Opinion of the Justices to the House of Representatives (Lawyers Weekly No. 10-097-15)
NOTICE: All slip opinions and orders are subject to formal revision and are superseded by the advance sheets and bound volumes of the Official Reports. If you find a typographical error or other formal error, please notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Judicial Court, John Adams Courthouse, 1 Pemberton Square, Suite 2500, Boston, MA 02108-1750; (617) 557-1030; SJCReporter@sjc.state.ma.us SJC-11883 OPINION OF THE JUSTICES TO THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES. General Court. Constitutional Law, General Court, Appropriation of money, Taxation. Statute, Appropriation of money, Amendment. Taxation. On June 15, 2015, the Justices submitted the following response to questions propounded to them by the House of Representatives. To the Honorable the House of Representatives of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts: The undersigned Justices of the Supreme Judicial Court respectfully submit this response to the questions set forth in an order adopted by the House of Representatives on May 22, 2015, and transmitted to us on that date. The order poses five questions concerning the State budget legislation for fiscal year 2016. All of the questions involve Part II, c. 1, § 3, art. 7, of the Massachusetts Constitution, which we will refer to as the origination article.[1] They ask, among other things, whether certain provisions in the House budget bill rendered it a “money bill” within the meaning of the origination article, and whether the Senate improperly “originated” a money bill in violation of this article. As explained below, we are of the view that the House bill was a money bill, and that the Senate did not improperly originate a money bill.[2] Bills and amendments at issue. We begin by summarizing the history of the various bills and amendments that give rise to the questions, and by describing generally the provisions that are at issue, reserving for later a more detailed analysis of the legal effect of those provisions. On March 4, 2015, acting pursuant to art. 63, § 2, of the Amendments to the Massachusetts Constitution, as amended by art. 107 of the Amendments, and pursuant to G. L. c. 29, § 7H, the Governor filed with the House his recommended budget for fiscal year 2016, which, as is customary, was designated House No. 1. Among its many provisions was section 27, entitled “Delay FAS 109 Deduction,”[3] which provided: “Subsection (2) of section 95 of chapter 173 of the acts of 2008 is hereby amended by striking out the figure ’2016′, inserted by section 189 of chapter 165 of the acts of 2014, and inserting in place thereof the following figure:- 2017.” The Governor’s submission described section 27 as follows: “This section delays until tax year 2017 the start of the deduction allowed to certain publicly-traded companies to offset increases in their net deferred tax […]