Law Student Robert Drean Sees Value in Legislative Vote

From: The Topeka Capital-Journal, Monday, April 15, 1996, p. 6-A.
Photo caption and credit at end of article.

Beliefs stem from opposition to ruling that said votes weren't 'something of value.'

By BILL BLANKENSHIP
The Capital-Journal

"You're voting with us this time." the representative said ominously.

"Carmen? This is Melvin Neufeld. I'm sorry to have to call you but you have some problems in your marriage..."

--From a Washburn Law Journal article written by third year law student Bob Drean.

But for its 21 footnotes, the opening of Bob Drean's law journal article reads more like the first page of a John Grisham novel.

"It does sound like a bodice-ripper, doesn't it?" said a grinning Drean, as he sat Saturday in a conference room in the law clinic of the Washburn University School of Law.

"But every phrase is cited," the third-year law student quickly added.

The source is the transcript of the preliminary hearing for Rep. Melvin Neufeld, R-Ingalls, who was accused of blackmail for trying to coerce Rep. Richard Alldritt, D-Harper, into changing a vote May 2-3, 1994, during the waning hours of the legislative session.

However, Shawnee County District Judge James P. Buchele dismissed the charge.

Buchele ruled blackmail is defined in Kansas as "compelling someone to act against their will or gaining or attempting to gain something of value."

Since Alldritt didn't change his vote, blackmail didn't occur because the law didn't say "compelling or attempting to compel."

Looking at the other basis for blackmail, Buchele then made the ruling that grabbed the headlines.

He determined a legislative vote wasn't "something of value."

Value as defined by lawmakers is limited to "pecuniary or monetary gain from the resulted threatened conduct," Buchele ruled.

Drean disagrees.

He wrote a Washburn Law Journal article on the subject and filed an amicus curiae - friend of the court - brief with the Kansas Supreme Court, which on Tuesday afternoon will hear an appeal of the dismissal of the blackmail count.

Drean said the Supreme Court judges have few prior appellate court cases dealing with whether a legislative vote has value.

Therefore, the judges will have to took elsewhere for the meaning of value, including economic philosophers as opposite as Karl Marx, the founder of modern socialism, and Adam Smith, the father of capitalism.

Drean argues Smith, Marx and other economic philosophers would call a vote valuable because it can be exchanged, but Drean went on to calculate a cash value on a legislative vote.

Researching legislative and campaign finance records, Drean determined it cost Alldritt $2.50 for each of his votes during the 1993 and 1994 sessions based upon the $3,088 he spent to get elected.

Each of Alldritt's votes was worth $17.65 to state taxpayers based on the daily pay and spending allowances given each lawmaker.

And all of that doesn't include the money spent by lobbyists each legislative session where a few votes one way or another result in millions of dollars being spent.

Drean cited the 63-59 vote on which the $2.346 billion highway bill passed the House in 1989.

A three-vote shift would have defeated the legislation.

"Three votes for $2.346 billion or $782 million per vote argues vehemently for the dollar value of a legislative vote," Drean wrote.

But there are other ways to value votes, with Drean noting the blackmail statute doesn't include a qualifier, such as "cash value," "money value" or fair-market value."

There is the value of a constituent being able to rely on a legislator's unfettered ability to vote his or her will without coercion by a fellow lawmaker.

"Thus, to obstruct the right to selfgovernment by blackmail, or by other means, is a taking of human freedom, a right more precious than gold" Drean wrote.

Drean isn't sure his law journal article or legal brief will influence the court's decision, but he said having them before the judges is enough.

"This is the highlight of my law school career," said the 53-year-old Orlando, Fla., real estate company manager who enrolled in law school after he and his wife divorced.

Drean may not even be in the courtroom when the Kansas Supreme Court hears oral arguments on the appeal. He isn't entitled to speak as an amicus curiae.

Instead, Drean could be in district court at his first jury trial defending someone charged with criminal trespass.

He wasn't sure the trial would be over before the oral arguments.

And when the Kansas Supreme Court hands down its decision in the Neufeld case, Drean should be back in Florida after graduating May 11.

And what if the judges agree with his legal reasoning and cite his work?

"Wouldn't it be glorious," he said.

Photo by: Nicole DeVito/The Capital-Journal
Photo caption: Bob Drean, a third-year law student at Washburn University, has filed a brief with the Kansas Supreme Court concerning the legislative vote, which was ruled not "something of value" in a case on alleged legislative blackmail. Drean works on cases often in the Washburn law library.