Every jot and tittle

In yesterday's episode, Thomas Van Flein attempted to change the venue of the Troopergate investigation to the Palin controlled Personnel Board. That move failed, in part because the Personnel Board only has jurisdiction when a complaint has been filed, and no complaint had been filed.

Today, Governor Palin attempted to secure jurisdiction for the Personnel Board by filing a complaint against herself.

Addendum: Van Flein sent a letter to the independent investigation letting them know about the complaint and introducing this humdinger of an argument. Strikes me as a little crazy, but maybe one of the lawyers in the audience can provide an informed opinion:

While the Legislative Council does have some limited investigatory power, those powers seem to be limited to investigations related to proposed or current laws. We are not aware of any such proposed legislation. In fact, we are suggesting that the Legislature may lack jurisdiction to investigate a co-equal branch of the government. While Governor Palin does not have anything to hide, you certainly can appreciate why she would insist that the investigation be conducted fairly, consistent with Alaska Statutes, and free from even the suggestion of political influence. Senator French suggests that this position is somehow "at odds with our state's constitution." We are not aware of which provision of the constitution he refers to but would be happy to reconsider our position if you point us to it. In fact, Mr. French may have overlooked this part of the State Constitution:

The right of all persons to fair and just treatment in the course of legislative and executive investigations shall not be infringed

Art. I, Sec.7. The Governor is a "person" and is entiteld to "fair and just treatment" as part of this investigation. Following state law, including the personnel board process, would comply with the Constitution. |Source (pdf!!)|

Maybe it's worth noting that Van Flein is making two entirely separate, and possibly incompatible, arguments here.

He argues, first, that the legislative power of the state legislature does not include the power to investigate the executive branch. This strikes me as Bushian take on the separation of powers. Van Flein raises the stakes a few paragraphs later when he further asserts that "the general legislative power to issue subpoenas is clearly prohibited relative to the Legislative Council."

Van Flein's second argument is that having created a mechanism for investigation of the executive branch, namely the personnel board process, the Legislature may not now investigate using a different process. This argument could be compelling only if one first rejected the major premise of Van Flein's first argument. That is, if you grant, contra Van Flein, that the legislature has investigatory power, then you might further argue that the legislature has ceded that power to the personnel board process. Even then, you would be on thin ice as nothing in the Executive Branch Ethics Act (pdf!!) speaks to the possibility of concurrent investigations of suspicious acts except for Sec. 39.52.910(b) which says, in part, "nothing in this chapter precludes a prosecution under an applicable criminal statute nor prevents enforcement of any other state law that imposes a stricter standard of ethical conduct on public officers."