Labor & Industry Department v. Unemployment Compensation Board of Review

• Decision Date: 20 December 1938
• Docket Number: 15-1939,14-1939
• Parties: Labor and Industry Department, Appellant, v. Unemployment Compensation Board of Review
• Court: Pennsylvania Superior Court

3 A.2d 211

133 Pa.Super. 518

Labor and Industry Department, Appellant, v. Unemployment Compensation Board of Review

Nos. 14-1939, 15-1939

Superior Court of Pennsylvania

December 20, 1938

Argued October 24, 1938.

Appeals by Department of Labor and Industry, from reports and decisions of Unemployment Compensation Board of Review affirming the respective awards of referee, in re Appeals of Elbert Elmer Bush, No. B-44-1-C-1 and John Priest No. B-44-1-D-5, from decisions of Department of Labor and Industry holding claimants ineligible for unemployment compensation.

Decision reversed in Appeal No. 14, and decision modified and affirmed in Appeal No. 15.

Hiram J. Bloom, Special Deputy Attorney General, with him Guy K. Bard, Attorney General, for appellant.

Clair Groover, Special Deputy Attorney General, for appellee.

Before Keller, P. J., Cunningham, Baldrige, Stadtfeld, Parker and Rhodes, JJ.

OPINION

PER CURIAM.

These appeals are by the Secretary of Labor and Industry of the Commonwealth, acting for the Department of Labor and Industry, of which he is the head, from final decisions of the Unemployment Compensation Board of Review established by the 'Unemployment Compensation Law' approved December 5, 1936, (P. L. of 1937, p. 2897) and its amendment of May 18, 1937, P. L. 658.

Claims for unemployment compensation under said act were filed by Elbert Elmer Bush (Appeal No. 14) and John Priest (Appeal No. 15) respectively, with the Department of Labor and Industry which determined, after examination of the claims filed and on the basis of the facts set forth therein, that the claims for compensation were not valid and the claimants were ineligible for compensation, because their unemployment was due to their having voluntarily left work and was not the result of any condition requiring them to join or remain a member of a company union or to resign from or refrain from joining any bona fide labor organization or to accept wages, hours or conditions of employment not desired by a majority of the employes in their establishments or occupations, or denying them the right of collective bargaining under generally prevailing conditions (section 402 (b) of said Act).

Appeals were taken by the respective claimants from the decisions of the department holding them ineligible for unemployment compensation, which were heard before the same referee, who reversed the decisions of the department and allowed the respective claimants unemployment compensation. The department thereupon appealed to the board of review (See section 303 of the general regulations promulgated as rules of procedure by the Unemployment Compensation Board of Review pursuant to the Act, which makes the claimant and the department parties to all appeal proceedings). The board of review, on consideration of the appeals, affirmed the respective awards of the referee, and these appeals were duly taken to this court by the department after the decisions of the board had become final (section 510).

The Act provides (section 510), that, "In any appeal to the Superior Court, the findings of the board or referee, as the case may be, as to the facts, if supported by the evidence and in the absence of fraud, shall be conclusive, and in such cases the jurisdiction of the court shall be confined to questions of law." The facts are not in dispute and fraud is not involved. Hence our jurisdiction is confined to questions of law. But the meaning of the phrase, 'Voluntarily leaving work,' (section 402 (b)), which the act declares shall render a claimant ineligible for compensation, and whether it applies to the undisputed facts in these cases, are questions of law and within the jurisdiction of this court.

The word, 'voluntarily', may be used in a number of different senses, but, in our opinion, having regard to the purpose and intent of the act, considered as a whole, but with special reference to its declaration of public policy (section 3) and its fourth article, which prescribes the qualifications required to secure compensation and enumerates the causes which will make an employe ineligible for compensation, the most appropriate meaning or definition is, "Of one's own motion" (Century Dictionary); "of one's own accord" (Oxford Dictionary); "acting of one's self" (Webster's New International Dictionary). When we say, "He left work voluntarily," we commonly mean, he left of his own motion; he was not discharged. It is the opposite of a discharge, dismissal or lay-off by the employer or other action by the employer severing relations with his employes, to provide against which the act was mainly designed.

This meaning of the term is easily applied, is of general significance and obviates the necessity of an inquiry or examination into the mental processes of the employe which led up to or brought about his resignation or quitting work of his own motion, the result of which might or might not be deemed voluntary as considered by different persons, from different points of view, and thus be variable and subject to no uniform standard.

We are satisfied that the act does not apply to a severance from work caused by an accident to the employe; and that it is not a health insurance measure. The suggestion now being made in congressional circles that the Social Security Act, with which our Unemployment Compensation Act is closely connected, shall be enlarged so as to provide compensation for unemployment resulting from sickness is a potent reason for concluding that it is not now included within present legislation.

We are of opinion, therefore, that, subject to the special exception stated in section 402 (b) relative to labor organizations, etc., where the employe, without action by the employer, resigns, leaves or quits his employment, his action amounts to 'voluntarily leaving work,' such as to render him ineligible for unemployment compensation under the act.

We shall now apply these general principles to the particular cases being reviewed.

No. 14 March Term, 1939 -- The Bush case.

The undisputed evidence in this case is that Mr. Bush was not discharged, dismissed or laid off by his employer. He was employed, and had been for approximately three years and ten months prior to November 26, 1937, to deliver milk on a milk route by Model Dairy Company of Corry, Pa. He quit work because his physician advised him to give up his position on account of a rheumatic condition. He was experiencing pains in his feet and legs, which were aggravated or increased by being on his feet so much in the early morning and jumping in and out of the wagon in all kinds of weather, storms, snow and rain, and by lack of sleep.

The referee found that "claimant's employment was terminated November 26, 1937 for the reason that claimant was physically unable to continue the said employment," and drew the conclusion of law that "claimant was unemployed because he was discharged and did...