ACLU joins opposition to barring government workers from legislature

The American Civil Liberties Union on Thursday joined the opposition to banning government workers from serving in the Legislature.

Citing some of the same arguments raised by the Legislative Counsel Bureau and a group of public employee unions, ACLU lawyers said the framers of Nevada's Constitution never intended to bar all public employees from legislative service - only those in policy making or other elective offices.

It argues the Supreme Court has already addressed the issue of public employees serving and ruled they can. It says the constitution exempts public employees who aren't "public officers" from the ban on legislative service while holding a government job.

The brief backs that up with court cases defining a public official as requiring an oath and exercising sovereign powers of the office, arguing most government employees don't fit that description.

"Our system contemplates that all legislators, regardless of where employed, will likely be required at some point to address a conflict between their job and their legislative duties," the brief says. "This does not disqualify any individual from serving. The Nevada Legislature is a citizen legislature."

The brief was filed in response to the secretary of state's petition seeking a ruling from the high court on whether state and local government employees can also be legislators and, if not, removing more than a half dozen Nevada legislators from their positions and barring any others in that position from filing this year.

The brief concludes saying that state or local government employees have served for decades in the Legislature and that suddenly ruling that service illegal "would not be to interpret the constitution but to effectively amend it by judicial fiat."