Smith v. Department of Employment

• Decision Date: 25 June 1979
• Docket Number: No. 12172,12172
• Citation: 100 Idaho 520,602 P.2d 18
• Parties: Marlene G. SMITH, Claimant-Respondent, v. DEPARTMENT OF EMPLOYMENT, Defendant-Appellant.
• Court: Idaho Supreme Court

Page 18

602 P.2d 18

100 Idaho 520

Marlene G. SMITH, Claimant-Respondent, v. DEPARTMENT OF EMPLOYMENT, Defendant-Appellant.

No. 12172.

Supreme Court of Idaho.

June 25, 1979.

R. LaVar Marsh, Deputy Atty. Gen., Boise, for defendant-appellant.

Norman Vieira, College of Law, Univ. of Idaho, Moscow, Philip E. Peterson, Lewiston, for claimant-respondent. BAKES, Justice.

Claimant appellant Marlene G. Smith worked for several years as a retail clerk in a Boise department store before losing her job through no fault of her own in the spring of 1975. While she had been employed as a retail clerk her working hours started at 9:30 a. m. and ended early enough to enable her to take evening classes at Boise State University. When she became unemployed Smith enrolled in early morning summer classes at Boise State, attending class from 7:00 a. m. to 9:00 a. m. five days a week for the first half of the summer semester and from 7:00 a. m. to 8:30 a. m. five days a week for the second half. The Department of Employment denied unemployment compensation benefits for the weeks during which she attended these early morning classes upon the authority of I.C. § 72-1312(a). That statute provides the following:

"(N)o person shall be deemed to be unemployed while he is attending a regular established school excluding night school . . . ."

Claimant Smith appealed the Department's decision to the Idaho Industrial Commission which reversed the Department's determination, finding that Smith was available for work during the weeks she had taken summer classes and, based upon our decision in Kerr v. Department of Employment, 97 Idaho 385, 545 P.2d 473 (1976), awarded her unemployment compensation benefits for those weeks. The Department appealed the Industrial Commission's decision to this Court, and we affirmed, holding that denial of unemployment benefits to otherwise eligible persons attending school during the day, while allowing students attending classes at night to receive benefits, violated the equal protection clause of the fourteenth amendment of the United States Constitution. Smith v. Department of Employment, 98 Idaho 43, 557 P.2d 637 (1976). The Department of Employment appealed our decision to the Supreme Court of the United States. That court reversed, holding that since the legislative classification involved the regulation of economic activity and the distribution of economic benefits, the requirements of the equal protection clause would be met if the classification had some rational basis. That court found that:

"It was surely rational for the Idaho Legislature to conclude that daytime employment is far more plentiful than nighttime work and, consequently, that attending school during daytime hours imposes a greater restriction upon obtaining full-time employment than does attending school at night." Idaho Department of Employment v. Smith, 434 U.S. 100, 101, 98 S.Ct. 327, 328, 54 L.Ed.2d 324, 327 (1977).

On remand from the Supreme Court of the United States, claimant Marlene Smith urges that the legislative classification in question, although not violative of the equal protection clause of the United States Constitution, does violate the Constitution of the State of Idaho. We do not reach the state constitutional issue raised by claimant Smith because we conclude that the statute does not bar receipt of unemployment compensation benefits by claimant Smith. State v. Lindquist, 99 Idaho 766, 589 P.2d 101 (1979); Poesy v. Bunney, 98 Idaho 258, 561 P.2d 400 (1977).

The Idaho Employment Security Act was enacted to help alleviate the economic and social hardships caused by unemployment which did not result from the fault of the employee. I.C. § 72-1302. ¹ The Act must be liberally construed to effect that purpose. In re Potlatch Forests, Inc., 72 Idaho 291, 240 P.2d 242 (1952). The narrow question presented by this appeal is whether I.C. § 72-1312(a) precludes claimant Marlene Smith from receipt of unemployment compensation benefits because of her attendance at early morning classes at Boise State University. We conclude that the statute does not preclude receipt of benefits by Smith.

Statutes should be interpreted to mean what the legislature intended them to mean and to accomplish what the legislature sought to achieve by their passage. "Moreover, enactments of the legislature are to be interpreted to accord with common sense and reason." State ex rel. Newsom v. Alarid, 90 N.M. 790, 794, 568 P.2d 1236, 1240 (1977). When the language of a statute is ambiguous, we must consider the social and economic results which would be effectuated by a decision on the meaning of the statute. Herndon v. West, 87 Idaho 335, 393 P.2d 35 (1964). Policy grounds and reasonableness may also be utilized to determine the meaning of a statute. Summers v. Dooley, 94 Idaho 87, 481 P.2d 318 (1971).

"We are entitled to, and must look to the intention of the Legislature as gathered from the whole act, and when a literal reading of a provision will work an unreasonable or absurd result, if a reasonable intent of the Legislature can be arrived at, the court should so construe the act as to arrive at such intention rather than an absurdity." Smallwood v. Jeter, 42 Idaho 169, 184, 244 P. 149, 153 (1926).

See also Herndon v. West, 87 Idaho 335, 393 P.2d 35 (1964).

The Department of Employment maintains that the provision of I.C. § 72-1312(a) which governs this case is unambiguous and that its plain language compelled denial of benefits to claimant Smith upon her enrollment in classes meeting during the daytime at Boise State University. However, nowhere in the Employment Security Act is the term "night school," as used in I.C. § 72-1312(a), defined. Webster's Third New International Dictionary defines night school as:

"School held in the evening; Specif : a course offered (as by a university or high school) for people in working life and often stressing vocational training and recreational activities as well as general education."

While the classes involved in this case were not conducted in the evening, the evidence does indicate that the classes could be characterized as "offered for (a person) in working life."

If I.C. § 72-1312(a) is interpreted literally, night school would only include those schools which operate...