Spin put on Compact
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Editor,
Despite the crowing by the state of Montana, the legislature’s 2015 vote on the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Compact was ruled unconstitutional because the Compact created a separate, new immunity for the State of Montana. The Montana constitution requires that the legislature needed a two-thirds vote to pass SB262 in 2015. And that it did not get.
The only question presented to the court was whether the vote itself — not the compact — was constitutional. Both the state and the CSKT tried to add other issues not relevant to that key question. In a political handoff to them, the ruling agreed with some of the issues, including whether certain language in the compact could be “severed.” Those political tidbits did not convey “constitutionality” to the compact — because that was not the question.
The operative concept here is that the legislature must act to “fix” the immunity language in the Compact. This will require the legislature remove the immunity language or return the compact to the legislature to achieve the two-thirds vote necessary to convey to Montana immunity from potentially billions of dollars of damages, costs, and attorneys' fees resulting from the implementation of the compact.
With this court ruling, it is simple: a two-thirds vote was needed in the legislature to pass SB262. The CSKT Compact thus remains stuck in court for the foreseeable future. All spinning aside, it is time for the State of Montana to stop misleading its citizens.
Catherine Vandemoer,
Polson
