JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. – The Missouri Supreme Court ruled 4-3 Tuesday that HB 150, a bill that limited unemployment benefits, was passed over Gov. Jay Nixon’s veto unconstitutionally in the Sept. 2015 veto session.
The bill was truly agreed to and finally passed April 21, 2015 and vetoed by the governor May 5 before being taken up by the House May 12 and passed over on the veto. However, the Senate did not vote to pass the bill over veto until the following veto session in September.
In the majority opinion, Judge George Draper III, joined by Judges Laura Stith, Paul Wilson and Richard Teitelman, found that the bill was not a “late-vetoed bill,” meaning a bill vetoed in the last five days of of a legislative session. Draper argued only late-vetoed bills qualified to be vetoed during session.
“Since [1945]…the people of Missouri gradually have restricted the legislature’s power regarding which bills it can reconsider and when the reconsideration can occur,” Draper writes. “The subsequent amendments enacted by the people of Missouri have made a clear distinction between ‘every bill’ returned by the governor and late-vetoed bills. This Court must presume these amendments have meaning and were intended to define the scope of the September veto session.”
Draper was definitive that the state constitution said that the Senate’s failure to pass the bill by the end of the 2015 regular legislative session made its passage meaningless.
“Because HB 150 was not passed over the governor’s veto, none of its provisions became law.”
Rep. Scott Fitzpatrick, R-Shell Knob, authored the legislation and disagreed with the decision.
“To be honest, I’m shocked. To reverse the decision of the lower court on a 4-3 decision shows a lack of jurisprudence,” Fitzpatrick said. “I think it shows a partisan edge to the court.”
Stith, Draper, Teitelman, and Wilson were all appointed by Democratic governors, either Nixon or former Gov. Bob Holden. However, Judge Mary Russell, another Holden appointee, wrote the dissenting opinion. She believes the majority twisted the language of the constitution.
“HB 150 is valid and enforceable because the General Assembly followed the procedures required by the Missouri Constitution for passing a bill over the governor’s objections,” she said. “To reach its result invalidating the substantive provisions of the bill, the majority opinion reads into the text… of the Missouri Constitution limitations on the plenary power of the legislature that do not appear in the plain language of the section.”
Chief Justice Patricia Breckenridge and Judge Zel Fischer joined on Russell’s dissent.
The Governor expressed that he was pleased with the ruling.
“I am pleased with the Supreme Court ruling,” Nixon said. “The judges’ ruling clarifies the law limiting when the legislature may vote to override a Governor’s veto and is good news for thousands of Missourians who were wrongfully denied the unemployment benefits they had earned.”
Rep. Jake Hummel, the outgoing Minority Floor Leader, was pleased with the outcome and had sharp words for the majority.
“The constitutional limitations on when lawmakers have the legal authority to override a veto cannot be ignored simply because the majority party finds them inconvenient,” he said in a statement. “Unfortunately, Republican legislative leaders too often treat the Missouri Constitution as [a] mere set of guidelines rather than actual rules. With today’s Supreme Court decision, we hope GOP lawmakers have finally learned that claiming to be a constitutional conservative requires one to obey the constitution.
“Although we are certain GOP lawmakers will again try to reduce unemployment benefits next year, Democrats are confident that after the upcoming elections we will be in a strong position to stop them.”
The President of the Missouri AFL-CIO Mike Louis was also pleased with the decision.
“This is a victory for all working people. Everyone who loses a job by no fault of their own, deserves to be paid what they have earned,” he said. “Our legislators had no right to manipulate our laws to hurt hard working families in favor of big business nor to ignore the rules of the people as dictated in our great state’s Constitution.”
As a lead advocate of House Bill 150, the Missouri Chamber strongly supported the bill, which among several provisions,would tie the number of weeks of unemployment benefits that are available to the unemployment rate. The Missouri Chamber will pursue this legislation again in the 2017 Legislative Session.
“The Missouri Chamber is extremely disappointed in the Supreme Court decision. This common-sense measure was designed to protect Missouri’s unemployment insurance system from economic downturns that have repeatedly thrown Missouri’s fund into insolvency over the last decade,” said Dan Mehan, Missouri Chamber president and CEO.
“I’m disappointed with the Missouri Supreme Court decision to nullify the successful veto override of House Bill 150,” said bill handler Sen. Mike Kehoe, R-Jefferson City. “The measure included important regulatory reforms for small businesses and would have helped insulate the state from any future economic downturns. This issue is vitally important to Missouri businesses and the state’s budget, and I expect the legislature to pursue these improvements next year with a new governor.”
Fitzpatrick sounded that Republicans will put the law on the books once again in the 2017 session.
“If that’s where we’re at, we’ll file the bill again and it will become law next year,” he said.
