As South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford’s drive to give his successors more power gains little traction among state legislators, he’s taking the quest to where some of his predecessors have gone before: the third branch of government.
The state Supreme Court has decided to take a case that will decide whether the governor can trump the Legislature’s overhaul of the workers’ compensation system. Sanford also has asked the justices to take a case challenging his authority to oust a board member from the State Ports Authority.
While Sanford has been accused of trying to overstep his authority, some of his fellow Republicans see the moves as consistent with a governor who has said he wants more accountability in state government. They even include examples that have earned Sanford criticism: a call late last year to a judge hearing an annexation case in Jasper County and recent word of Sanford’s involvement in the sale of port facilities in Port Royal.
“His views and direct inquiry into matters – from the workers’ comp case all the way to this phone call to the judge and to the inquiry about the bidder on the port – shows he believes in, and I think most people believe in, an accountable chief executive,” Attorney General Henry McMaster said. “They want him to have authority to do things and he is clearly one that believes that very strongly.”
In that regard, Sanford’s not a lot different from other governors, McMaster said.
So far, the second-term governor’s success in courts has been mixed. He won court decisions saying legislators can’t pack bills with dozens of unrelated items, and was victorious when challenged over his ability to serve as governor and be a commissioned Air Force Reserve officer.
In November, the court dismissed a case brought by Sanford allies that claimed the state Budget and Control Board – a budget oversight panel that Sanford heads and wants eliminated – is unconstitutional. That challenge came after the Legislature elected one of its members as state treasurer, shifting the balance of power on the board that oversees state borrowing, real estate and other financial decisions toward legislative leaders on the panel.
The Supreme Court has yet to decide whether it will take up a case brought by Carroll Campbell III, whom Sanford ousted from the Ports Authority in January. Campbell sued in Lexington County, alleging in part that he was tossed because he questioned Sanford’s involvement in selling Port Royal’s port. That sale also was the subject of phone calls Sanford made last year to the-then chairman of the Ports Authority and to the agency’s lawyer disparaging the reputation of a developer seeking to buy the property.
Campbell’s case appears to face long odds – it rehashes some issues Sanford’s predecessors won in the Supreme Court. In 1997, the court upheld Republican Gov. David Beasley’s firing of the state Department of Public Safety’s director. Three years later, Democratic Gov. Jim Hodges had the court side with him in firing the chairman of Santee Cooper, the state-run electric utility.
Shortly after Campbell filed his lawsuit, Sanford asked the Supreme Court to decide it.
“We don’t think that case has any merit whatsoever,” said Sanford spokesman Joel Sawyer. “The governor’s removal authority in that case is crystal clear. This suit is entirely of a political nature.”
But Johnny Felder, Campbell’s lawyer, said Sanford’s authority is the issue. “What’s clear to me is that our governor in several different issues has indicated a willingness to exceed the scope of his authority. It doesn’t appear that he feels limited in his actions by the parameters contained in the spirit and the letter of the law,” Felder said.
In the workers’ compensation case, Sanford wants the court to affirm his authority over the state Workers’ Compensation Commission. Last year, Sanford ordered the commissioners who decide payments to injured workers to use standards he set, even though the Legislature had rejected them. As he pushed that, workers sued in federal court.
Sanford wants that case decided by the Supreme Court, not in federal court, Sawyer said. Beyond that, Sawyer declined to comment.
It’s not clear when the different cases will be heard. Sanford’s critics hope the justices check his reach.
“He doesn’t write the laws; he enforces the laws. He doesn’t change the law,” said Belinda Ellison, president of Injured Workers Advocates, a group of worker’s compensation lawyers. “It’s an abuse of power.”
What some may term abuse and others call a push for accountability certainly raised the eyebrows of the federal judge hearing the workers’ compensation case when he heard of the governor’s telephone call to a state judge hearing an annexation case.
“That’s hard for me to believe that a governor would assume he had the authority to call a presiding judge,” U.S. District Judge Ross Anderson said in a Jan. 14 hearing, according to The (Columbia) State newspaper. “I’m just in shock, disbelief that that could happen.”
In the case, the state and the Coastal Conservation League were challenging the town of Yemassee’s annexation of coastal plantation land. It’s not clear what Sanford said in the call.
McMaster takes part of the blame. He said that during a meeting Sanford praised him for work on the annexation case. When he learned the case had been dismissed, Sanford asked about calling the judge. Initially he was told that wouldn’t be a good idea, but McMaster told him it should be OK since the judge had decided the case. Because the judge hadn’t written his ruling, it created a problem, McMaster said.
“There’s nothing unethical about the governor’s call,” McMaster said. “It still is unusual.”
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