State ex rel. Gainer v. West Virginia Board of Investments

The majority opinion is well reasoned and elicits great respect from me. Nonetheless, I dissent because I don’t believe that our Constitution compels the majority’s conclusion. As the majority opinion forthrightly recognizes, the purpose of W.Va. Const. Art. X, § 6 was to prevent state government from helping selected private businesses when those businesses had powerful political allies. W.Va. Const. Art. X, § 6 was written long before state-managed pension plans presented the problem of sustaining the inflation-adjusted value of massive amounts of accumulated capital.

The State now manages…