13(g) is the 200,000 to
300,000 population category. In order to save the remainder of the
subsection, its provisions would have to apply statewide such that any
annexation by an Indiana municipality could be defeated by a majority vote
of landowners in the affected area. We reject that conclusion for two
reasons. First, applying subsection (g) statewide would conflict with
subsection (e), which provides for the defeat of annexation by a sixty-five
percent vote in every other county in the state. Second, it seems clear to
us that the legislature would not have passed subsection (g) as appropriate
for the entire state.
B. Other Amendments Provided by Public Law No. 257
Public Law No. 257 included two other sections, in addition to
Section 3 that enacted subsection (g) and Section 4 declaring an emergency.
Section 1 included a minor revision to Indiana Code section 36-4-3-4, and
Section 2 amended section 36-4-3-9. This case presents no challenge to
either provision and we do not address the validity of either today.
Conclusion
Despite its facial generality, this Court finds that subsection (g)
does, and was intended to, specifically target St. Joseph County. Thus,
subsection (g) is special legislation. Although reasons have been advanced
to explain why annexation in St. Joseph County must be handled differently
than it is in every other county in the state, no facts supporting those
reasons have been set forth in the record by the proponents of the special
legislation, and we are directed to judicial notice of none. Therefore,
under Article IV, Section 23, the application of subsection (g) to prevent
the City of South Bend from annexing the Copperfield area is
unconstitutional.
The judgment of the trial court is reversed.
SHEPARD, C.J., and DICKSON and RUCKER, JJ., concur.
SULLIVAN, J., dissents with separate opinion.
SULLIVAN, Justice, dissenting.
I dissent. I believe the Court’s decision is wrong for the following
reasons.
1. Both precedent and established constitutional jurisprudence
counsel upholding the challenged statute.
As the Court observes, we rejected challenges to the
constitutionality of statutes under art. IV, § 23, of the Indiana
Constitution as non-justiciable prior to 1936. While it is certainly true
that since that time, this Court has adopted different formulations or
tests for analyzing such challenges, each result has been the same: the
Court has deferred to the Legislature’s judgment. In recent years, this
has been especially apparent:
In Evansville-Vanderburgh Levee Authority District v. Kamp, 240
Ind. 659, 168 N.E.2d 208 (1960), we affirmed the constitutionality of
the Legislature’s decision to allow Vanderburgh County to have a
unique city-county levee authority.
In Dortch v. Lugar, 255 Ind. 545, 266 N.E.2d 25 (1971), we
affirmed the constitutionality of the Legislature’s decision to allow
Marion County to have the unique Unigov system of government.
In Indiana Gaming Commission v. Moseley, 643 N.E.2d 296 (Ind.
1994), we affirmed the constitutionality of the Legislature’s decision
to allow Lake County to have a unique system for gambling referendums.
In State v. Hoovler, 668 N.E.2d 1229 (Ind. 1996), we affirmed
the constitutionality of the Legislature’s decision to allow
Tippecanoe County to have a unique environmental cleanup tax.
In Williams v. State, 724 N.E.2d 1070 (Ind. 2000), we affirmed
the constitutionality of the Legislature’s decision to allow Lake
County to have a unique system for the appointment of Superior Court
magistrates.
Each of these cases used a somewhat different formulation or test for
analyzing the claim but reached a uniform result: that the Legislature was
acting within the bounds of its constitutional authority. In my view, the
precedent here has not been established so much by the particular words
different judges have used in their opinions as by the uniform results
those opinions have reached.
These results have been correct and highly appropriate for, as we
frequently observe, “Presuming [a] statute to be constitutional, courts
place the burden upon the challenger ‘to negative every conceivable basis
which might have supported’” constitutionality. Collins v. Day, 644 N.E.2d
72, 80 (Ind. 1994) (upholding the constitutionality of a statute that
denied worker's compensation benefits to farm workers) (quoting Johnson v.
St. Vincent Hosp., Inc., 273 Ind. 374, 392, 404 N.E.2d 585, 597 (1980)
(upholding the constitutionality of the Indiana medical malpractice act)).
Such reasoning is deeply grounded in the jurisprudence of judicial review
that recognizes people’s elected representatives in a democracy, not
unelected judges, are entrusted with the lawmaking power. Judicial review
of the legality of such laws poses a “countermajoritarian difficulty.”[12]
Unless a challenged statute is within the scope of the Bill of Rights, is
directed against discrete and insular minorities, or restricts those
political processes that can ordinarily be expected to bring about repeal
of undesirable legislation, American courts presume constitutionality.
United States v. Carolene Prods. Co., 304 U.S. 144, 152-53 & n.4 (1938).
The legislation at issue here represents a political struggle between
suburban and urban interests. While the geographic focus of this
particular law was St. Joseph County, the legislative history shows a hard-
fought battle in which the suburban interests narrowly prevailed. The vote
in the House of Representatives on the bill was 51-49 – the minimum number
necessary to pass.[13] The vote in the Senate on the bill was 27-19 – one
more than the minimum.[14] Such close votes indicate that this was a bill
with significance well beyond St. Joseph County. It is a classic case of
the countermajoritarian difficulty when a court intervenes to turn those
who lost a close fight in the Legislature into winners.
2. The Court gives little guidance to the General Assembly for the
future.
In the future, the Legislature will need to contend with today’s
decision when it attempts to address such questions as flood control in
Vanderburgh, Unigov in Marion, riverboat gambling or selection of
magistrates in Lake, environmental taxes in Tippecanoe, or annexation in
St. Joseph Counties. The Court gives little guidance to the Legislature in
how it will answer that question.
The test announced by the Court today is that special legislation
will pass constitutional muster only if “the conditions the law addresses”
are unique to the county to which the legislation applies: “if the
conditions the law addresses are found in at least a variety of places
throughout the state, a general law can be made applicable and is required
by Article IV, and special legislation is not permitted.”
But how will this work? Let us take what appears to the Court to be
the easiest case, the Tippecanoe County environmental tax at issue in
Hoovler. The Court tells us that the unique condition the law addresses is
that Tippecanoe County has “unique Superfund site needs.” But this
condition is found in a variety of other counties throughout the state: at
least fifteen other Indiana counties have Superfund sites on the U.S.
Environmental Protection Agency’s Superfund National Priorities List.[15]
That is, the law in Hoovler clearly addresses conditions “found in at least
a variety of places throughout the state.” The Court’s opinion today says
the Hoovler statute is permissible but the Court’s test indicates that it
is not.
Perhaps the greatest difficulty the Legislature will face is trying
to figure out what a court will hold to be “the conditions the law
addresses.” Consider the riverboat gambling statute at issue in Moseley.
It permits such gambling in certain areas contiguous to Lake Michigan, the
Ohio River, and Patoka Lake. If “the conditions the law addresses” are
adjacency to large bodies of water, the statute does not meet the Court’s
test because these conditions are found in a variety of other places:
areas adjacent to the Maumee and Wabash Rivers, Lakes Maxinkukee, Wawasee,
and Monroe, etc. But perhaps a court will hold the law addresses different
conditions. How is the Legislature to know?
3. The Court renders an enormous body of Indiana law suspect and
takes on an enormous burden for the judicial system.
In the Moseley case, one amicus, in an effort to demonstrate how many
statutes would be constitutionally questionable if we were to find the
riverboat gambling statute violated art. I, § 23, filed an appendix with us
with a copy of all such laws. It ran over 500 pages.
With today’s decision, the Court renders at least suspect the
validity of those 500 pages of the Indiana Code. The only way to resolve
the uncertainty will be through litigation, one statute at a time.
4. The Court improperly subjects the City’s claim to art. I, § 23,
scrutiny.
The Court subjects the City’s claim to scrutiny under the Equal
Privileges and Immunities Clause of art. I, § 23. But art. I, § 23,
applies only to “citizens,” which a political subdivision is not. (I note
the City makes no argument that the statute violates its privileges or
immunities.) It is wrong as a textual matter to say that legislation that
applies to some geographic areas of the state and not others could violate
the Equal Privileges and Immunities Clause; our Bill of Rights does not
confer citizenship on political subdivisions. It is also wrong as a
jurisprudential matter not to afford more deference to enactments adopted
by the legislative branch in the exercise of its powers under art. IV than
to legislation within a specific prohibition of the Bill of Rights. See
Carolene Prods., 304 U.S. at 152-53 n.4.
This Court was correct when it held that claims under art. IV, § 23,
presented no justiciable issue. Board of Comm’rs of Jennings County v.
Fetter, 193 Ind. 288, 296, 139 N.E. 451, 454 (1923); Gentile v. State, 29
Ind. 409 (1868).[16]
-----------------------
[1] At the time this action was initiated, the new subsection was codified
at § 36-4-3-13(e). It was moved to subsection (g) in the 1999 amendments
to the statute.
[2] The remonstrators are also required to show: (1) police and fire
protection, and street and road maintenance services are already adequately
provided by a source other than the municipality; and (2) the annexation
would have a significant financial impact on the residents or owners of
land. Ind. Code § 36-4-3-13(g) (2002).
[3] As an alternative to opposition by a majority of landowners, the
remonstrators may show opposition by the owners of more than seventy-five
percent of the assessed valuation of the land. I.C. § 36-4-3-13(g). That
alternative is also available for all other counties under subsection (e)
as it stands today. Id. § 36-4-3-13(e).
[4] Justice Sullivan sees significance in the narrow vote approving the
statute in this case. We do not. The “logrolling” issue Article IV
addresses is not that the legislators have no interest in special
legislation. They may indeed be very interested in using their vote as a
trading chip for special legislation of their own or for other
considerations. But their constituents do not share that interest, leaving
legislators from unaffected areas free from accountability to concerned
voters. Whether Article IV, Section 23’s effort to limit logrolling is
wise is not the issue. The Constitution makes that call for us.
[5] Article IV, Section 22 states:
The General Assembly shall not pass local or special laws: Providing
for the punishment of crimes and misdemeanors; Regulating the practice
in courts of justice; Providing for changing the venue in civil and
criminal cases; Granting divorces; Changing the names of persons;
Providing for laying out, opening, and working on, highways, and for
the election or appointment of supervisors; Vacating roads, town
plats, streets, alleys, and public squares; Summoning and empaneling
grand and petit juries, and providing for their compensation;
Providing for the assessment and collection of taxes for State,
county, township, or road purposes; Providing for the support of
common schools, or the preservation of school funds; Relating to fees
or salaries, except that the laws may be so made as to grade the
compensation of officers in proportion to the population and the
necessary services required; Relating to interest on money; Providing
for opening and conducting elections of State, county, or township
officers, and designating the places of voting; Providing for the sale
of real estate belonging to minors or other persons laboring under
legal disabilities, by executors, administrators, guardians, or
trustees.
[6] The court in Schwartzman stated that the case involved “the
constitutional validity” of certain statutes, 60 F.2d at 1035, but cited no
specific state or federal constitutional provision. The opinion did,
however, cite to the United States Supreme Court’s ruling in Continental
Baking, id. at 1037, which is clearly a federal constitution case.
[7] In viewing the first issue as identification of a law as “special” or
“general,” we agree with some states and disagree with others. The
Louisiana Supreme Court put it precisely as we do: “An analysis of whether
a statute constitutes an unconstitutional local or special law begins with
a determination of whether the law is, in fact, local or special.” Morial
v. Smith & Wesson Corp., 785 So.2d 1, 17 (La. 2001). Other states, like
some earlier Indiana cases, rely on the reasonableness of the
classification to determine whether a particular statute is special
legislation. See, e.g., Concerned Taxpayers of Kootenai County v. Kootenai
County, 50 P.3d 991, 994 (Idaho 2002) (“The test for determining whether a
law is local or special is whether the classification is . . .
unreasonable.”). Arizona’s constitution considers a “special law” to be
the equivalent of the legislation the Indiana Constitution prohibits in
Article I, Section 23, with that state’s courts also employing a
reasonableness test. See Sherman v. City of Tempe, 45 P.3d 336, 341 (Ariz.
2002) (“An unconstitutional special law grants ‘to any corporation,
association, or individual, any special or exclusive privileges.’ To
determine whether a law is a special law we first consider whether the
classification created by the law has a reasonable basis.”) (citation
omitted). Illinois also says it generally judges equal protection and
special legislation challenges “under the same standards.” Miller v.
Rosenberg, 749 N.E.2d 946, 952 (Ill. 2001).
[8] Justice Sullivan points out that there are at least fifteen other
Indiana counties with Superfund sites. This wholly misses the point. The
Superfund liability described in Hoovler was unique because Tippecanoe
County had the only site in the state for which local governmental entities
had been designated Potentially Responsible Parties by the EPA. Hoovler,
668 N.E.2d at 1234. The issue is whether the county government had major
Superfund exposure, not whether a Superfund site was located in the county
but funded by private “Potentially Responsible Parties.”
[9] Justice Sullivan describes the issue in Moseley as whether riverboat
gambling was appropriately permitted in areas contiguous to Lake Michigan,
the Ohio River, and Patoka Lake and not in other Indiana locales bordering
other large bodies of water. As this Court explained, the issue was not
that, but rather whether the different voting procedures in the counties
permitted to have riverboat gambling satisfied Article IV, Section 23:
To their credit, counsel for appellees recognize [that limiting the
locations of riverboats to the specified counties naturally flows from
the fact that not every county is home to a suitable body of water],
and argue beyond it that all counties selected must still be treated
alike. We conclude that the distinctions drawn between Lake County and
the others fit this purpose of this local law. In Lake County, the
whole of the waterfront is covered by substantial cities, whose
residents have the greatest interest in how the shore is used. In all
the other counties, however, the shore contains both incorporated and
unincorporated territory. It thus seems sensible to stage a vote of
all persons in the county.
Moseley, 643 N.E.2d at 301. Moseley thus turned on facts specific to Lake
County as distinguished from the other counties authorized to adopt
riverboat gambling.
[10] To be sure, Article I confers rights on “citizens.” But we do not
mean to imply acceptance of Justice Sullivan’s suggestion that citizens who
are classified by geographic locale have any less claim to equal privileges
and immunities than those classified by any other means. This, however, is
an issue for another day.
[11] The 1960 election was conducted using districts drawn based on the
1920 census. Stout v. Hendricks, 228 F. Supp. 568 (S.D. Ind. 1963). By
reason of the enormous growth of cities and suburbs in the intervening
period, by 1960 some representatives were elected from districts four times
the size of others. Baker v. Carr, 369 U.S. 186 (1962), and Reynolds v.
Sims, 377 U.S. 533 (1964), were regarded as muscular exercises of judicial
power forty years ago, but in retrospect are widely accepted as necessary
checks on legislative discretion for the very reason that the normal
incentives of the legislature to act in the overall public interest are
disabled if each individual legislator is benefited by the status quo. See
Martin D. Carcieri, Bush v. Gore and Equal Protection, 53 S.C. L. Rev. 63,
76-77 (Fall 2001) (“In some cases, notably the voting rights cases, [for
example Baker v. Carr and Reynolds v. Sims] the judicial role can be
defended as necessary to safeguard the equal access of every American to
elected officials and institutions of governance. Even if the institutional
limitations of the adjudicatory process decrease the possibility that
courts can provide comprehensive solutions, on balance the good done by the
judiciary in these cases of political process failure outweighs the
harm.”); Richard H. Pildes, Voting Rights, Equality, and Racial
Gerrymandering: Diffusion of Political Power and the Voting Rights Act, 24
Harv. J.L. & Pub. Pol’y 119, 126-27 (Fall 2000) (“The Supreme Court’s
initial development of the one-person, one-vote doctrine came in the
context of the grotesque, massive malapportionments characteristic at the
time of Baker v. Carr and Reynolds v. Sims. That doctrine resulted in the
necessary destabilization of a democratic system that had become captured
by a small oligopoly that had no interest in changing the rules under which
it had been elected.”).
[12] The scholarship is voluminous. The classics include: Learned Hand,
The Bill Of Rights (1958); Herbert Wechsler, Toward Neutral Principles of
Constitutional Law, in Principles, Politics and Fundamental Law (1961);
Alexander Bickel, The Supreme Court, 1960 Term Forward: The Passive
Virtues, 75 Harv. L. Rev. 40 (1961); Alexander Bickel, The Least Dangerous
Branch (1962); Gerald Gunther, The Subtle Vices of the "Passive Virtues”—A
Comment on Principle and Expediency in Judicial Review, 64 Colum. L. Rev. 1
(1964).
[13] 1993 H.J. 636.
[14] 1993 S.J. 669.
[15] See http://www.epa.gov/superfund/sites/npl/in.htm (visited Jan. 15,
2002). Indiana has many more Superfund sites that do not rise to the level
of a National Priority Site. See
http://www.epa.gov/superfund/sites/cursites/incerlst.htm (visited Jan. 15,
2002).
[16] These early cases deserve more credit than the Court gives them today
because cases decided close to the time of the enactment of the
constitutional provision help us understand the intent of the framers. See
McIntosh v. Melroe Co., 729 N.E.2d 972, 974 (Ind. 2000); Richardson v.
State, 717 N.E.2d 32, 38 (Ind. 1999); Bayh v. Sonnenburg, 573 N.E.2d 398,
412 (Ind.1991), cert. denied 502 U.S. 1094 (1992) (quoting State v. Gibson,
36 Ind. 389, 391 (1871)).