Evers v. Marklein
Wisconsin Supreme Court held that statutes permitting a legislative committee to pause, object to, or suspend administrative rules for varying periods of time both before and after promulgation — used by the committee in this case effectively to block for three years a rule banning “conversion therapy” for LGBTQ+ patients — facially violate the state constitution’s bicameralism and presentment requirements. Because the majority found the laws violate bicameralism and presentment, they did not address the parties’ alternative separation of powers arguments.
In an earlier installment of the case, the court ruled that a law permitting a legislative budget committee to block a land conservation agency’s decisions about how to spend money already appropriated to the agency by the legislature violated the executive branch’s “core power” to “take care that the laws be faithfully executed.” While the Wisconsin Constitution gives the legislature authority to create an agency, define its parameters, and appropriate funds for it, the power to spend those funds in accordance with legislation lies solely with the executive, the court said.
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