Baugh v. United Tel. Co.

• Decision Date: 28 June 1978
• Docket Number: 77-933 and 77-934,Nos. 77-932,s. 77-932
• Citation: 377 N.E.2d 766,54 Ohio St.2d 419
• Parties: , 8 O.O.3d 427 BAUGH et al., Appellants, v. UNITED TELEPHONE CO. of Ohio, Appellee. ALBERTE et al., Appellants, v. UNITED TELEPHONE CO. of Ohio, Appellee. ATKINS et al., Appellants, v. UNITED TELEPHONE CO. of Ohio, Appellee.
• Court: Ohio Supreme Court

Page 419

54 Ohio St.2d 419

377 N.E.2d 766, 8 O.O.3d 427

BAUGH et al., Appellants, v. UNITED TELEPHONE CO. of Ohio, Appellee.

ALBERTE et al., Appellants, v. UNITED TELEPHONE CO. of Ohio, Appellee.

ATKINS et al., Appellants, v. UNITED TELEPHONE CO. of Ohio, Appellee.

Nos. 77-932, 77-933 and 77-934.

Supreme Court of Ohio.

June 28, 1978.

Syllabus by the Court

Where, during the course of a bona fide labor dispute, the employer terminates the employer-employee relationship through his affirmative action of replacing the striking employee, preventing any volition on the part of said employee to return to work, the employer thereby has severed the labor dispute as the proximate cause of unemployment, and the statutory disqualification provision, R.C. 4141.29(D)(1)(a), is inapplicable as a bar to the right to receive unemployment compensation benefits.

The collective bargaining agreement between the appellee, The United Telephone Company of Ohio, and the appellants, the traffic department employees ("traffic employees") of that company, expired in October of 1971. The traffic employees thereafter continued working under the provisions of the expired agreement. However, on January 4, 1972, the traffic employees, members of Local 1067, International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, commenced a work stoppage resulting in an economic strike.

Following a period of negotiation, the union representatives of the traffic employees notified the company, on May 22, 1972, that the company's last proposal was unacceptable. At this point an apparent impasse existed. The company then mailed a letter, dated May 25, 1972, to each of the striking employees. This letter stated that an impasse existed, and unless the striking employees returned to work by June 1, 1972, the company would commence hiring permanent replacement employees.

The traffic employees, in accordance with their decision reached at a meeting on May 30, 1972, refused to return to work on June 1, 1972. The company then, on or around June 1, 1972, did commence the hiring of permanent replacement employees. Additionally, each striking traffic employee received a second letter from the company shortly after June 1, 1972, advising the employee that he or she had been permanently replaced.

Following a series of negotiating sessions, a strike settlement agreement, effective July 31, 1972, was reached. As part of this agreement the company consented to return traffic employees to full-time employment only when the permanent replacements hired by the company terminated their relationship with the company. Until all traffic employees could be returned on a full-time basis, they would work every third week.

Immediately after their permanent replacement by the company on June 1, 1972, the traffic employees applied for unemployment compensation on that date. The Administrator of the Ohio Bureau of Employment Services' decision in each case herein that the employees were not disqualified by reason of separation of employment from receiving unemployment benefits was affirmed by the Board of Review.

The company filed appeals with the Court of Common Pleas, which reversed the decisions of the Bureau of Employment Services. The Court of Appeals, thereafter affirmed the judgments of the Court of Common Pleas.

The causes are now before this court pursuant to the allowance of appellants' motions to certify the record. The causes have been consolidated for final decision herein as they involve the same legal issues.

Green, Schiavoni, Murphy & Haines, Eugene Green and Ronald G. Macala, Youngstown, for appellants in each case.

Guarnieri & Secrest and Charles A. Young, Warren, for appellee in each case.

LOCHER, Justice.

The appellants have presented two propositions of law: (1) The disqualification from unemployment compensation benefits imposed upon an employee under the "labor dispute" provision of R.C. 4141.29(D)(1)(a) is extinguished when the employee is permanently replaced during the course of that labor dispute, and (2) an employee, unable to return to his job on a full-time basis because of his permanent replacement during the course of a labor dispute, is deemed to be in a lay-off status during those periods when no work from his employer is available and is entitled to unemployment compensation benefits for that time. Simply phrased, the threshold question is whether the appellants are disqualified under the facts of the instant cause from receiving unemployment compensation benefits because of R.C. 4141.29.

R.C. 4141.29, with respect to an individual's right to receive these benefits, in relevant part, provides:

"(D) Notwithstanding division (A) of this section, no individual may serve a waiting period or be paid benefits under the following conditions:

"(1) For any week with respect to which the administrator finds that:

"(a) His unemployment was due to a labor dispute other than a lockout at any factory, establishment, or other premises located in this or any other state and owned or operated by the employer by which he is or was last employed; and for so long as his unemployment is due to such labor dispute. * * * " (Emphasis added.)

In affirming the trial court's reversal of the Bureau of Employment Services' decision in each case that appellants could not be disqualified by reason of separation from employment, the Court of Appeals, relying upon this court's prior decisions in Baker v. Powhatan Mining Co. (1946), 146 Ohio St. 600, 67 N.E.2d 714, and Leach v. Republic Steel Corp. (1964), 176 Ohio St. 221, 199 N.E.2d 3, found that the reason for appellants' unemployment was a labor dispute and thus they were disqualified, pursuant to R.C. 4141.29(D)(1)(a). The inapplicability of Baker, supra, and Leach, supra, to the resolution of the instant cause is readily discernible upon an examination of these cases. The issue in Baker, supra, although concerning the disqualification provision in G.C. 1345-6, now R.C. 4141.29, was "whether the industrial conditions which prevailed at the mines (production men did not report to work although work was available) where claimants were employed were such as to constitute a strike * * * ." Similarly, despite the ultimate application of the disqualification clause in Leach, supra, the question therein considered was in a case where a labor dispute closed the employer's establishment, and the strike is summarily ended by an injunction, is unemployment compensation payable from the end of the strike until the employee is recalled to work after the employer's establishment is readied for a resumption of its operations.

It is thus apparent that the precise question, whether the statutory disqualification pursuant to R.C. 4141.29(D)(1)(a) imposed upon an employee because of a labor dispute terminates when the employer permanently replaces the employee during the course of the labor dispute, has never been addressed by this court.

The disqualification provision of R.C. 4141.29(D)(1)(a) applies only if "unemployment was due to a labor dispute." We find that the words "due to" mean "caused by." They do not mean merely "occurring during the course of." Thus, the element of causation is indispensable. Hence, the vital question is not whether the unemployment occurred in the course of the labor dispute, but whether the unemployment was caused by the labor dispute. Skookum Co. v. Employment Div. (1976), 24 Or.App. 271, 545 P.2d 914; Brechu v. Rapid Transit Co. (1957), 20 Conn.Sup. 210, 131 A.2d 211. In construing an analogous disqualification provision, ^* the Supreme Court of California has recognized that the section creates a test of proximate causation as to the reason for an applicant's unemployment. Ruberoid Co. v. California Unemployment Ins. Appeals Board (1963), 59 Cal.2d 73, 27 Cal.Rptr. 878, 378 P.2d 102; Isobe v. California Unemployment Ins. Appeals Board (1974), 12 Cal.3d 584, 116 Cal.Rptr. 376, 526 P.2d 528. In Ruberoid, supra, the court stated that the loss of benefits must be attributable to a trade dispute which is the direct cause of the unemployment.

The Wisconsin Supreme Court has also impliedly recognized the proximate-causation test created...