Jocz v. Labor and Industry Review Com'n

• Decision Date: 08 August 1995
• Docket Number: No. 93-3042,93-3042
• Citation: 538 N.W.2d 588,196 Wis.2d 273
• Parties: , 103 Ed. Law Rep. 1234 Patricia JOCZ, Plaintiff-Appellant, d v. LABOR AND INDUSTRY REVIEW COMMISSION and Sacred Heart School of Theology, Defendants-Respondents.
• Court: Wisconsin Court of Appeals

Page 588

538 N.W.2d 588

196 Wis.2d 273, 103 Ed. Law Rep. 1234

Patricia JOCZ, Plaintiff-Appellant, ^d v. LABOR AND INDUSTRY REVIEW COMMISSION and Sacred Heart School of Theology, Defendants-Respondents.

No. 93-3042.

Court of Appeals of Wisconsin.

Submitted on Briefs Aug. 2, 1994.

Opinion Released Aug. 8, 1995.

Opinion Filed Aug. 8, 1995.

For the plaintiff-appellant the cause was submitted on the briefs of Steven G. Kmiec of Kmiec Law Offices, of Milwaukee.

For defendant-respondent Sacred Heart School of Theology the cause was submitted on the briefs of John M. Loomis and Katherine L. Williams of Beck, Chaet, Loomis, Molony & Bamberger, S.C., of Milwaukee.

For defendant-respondent Labor and Industry Review Commission the cause was submitted on the briefs of James E. Doyle, Attorney General, and Richard Briles Moriarty, Assistant Attorney General.

Before WEDEMEYER, P.J., and SULLIVAN and SCHUDSON, JJ.

SULLIVAN, Judge.

Patricia Jocz appeals from a trial court order affirming a Labor and Industry Review Commission (the Commission) order that dismissed her employment discrimination complaint against the Sacred Heart School of Theology, a Roman Catholic seminary, based on lack of subject matter jurisdiction. Jocz alleged in her complaint that the seminary violated the Wisconsin Fair Employment Act (WFEA), § 111.31, STATS. et seq., when it did not renew her employment contract allegedly because of her sex and her opposition to discriminatory practices. The administrative law judge concluded that the Department of Industry, Labor, and Human Relations (the Department) lacked subject matter jurisdiction to review the discrimination complaint because such review would violate the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution ¹ and the Freedom of Worship Clause of Article I, Section 18 of the Wisconsin Constitution. ² The Commission affirmed the administrative law judge's conclusion, as did the trial court.

On appeal to this court pursuant to Chapter 227, STATS., Jocz essentially presents the following issues for review: (1) whether the Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution or the Freedom of Worship Clause of Article I, Section 18 of the Wisconsin Constitution deprives the Department of subject matter jurisdiction to review and investigate employment discrimination complaints filed by employees of religious associations such as the Sacred Heart School of Theology; and (2) whether the Commission erred when it concluded that Jocz's position as Director of Field Placement at the seminary was "ministerial," thereby invoking the seminary's constitutional Free Exercise protection. ³

We hold that neither the Free Exercise Clause of the United States Constitution, nor the Freedom of Worship Clause of the Wisconsin Constitution, categorically deprives the Department of subject matter jurisdiction to review and investigate whether evidence supports a WFEA employment discrimination complaint filed against a religious association. If the employment position at issue, however, is inherently "ministerial" or "ecclesiastical," the religious protection embodied in the federal and state constitutions precludes the state and its agencies from enforcing the mandates of the WFEA against the religious association. Further, we conclude that the Commission did not err in determining that Jocz's position as Director of Field Placement was "ministerial." Accordingly, because the position is "ministerial," the State is precluded from enforcing the WFEA's sex discrimination prohibition against the seminary; thus, the Commission properly dismissed Jocz's complaint.

I. BACKGROUND

The Commission adopted the following findings of fact that the administrative law judge made after a three-day hearing on the Department's subject matter jurisdiction. The Sacred Heart School of Theology first employed Jocz in 1971 as a part-time teacher of "catechetics," the methodology of religious teaching. ⁴ She gradually became more involved in arranging and supervising seminary students in "field placements," that is, "pastoral" positions at parishes, hospitals, and jails. In January 1973, the seminary appointed Jocz to the position of "Pastoral Field Education Personnel," and from September 1973 to August 1974 she held the position of "Placement Supervisor" for the seminary's religious education program.

After the Vatican Council II, the Roman Catholic Church issued norms to increase the Church's emphasis on "pastoral" formation of priests. In 1974, the seminary created the Department of Field Education to increase seminary students' "pastoral" development outside of the classroom. The seminary selected Jocz "to organize, develop, and lead" the new department. Jocz's original title was "Coordinator of Field Education," but the seminary formally changed it to "Director of Field Education" in 1978. Jocz and the seminary signed a series of written employment agreements, "including an umbrella agreement for 1978-81, and one for 1981-86 explicitly requiring a separate contract for each year setting forth specific terms." The parties further "entered into separate agreements for each academic year from 1974-75 through 1977-78 and 1979-80 through 1984-85."

In 1981, the United States National Conference of Catholic Bishops promulgated The Program for Priestly Formation, a set of guidelines approved by the Sacred Congregation for Catholic Education, which governed all Roman Catholic seminaries in the United States. ⁵ See generally NATIONAL CONFERENCE OF CATHOLIC BISHOPS, THE PROGRAM OF PRIESTLY FORMATION (3d ed. 1982). The Program, as summarized by the administrative law judge, set forth the following provisions governing the Director of Field Education--a position that had to be filled by a member of the Roman Catholic faith:

"The field education program should be entrusted to a director who has full faculty status. The director will have the responsibility of developing the program and evaluating the performance of the seminarians and should be professionally trained for this work. The training should be particularly in two areas: first, in theology, so that field education may be a truly theological discipline; second, in supervisory techniques," a learnable skill, as demonstrated in various professions. Other disciplines may be added, "such as religious sociology, psychology, counseling, and group dynamics."

"Above all, the director of field education must have had personal pastoral experience. This role in the overall seminary program is crucial and the director will have a unique opportunity, not ordinarily shared by others on the academic faculty, to teach and judge the seminarians in a special forum."

"Any apostolic program under a trained supervisor will be far more educationally fruitful than one directed by an untrained faculty member. Until such a trained supervisor is prepared, however, interim personnel can direct the work so that the implementation of the program is not postponed."

(Administrative Law Judge Findings of Fact (quoting THE PROGRAM, supra at 58-59; citations omitted)).

In June 1981, Pope John Paul II mandated a papal visitation of all Roman Catholic seminaries in the United States. On February 13-17, 1984, the papal visitation team, including the Pope's personal representative, visited the Sacred Heart seminary. The visitation team then finalized a report on the seminary, including a discussion on the Department of Field Education, and transmitted it to the Holy See in 1985. (See supra note 4 discussing "Holy See."). In 1986, as part of its response to the papal visitation team's report on the United States seminaries, the Holy See promulgated administrative policies concerning Roman Catholic institutions such as the seminary. One of these policies provided that: "Directors of Field Education at such seminaries should be experienced priests, to enhance the quality of the Field Education program's supervision and theological reflection concerning (1) the relationship between the pastoral situation and the priesthood, and (2) the specific priestly contributions to be made in the pastoral situation." (Quotation from Administrative Law Judge findings.)

Prior to the beginning of the 1985-86 school year, the seminary's then-rector, the Rev. Thomas J. Garvey, decided it was in "the best interests" of the seminary not to offer Jocz a contract for the Director of Field Education position for the 1985-86 school year. According to the administrative law judge: "The reason or reasons underlying this decision [we]re the subject of a sharp factual dispute not at issue in this phase of the proceeding." Jocz declined an associate director position, and her employment with the seminary terminated after the 1984-85 school year.

On January 18, 1985, Jocz filed a complaint with the Equal Rights Division of the Wisconsin Department of Industry, Labor, and Human Relations. The complaint alleged that when the seminary failed to renew her employment contract, it discriminated against her because of her sex and her opposition to discriminatory practices (retaliation). Consequently, she alleged that these actions violated the WFEA.

After a lengthy independent investigation by the United States Equal Employment Commission, the Equal Rights Division conducted its own investigation and on November 28, 1989, issued an initial determination that there was probable cause that the seminary impermissibly discriminated against Jocz. A hearing before an administrative law judge was set, but the seminary later moved to bifurcate the proceedings so that in the initial phase of the hearing the administrative law judge could rule solely on the issue of whether the federal and state constitutions deprived the Department of subject matter jurisdiction over the complaint. After a three-day evidentiary hearing in May 1990, the administrative law judge issued an exhaustive memorandum...