Caseflicks

Supreme Court of the United States • 1920

Hawke v. Smith (No. 1)

253 U.S. 221 | 40 S. Ct. 495 | 64 L. Ed. 871 | 1920 U.S. LEXIS 1416 | 10 A.L.R. 1504

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Takeaway

In short, this case holds that when Congress chooses ratification by state legislatures under Article V, a state may not require a popular referendum before that ratification becomes effective.

Background

Congress proposed the Eighteenth Amendment in December 1917 and specified that it would become effective only if ratified by the legislatures of three-fourths of the states within seven years. Ohio’s General Assembly ratified the amendment in January 1919, and the Governor transmitted the ratification to federal officials. Ohio was subsequently included among the thirty-six states proclaimed to have ratified the amendment.

Before Ohio’s ratification, the state electorate had adopted a state constitutional provision reserving a referendum power over the General Assembly’s ratification of proposed federal constitutional amendments. Hawke sought to enjoin Ohio’s Secretary of State from spending public funds to prepare ballots for such a referendum on the Eighteenth Amendment’s ratification.

The Ohio Court of Common Pleas sustained a demurrer to Hawke’s petition. The Ohio Court of Appeals and the Supreme Court of Ohio affirmed. Hawke brought the case to the United States Supreme Court.

Issues

Issue #1

Whether Ohio could require the General Assembly’s ratification of a proposed federal constitutional amendment to be submitted to the people through a state referendum.

Holding

No. Article V requires ratification by state legislatures or state conventions, as Congress selects, and Ohio could not add a popular-referendum requirement to legislative ratification.

Reasoning

Article V creates a complete national process for constitutional amendment. Congress may propose an amendment, or call a proposing convention on application of two-thirds of the state legislatures, and Congress chooses whether the states will ratify through their legislatures or through conventions. Because Congress selected legislative ratification for the Eighteenth Amendment, ratification had to occur through that constitutionally prescribed method.

The Constitution’s reference to state “Legislatures” means the representative lawmaking bodies of the states. At the founding, that term had a settled meaning, and the Constitution consistently distinguishes action by a legislature from direct action by the people. Where the Constitution meant to require popular action, as in the selection of House members, it used language expressly calling for election by the people.

The framers could have made constitutional amendments subject to direct popular vote, but they instead chose deliberative bodies—state legislatures or state conventions—as the two permissible ratifying institutions. State officials, legislatures, and courts cannot alter that federal choice by imposing another step, even one authorized by the state constitution.

Issue #2

Whether a state legislature’s ratification of a proposed federal amendment is ordinary state legislation that may be subjected to the state’s referendum process.

Holding

No. Ratification is a federal constitutional function, not an act of ordinary state legislation.

Reasoning

A legislature ordinarily derives its power to enact state laws from the people of the state. But its authority to ratify a proposed federal constitutional amendment comes directly from Article V, to which both the state and its people have assented. Ratification is therefore the state legislature’s expression of assent to a federal proposal, not an exercise of its ordinary lawmaking authority.

The Court found support in Hollingsworth v. Virginia, which held that the President has no role in proposing or adopting constitutional amendments. That decision recognized amendment activity as a substantive constitutional act outside the ordinary legislative process; similarly, state ratification is not subject to state-law procedures governing ordinary legislation.

Davis v. Hildebrant did not compel a different result. That case allowed Ohio’s referendum to operate on congressional redistricting legislation because Article I, Section 4 assigns states authority to regulate the times, places, and manner of congressional elections, and Congress had recognized the referendum as part of Ohio’s legislative authority for that purpose. Article V, by contrast, prescribes a distinct and exclusive ratification function rather than delegating ordinary legislative power to the states.