Request By:
Mr. Vic Hellard, Jr.
Director, Legislative Research Commission
Room 300, State Capitol
Frankfort, Kentucky 40601
Opinion
Opinion By: Frederic J. Cowan, Attorney General; William B. Pettus, Assistant Attorney General
This is in response to your letter of February 25, 1991, in which you request a formal opinion from this Office. Your letter states that on Friday, February 22, 1991, the General Assembly adjoured sine die from its extraordinary session. Your letter requests an opinion on what is "the normal effective date for legislation enacted during this extraordinary session, which does not contain an emergency or delayed effective date.
Extraordinary sessions of the General Assembly are authorized by the Constitution of Kentucky § 80. The Constitution of Kentucky § 55 governs the effective date of legislation and provides as follows:
No act, except general appropriation bills, shall become a law until ninety days after the adjournment of the session at which it was passed, except in cases of emergency , when, by the concurrence of a majority of the members elected to each House of the General Assembly, by a yea and nay vote entered upon their journals, an act may become a law when approved by the governor, but the reasons for the emergency that justifies this action must be set out at length in the journal of each House.
The day of adjournment, February 22, 1991, must be excluded in computing the 90 day period set forth in the Constitution of Kentucky § 55 and the 90th day, May 23, 1991, must be included. See OAG 89-1. Therefore, it is the opinion of this Office that the effective date for ordinary legislation, not containing an emergency or delayed effective date, which was enacted during the 1991 extraordinary session, is May 24, 1991.