City, AGs fight McKenna's suit over Obama health care plan
Olympia, WA - Twenty state attorneys general are suing to halt President Barack Obama’s signature piece of legislation. Washington Democrats would love to make it 19.
But knocking Attorney General Rob McKenna out of the multi-state lawsuit against federal health care reform will require convincing the state Supreme Court.
An attorney for the City of Seattle tried today, but the city has a steep legal hill to climb. First, City Attorney Pete Holmes’ lawyers must show why a city government has any business challenging decisions of a state official. Some justices seemed skeptical. Second, they must prove McKenna is overstepping his authority by striking out on his own.
“This court,” Assistant City Attorney Laura Wishik said, “has never approved of the attorney general initiating a lawsuit on his own, without an agency or officer as a client, and without the governor’s (consent).”
The city argues the Legislature has authorized the attorney general to take action in only certain areas. Mc-Kenna says a catch-all provision in the law gives him broader authority. The attorney general “shall also represent the state and all officials,” it says, “... in all legal or quasi legal matters.”
“The attorney general derives his authority from the law, and not the permission of other state officers,” said state Solicitor General Maureen Hart, who argued McKenna’s case.
Together with another case argued today involving McKenna, Seattle’s case has implications for the role of an elected attorney general. Is he free to pursue his own agenda, or is he mostly just the lawyer for state agencies?
There are also political implications, or else the courtroom crowd wouldn’t have included observers such as Aaron Ostrom, executive director of liberal advocacy group Fuse.
McKenna is seen as a likely Republican candidate for governor in 2012. Democrats say his opposition to health care reform is political posturing. They hope it backfires to shatter McKenna’s moderate image.
“It would appear to me that he’s siding with corporations and private interests,” Ostrom said.
McKenna says he’s upholding the U.S. Constitution. The centerpiece of the health care challenge is a charge that the bill’s mandate for all people to buy health insurance is unconstitutional. The federal government can’t fine people for refusing to buy a product, the attorneys general say.
“Yes, there’s politics involved here. Who could miss it?” Wishik said. “But the real heart of this case is, what authority does the attorney general have?”
That’s also at the heart of the other case, in which Democratic Lands Commissioner Peter Goldmark has asked the court to compel McKenna to continue representing him.
Goldmark wants McKenna to appeal a judge’s ruling that an Okanogan County public utility district can condemn state land in the Methow Valley to build a power line. McKenna says the law obligates him only to take the case, not to pursue it on appeal.
In their questions to McKenna’s attorney, justices focused on the fact that state agencies like Goldmark’s have no access to the courts except through the attorney general.
That would allow the attorney general to usurp the power of other state officials, Chief Justice Barbara Madsen suggested. “How do you carry out the policy,” she asked, “if you cannot use the courts?”
It could be weeks or months before justices rule.
Jordan Schrader: 360-786-1826
Read more: http://www.theolympian.com/2010/11/18/v-print/1445068/city-ags-fight-mckennas-suit-over.html#ixzz15kbrGEuE