Board of Educ. of Montgomery County v. Paynter, 123

• Decision Date: 01 September 1984
• Docket Number: No. 123,123
• Citation: 491 A.2d 1186,303 Md. 22
• Parties: , 24 Ed. Law Rep. 1181 BOARD OF EDUCATION OF MONTGOMERY COUNTY v. Milton A. PAYNTER et al. ,
• Court: Maryland Court of Appeals

Page 22

303 Md. 22

491 A.2d 1186, 24 Ed. Law Rep. 1181

BOARD OF EDUCATION OF MONTGOMERY COUNTY v. Milton A. PAYNTER et al.

No. 123, Sept. Term, 1984.

Court of Appeals of Maryland.

May 9, 1985.

Roger W. Titus, Rockville, for appellant.

Mark D. McCurdy, Asst. Atty. Gen., Baltimore, for appellee, Department of Employment Security.

Stephanie Klein, Legal Aid Bureau, Silver Spring, for appellee, Milton A. Paynter.

Stephen H. Sachs, Atty. Gen. and Diana G. Motz, Asst. Atty. Gen., Baltimore, on brief for appellee, Department of Employment Security.

Argued before MURPHY, C.J., SMITH, ELDRIDGE, COLE, RODOWSKY and McAULIFFE, JJ., and CHARLES E. ORTH, Jr., Associate Judge of the Court of Appeals of Maryland (retired), Specially Assigned.

ORTH, Judge.

The General Assembly of Maryland has declared that

in its considered judgment the public good, and the general welfare of the citizens of this State require the enactment of [an unemployment insurance law], under the police powers of this State, for the compulsory setting aside of unemployment reserves to be used for the benefit of persons unemployed through no fault of their own. Md.Code (1957, 1979 Repl.Vol., 1984 Cum.Supp.) Article 95A, § 2.

Milton A. Paynter, a teacher employed by the Board of Education of Montgomery County, thought that the reserves so set aside should be tapped for his benefit because, he believed, he had become unemployed through no fault of his own. He applied to the Unemployment Insurance Division of the Employment Security Administration, which, as a part of the Department of Human Resources, was then charged with the administration of the Unemployment Insurance Law, codified at Art. 95A. (Hereinafter section citations are to Art. 95A unless otherwise noted.) His claim for benefits was referred to a claims examiner who denied it. § 7(c). Paynter was not happy with the examiner's decision and sought help from the Board of Appeals of the Employment Security Administration. § 7(c)(ii) and (e). The Board referred the matter to a referee. The referee conducted an evidentiary hearing, made findings and conclusions, and on the basis thereof reversed the determination of the examiner, holding that there was to be "no denial of benefits." § 7(e). The decision of the referee aggrieved Paynter's former employer, and it sought review by the Board of Appeals. § 7(f). The Board, on the basis of evidence previously submitted before the referee, adopted "the facts and reasoning contained in the decision of the Appeals Referee" and affirmed his decision. Id. The Board of Education of Montgomery County was by no means satisfied. It secured judicial review of the decision of the Board of Appeals by appeal to the Circuit Court for Montgomery County. § 7(h). ¹ The court was persuaded by Paynter, who was joined by the Board of Appeals, represented by the Attorney General of Maryland, that within the statutory limitations of its scope of review, it should affirm the decision of the Board of Appeals. Id. The Board of Education of Montgomery County was still not convinced that Paynter was entitled to benefits. It took an appeal to the Court of Special Appeals. Id. We found that review of the case by this Court before the intermediate appellate court had rendered a decision was desirable and in the public interest, and ordered by writ of certiorari that the case be certified to us. We are called upon to determine who was out of step--the examiner or the referee, the Board of Appeals and the circuit court.

This case is governed by § 6(a) of the Unemployment Insurance Law. Its provisions were applied by the examiner, the referee, the Board of Appeals and the circuit court in reaching their respective decisions. We must reach our decision in the light of its dictates. Section 6 concerns "Disqualification for benefits." It enumerates a number of circumstances under which an individual shall be disqualified completely or partially for benefits. The first of these circumstances is "Voluntarily leaving work," and it is dealt with in subsection (a).

An individual is disqualified for all benefits if his "unemployment is due to his leaving work voluntarily without good cause." He is partially disqualified for benefits if his unemployment is due to his leaving work voluntarily because of valid circumstances. The extent of the disqualification depends upon the seriousness of the valid circumstances. Purely personal reasons, no matter how compelling they may be, provide no excuse for voluntarily leaving work. The subsection gives three examples. "Leaving work," it declares, "to become self-employed, to accompany or join one's spouse in a new locality, or to attend an educational institution is neither good cause nor a valid circumstance for voluntarily leaving work." With respect to good cause,

[o]nly a cause which is directly attributable to, arising from, or connected with the conditions of employment or actions of the employer may be considered good cause.

With respect to a valid circumstance,

[o]nly a substantial cause which is directly attributable to, arising from, or connected with the conditions of employment or actions of the employer, or another cause of such necessitous or compelling nature that the individual had no reasonable alternative other than to leave the employment may be considered a valid circumstance.

Other than these guidelines as to what good cause and valid circumstance must be and may not be, the legislature left the determination of what amounts to both good cause and valid circumstance in the hands of the administrative agency charged by it to administer the Unemployment Insurance Law. That the legislature was relying on the expertise of the agency in this regard is clearly evident from the language of subsection (a) "[i]f the Executive Director finds that the individual's unemployment is due to his leaving work voluntarily without good cause," and "according to the seriousness of valid circumstances as determined in each case by the Executive Director...." (Emphasis supplied). To ascertain and effectuate the actual legislative intention in enacting any statute is, of course, the cardinal rule of statutory interpretation. In this regard, the primary source of legislative intent is the language of the statute itself. Where the statutory provisions are unambiguous, no construction is required, so that a plainly worded statute must be construed without forced or subtle interpretations designed to extend or limit the scope of its operation. State v. Intercontinental, Ltd., 302 Md. 132, 137, 486 A.2d 174 (1985) (citations omitted).

The provisions of § 6(a) are unambiguous and we need not go behind what the statute plainly says on its face to ascertain the legislative intent.

The Board of Education would have the "necessitous or compelling" provision related in the statute to valid circumstance apply equally to good cause. To do otherwise, it states, would result in a more onerous standard for the payment of limited benefits than for the payment of full benefits. This, it suggests, would be absurd in light of the purposes of the Unemployment Insurance Law and the policy regarding it announced by the legislature. See § 2. The invalidity of the argument of the Board of Education is readily apparent on the face of the statute. Neither good cause nor valid circumstance may be predicated upon a purely personal reason. But, although the statute commands that good cause be job-related, it recognizes a cause in addition to one that is job-related with respect to a valid circumstance. It is this alternative cause provided with respect to valid circumstance, and not applicable to good cause, which must meet the "necessitous or compelling" test. Provision for the additional cause as to valid circumstance is clearly spelled out in the statute when it prescribes:

Only a substantial cause which is directly attributable to, arising from, or connected with the conditions of employment or actions of the employer, or another cause of such necessitous or compelling nature that the individual had no reasonable alternative other than to leave the employment may be considered a valid circumstance. (Emphasis supplied).

The obvious rationale for the strict test required as to this alternative non-job-related cause is that if the employer must contribute to the payment of benefits arising from a cause not connected with the claimant's employment or the employer's actions, that cause should have a higher standard of proof. It is perfectly plain from the statutory language that the legislature did not intend that the necessitous or compelling requirement apply to good cause.

As we have indicated, the decision at each level of appeal was based upon the evidence adduced at the hearing conducted by the referee and his factual findings thereon. Indeed, the evidence stands undisputed and unrefuted. It consists in major part of the testimony of Paynter, testifying in his own behalf and of the testimony of John Joseph Dalton, assistant principal of Wheaton High School, called by the Board of Education. We give a compendium of their testimony.

Paynter was a full-time teacher of Spanish with the Montgomery County School System from 31 August 1981 to 30 November 1982 when his resignation became effective. The first year of his employment was spent at White Oak Junior High School and Springbrook High School. The difficulties which led to his resignation occurred during his three months at Wheaton High School. He explained why he resigned:

I left primarily because I was being harassed on a daily basis. I was threatened and I felt that I wasn't really receiving the type of aid that I felt I deserved from the administration to deal with the problem.

Apparently the seed of the harassment was planted while Paynter was at Springbrook when a student named Allen Studivan started a fight with Paynter. On Paynter's second day at Wheaton he came upon Studivan with a group of...