## Facts

- New York enacted Chapter 485 of the Laws of 1981, increasing the sales and compensating use tax by 0.25% within the Metropolitan Commuter Transportation District (MCTD), a 12-county region that included Orange and Suffolk Counties, to fund the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA).
- The bill passed the Legislature in July 1981 and became effective September 1, 1981.
- The Senate used a “fast roll call” procedure under its rules and custom: only certain senators were called individually, and other senators previously marked “present” were treated as voting in favor unless they voiced opposition or were treated as absent or excused.
- Senator Howard Nolan checked in as present on July 8, 1981, then left for a hospital before the early-morning July 9 vote and did not make a formal on-the-record request to be excused.
- The Senate journal recorded final passage by a vote of 31–26, with three senators excused, and recorded Nolan as voting in the affirmative.
- Nolan later asserted by affidavit that he would have voted against the bill and claimed he had asked to be excused; the Senate Minority Leader disputed that any excusal request was made.
- County executives from Orange and Suffolk Counties sued the State and the Commissioner of Taxation and Finance, alleging (1) the statute was not validly enacted because it did not receive the constitutionally required majority assent, and (2) the tax violated federal equal protection because the taxed counties allegedly received disproportionate MTA benefits.
- The trial court granted summary judgment to plaintiffs on the enactment claim and declared the statute “had not become law.”
- On appeal (with the Temporary President of the Senate permitted to intervene), the appellate court reversed, granted summary judgment to defendants, and declared the statute valid and constitutional.

## Issues

1. Whether Chapter 485 was validly enacted under the New York Constitution’s requirement that a majority of the members elected to each house assent to a bill, where the Senate used a fast roll call and treated a physically absent senator as voting in the affirmative based on Senate custom and journal entries.
2. Whether the MCTD-only tax increase violated the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause due to an allegedly arbitrary geographic classification and unequal distribution of burdens and benefits.

## Decision

- The court reversed the trial court’s declaration invalidating Chapter 485.
- The court held that Chapter 485 was validly enacted; the Senate’s fast-roll-call practice and its treatment of a member marked “present” as voting in the affirmative was a reasonable interpretation of the constitutional majority-assent requirement and was substantially complied with.
- The court declined to invalidate the law based on internal disputes regarding whether a senator sought excusal and relied on the Senate journal’s recorded vote as sufficient proof of passage.
- The court held the MCTD tax increase did not violate equal protection because the geographic classification had a rational basis and a substantial connection to the legitimate objective of funding and stabilizing the MTA.
- The court granted defendants’ cross-motion for summary judgment and declared Chapter 485 valid in all respects.

## Legal Principles

- Courts may review legislative enactments for compliance with explicit constitutional requirements but generally will not intervene in internal legislative procedures where legislative rules and long-standing customs reasonably implement constitutional prescriptions.
- Substantial compliance with constitutional voting requirements, as reflected in the legislative journal and reasonable legislative practice, is sufficient absent conclusive evidence of a constitutional violation.
- Under rational-basis review, a geographically limited tax classification satisfies equal protection if it is rationally related to a legitimate governmental objective and bears a substantial connection to that objective.
- Equal protection does not require precise equivalence between taxes paid and benefits received across localities within a regional taxation scheme.

## Conclusion

The appellate court upheld a regional sales and use tax increase funding the MTA, ruling that the Senate’s fast-roll-call voting practice satisfied constitutional enactment requirements and that the geographic tax classification within the MCTD was rational and therefore consistent with equal protection.


Heimbach v. State, 89 A.D.2d 138, 454 N.Y.S.2d 993 (App. Div. 3d Dep’t 1982)