California State Employees Ass'n v. Regents of University of California

• Decision Date: 26 November 1968
• Citation: 267 Cal.App.2d 667,73 Cal.Rptr. 449
• Court: California Court of Appeals Court of Appeals
• Parties: CALIFORNIA STATE EMPLOYEES' ASSOCIATION, a non-profit corporation on behalf of itself and its members, A. Doyle Reed and Leon G. Chassagne, on behalf of themselves and all others similarly situated, Plaintiffs and Appellants, v. The REGENTS OF the UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, a corporation, Defendant and Respondent. Civ. 25302.

Page 449

73 Cal.Rptr. 449

267 Cal.App.2d 667

CALIFORNIA STATE EMPLOYEES' ASSOCIATION, a non-profit corporation on behalf of itself and its members, A. Doyle Reed and Leon G. Chassagne, on behalf of themselves and all others similarly situated, Plaintiffs and Appellants, v. The REGENTS OF the UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, a corporation, Defendant and Respondent.

Civ. 25302.

Court of Appeal, First District, Division 4, California.

Nov. 26, 1968.

Rehearing Denied Dec. 12, 1968.

Hearing Denied Jan. 22, 1969.

Thomas T. Jordan, Wilmer W. Morse, Robert H. Sharpe, Sacramento, for plaintiffs and appellants.

Thomas J. Cunningham, Donald L. Reidhaar, Warren S. Levin, Berkeley, for defendant and respondent.

CHRISTIAN, Associate Justice.

The California State Employees' Association, and two of its members who are employees of the University of California, seek a declaration that University employees are entitled to require the University to make salary deductions for membership dues of the Association. We uphold the determination made by the lower court, in entering judgment for the Regents of the University on the pleadings, that the statute which empowers 'State officers and employees' to direct the making of such deductions from their salaries does not apply to University employment.

Applicable portions of sections 1156, 1156.1, and 1157.3 of the Government Code are set out in the margin. ¹ In summary, they provide that 'State officers and employees' may authorize and direct the making of deductions from their salaries for the purpose, amoug others, of paying dues in employee associations. The State Controller or other appropriate officer is then required to administer a payroll deduction system. 'Employees of a public agency' may also authorize deductions for dues to an employee association. However, in the case of such an agency the appropriate officer need only administer such a system if the governing body so decides.

Appellants first contend that sections 1156 and 1156.1 unambiguously include employees of the University of California within their coverage. It is true that these sections refer to 'state employees' and that the courts have held that for various purposes employees of the University of California are 'state employees' (e.g. Tolman v. Underhill (1952) 39 Cal.2d 708, 249 P.2d 280; Fraser v. Regents of University of California (1952) 39 Cal.2d 717, 249 P.2d 283).

But these statutes should be construed with reference to the whole system of law of which they form a part. (Select Base Materials Inc., v. Board of Equalization (1959) 51 Cal.2d 640, 335 P.2d 672; J. T. Jenkins Co. v. County of Los Angeles (1960) 178 Cal.App.2d 379, 2 Cal.Rptr. 852.) The meaning of certain words or phrases in a section of a statute may be limited or restricted by reference to surrounding statutes. (People v. Pereles (1932) 125 Cal.App.Supp. 787, 790, 12 P.2d 1093.)

Sections 1150 through 1157.5 of the Government Code (Title I, div. 4, ch. 1, art. 6), dealing with salary deductions, establish two distinct classes of employees: employees of a 'public agency' (hereinafter public employees) and employees of the state (hereinafter state employees). Parallel statutory sections provide for authorization of deducations by each class of employee for various purposes: the purchase of savings bonds (§§ 1152, 1153); contributions to charity (§§ 1156.3, 1157.2); employee association dues (§§ 1156, 1156.1, 1157, 1157.1, 1157.3). Finally, sections 1157.4 and 1157.5 authorize deductions by county employees.

Given this statutory scheme, we must determine whether the University of California is for purpose of this statute a part of state government or another kind of public agency. Section 1151 defines 'public agency' as including 'counties, cities, municipal corporations, political subdivisions, public districts, and other public agencies of the State.' Appellants argue that this must exclude all but local agencies, under the rule of construction that general terms are limited by the specific terms contained in the same series. (Hart v. City of Beverly Hills (1938) 11 Cal.2d 343, 347, 79 P.2d 1080.) On this theory, the concluding phrase of section 1151--'other public agencies of the State'--would be restricted to local agencies and thus could not include the University of California. But the rule of construction cited by appellants is merely an aid in determining legislative intent. It will not be applied so as to defeat legislative intent otherwise determined. (Coleman v. City of Oakland (1930) 110 Cal.App. 715, 295 P. 59; People v. McKean (1925) 76 Cal.App. 114, 243 P. 898.) Where general and specific words or phrases have independent purposes and are not used merely to color one another, the rule should not be used to defeat the apparent purpose of the statute. (Sacramento County v. City of Sacramento (1946) 75 Cal.App.2d 436, 171 P.2d 477.)

We have concluded that sections 1150 through 1157 disclose a legislative intent not to treat the University of California as a part of state government for purposes of payroll deductions. First, the legislation repeatedly provides that wage deduction programs for state employees be administered or regulated in various ways by the State Controller or Board of Control. ² Since the Controller and the Board of Control do not regulate the activities or policies of the University of California (California Constitution, art. IX, § 9; Gov.Code, § 12470; Newmarker v. Regents of University of California (1958) 160 Cal.App.2d 640, 325 P.2d 558), an implication arises that the Legislature did not intend that University employees be regarded as state employees for this purpose. Second, legislative intent regarding University employment may be inferred from the difference in treatment accorded to the policy issues involved in setting up schemes for payroll deduction in behalf of state employees as opposed to other public employees. The Legislature, acting by itself and through such delegated agencies as the State Board of Control and the Controller, constitutes the 'governing body' for state government. Therefore the Legislature itself made the policy determination, in sections 1156 and 1156.1, that state employees were to be entitled to authorize certain specified deductions from their salaries. Important considerations of personnel management were involved in that determination. The Legislature may have considered that as to other employing jurisdictions, where it was not the 'governing body,' it should refrain from making the policy determination to which we have just referred. Accordingly in dealing with the question of payroll deduction by employees of other public agencies, the legislation we have reviewed leaves the governing body of the employing jurisdiction empowered to form its own policy as to whether to honor various categories of payroll deduction. There can be no question of the power of the Legislature to put into effect in 'counties, cities, municipal corporations, political subdivisions, (and) public districts' the same statutory scheme that it applied to state employment. Its failure to do so implies an intention to exempt any public jurisdiction having a 'governing body' other than the Legislature. Under...