Fud's, Inc. v. State, 98-408-Appeal.

• Decision Date: 31 March 1999
• Docket Number: No. 98-408-Appeal.,98-408-Appeal.
• Citation: 727 A.2d 692
• Parties: FUD'S, INC. et al. v. STATE of Rhode Island et al.
• Court: Rhode Island Supreme Court

727 A.2d 692

FUD'S, INC. et al. v. STATE of Rhode Island et al.

No. 98-408-Appeal.

Supreme Court of Rhode Island.

March 31, 1999.

Robert J. Ameen, Pawtucket, Rebecca Tedford Partington, Providence, for plaintiff.

Christopher M. Mulhearn, Cynthia M. Hiatt, for defendant.

Before WEISBERGER, C.J., and LEDERBERG, BOURCIER, and FLANDERS, JJ.

OPINION

FLANDERS, Justice.

The Superior Court has certified to us the following question:¹ do employers have a constitutional right to a jury trial in connection with unlawful-employment-practice charges that are brought against them? The Fair Employment Practices Act (FEPA), G.L.1956 chapter 5 of title 28, allows employees and other aggrieved parties (collectively, employees) to file unlawful-employment-practice charges against employers. Under FEPA, such charges are filed with the defendant, Rhode Island Commission for Human Rights (commission)² After conducting a preliminary investigation of the charges and attempting to eliminate or conciliate any alleged unlawful employment practice(s), the commission may issue a complaint to employers specifying the charges and noticing a hearing before the commission. See § 28-5-18. Between 120 days to two years after filing the charge, however, employees may request an authorization from the commission to file suit in Superior Court. See § 28-5-24.1. The commission must grant this right-to-sue authorization within thirty days after receiving the employees' request. See id. As a result, employees can bypass any hearing before the commission (provided that the commission's hearing has not yet begun) and pursue an employment-discrimination suit against employers in Superior Court. See id. But if any employee does so, then either party may opt for a Superior Court jury trial of the underlying discrimination claims and defenses.

Employers, however, enjoy no such similar right to bypass the commission. Unlike employees, they are unable to request the commission's authorization to litigate employees' discrimination claims in Superior Court. As a result, employers cannot obtain a jury trial of employees' discrimination charges unless an aggrieved employee decides to request the commission for its authorization to file suit in the Superior Court. Instead, employers are subject to the initial jurisdiction of either the commission or the Superior Court, depending solely upon the employees' choice of forum. Moreover, if an employee elects a commission hearing and obtains a favorable ruling, then the employer may obtain only an on-the-record administrative review of the commission's decision in the Superior Court. See Administrative Procedures Act, G.L.1956 § 42-35-15.³ The certified question asks us to determine the legality of this process under the right-to-a-jury-trial section of the Rhode Island Constitution. After briefly relating the facts and travel of this case, we proceed to explain why this statutory scheme is unconstitutional.

Facts and Travel

The defendant, Denise A. Thayer (Thayer), filed a charge with the commission alleging that her former employer, plaintiff FUD's, Inc. (FUD's), discriminated against her with respect to the terms and conditions of her employment. Thayer claimed that she was unable to operate a motor vehicle to transport herself to and from her waitressing job at a FUD's restaurant because of a degenerative, myopic condition in both her eyes. During the commission's preliminary investigation, the parties presented conflicting evidence about whether FUD's in fact fired Thayer because of her disability or whether she refused to continue working there after FUD's inquired about her ability to drive herself to and from work. Nevertheless, after investigating and finding probable cause that an unlawful discriminatory employment practice occurred, the commission issued a notice of hearing on Thayer's charges. The commission conducted a hearing on the matter, and thereafter, a hearing commissioner issued a decision on behalf of the commission. The commission found that FUD's had discriminated against Thayer with respect to the terms and conditions of her employment because of her disability. It also found that FUD's had terminated Thayer and denied her a reasonable job accommodation on account of her disability, thereby violating § 28-5-7 and G.L.1956 § 42-87-2. Consequently, the commission ordered FUD's, inter alia, to cease and desist from further unlawful employment practices, to offer its next available waitress position to Thayer, and to remit to Thayer $14,201.18 in back pay and $7,000 in compensatory damages for her pain and suffering.

FUD's appealed this decision to the Superior Court, arguing inter alia that the commission's procedures unconstitutionally deprived FUD's of its right to a jury trial. Because of this challenge to a state statute's constitutionality, the Superior Court granted the Attorney General's motion to intervene as a party plaintiff. See G.L.1956 § 9-30-11. Thereafter, the Attorney General moved to certify the employer's right-to-a-jury-trial question to this Court, and the Superior Court granted this request. The Attorney General has submitted a legal brief to this Court in support of FUD's position, arguing that FEPA's procedures are unconstitutional because they prevent employers from obtaining a jury trial on employees' discrimination claims unless an aggrieved employee opts to bypass the commission and sue in Superior Court. For the reasons discussed below, we hold that FEPA's statutory scheme violates employers' rights to a jury trial, and therefore, we answer the certified question in the affirmative.

Analysis

Pursuant to article 1, section 15, of the Rhode Island Constitution (constitution), "[t]he right of trial by jury shall remain inviolate" in this state. Accordingly, this right is not only immune to any legislative attempt at abolishment or alteration, see Dyer v. Keefe, 97 R.I. 418, 198 A.2d 159 (1964),

but it also must remain available to litigants in any type of legal action which was triable before a jury in 1843, the year when Rhode Island's first constitution became effective. That constitution included the same language as is now contained in article 1, section 15, of the current constitution. See Egidio DiPardo & Sons, Inc. v. Lauzon, 708 A.2d 165, 171 (R.I.1998); Bendick v. Cambio, 558 A.2d 941, 943-44 (R.I.1989).

In attempting to determine whether a cause of action triggers the right to a jury trial, we generally ask whether the particular cause of action or any analogous claim would have been triable to a jury in 1843. See DiPardo, 708 A.2d at 171-72; see also Bendick, 558 A.2d at 944-45

(citing Tull v. United States, 481 U.S. 412, 107 S.Ct. 1831, 95 L.Ed.2d 365 (1987)) (analogizing the imposition of civil penalties by an administrative agency for the violation of penal statutes to a common-law debt action triable to a jury). We also try to assay whether the type of relief available for the cause of action is legal or equitable. See Bendick, 558 A.2d at 945; see also Tull, 481 U.S. at 417-18,

107 S.Ct. at 1835,

95 L.Ed.2d at 373. Indeed, this available-relief analysis is "`[m]ore important' than finding a precisely analogous common-law cause of action in determining whether" article 1, section 15, mandates the opportunity for a jury trial. Tull, 481 U.S. at 421,

107 S.Ct. at 1837,

95 L.Ed.2d at 375 (quoting Curtis v. Loether, 415 U.S. 189, 196, 94 S.Ct. 1005, 1009, 39 L.Ed.2d 260, 267 (1974)).

Because a court may grant any such relief to which a complainant is entitled "even if the party has not demanded such relief in the party's pleadings," Super.R.Civ.P. 54(c), we look to FEPA's available remedies to ascertain whether legal relief may be awarded if the charges are found to be proven. Indeed, regardless of the scope of the employee's actual prayer for relief, both the commission and the Superior Court possess the power to award the employee remedies in lieu of or in addition to those remedies specifically requested. See §§ 28-5-24 and 28-5-24.1 (empowering the commission and the Superior Court to award various injunctive and other remedies upon determining that the employer has engaged in or is engaging in unlawful employment practices).

Until 1991, the General Assembly had authorized the commission to provide mostly equitable remedies to a complaining employee upon finding that an employer had engaged in or was engaging in unlawful employment practices. See Town of Johnston v. Ryan, 485 A.2d 1248, 1250 (R.I.1984)

(holding that because "most of the remedies available to the commission are equitable in nature," an employee was not required to comply with G.L.1956 § 45-15-5 by presenting her claims to the town council before filing a discrimination charge with the commission). Specifically, the commission could order a respondent to cease and desist from any unlawful employment practice(s), or it could award other equitable remedies, including, but not limited to, hiring, reinstatement, or upgrading of affected employees with or without back pay, as well as admission or restoration of the employee to union membership, and it could require the employer to file reports concerning the manner of its compliance. See § 28-5-24(a). In 1991, however, the General Assembly amended FEPA to enable the commission to award compensatory damages, see § 28-5-24(b), as well as punitive damages, see § 28-5-29.1.

While the remedies available under FEPA before 1991 were mostly equitable in nature, the remedies added by the 1991 amendment—compensatory and punitive damages—constitute traditional forms of legal relief. See Curtis, 415 U.S. at 195-96,

94 S.Ct. at 1009,

39 L.Ed.2d at 267 ("[T]he relief sought here—actual and punitive damages— is the traditional form of relief offered in the courts of law."). Although we have looked to the conclusions and reasoning contained in United States Supreme Court decisions to inform our own right-to-a-jury-trial jurisprudence, see...