The Arizona Supreme Court agreed on May 23 to hear a lawsuit filed by the Legislature that alleges Governor Napolitano exceeded her authority when she used a line-tem veto to void a portion of a state employee pay raise bill in January.
Oral arguments for Weiers v. Napolitano were set to be heard on June 27, said Cari Gerchick, a spokeswoman for the court.
The lawsuit, filed by the Republican-led House and Senate in March, states Ms. Napolitano’s deletion of a section of H2662 that would have excluded about 200 future employees from the state’s merit system unlawfully interferes with their constitutional lawmaking power.
Republicans say they fully expected the court to hear the case.
“We had every confidence they would,” House Majority Leader Steve Tully, R-11, said.
Though Democrats were opposed en masse to motions by both the House and the Senate to authorize the lawsuit on behalf of the Legislature, some say the court made the right decision in hearing the case.
“I’m glad they are [accepting the case],” House Minority Whip Pete Rios, D-23, said. “Setting politics aside, I think this, at the end of the day, is a separation-of-powers issue.”
However, some Democrats still say the lawsuit is a political ploy that is wasting time and money.
“They’re going after [Ms. Napolitano] on everything,” House Assistant Minority Leader Linda Lopez said of legislative Republicans. “This is just one of a long string of things.”
In February, both legislative chambers approved motions empowering House Speaker Jim Weiers, R-10, and Senate President Ken Bennett, R-1, to act on behalf of the Legislature.
That move was done in response to a Supreme Court ruling in the 2002 Bennett v. Napolitano case, in which the court deemed four lawmakers did not have standing to act on behalf of the Legislature to sue the governor for perceived misuse of her line-item veto powers.
Sen. Linda Aguirre, D-16, said the suit may cause political problems for the governor, but welcomed an answer to the question posed.
“At least we’ll have a decision on that,” she said. “We’ll know clear cut what she can line item and what she can’t line item. It was always a question in my mind and it was probably a question in her mind, but she wanted to see how far she could do a line item.”
Mr. Rios, who, as Senate president in 1992, brought his own line-item-veto lawsuit against then-Gov. Fife Symington, says the court needs to better define what legally constitutes an appropriation to ensure future governors don’t have carte blanche to line-item veto more than the state Constitution intends.
“To give that kind of power to governors, to decide what is and isn’t an appropriation, is basically rendering the Legislature neutral,” he said.
Mr. Tully went a step further, saying the court would “fundamentally alter the balance of power between the legislative and executive branches” if it rules Ms. Napolitano acted within the scope of her constitutional powers.
“If her logic is allowed to stand,” he said, “then the governor has line-item veto power on virtually anything.”
The governor vetoed the bill because she said exempting employees from the state merit system would cost the state more because exempted employees earn time off at a higher rate than other employees.
The proponents of the lawsuit insist the veto was unconstitutional because the deleted portion did not contain a “certain sum,” a “specified object” and “authority to spend,” and therefore did not fit the definition of appropriation the court specified in the Rios v. Symington case.
The current lawsuit alleges the governor deprived the Legislature of its constitutional authority to pass laws.
“When unconstitutional action prevents a bill, or any part of it, from becoming law even though passed by a majority vote, the legislative branch has sustained an actual and palpable injury,” the lawsuit reads.
Governor’s reply to the lawsuit
In a reply to the lawsuit, Tim Nelson, an attorney for Ms. Napolitano, disputed that language, which is also found in the Rios v. Symington decision.
“No specific language is necessary for a legislative act to be an appropriation,” he wrote. “Instead, the legislation must simply reflect an intent to authorize executive officials to pay an ascertainable sum for a specified object. That test is met.”
The governor’s veto powers must be “interpreted broadly” to ensure the power to “participate meaningfully” in the appropriations process, he wrote.
The Arizona Constitution upholds the governor’s power to line item veto portions of appropriations legislation in Article 5, Section 7. It reads: “If any bill presented to the Governor contains several items of appropriations of money, he may object to one or more such items, while approving other portions of the bill.”
Mr. Nelson had urged the court not to accept the suit because the Legislature had sought to create a “constitutional question” out of a “political dispute” with the governor’s line item veto — and voted to decline a veto override.
Ms. Napolitano said she did not expect the Supreme Court’s decision to affect budget negotiations.
“It’s a pretty confined issue,” she said. “If we reach a budget agreement, one would think part of that would be I wouldn’t line-item veto, or there would be agreed items I could line item veto.”
The future employees who would be affected by the legislation were classified as pay grade 24 or higher and set to receive annual salaries between $49,408 and $84,596.
Ms. Napolitano signed the remaining portions of the bill into law, which appropriated $51.7 million for the current fiscal year and included $169 million for employee pay raises during the next fiscal year.
Senate reporter Phil Riske contributed to this article.