Amicus Briefs
Beshear v. Goodwood Brewing Company
CASE SUMMARY
In January 2021, the legislature voted to limit Governor Beshear’s emergency powers used to address the Covid-19 pandemic. The governor vetoed the bill to limit his powers, and the legislature overrode that veto with the required majority. The governor then resisted the legislature’s lawful withdrawal of power by filing a lawsuit to enjoin the new law as a violation of his executive powers. This lawsuit was brought to enforce the new law. Both sides won their respective lawsuits at the trial court level, which set up a conflict for the state supreme court to resolve.
In 2020, the Kentucky Supreme Court held that the governor had been delegated emergency powers he could use to address the pandemic. In so holding, the Court also noted that the Kentucky Legislature, if it disagreed, could respond by withdrawing the emergency power it had delegated to the governor. The legislature did just as the Court’s order contemplated. It tried to rein in the governor’s powers so that no emergency order could last more than 30 days without further authorization or ratification by the legislature.
The Plaintiffs were a group of Kentucky restaurants and breweries that had been significantly impacted by Governor Beshear’s enforcement of executive-branch directives. In Beshear, et al. v. Goodwood Brewing Co., LLC, et al., these businesses challenged the emergency authority Governor Beshear claimed in disregard of the legislative changes. Specifically, they maintained that the governor’s executive orders had become unlawful because they conflicted with the limiting statutes the legislature passed over the governor’s veto.
The amici curiae, NCLA, the Southeastern Legal Foundation, and the Mackinac Center for Public Policy, argued that the Kentucky Constitution denies the governor dictatorial power. To ensure such power does not develop in any branch, the Kentucky Constitution separates government power and vests the legislature with law-making authority, which the legislature can always reclaim once delegated. Amici urged the Court to rule that the executive orders and emergency administrative regulations of the executive that contravened the duly enacted laws of Kentucky’s Legislature were unlawful.
OUR TEAM
RELEVANT MATERIALS
NCLA FILINGS
Brief of the New Civil Liberties Alliance, Southeastern Legal Foundation, & The Mackinac Center for Public Policy, as Amici Curiae in Support of Plaintiff-Respondents
May 20, 2021 | Read More
PRESS RELEASES
NCLA Files Joint Amicus Brief Asking Kentucky Supreme Court to Uphold Constitutional Governance
May 20, 2021 | Read More