Recent funding cuts to California's beleaguered court system may be so severe as to be unconstitutional. At issue is whether the $350 million that lawmakers permanently slashed from the budget could violate California's separation of powers doctrine under Article III, section 3, of the state constitution.
"We are supposed to have three independent, coequal branches of government," said H. Scott Leviant, a senior associate at Spiro Moss in Los Angeles who has written about court budgets. "With these cuts, the judiciary is now effectively second fiddle to the governor and legislature."
That's also the view of the San Francisco bar association, which is convening a task force to advocate for more money for the courts and to educate people about the impact of the cuts.
"The inadequate funding of our third branch of government threatens our very democracy and may present an unconstitutional infringement upon the independence of the courts," says bar President Priya Sanger. "The courts protect the minority against the will of the majority, but these cuts could prevent it from being independent of the other branches of government."
Constitutional challenges to judicial cutbacks have arisen in other states. The Mississippi Supreme Court ruled in 2010 that funding cuts forcing the closure of state courts there violated the state constitution, holding that the legislature had a duty to adequately fund all the branches of government. Also last year, New York's Court of Appeals overturned a decade-long pay freeze for state judges that it said violated the separation of powers.
Such a challenge in California would have to be considered from first principles, says Shane G. Smith, an associate at McDermott Will & Emery in Menlo Park who pointed to
LeFrancois v. Goel (35 Cal. 4th 1094 (2005)) as a possible guide. In that case the state Supreme Court explained that while legislators may regulate the inherent power of the judiciary, they may not deprive or materially impair its ability to resolve cases.
For now, California jurists are primarily focused on making do with less. This month the San Francisco Superior Court plans to put 41 percent of it's staff "on-notice" and close 25 of its 63 courtrooms. And observers expect courts to drastically reduce the number of civil cases they accept.
"These cuts have certainly marginalized access to justice," says California Chief Justice Tani Cantil-Sakauye. "It's hard to say yet if this rises to the level of a constitutional violation."
Kari Santos
Daily Journal Staff Writer
