Do registered lobbyists and their principals have to file a separate set of expense reports after every special (extra) session of the North Carolina General Assembly, or only after each regular session?

Plain-English summary

The North Carolina General Assembly was preparing to convene a special (extra) session in 1994 to handle a limited agenda. Chief Deputy Secretary of State Richard H. Carlton, who oversaw the office that took in lobbyist reports, wrote to the AG with a procedural question. Under N.C. Gen. Stat. § 120-47.6(a) and § 120-47.7(a), registered lobbyists and their principals had to file expense reports within 60 days after the last day of "the regular session." Did the same rule apply to an extra session, requiring a separate set of expense reports after that session ended?

Chief Deputy Attorney General Andrew A. Vanore, Jr. and Special Deputy Attorney General Charles M. Hensey concluded the statute did not reach extra sessions. No separate expense reports were required.

The textual basis was simple: the statute said "regular session" and was silent about extra sessions. Statutory silence is a tool the AG used here as if it were a positive choice by the legislature. The AG argued the legislature could have written "after the end of any session" or "after each session" if it wanted both kinds covered, but it did not.

The constitutional and statutory backdrop made the regular-versus-extra distinction sharp. N.C. Const. art. II, § 11(1) provides that the General Assembly meets in regular session in 1973 and every two years thereafter on the day prescribed by law. That day is in N.C. Gen. Stat. § 120-11.1 (the third Wednesday after the second Monday in January after a legislative election). Elections occur in even-numbered years per § 163-1(a). Reading those provisions together, regular sessions convene in odd-numbered years.

The N.C. Court of Appeals had already canonized this reading in Newsome v. N.C. State Board of Elections, 105 N.C. App. 499, 415 S.E.2d 201 (1992). The court said: "Under the directive in section 11(1), there are `regular' sessions of the General Assembly in the odd-numbered years after 1973." The court also acknowledged that the 1990 session was a "short session," structurally a continuation of the 1989 regular session, in which only a limited number of matters were considered.

Extra sessions are constitutionally distinct. They can be convened on legislative call (art. II, § 11(2)) or by the Governor with the advice of the Council of State (art. III, § 5(7)). They are sporadic, deal with limited specific issues, and have a different temporal pattern from regular sessions. Because the statute targeted "regular sessions" and extra sessions are "clearly different," the statute did not require filing after an extra session.

The practical answer was that lobbyists and principals had to file one set of expense reports per regular session (with the short session and its companion long session typically reported together as the biennial regular session), but they did not have to file a separate set after each extra session.

Currency note

This opinion was issued in 1994. 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. North Carolina's lobbying laws have been substantially overhauled multiple times since 1994, with major rewrites in 2006 (Lobbying Reform Act) and again in later years moving disclosure to a quarterly model rather than session-tied. The modern reporting framework now in Chapter 120C (rather than Chapter 120, Article 9A) requires lobbyist and principal reports on a calendar quarter basis, independent of whether the General Assembly is in session. The 1994 opinion's specific holding about session-tied filings has therefore been overtaken by the modern statutory scheme.

Background and statutory framework

The North Carolina General Assembly operates on a biennial schedule. Each two-year cycle is called a "biennium." Within the biennium, the long session (in the odd-numbered year, beginning in January) handles the bulk of legislation. The short session (in the even-numbered year, of compressed length) handles a constitutionally and procedurally limited set of subjects, typically budget adjustments and matters specifically referred to it.

Extra sessions sit outside the regular biennial structure. They are called for specific purposes: emergency legislation, court-mandated reapportionment, response to a budget crisis, or other narrow matters. The Constitution gives two paths: the General Assembly can call itself into extra session by joint resolution, or the Governor can call one with Council of State approval. Extra sessions can occur in any year and at any time, with the agenda limited to whatever the call specifies.

The 1990s-era lobbying disclosure regime in Chapter 120, Article 9A was session-tied. The reporting cycle ran from the start of a regular session to its end (or technically, to 60 days after the end). The statute used "regular session" as its temporal anchor. Whether that anchor was deliberately drawn to exclude extra sessions or just reflected the drafter's session-of-the-moment focus was a question the AG had to confront.

The AG's answer favored the statute's text over a hypothetical purpose-based reading. A purpose-based reading might have said: the point of lobbyist disclosure is transparency about influence on legislation, extra sessions involve legislation, therefore the statute should be read to cover extra sessions despite its narrower text. The AG declined that route. Instead the AG treated "regular session" as the operative term, observed the constitutional separateness of regular and extra sessions, and concluded the statute did not extend.

That approach put the policy burden on the legislature. If the General Assembly wanted lobbyist disclosure after extra sessions, it could amend the statute. The legislature later did substantially restructure the regime, moving to quarterly reporting and eliminating the session-tied trigger entirely. The 1994 opinion thus had a relatively short operative life as the practical framework changed underneath it, although the textual-interpretation method it modeled remains a recurring approach in NC AG opinions.

Common questions

What if an extra session had run for months and involved millions of dollars in lobbying activity?

Under the 1994 reading, no separate report would have been required. The lobbying activity would have been reported under the next regular-session report (if it occurred between sessions) or arguably in the same report as the regular session that preceded the extra session, depending on how the reporting offices handled it. The opinion did not address that aggregation question directly; the office of the Secretary of State would have had to set policy on aggregation.

Did this mean lobbyists could spend without limit during an extra session?

No. The expense reporting rules and the gift limits were separate. The opinion addressed only the timing and form of expense reports, not the substantive limits on lobbyist conduct. Other provisions of Article 9A (and other criminal statutes) constrained gifts to legislators regardless of when they occurred.

Could the Secretary of State have issued a regulation requiring reports after extra sessions despite the statute?

Probably not. An agency cannot expand its statutory mandate through rulemaking. If the statute did not authorize the Secretary of State to require post-extra-session reports, a regulation purporting to require them would have been subject to challenge as exceeding the agency's authority. The opinion was, in part, a defense of that limit.

Why is this opinion still useful to read today?

The current statutory regime (Chapter 120C) does not turn on the regular-versus-extra session distinction, so the 1994 holding does not control modern reporting. But the opinion is still useful as an illustration of how the NC AG treats statutory silence: silence can be a deliberate omission, especially when the statute uses a defined constitutional term ("regular session") and that term has a constitutionally narrower companion ("extra session"). The interpretive method recurs across many areas of NC law.

Source

• Landing page: https://ncdoj.gov/opinions/separate-set-of-expense-reports-would-be-required-for-registered-lobbyists-and-principals/

Citations

• N.C. Gen. Stat. Ch. 120, Article 9A (lobbying registration and reporting)
• N.C. Gen. Stat. § 120-47.6(a)
• N.C. Gen. Stat. § 120-47.7(a)
• N.C. Const. art. II, § 11(1) (biennial regular sessions)
• N.C. Const. art. II, § 11(2) (extra sessions on legislative call)
• N.C. Const. art. III, § 5(7) (extra sessions called by Governor)
• N.C. Gen. Stat. § 120-11.1 (1991)
• N.C. Gen. Stat. § 163-1(a) (1991)
• Newsome v. N.C. State Board of Elections, 105 N.C. App. 499, 415 S.E.2d 201 (1992)

Original opinion text

February 7, 1994

Mr. Richard H. Carlton
Chief Deputy Secretary of State
State of North Carolina
300 N. Salisbury Street
Raleigh, North Carolina 27603-5909

RE: Advisory Opinion, N.C. Gen. Stat. Ch. 120, Article 9A

Dear Mr. Carlton:

This is in response to your letter of January 21, 1994, requesting an opinion on the issue of whether a separate set of expense reports would be required for registered lobbyists and principals for the upcoming special session of the General Assembly.

N.C. Gen. Stat. §§ 120-47.6(a) and -47.7(a) (1993), require all registered lobbyists and principals to file expense reports within 60 days after the last day of the regular session of the General Assembly. It is our opinion that this statute does not require filing of a separate set of reports after a special session of the legislature.

The constitution provides, "The General Assembly shall meet in regular session in 1973 and every two years thereafter on the day prescribed by law." N.C. Const. Art. II, § 11(1). The "day prescribed by law" is in N.C. Gen. Stat. § 120-11.1 (1991) which says: "The regular session of the Senate and House of Representatives shall be held biennially beginning at 12:00 noon on the third Wednesday after the second Monday in January next after their election." N.C. Gen. Stat. § 163-1(a) (1991) specifies that the election of members of the General Assembly shall be held on "Tuesday next after the first Monday in November 1968 and every two years thereafter." Accordingly, when read together, all of the constitutional and statutory provisions contemplate elections in even numbered years and convening of a regular session of the General Assembly in the following odd numbered years. The view that regular sessions of the General Assembly convene in odd numbered years was articulated in the recent case of Newsome v. N.C. State Board of Elections, 105 N.C. App. 499, 415 S.E.2d 201 (1992). There the Court of Appeals said: "Under the directive in section 11(1) [of the North Carolina Constitution], there are `regular' sessions of the General Assembly in the odd-numbered years after 1973." Id. at 508, 415 S.E.2d at 203.

The Court of Appeals also recognized that the General Assembly had adopted resolutions establishing a date for it to reconvene for a short session in an even numbered year and, implicitly, that it had the power to do so. Specifically, the Court said: "The session of the General Assembly held in 1990 was a continuation of the 1989 `regular' session, commonly termed a short session, in which only a limited number of matters are considered. See H.R.J. Res. 34, 138th Leg., First Sess., 1989 N.C. Sess. 3064." Id. Thus, regular sessions can be held in even numbered years.

The constitution further provides for "extra sessions" on legislative call, N.C. Const. Art. II, § 11(2), or by the Governor with the advice of the Council of State, N.C. Const. Art. III, § 5(7). The extra sessions can be convened at any time as long as the constitutional requirements are met. Extra sessions are convened at infrequent intervals and at different times from regular sessions with limited agendas to deal with specific issues. Extra sessions are clearly different from regular sessions.

In that the statute by its very terms is limited to regular sessions and is silent as to extra sessions, it is our view that it was not intended to apply to them. Therefore, separate sets of expense forms for an extra session are not required.

Andrew A. Vanore, Jr.
Chief Deputy Attorney General

Charles M. Hensey
Special Deputy Attorney General