In 1985, could a Maine legislator leave office at retirement age and keep state health coverage without retiring from a state pension system?

Plain-English summary

The 1985 opinion answered two questions about Maine's group health plan for state employees and legislators. First, reaching age 60 and leaving state service was not enough for ordinary retiree coverage under the version of § 285 the AG examined. The employee had to be a member of a legislatively established retirement system when leaving and accept a pension from it. The opinion drew this distinction from the statute's use of “retire,” as opposed to merely reaching normal retirement age.

Second, the Legislature had adopted a special route for legislators who were already retired teachers. The AG treated state paid retiree health coverage as legislative compensation, but found no constitutional problem for the members then serving. The amendment would take effect only after the 112th Legislature ended, which the AG said satisfied the Maine Constitution's rule against an increase in a Legislature's compensation during its own life.

Currency note

This opinion was issued in 1985. Subsequent statutory amendments, court decisions, or later AG opinions may have changed the analysis. Treat this page as historical context, not current legal advice. Verify current law before relying on any specific rule, deadline, or remedy mentioned here.

Common questions

Q: Was age 60 alone enough for a legislator to enter the retiree health plan? A: No. For the ordinary path analyzed, the AG required retirement from a state retirement system with a pension, not only age and departure from office.

Q: Why was the retired teacher amendment treated differently? A: The amendment created a separate route for qualifying former legislators who already received teacher retirement allowances. The opinion considered its stated start after the Legislature's term when answering the compensation question.

Q: Did the AG think the benefit counted as legislative compensation? A: Yes. The opinion called state paid health coverage for retiring legislators compensation, then held that the delayed effective date avoided the constitutional timing prohibition.

Q: Does the opinion establish current Maine health plan eligibility? A: No. It interprets the provisions expected to be in effect in December 1986 and resolves the constitutional question posed in 1985.

Background and statutory framework

Section 285 supplied the eligibility rules the AG read. The opinion also cited the retirement system's definition of “retirement” in § 1001(20). For the special teacher legislator provision, the constitutional issue was the ban on a law increasing legislators' compensation taking effect during the Legislature that enacted it. The AG focused on when the benefit would take effect, rather than denying that it was compensation.

Citations and references

• 5 M.R.S.A. § 285: group health plan eligibility.
• 5 M.R.S.A. § 1001(20): retirement definition cited by the AG.

Source

• Landing page: https://www.maine.gov/legis/lawlib/lldl/agops/agops.htm
• Original PDF: https://lldc.mainelegislature.org/Open/AG/Opinions/1985/ag_19851126a.pdf

Original opinion text

Best-effort transcription from a scanned PDF. Minor errors may remain — the linked PDF is authoritative.

}AML.: E. TIER"in
ATTORNEY GENERAL
85-24

STAn or M,..11,r:
DEPARTME"iT OF THE AITOR"iEY GE"iERAL
ST ATE HOl;SE STATIO"i 6
Al'Gl'STA, MAl"iE 04-333

November 26, 1985

The Honorable John L. Martin, Speaker Maine House of Representatives State House Augusta, Maine 04333

Dear Speaker Martin:

You have requested the opinion of this Office on two questions relating to the eligibility of members of the Legislature for participation in the group accident and sickness or health insurance program established by 5 M.R.S.A.
§ 285. Specifically, you ask first whether a legislator, or any state employee, must be a member of one of the legislatively-established retirement systems at the time he leaves the state's service in order to eligible for participation in the program. Second, you inquire whether the provisions of P.L. 1985, ch. 391, extending the eligibility for participation in the program to certain members of the Legislature who are retired teachers, may constitutionally be applied to retired teachers who are currently members of the Legislature and who both will be 60 years of age and will. leave ~ the Legislature on December 2, 1986. For the reasons which follow, it is the opinion of this Office that a state employee, including a legislator, must be a member of a retirement system at the time he leaves state service in order to be eligible for participation in the program, and that it would not violate the provisions of Article IV, Part 3, Section 7 of the Maine Constitution for such eligibility to be extended to retired teachers who are currently members of the Legislature who seek to participate in the program on December 3, 1986.
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Title 5 M.R.S.A. § 285i/ provides in pertinent part:
Group accident and sickness or health insurance shall be available to state employees, subject to the following provisions:
1. Eligibility; generally. The following persons are eligible for group accident and sickness or health insurance:
A. Each appointed or elective officer or employee of the State who is eligible for membership in the Maine State Retirement System, Maine Legislative Retirement S¥stem or the State Police Retirement System;

G. Subject to subsection 1-A, employees in any of the categories denominated in paragraphs A to F who:

(2) After April 26, 1968, retire and who on the date of their retirement are currently enrolled in this group accident and sickness or health insurance plan; or
(3) After December 2, 1986, and after reaching normal retirement age, cease to be members of the Legislature and are recipients of retirement allowances from the Maine State Retirement System based upon creditable service as teachers, as defined by section 1001, subsection 25. This paragraph shall also apply to former members who were members on December 2, 1986.
1-A. Eligibility; retirees. Any person otherwise eligible pursuant to subsection 1, paragraph G, must in addition, in order to be eligible under this section:

i/ The provisions quoted are those that will be in effect on December 3, 1986, when the questions which you ask will actually arise.
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B. If not retiring on a disability benefit, have participated in the group accident and sickness or health insurance plan for at least one year immediately prior to retirement; or
C. If eligibility is based upon subsection 1, paragraph G, subparagraph (3), have participated in the group accident and sickness or health plan for at least one year immediately prior to ceasing to be a member of the Legislature.
1-B. Ineligibility. Eligibility unless thfs section shall not be extended to include members of . . . the Maine Teachers Association . . .
(emphasis added)
It is apparent from the foregoing that the Legislature intended that only those state employees, including legislators, who are members of one of the legislatively-created retirement systems at the time they leave state service, and who accept a pension from that system, be eligible for participation in the group accident and sickness or health insurance program when they leave state service.
This conclusion is made clear by the use of the word "retire" in subsection l(G)(2) of Section 285, as distinguished from the words "after reaching normal retirement age" in the succeeding subsection dealing with teachers who are members of the Legislature but who are also receiving retirement allowances.
It is therefore not enough for a state employee, or a legislator, simply to reach the age of 60 and to terminate his state employment in order to be eligible for participation in the program. He must also "retire," which means to accept a pension from one of the retirement systems.L/ With regard to your second question, Subsection l(G)(3) and Subsection 1-A(C) of Section 285 were enacted in 1985 for the purpose of extending eligibility to participate in the group accident and sickness or health insurance program to those members of the Legislature who were retired teachers and therefore otherwise not eligible to participate because of the provisions of Subsection 1-B. P.L. 1985, ch. 391. The

L/ While not strictly applicable to Section 285, the definitional section of the statute establishing the State Retirement System defines "retirement" to mean ~termination of membership [in the System] with a retirement allowance granted [by the retirement statutes]." 5 M.R.S.A. § 1001(20).

(
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legislators affected by this latter subsection desired to be free of its disqualification because as members of the Maine Teachers Association Retirement Plan, they are obliged to pay regular premiums for participation in a group health insurance plan, whereas if they were able to participate in such a plan in the capacity of retired legislators, such premiums would be paid by the State Retirement System. 5 M.R.S.A. § 285(8).
Thus, the new provisions stipulated that after December 2, 1986, the last date in the life of the 112th Legislature, any person leaving the Legislature who has reached "normal retirement age" (currently 60 years) may participate in the program, with the premiums to be paid by the Maine State Retirement System as for all other retired state employees.
You have asked, however, whether such a provision, as it applies to the members of the 112th Legiilature might violate Article IV, Part 3, Section 7 of the Maine Constitution. That article provides, in pertinent part:
The Senators and Representatives shall receive such compensation, as shall be established by law; but no law increasing their compensation shall take effect during the existence of the Legislature, which enacted it.
( There would seem to be little doubt that the provision of free health insurance for life to retiring members of the Legislature constitutes a form of "compensation" within the meaning of the consti·tutional provision. See Opinion of the Justices, 159 Me. 77 (1963) ("compensation" means personal expenses rather than legislative expenses.) The question thus becomes whether the new provisions of Section 285 escape the application of the constitutional provision because they do not become effective until after the life of the 112th Legislature.
It is the opinion of this Office that, for that reason, these provisions do not violate the Constitution. The purpose of the constitutional prohibition appears to have been to prevent members of a particular Legislature from voting themselves and actually receiving financial benefits without the opportunity for the electorate to hold them accountable for doing so. This policy was reflected in the remarks of Delegate John Holmes of Alfred at the Maine Constitutional Convention of 1819-20, when, during the course of a debate over whether the compensation of the Legislature should be fixed in the Constitution or left to ordinary legislation, he stated:
Forty years' experience, in Massachusetts, has proved that there is no risk in trusting the Legislature to establish their own f.
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  compensation. Can we with safety fix the compensation of any of the officers in the Constitution? What is an adequate sum to-day, may be too much or too little tomorrow. This is the business of legislation, and it may be more safely trusted to the representatives, who expecting to be re-elected, will take care not to offend their constituents.
  Experience has lately proved, that such offenses are not easily pardoned. Debates and Journal of the Constitutional
  Conventions of the State of Maine
  (1819-1820) 209 (1894).

Thus, so long as a statute according additional compensation to the members of a particular Legislature does not take effect until after the end of the life of that Legislature, it cannot violate Article IV, Part 3, Section 7.
I hope the foregoing answers your questions. Please feel free to reinquire in further clarification is necessary.

TIERNEY
General
JET/dab cc: Sally Diamond, Executive Director
Legislative Council
Jo Gill, Executive Director
Maine State Employees Health Insurance Program •