School administrators and principals from across South Carolina have asked the U.S. District Court in Columbia to throw out a lawsuit filed by Gov. Mark Sanford last week involving $700 million in federal stimulus funds that he does not want to accept.
In a lawsuit filed on Tuesday the South Carolina Association of School Administrators asked to become part of Sanford case, and then went on to argue that the lawsuit should be dropped and the issues it raises handled instead by the state’s Supreme Court.
If the governor were to prevail they argued, school districts across the state would be forced to make deep budget cuts which would be detrimental to the students they serve.
State legislators effectively ordered Sanford to request the money — a portion of the total $2.8 billion the state is eligible for in the Obama Administration’s economic stimulus package — by including the funds in its budget for the state’s next fiscal year.
However, Sanford responded by filing a federal lawsuit last week to assert his control over the money, contending that the legislature overstepped the bounds of both the state and the federal Constitutions.
“If the governor can’t make decisions independent of the legislature, why have a governor?” Sanford asked during a press conference in the west wing of the Capitol last week.
Sanford took an equally pugnacious stance on Tuesday, directing attorney John Witherspoon Foster of the firm Kilpatrick Stockton to seek the removal of a suit the school administrators filed in the state Supreme Court to the federal court in Columbia.
In a written statement issued Tuesday, Sanford said, “Our suit is fundamentally about the balance of power and separation of powers in our state, and whether or not the legislature is going to be allowed to erode the Executive Branch even further in South Carolina.”
“Legislative dominance costs our state’s citizens far too much for the way it breeds waste and duplication,” he continued. “The last thing we need to be doing is exporting that dysfunctional system to other states, which is what will happen if our General Assembly is allowed to re-write federal law in this way.”
Two other suits related to the stimulus money, both filed by high students, are also now in the state Supreme Court. In the same statement that was quoted above, Sanford initially said he would not file a response to those suits as he’s not specifically named as a defendant in either and is therefore “not bound” by their outcome. In both cases, the state is named as the defendant.
But the governor changed his tune on Tuesday afternoon, issuing a statement saying he would attempt to intervene in the state court case filed on behalf of a South Carolina High School senior by attorney Dwight Drake of the law firm of Nelson Mullins Riley and Scarborough, and attorney Richard Harpootlian.
“This issue is about the fundamental balance of power between the executive and the legislative branches of South Carolina government,” Sanford reiterated in the latter statement. “We hope for all concerned it is decided quickly.”
A response to the state lawsuits by Attorney General Henry McMaster and Education Superintendent Jim Rex is also anticipated to be imminent.
Speaking with reporters in Columbia on Tuesday, McMaster said he had grave concerns about the outcome of the various cases, fearing “they may weaken the office of the governor to the port of potential irrelevancy.”
McMaster also said the situation unfolding in various courtrooms around Columbia is unique, and that there’s little if anything in the way of court precedent on which to base rulings on the matter.
Foster’s filings on the behalf of the governor meanwhile argue that the school administrator’s lawsuit should be handled in federal court because he contends the legislature effectively — and unconstitutionally — pre-empted federal law by including the disputed funds in the budget and forcing the governor’s hand when it came to the $700 million in question.
Attorney John Reagle, of the firm of Childs and Halligan in Columbia is representing the South Carolina Association of School administrators. A hearing on the jurisdictional issue has been set for June 1 at 10 a.m. in the Matthew J. Perry Courthouse in Columbia. U.S. District Judge Joseph Anderson Jr. is presiding.
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