North Dakota Supreme Court Highlights continued ...
The Court held the bill ’ s title did not fairly apprise the reader of anything other than the act is a general appropriations bill that also deals with an assortment of unrelated laws . The Court also held the body of S . B . 2015 embraced multiple distinct subjects extraneous and not germane to even the impermissibly broad topic of “ state government functions .” Specific to NDPERS , the Court stated the substance of S . B . 2015 , § 41 amends a law concerning the number of individuals who may sit on the NDPERS Board , their qualifications , and how they are appointed . As section 41 does not relate to the many other provisions of S . B . 2015 , the Court held both the title and body of S . B . 2015 embraces more than one subject and therefore violates N . D . Const . art . IV , § 13 .
The Court then considered the effect of S . B . 2015 being unconstitutional . The Court held when legislation , such as S . B . 2015 , includes multiple subjects in both the body and the title , the whole act is invalid because its formation was contrary to the constitutional single subject prohibition .
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Chief Justin Jensen concurred in the majority opinion that S . B . 2015 violated the single subject rule but concurred specially to provide that due to the far-reaching implication of the Court ’ s decision and prior deference with regard to the single subject rule , the Court should stay the mandate of the Court ’ s decision for a period of 30 days to provide the legislature an opportunity to call a special session and enact all impacted legislation in compliance with the single subject rule . The Chief Justice also wrote if the Court reached the merits of the underlying legislation at issue , he would have concluded the legislation regarding appointing four sitting legislators to the NDPERS board did not violate the various articles of the Constitution .
Justice McEvers also wrote a separate concurrence joined by Judge Lee ( sitting in place of Justice Bahr ) that agreed with the majority opinion concluding the legislation enacted is in violation of the single subject rule . Justice McEvers also agreed with the Chief Justice that a stay of the mandate is appropriate given the unusual facts and circumstances of the case and decision .
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