Questions raised about special session call's constitutionality
by Mike Hasten - The Town Talk (excerpt)

BATON ROUGE -- Questions about whether Gov. Bobby Jindal's call for the special session that starts Sunday meets the requirements set up in the constitution could only be settled in court, top staffers in the House and Senate say, but they don't expect anyone to challenge it.

But Jimmy Faircloth of Pineville, Gov. Bobby Jindal's executive counsel, says there's no doubt that the governor's call complies with the constitution. He says that regardless of how the constitution is interpreted, the call fits.

The state constitution requires that "at least five days prior to convening the legislature in extraordinary session, the governor or the presiding officers, as the case may be, shall issue a proclamation stating the objects of the session, the date on which it shall convene, and the number of days for which it is convened."

But there's no explanation of whether that means five calendar days or five 24-hour periods, say Butch Speer, clerk of the House of Representatives, and Glenn Koepp, secretary of the Senate.
To Speer, the call conforms to the requirements because the House goes by the 24-hour rule, not the day of the week rule for filing bills.

"Do you count calendar days or 24-hour periods?" he asks. "No one knows. The constitution doesn't tell us how to count five days and the statute dealing with special sessions doesn't tell us. Since no one knows, I cannot presume it's something that falls afoul of the law."

Speer said he would advise a governor to use "the belt and suspenders approach," taking every precaution to make sure a call is issued at least five days before the session convenes.