Bill > HB30

This bill modifies Montana's legal statutes to establish a high standard of proof when challenging the constitutionality of a legislative act in the state's Supreme Court. Specifically, the bill changes existing law by requiring that when a party challenges a legislative act as unconstitutional, the Supreme Court must uphold the act unless the challenger can prove the act is unconstitutional "beyond a reasonable doubt" - a notably high legal standard typically reserved for criminal cases. The bill also makes smaller linguistic changes, such as replacing mandatory language like "shall" with more permissive terms like "may" when describing the Supreme Court's rule-making powers. By imposing this stringent burden of proof, the legislation makes it significantly more difficult to successfully challenge the constitutionality of laws passed by the Montana legislature, effectively providing greater deference to legislative acts and making judicial invalidation of laws a much higher bar to clear.

Justice

https://bills.legmt.gov/#/laws/bill/20251/LC0617