Small v. Jacklin Seed Co.

• Decision Date: 29 May 1985
• Docket Number: No. 14994,14994
• Citation: 109 Idaho 541,709 P.2d 114
• Parties: , 39 Empl. Prac. Dec. P 35,816 Patricia J. SMALL, Claimant-Appellant, v. JACKLIN SEED COMPANY, Employer-Respondent, and Idaho Department of Employment, Respondent.
• Court: Idaho Supreme Court

Page 114

709 P.2d 114

109 Idaho 541, 39 Empl. Prac. Dec. P 35,816

Patricia J. SMALL, Claimant-Appellant, v. JACKLIN SEED COMPANY, Employer-Respondent and Idaho Department of Employment, Respondent.

No. 14994.

Supreme Court of Idaho.

May 29, 1985.

Patricia J. Small, pro se.

Jim Jones, Atty. Gen., Lynn E. Thomas, Sol. Gen., Carol Lynn Brassey, Katharine A. Gerrity, Deputy Attys. Gen., Boise, for Department of Employment.

BAKES, Justice.

Appellant Patricia J. Small began working for respondent Jacklin Seed Company as a general laborer in March of 1982. Small voluntarily quit her job on August 9, 1982. Small then filed a claim for unemployment insurance with respondent Department of Employment, asserting that she had terminated her employment with good cause based upon allegations of sexual harassment. Her claim was denied. Later, a redetermination issued in which Small was again found ineligible to receive benefits. Small appealed the redetermination to the Appeals Bureau of the Department of Employment. The appeals examiner, after conducting a telephone conference hearing, concluded that Small had failed to establish good cause for voluntarily leaving her employment. Small appealed to the Industrial Commission. The Industrial Commission, without conducting a new hearing and based upon the transcript of the telephone conference hearing, adopted the decision of the appeals examiner. Small appeals from the commission's ruling, arguing that the record does not support its conclusion that she voluntarily quit without good cause.

The sole issue raised on appeal by appellant is whether the findings of the Industrial Commission are supported by substantial evidence. However, apparently through inadvertence the Industrial Commission did not consider all of the evidence which was before the appeals examiner. The record prepared by the Department of Employment and certified to the Industrial Commission contained nine exhibits, but two of the exhibits were not transmitted to the Industrial Commission. The certificate of the Industrial Commission on appeal indicates that only Exhibits 1 through 7 were considered by the Industrial Commission in reviewing the Department of Employment's record. Thus, it appears that Exhibits 8 and 9, although required to be included in the record on appeal before the Industrial Commission, were never forwarded to or considered by the Industrial Commission in arriving at its decision. Exhibits 8 and 9 are not contained in the commission's record filed in this Court. ¹ Exhibit 8 was the employer's "Temporary Employees Handbook," and Exhibit 9 was a photocopy of pictures taken by claimant's supervisor who allegedly inflicted the sexual harassment. The pictures allegedly were of women, including claimant, in bent over positions while working in the fields, offered to illustrate the supervisor's alleged preoccupation with sexual matters.

Considering the sensitive nature of the appellant's claim in this appeal, i.e., that she had good cause to quit because of sexual harassment, and considering the marginal quality of the transcript of the telephone conference hearing held before the appeals examiner which was the basis of the record before the Industrial Commission, it is the conclusion of this Court that the apparent omission by the Industrial Commission to consider Exhibits 8 and 9 requires this Court to remand the case to the Industrial Commission for reconsideration. The commission may well want to consider a new hearing to obtain an accurate record from which to evaluate appellant's case, considering the apparent inadequacies of the telephone conference record presently before the Court.

Remanded to the Industrial Commission for further proceedings. No costs allowed.

DONALDSON, C.J., and HUNTLEY, J., concur.

SHEPARD, J., dissents without opinion, and would affirm the order of the Industrial Commission.

BISTLINE, Justice, agreeing only that the decision of the Commission cannot stand, but not for reasons stated by the majority.

Although the majority opinion will read well to those two thousand attorneys who do not see the record and see only that the claimant is not entirely disenfranchised of her right to benefits, on even a cursory review of the appeal record the reader finds himself on Tobacco Road. The Department of Employment contends that the examiner's findings, as adopted by the Industrial Commission, were supported by substantial evidence. The examiner found that Patricia Small had quit voluntarily without good cause, hence she was not entitled to unemployment benefits. The crux of the matter is whether the claimant had good cause to leave Jacklin Seed Company when she did. The appeals examiner for the Department of Employment concluded that she did not. That determination was made following a telephone conference hearing. Not only did the appeals examiner not see the witnesses, but neither did the Industrial Commission, which in turn simply endorsed the decision of the appeals examiner without any hearing whatever. In turn, a majority of this Court has avoided meeting the issue presented, notwithstanding that the five of us are as equally competent and capable as the three commissioners to independently review a cold record. I am appalled at the result and the system which has produced it.

Cumulative evidence of sexual harassment, intimidation, badgering, mistreatment, and provoking of the claimant, along with other co-workers in her presence, is grounds for any reasonable employee to leave a job and look for other employment. The claimant more than amply demonstrated that she was so subjected by an employee in a supervisory capacity and by him stripped of, if not her clothing, the dignity to which any human being in this country is entitled--whether a field hand as here, or a secretary to an executive. The employer, on the other hand, did not produce one single witness who testified that the claimant's testimony was exaggerated, inaccurate, unfounded, or untrue.

A well-settled rule of law is that the burden of proving and establishing statutory eligibility for unemployment rests with the claimant. Pyeatt v. Idaho State University, 98 Idaho 424, 565 P.2d 1381 (1977). Further, an employee who voluntarily quits must have had good cause in order to be eligible for unemployment benefits. I.C. § 72-1366(e). The ultimate question in a voluntary quit case, then, is what constitutes good cause to abandon employment, and the case law reflects that in Idaho this has been a difficult standard to meet. ¹ The test for good cause was set forth in Burroughs v. Employment Security Agency, 86 Idaho 412, 387 P.2d 473 (1963), and reiterated in Fong v. Jerome School District No. 261, 101 Idaho 219, 222, 611 P.2d 1004, 1007 (1979):

In order to constitute good cause, the circumstances which compel the decision to leave employment must be real, not imaginary, substantial not trifling, and reasonable, not whimsical; there must be some compulsion produced by extraneous and necessitous circumstances. The standard of what constitutes good cause is the standard of reasonableness as applied to the average man or woman, and not to the supersensitive; ....

This standard was elaborated upon in Boodry v. Eddy Bakeries Co., 88 Idaho 165, 170, 397 P.2d 256, 259 (1964), wherein this Court stated:

A construction of "good cause" as used in I.C. § 72-1366 must not be extended to include purely personal and [subjective] reasons which are unique to the employee--it must require that such case is not a condition which by common knowledge is usual where accompanied by minor irritations.

The parameters of reasonableness are difficult to outline and the courts generally agree that a case-by-case determination is necessary. A review of decisions involving menacing employers or harassment of employees provides some guidelines for understanding what behavior must reasonably be tolerated by an employee, and what behavior need not be tolerated. In Stewart v. Dept. of Industrial Relations, 40 Ala.App. 383, 114 S.2d 274 (1959), the court held that abusive language alone is not good cause to quit a job. Similarly, yelling and screaming at all employees, without any arbitrary or discriminatory selection of which employees were subject to harassment does not constitute good cause to leave a job. Uniweld Products, Inc. v. Industrial Relations Com., Florida Dept of Commerce, 277 S.2d 827 (Fla.App.1973). Nor does a sexist attitude by an employer provide grounds for good cause to quit employment. McCain v. Employment Div., 17 Or.App. 422, 522 P.2d 1208 (1974). And, being given the "cold treatment" by a supervisor is not good cause to leave one's job. Citizen's Bank of Shelbyville v. Industrial Com. of Missouri, 428 S.W.2d 895 (Mo.App.1968).

However, abusive language plus some additional mistreatment is considered good cause to quit voluntarily, entitling a claimant to unemployment compensation. Case law in this area provides interesting examples of what type of behavior falls within the category of mistreatment. In Associated Utility Services, Inc. v. Board of Review, 131 N.J.Super. 584, 331 A.2d 39 (1974), the claimant was continually harassed and mistreated by her employer, including undue scoldings at work, and being called at home and yelled at. Even after claimant objected to this treatment indicating that the harassment bothered her, the mistreatment continued. The court concluded this was good cause to quit. Similarly, arbitrary and discriminatory treatment of a bank teller provided good cause for leaving. Wilson v. Doyal, 319 S.2d 855 (La.App.1975). In this case, the claimant was required to balance her accounts after hours, while other tellers were allowed to balance during the day. She wasn't paid for her overtime, nor was she paid for her sick leave. Under these circumstances the court determined it was reasonable for the claimant to leave voluntarily.

Employees are also not required to continue...