Kohler v. Tugwell

292 F. Supp. 978
CourtDistrict Court, E.D. Louisiana
DecidedFebruary 24, 1969
DocketCiv. A. 68-253
StatusPublished
Cited by24 cases

This text of 292 F. Supp. 978 (Kohler v. Tugwell) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, E.D. Louisiana primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Kohler v. Tugwell, 292 F. Supp. 978 (E.D. La. 1969).

Opinions

RUBIN, District Judge:

Louisiana citizens seek an injunction prohibiting any action under the authority of a state constitutional amendment adopted in 1966 on the ground that the designation of the amendment as it appeared on the state ballot misled voters. Hence, they contend that those who voted in favor of the enactment were deprived of their right to- vote, and were denied both Due Process of Law1 and the right to a Republican Form of Government.2

In 1952 Louisiana’s voters adopted a constitutional amendment to authorize the dedication of state revenues to supplement the financing of a toll bridge. After the bridge was built, some of its users objected to the payment of tolls. During the 1964 gubernatorial campaign, one of the candidates promised that, if he were elected, passage on the bridge would be free. Upon his election, the Governor kept his promise. He approved a contract between the Mississippi River Bridge Authority and the State of Louisiana Department of Highways.3 This provided that State highway funds would be paid to service the bonds and tolls would not be collected so long as this was done.

Later the Mississippi River Bridge Authority began to plan the possible construction of additional bridges across the river in the New Orleans area, and it was necessary to amend the Constitution to permit the further pledge of state funds to assist in financing the construction of any new bridge.

Accordingly, on November 8, 1966, Louisiana’s citizens were presented with the proposal as part of a ballot containing forty-four other proposed amendments to their Constitution,4 already the longest in the Union.5 Proposed Amendment 26 was identified on the ballot as follows:

“For or Against:”
“The proposed amendment to Article VI, Section 22(a) (4) of the Louisiana Constitution to amend so as to provide for a dedication of funds to the police jury of the parish of Tangipahoa and a dedication of funds to the St. Charles-St. John the Baptist Bridge and Ferry Authority and so as to provide for funds for additional river crossings across the Mississippi River at or near New Orleans for so long a time as any bonds, whatsoever are outstanding in connection with any such bridge and reimposing reasonable tolls on all bridges and facilities of the Greater New Orleans Mississippi River Bridge Authority.” (Emphasis supplied.)

Louisiana’s constitution requires that proposed constitutional amendments be submitted to the voters but mentions the manner in which they are to be described only by stating that amendments “shall be so submitted as to enable the electors to vote on each amendment [980]*980separately.”6 However, the State Constitution does require 7 the full text of each proposed amendment to be published in a newspaper in each of the state’s sixty-four parishes twice during a period at least thirty and not more than sixty days before the election, and this was done.

The plaintiffs contend that the language in the ballot’s description of Amendment 26 led voters to believe that tolls would be reimposed on the existing bridge as soon as the constitutional amendment became effective, twenty days after issuance of the Governor’s proclamation declaring its passage,8 when in fact the amendment contains no requirement that tolls be reimposed. They urge that voters were misled, for the ballot description would lead the average voter to read the words “ . . . and reimposing reasonable tolls on all bridges” to mean as soon as this amendment becomes effective.

The defendants read the ballot designation as saying that the amendment is “to provide for * * * reimposing reasonable tolls,” finding the inference in the text that the tolls will be reimposed when additional bridges are built.

The relevant part of the amendment itself first provides for the payment of certain sums from State Highway Fund No. 2 to the Parish of Tangipahoa and to the St. Charles — St. John the Baptist Bridge and Ferry Authority. Then it states:

“* * * provided that the foregoing $100,000.00 annual payment to the governing authority of the parish of Tangipahoa and the foregoing $150,000.00 annual payment to the St. Charles — St. John the Baptist Bridge and Ferry Authority shall in no event become due and payable unless and until presently outstanding bonds of the Mississippi River Bridge Authority are paid or refunded in full in principal and interest in order for the building of an additional Bridge or Bridges within the Jurisdiction of the Mississippi River Bridge Authority for which financing the imposition or re-imposition of tolls is required.”

It is charitable to say the language of this clause insofar as it relates to “the building of an additional Bridge or Bridges” is inartistic. These words seem to us, in Judge Learned Hand’s memorable phrase, to “dance before [our] eyes in a meaningless procession * * * leav[ing] in [our] mind[s] only a confused sense of some vitally important, but successfully concealed purport * * 9 At best ambiguous, they may in fact be unintelligible. But no issue of their interpretation is raised here, and whether meaning can be found in them is a matter for the Louisiana courts.10

So far as we can divine the intended meaning without resorting to haruspication, we surmise that the provision merely suspends any payments to the designated parochial authorities until after payment in full of all bridge bonds outstanding when the amendment was adopted and of all bonds issued subsequent to its passage financed by the imposition or reimposition of tolls. If so, the constitutional amendment makes no requirement that tolls be reimposed at any time, although the exigencies of financing and the demands of bond buyers may as a practical matter make the levying of tolls inescapable.

It is apparent that the text is so turgid that it would be difficult to say that any ballot designation could describe it accurately. The voters could attempt to derive their own interpretations from the entire text of the pro[981]*981posed amendment, which was published twice in every parish in the state. The language that1 appeared on the ballot was not phrased by some official11 but was set forth verbatim in the legislative act that proposed the constitutional amendment. What appeared on the ballot was sufficient to tell the voters what the complicated constitutional amendment was about. It was up to them to study its exact text.

The issue before us is not a proposition for grammarians. If the average voter had to decide what he was voting on from the ballot alone, he might well have read it as the plaintiffs do. But he did not have to decide from this summary. He could look at the amendment itself.

The ballot, as will appear from Appendix A, was long. No one who has voted in any election at which voting machines are used can fail to know that Louisiana’s voters, once they stand before a voting machine in a voting booth, are not likely to be able to study the description of each proposition on the ballot. They must come to the polls prepared in advance to vote on the amendments if they are to vote with any semblance of understanding.

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Bluebook (online)
292 F. Supp. 978, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/kohler-v-tugwell-laed-1969.