On SDPB Wednesday, Brendan Johnson previewed at least one of the arguments that sponsors of Amendment A will use to beat back the state-backed lawsuits seeking to repeal the voter-approved legalization of marijuana in South Dakota. The intervening sponsors (intervening, because Attorney General Jason Ravnsborg is supposed to defend South Dakota’s constitution and voters in court, but good grief, Ravnsborg is too busy looking at his phone to mount any good legal defense) contend that the challenge from gubernatorially funded cops should have been filed before Amendment A went to the voters:
“If you have a question about the constitutionality of the measures the time to argue that and the time to seek to enjoin that from going on the ballot is before you have tens of thousands of people voting on it,” Johnson says. “Once it is in the constitution it is, of course, constitutional” [Lee Strubinger, “Marijuana Group Says Post-Election Court Challenge Is Too Late,” SDPB, 2020.12.02].
Johnson and the Amendment A Team will surely lay out the legal support for the too-late argument in greater detail in their court filings. But Johnson’s SDPB soundbite doesn’t feel entirely correct.
The state’s agents are making two arguments against Amendment A: (1) that it is a revision, not an amendment, and should have been run through a constitutional convention first, and (2) that it covers more than one subject and thus was not legally proposed. Both arguments could have been made before the election. I made the single-subject argument back in January. Heck, both arguments could have been made in 2019, during the petitioning, when the complainants could have sought a court injunction against the effort to place this allegedly improper amendment on the ballot.
But do arguments of impropriety in the crafting and adoption of a constitutional amendment end just because the voters have approved it? If we elect a person to office and then discover that person bribed voters, that person loses her office [SDCL 12-26-17]. At least by analogy, it would seem that if we discover some fatal flaw in a constitutional amendment adopted by the voters, the courts can annul that adoption, saying, “Sorry, words don’t get into the constitution if they don’t follow the rules.”
Johnson’s argument does make some sense given the limited scope of the complainants’ challenge. They aren’t claiming Amendment A violates any provision of the obviously overriding federal Constitution. The complaint is entirely internal: this new provision we’ve written into our state Constitution allegedly violates other provisions of our state Constitution. But the amendment itself doesn’t create any unworkable contradiction in the execution of our Constitution; only the process by which it was adopted has problems.
But as much as I’d like to say, if you have a complaint with the process, you have to bring it up during the process, I keep thinking that we have a right to bring up procedural errors as reasons to reverse a legislative action. if the county commission adopts an ordinance but lacked a quorum or did not give proper notice, the court can moot that ordinance. If the voters enact a constitutional amendment by unconstitutional means, it seems interested parties should still be able to challenge that amendment.
But stay tuned for the legal briefs and the case law the Amendment A Team will provide.
Wait a second, Cory. Are you trying to fairly criticize this legal effort by a Democrat, based solely on it’s lack of merits, rather than blindly supporting anything a Democrat does?
This does not compute. You are supposed to be a Libtard partisan hack.
Very suspicious behavior. Is this a deep-state trick? False Flag operation?….Hmmm.
*heavy sarcasm implied*
Pubs are always about control what can you say? Its a mental disorder and it won’t go away.
Cory’s analysis seem correct. It would be very strange indeed if an unconstitutional law were permited to stand simply because of the timing of a challenge pointing out its constitutional defect.
A particularly odd aspect of the challenge here, however, is the proposition that one constitutional provision, here the single subject language, would trump all later attempts to amend that Constitution, here the marijuana Amendment. It would be like arguing the 18th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution prohibiting alcohol, barred the 21st Amendment repealing this prohibition. Once an Amendment is submitted and ratified by voters it would seem that the new Amendment would trump any prior inconsistent constitutional language. While a Constitution certainly and clearly bars the adoption or enforcement of inconsistent statutes, it makes little sense to argue that a Constitution bars voters from proposing and ratifying internal changes by Amendment to that same Constitution.
If two stautes cannot be reconciled, then the courts will typically apply the “doctrine of implied repeal.” I have not researched whether this applies to two irreconciliable constitutional provisionss, but I see no compelling reason why it would not apply
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Implied_repeal#:~:text=The%20doctrine%20of%20implied%20repeal,earlier%20Act%20become%20legally%20inoperable.
Last, but not least, TAG’s comment made me chuckle!
Looks like the Democratic House has passed a bill to decriminalize and tax marijuana. Kinda will moot and boot ol’ Thom and Miller right in the backside.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Democratic-controlled House on Friday approved a bill to decriminalize and tax marijuana at the federal level, an attempt to reverse what supporters called a failed policy of criminalization of pot use and taking steps to address racial disparities in enforcement of federal drug laws.
Opponents, mostly Republicans, called the bill a hollow political gesture and mocked Democrats for bringing it up at a time when thousands of Americans are dying from the coronavirus pandemic.” Rapid City Journal 12.4.20
These same republicans called the Covid a hoax, what hoaxes they are.
I had a friend in the Legislature, in SD an “R” of coarse, and they said the same thing about IM 22. They said it addressed to many issues so they repealed it. They said they would take care of the problems that Legislative session —— and like usual they did not. The Legislature can repeal an IM, but not a constitutional amendment. The strongest argument I have heard for the courts letting it stand as passed is the fact that everything in the amendment is connected to legalizing pot as a process —– not separate issues.
Chan chan Compay Segundo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WAjRmHODjyQ&feature=emb_logo
Enjoy the peace. Stay safe, wash your mitts and wear a mask.
Chip in and help out “South Dakotans for Better Marijuana Laws” donation page. Kick in some money to show how much you appreciate the efforts to block the brown shirts from stealing your vote.
The defendants are: Defendants means patriots
Randy Seiler, chair of the South Dakota Democratic Party and a former U.S. Attorney;
Melissa Mentele, executive director of New Approach South Dakota and sponsor of the successful medical marijuana ballot initiative;
Bill Stocker, a retired Sioux Falls police officer;
Chuck Parkinson, former staffer for Sen. Jim Abdnor and former appointees of Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush.”
Small grassroot donations. Booyah!!
“The committee has an initial fundraising goal of $10,000 and raised more than $8,000 between Nov. 20, when the lawsuit was filed, and Dec. 2, according to the group’s Facebook page.
“So far the response by way of small dollar donations from South Dakotans has been tremendous,” Johnson said.” Rapid City Journal 12.4.2020
Democracy hippocracy deja vu all over again.
Not only does South Dakota need a foreign election intervention (Perhaps Kenya) but the entire country does.
“Sure, Joe Biden won both the Electoral College and the popular vote. But the president refuses to give up. He’s got some militias in the north and the south solidly behind him, along with large sections of the country. You know what that means. Conditions are ripe for the secretary of state of some foreign country to parachute in and broker a power-sharing deal, as John Kerry did in Afghanistan in 2014. Maybe Trump could serve as chief executive officer of a unity government. Or he could be put in charge of national reconciliation. If that doesn’t work, maybe it’s time for a loya jirga.” Farah Stockman, New York Times 12.5.20
Democracy and freedom are being stolen from us. We are no longer the guiding light to the world under present conditions. Thom and Miller say they defend the Constitution, but they are lying. They are only looking out for their bonus money they get for busting sick people and people seeking individual freedom. Both are a clear and present danger to freedom while mocking the very uniforms they wear.