MADISON, Wis. (CN) - The Wisconsin Supreme Court ruled on Wednesday that the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction has no claim over $50 million earmarked for literacy spending but never allocated after the governor's unconstitutional partial veto.

In April, the state Supreme Court heard a complicated web of claims between the Legislature and the state Department of Public Instruction revolving around Acts 19, 20 and 100, which appropriated $50 million to the Joint Finance Committee's emergency fund. The money was supposed to go toward creating a new literacy coaching program and the Office of Literacy to control it, and establishing two empty accounts for the instruction department's future spending on the program.

The Legislature challenged Governor Tony Evers' partial veto of Act 100, effectively collapsing the two specialized accounts intended for the literacy coaching program into one catch-all account for general literacy spending, giving the instruction department more discretion over the cash.

In the same arguments before the state's high court, the instruction department counterclaimed that the Legislature's finance committee had illegally allocated the $50 million to its own emergency fund, then refused to release it to the department for spending.

Before making it to the supreme courtroom, the Dane County Circuit Court found in favor of Evers on the partial veto and in favor of the Legislature on the appropriation of funds.

On Wednesday, the Wisconsin Supreme Court unanimously decided that Evers' veto was unconstitutional and that the finance committee did not illegally allocate or withhold funds, partially reversing the lower court.

Wisconsin voters approved a constitutional amendment in 1930 giving the governor the unique power to partially veto appropriation bills. To decide what counts as an appropriation bill, the court applies the "four corners rule," which means that the bill must contain an appropriation within its four corners.

Act 100 created two empty bank accounts and appropriated nothing. Like many governors before him, Evers tested his luck, and the veto has been overturned.

Justice Rebecca Dallet pushed back on the allocation at oral arguments, questioning the Legislature's intentions when it created the empty accounts and stowed the money in an emergency fund: "So you can choose to not fund something at all, and then find the funding insufficient later? If that's what the Legislature did, how was that ever supposed to work?"

Attorney Ryan Walsh of the firm Eimer Stahl, who previously served as Wisconsin's chief deputy solicitor general, hit back by claiming the finance committee had every intention of putting the $50 million for literacy projects into the empty accounts before the governor misused his partial veto.

If this was the case, it was not clear to the court why the funds were not placed in the accounts in the first place.

For its claims, the instruction department made the case in April's arguments that the finance committee did not meet the statutory requirements to hold the cash in the emergency fund because there was no emergency or lack of funds. However, Justice Rebecca Bradley pointed out in Wednesday's opinion that the governor signed the bill allocating the money to the finance committee's supplemental or emergency fund, and so only the finance committee has legal claim to it.

The instruction department also argued that the Legislature violated the state constitution by giving the finance committee appropriation power, or power to decide what it doles out to the department. The court declined to consider the constitutionality of the statute allowing that allocation because the money was legally assigned to the committee.

"This court has no constitutional authority to override the Legislature's choice and appropriate the money to DPI instead," Bradley concluded.

The governor spun his veto and the instruction department's counterclaims into his "Year of the Kid" campaign in a statement on Wednesday: "I will never apologize for fighting for our kids and our schools. Not today, not ever. Nearly $50 million to improve our kids' reading has sat unspent in Madison for two years because Republican lawmakers have refused to release it."

This is not the first time the governor's veto power has been called into question. In April, the state Supreme Court ruled that Evers' use of a "Vanna White" veto in the 2023-2025 budget bill was constitutional despite its absurdity. His veto extended the sunset on school tax limit by 400 years.

The $50 million is set to expire in less than a week as the biennial comes to an end. In his statement, Evers urged Republican lawmakers to do something with the cash fast.

"Stop messing around with our kids and their futures and get it done," Evers said.

The finance committee could not be immediately reached to confirm whether it will move the funds into the accounts created by Act 100 now that the partial veto has been overturned.

Source: Courthouse News Service