Milford Ed. Ass'n v. Board of Ed. of Town of Milford

• Decision Date: 21 January 1975
• Citation: 167 Conn. 513,356 A.2d 109
• Court: Connecticut Supreme Court
• Parties: , 76 Lab.Cas. P 53,570 MILFORD EDUCATION ASSOCIATION v. BOARD OF EDUCATION OF the TOWN OF MILFORD.

Page 109

356 A.2d 109

167 Conn. 513, 76 Lab.Cas. P 53,570

MILFORD EDUCATION ASSOCIATION v. BOARD OF EDUCATION OF the TOWN OF MILFORD.

Supreme Court of Connecticut.

Jan. 21, 1975.

Stephen E. Ronai, Milford, with whom was John A. Parese, Milford, for appellant (defendant).

Martin A. Gould, Hartford, for appellee (plaintiff).

Before HOUSE, C.J., and SHAPIRO, LOISELLE, MacDONALD and BOGDANSKI, JJ.

HOUSE, Chief Justice.

This action arises out of a contract dispute between the plaintiff, the Milford Education Association, and the defendant, the board of education of the city of Milford. After a trial in the Superior Court, judgment was rendered for the plaintiff. The defendant has appealed from that judgment.

The plaintiff is a duly certified association of professional employees and is the certified collective bargaining representative for a unit composed of approximately 670 classroom teachers of the public schools in the city of Milford. The defendant board of education is the duly elected and constituted board of education of that city. On October 6, 1970, the plaintiff and the defendant executed a contract pursuant to § 10-153d of the General Statutes, as amended, for the period from September, 1970, to August 31, 1971. As of September 1, 1971, the parties had not completed negotiations for a successor contract for the 1971-1972 school year and agreed that while the negotiations were going on they would operate under the 1970-1971 agreement. ¹ On October 15, 1971, the parties entered into an identical agreement differing only in that it extended the 1970-1971 contract for the period from October 15, 1971, to October 22, 1971.

The current dispute arose over the parties' conflicting interpretations of the wording of the holdover agreements. The plaintiff claimed that the 1970-1971 contract provided that for each year of teaching experience a teacher would be advanced one step on the salary schedule and that, accordingly, while the parties were operating from September 1 to October 22, 1971, each teacher who had by September 1, 1971, completed another year of teaching experience would, under the terms of the 1970-1971 contract, be entitled to move up one step on the salary schedule. The defendant asserted, on the other hand, that the intention of the parties in entering into the holdover agreement was that the salaries paid from September 1 to October 22, 1971, were to be the same as those paid during the previous school year under the 1970-1971 agreement with no increase as a result of the year of additional teaching experience. On December 7, 1971, the parties agreed to the terms of a new contract effective as of November 19, 1971. During the period from September 1, 1971, to November 18, 1971, each teacher did in fact receive the same salary as that received during the 1970-1971 school year.

The plaintiff did not bring an action for breach of contract or for a declaratory judgment but instead proceeded by way of a petition for a writ of mandamus. The only relief sought by the plaintiff's complaint was 'a writ of mandamus ordering said Board of Education to make retroactive payments of salary to each of its teacher employees based upon the difference between the amount they were actually paid and the amount which they should have been paid had they been placed on the proper step on the 1970-1971 salary schedule for the period from September 1, 1971 to November 18, 1971.' The defendant pleaded by way of special defense that the plaintiff had not alleged sufficient facts to warrant the relief sought in that the complaint did not allege facts sufficient to show (1) that the defendant had a ministerial duty to perform the acts requested, which duty was imposed by law and did not involve the exercise of discretion; (2) that the plaintiff had a complete and immediate right to the relief sought; and (3) that the plaintiff had no other remedy.

The court found the issues for the plaintiff and rendered judgment ordering that 'the defendant Board of Education of the Town of Milford advance each teacher one step and be paid in accord with the 1970-1971 salary schedule from September 1, 1971 to October 22, 1971.'

On its appeal, the defendant, by its assignments of error, attacked the finding and the conclusions of the court on two principal bases. The first is predicated on the claim that the court erred in its interpretation of the contract and in its conclusion that the salary schedule, which was set forth in the 1970-1971 contract and which continued in effect during the extended periods, included the provision that each teacher should be advanced one step on the salary schedule after completion of a year of teaching experience. Its second principal claim is (1) that the court erred in concluding that the plaintiff had established that it was entitled to enforce its claim by way of the extraordinary relief of a writ of mandamus, and (2) that the relief as granted was illusory requiring further proceedings because there was no allocation made by the court as to the amount of damages to be recovered by the plaintiff and because no allocations were made as to the differing amounts to be paid to the various members of the plaintiff association.

We consider first the contention of the defendant that the court erred in concluding that the issuance of a writ of mandamus was an appropriate and proper remedy to grant in such a case as this where the cause of action set out in the complaint is basically one for breach of contract and the judgment of the court is for all intents and purposes an order that the defendant comply with a declaratory judgment predicated upon its interpretation of the terms of the contract.

There is merit to the contention of the defendant which was first pressed by demurrer and subsequently pleaded by way of special defense. 'The writ of mandamus is an extraordinary remedy, to be applied only under exceptional conditions, and is not to be extended beyond its well-established limits.' Lahiff v. St. Joseph's Total Abstinence Soc., 76 Conn. 648, 651, 57 A. 692, 693. Mandamus neither gives nor defines rights which one does not already have. It commands the performance of a duty. It acts upon the request of one who has a complete and immediate legal right; it cannot and does not act upon a doubtful and contested right. It is an expeditious remedy to protect a clear legal right. Boyko v. Weiss, 147 Conn. 183, 186, 158 A.2d 253. 'The essential conditions without which the writ will not be issued to enforce the performance of a ministerial duty are: (1) that the party against whom the writ is sought must be under an obligation, imposed by law, to perform some such duty,-that is, a duty in respect to the performance of which he may not exercise any discretion; (2) that the party applying for the writ has a clear, legal right to have the duty performed; and (3) that there is no other sufficient remedy.' Bassett v. Atwater, 65 Conn. 355, 360, 32 A. 937; Waterbury Teachers Ass'n v. Furlong, 162 Conn. 390, 294 A.2d 546; Basney v. Sachs, 132 Conn. 207, 43 A.2d 449; State ex rel. Berger v. Hurley, 73 Conn. 536, 48 A. 215. The same principle is more succinctly stated in State v. New Haven & Northhampton Co., 45 Conn. 331, 343, as follows: 'The writ of mandamus is designed to enforce a plain positive duty, upon the relation of one who has a clear legal right to have it performed, and where there is no other adequate legal remedy.'

We have always recognized the extraordinary character of proceedings by mandamus, and that its use is justified only when necessary to supplement the deficiencies of ordinary legal processes. Bassett v. Atwater, supra. We have consistently held to this rule, oft repeated and emphasized, and have applied it in both its letter and spirit. All attempts to appropriate it to use as an ordinary civil action have been steadily discountenanced. Chatfield Co. v. Reeves, 87 Conn. 63, 86 A. 750. As a result, issuance of the writ has been confined to situations where the aggrieved party has no adequate remedy either at law or in equity. State ex rel. Howard v. Hartford Street Ry. Co., 76 Conn. 174, 184, 56 A. 506.

Adequate remedy at law means a remedy vested in the complainant, to which he may at all times resort, at his own option, fully and freely, without let or hindrance. Atwood v. Partree, 56 Conn. 80, 83, 14 A. 85; State ex rel. Heimov v. Thomson, 131 Conn. 8, 37 A.2d 689; Wheeler v. Bedford, 54 Conn. 244, 249, 7 A. 22. Thus, we early held that mandamus will not lie where an action on the case will afford satisfaction equivalent to the specific relief claimed. Asylum v. Phoenix Bank, 4 Conn. 172, 178.

The general rule is that the writ is not available to recover a debt or damages arising out of a contract; Bassett v. Atwater, supra; nor to enforce a contract even though its performance necessarily devolves on a public official. 52 Am.Jur.2d, Mandamus, § 69, 55 C.J.S. Mandamus § 56; Parrotta v. Hederson, 315 Mass. 416, 419, 53 N.E.2d 97. The remedy in such cases is an action at law for breach of the contract. Mandamus is not the proper remedy to enforce performance of a...