California Advisory Opinions December 30, 1982: Ca. Att. Gen Opinion 82-1003

Advisory Opinion Text

TO BE PUBLISHED IN THE OFFICIAL REPORTS

GEORGE DEUKMEJIAN Attorney General

OPINION
of
GEORGE DEUKMEJIAN Attorney General
Clayton P. Roche Deputy Attorney General

THE HONORABLE DON ROGERS, MEMBER OF THE ASSEMBLY, has requested an opinion on the following question:

What is the effective date of Proposition 6, approved by the voters at the June 8, 1982, primary election?

The effective date of Proposition 6, approved by the voters at the June 8, 1982, primary election, is June 8, 1982, at 8:00 p.m., by virtue of section 4 of the proposition itself.

At the June 8, 1982, direct primary election, the voters approved Proposition 6. The proposition repealed certain provisions of the Revenue and Taxation

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Code and added other provisions to that code. The basic purpose of this initiative measure was to repeal California's gift and inheritance taxes. The issue presented is what is the effective date of the proposition.

With respect to statewide initiative and referendum measures, the California Constitution provides in article II, section 10(a):

"Sec. 10.(a). An initiative statute or referendum approved by a majority of votes takes effect the day after the election unless the measure provides otherwise . . . ." (Emphasis added.)

However, section 4 of Proposition 6 provided:

"Section 4. This act shall become operative as of the date of passage hereof , and shall apply to estates of those persons dying on or after such date , to transfers occurring by reason of a death occurring on or after such date , and to gifts made or completed on or after such date . . . ." (Emphases added.)

We are asked if Proposition 6 was effective on June 9, 1982, the day after the election, by virtue of article II, section 10(a), supra , or on June 8, 1982, the day of the election, by virtue of section 4 of the measure set forth above.

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The applicable rule of interpretation is set forth by the California Supreme Court in Atlantic Richfield Co . v. Workers' Comp . Appeals Bd . (1982) 31 Cal.3d 715, 726 as follows:

"We have said that 'It is a settled principle in California law that "When statutory language is . . . clear and unambiguous there is no need for construction, and courts should not indulge in it." ( Solberg v. Superior Court (1977) 19 Cal.3d 182, 198 . . . .)' ( In re Waters of Long Valley Creek Stream System (1979) 25 Cal.3d 339, 348 [158 Cal.Rptr. 350, 599 P.2d 656].) Thus 'We have declined to follow the plain meaning of a statute only when it would inevitably have frustrated the manifest purposes of the legislation as a whole or led to absurd results. [Citations.]' ( People v. Belleci (1979) 24 Cal.3d 879, 884 [157 Cal.Rptr. 503, 598 P.2d 473].)"

The plain meaning of section 4 of Proposition 6, supra , is that the proposition shall be operative (that is efficacious or effective) as of June 8, 1982, the day of the election. Furthermore, if the intent were that it should not be operative or effective until June 9, 1982, there would have been no need for the language in section 4 regarding the operative date. Such language would have been surplusage. However, as stated by the court in City and County of San Francisco v. Farrell (1982) 32 Cal.3d 47, 54:

"In construing the words of a statute . . . an interpretation which would render terms surplusage should be avoided, and every word should be given some significance, leaving no part useless or devoid of meaning. . . ."

Nor do we see that making Proposition 6 operative, that is, effective immediately is either absurd or frustrates the intent of the voters. Statutes are often made effective immediately. (See Cal. Const., art. IV, § 8, subd. (c)(2).) "Immediately" is, of course, the date of the election (or "the date of the passage"), and not the following day. As noted by the court in People v. Clark (1851) 1 Cal. 406, 407 in a situation where both the time of day as well as the date a statute was enacted was significant:

"To hold that a law operates all that part of the day of its passage prior thereto, is as absurd and as much of a fiction as the old doctrine that, by relation, it should commence running on the first day of the parliament. And if a statute shall go into effect from and after its passage , that is, from and after the point of time when it received the approval of the executive and became thus law, it would be equally as irrational and as much a fiction to imagine that it did not really become a law until the next day ."

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In People v. Clark the question presented was whether a particular judicial office was an appointive office to be filled by the Governor or an elective office to be filled by the People. This question arose because on the very day the electorate was to fill the office, the Legislature passed a bill changing the nature of the office from elective to appointive. The bill was signed by the Governor on the same day. The bill was approved to take effect from and after its passage . The California Supreme Court remanded the matter to the trial court to ascertain the precise time of the day the Governor signed the bill, that is, whether it was before or after the electorate had finished voting to determine whether the new law or the vote of the People predominated.

Cases such as People v. Clark , supra , 1 Cal.406 point out the only possible "ambiguity" we discern in the language of Proposition 6, that is, what time of day on the date of its passage was it to be operative. By analogy to cases such as People v. Clark , we believe the answer should be at 8:00 p.m. on that date, the time the polls closed and the electorate had done all that they could to approve or pass the measure. Such a construction gives effect to the intent of the voters that the measure should be effective at the first possible instant while also avoiding any argument of constitutional infirmity which would inhere were Proposition 6 to be construed as being operative the entire day of June 8, 1982. ( Braxton v. Municipal Court (1973) 10 Cal.3d 138, 145, statutes should be construed in manner consistent with constitutional requirements.)

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Accordingly, we conclude that Proposition 6 was effective on June 8, 1982, the date of the election, at 8:00 p.m., and that in making it effective immediately, the drafters and the People were exercising their option provided in article II, section 10(a) to provide a date other than the date after the election as the effective date.