July 20, 1976
Mr. Rodney J. Steele
Deputy State's Attorney
Kingsbury County
De Smet, South Dakota 57231
OFFICIAL OPINION NO. 76-71
Authority to draw policy regulations for county employees to work on days designated as legal holidays
Dear Mr. Steele:
You have requested an official opinion from this office relative to the stated factual situation:
The County of Kingsbury, South Dakota, is in the process of drawing employee policy guidelines. District II of the Rural Development Office is assisting the County in the drawing of said policy guidelines. The County wishes to require county employees to work on the second Monday in October of each year which has been designated as "Pioneers' Day," a legal holiday under SDCL 1-5-1.
The specific question you have requested an opinion concerning is: Does Kingsbury County have authority to draw policy regulations which require county employees to work on the day designated by SDCL 1-5-1 as a legal holiday?
As you have cited, "Pioneers' Day" is a legal holiday recognized by SDCL 1-5-1. The statute granting said status to the second Monday in October fails, however, to elaborate on the significance of "legal holidays." Faced with a similar vagueness in their own statute, a Connecticut court interpreted a "legal holiday" in the following manner:
The Legislature has designated certain days as legal holidays without stipulating in any general way what is the effect intended. Gen. Stat. F. 6565. It must have intended to attach to those days the significance generally accorded to a holiday in the civil law, that is, it is a day on which the ordinary occupations are suspended, a day of exemption or cessation from work, a day of religious observation or of recreation and amusement. 29 C.J. 761; 40 C.J.S. Holidays, F. 1 p. 410; 29 Am. L. Reg. N.S., 137 [Lamberti v. City of Stamford, 131 Conn. 396, 40 A. 2d 192 (1944)].
It is the opinion of this office that a similar intent was behind the enactment of what is now SDCL 1-5-1. In 1925, the Legislature specifically cleared up confusion as to the legality of acts performed on legal holidays. The purpose of the new section (SDCL 1-5-2) was not, however, to circumvent the initial intent as to the effect of legal holidays; it was to clarify that said legal holidays were not to be interpreted as having the same legal effect as Sundays. Acts on legal holidays, whether public or private, therefore, became legally valid. The intent of the Legislature for the purpose of such legal holiday should be a day of the cessation or exemption from work.
It is therefore the opinion of this office that a county does not have the authority to draw policy regulations which require county employees to work on the day designated by SDCL 1-5-1 as a legal holiday. The cloak of legality that has been placed on public and private acts on such days does not obliterate the intent of the Legislature that such days should entail a cessation of or exemption from work.
The answer to your question, therefore, is NO.
Respectfully submitted,
WILLIAM J. JANKLOW
ATTORNEY GENERAL
WJJ:DOG:DG:rw
