U.S. Steel Corp. v. Bridges, 78-1496
| Decision Date | 10 October 1978 |
| Docket Number | No. 78-1496,78-1496 |
| Citation | 582 F.2d 7 |
| Parties | UNITED STATES STEEL CORPORATION, Petitioner, v. Pervy BRIDGES and Director, Office of Workers' Compensation Programs, United States Department of Labor, Appellees. Summary Calendar. * |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit |
James D. Strader, Gen. Atty., Philip J. Sheehe, Atty., Pittsburgh, Pa., for petitioner.
William E. Mitch, Earl V. Brown, Cooper, Mitch & Crawford, Birmingham, Ala., Ralph Hartman, Director of Workers' Compensation Programs, NDOL, Laurie M. Streeter, Assoc. Sol. of Labor, Lee D. Richardson, Carin Ann Clauss, Sols. of Labor, U. S. Dept. of Labor, Washington, D. C., for appellees.
Benefits Review Board, Washington, D. C., for other interested party.
Appeal from the Benefits Review Board, United States Department of Labor.
Before MORGAN, CLARK and TJOFLAT, Circuit Judges:
Pervy Bridges filed a claim for total disability benefits under the Federal Coal Mine and Safety Act of 1969, asserting that he had contracted pneumoconiosis or "black lung" disease. The Act, Inter alia, provides benefits for persons who are totally disabled as a result of pneumoconiosis. After a hearing to determine the merits of Bridges' contentions, the hearing officer upheld his claim for benefits. His employer, the United States Steel Corporation, appealed the hearing officer's decision to the Benefits Review Board, and the Board upheld the findings of the hearing officer. United Steel subsequently filed an appeal in this court. We affirm.
United States Steel asserts that the hearing officer erred in finding that Bridges was totally disabled because of pneumoconiosis. In reaching his determination on this issue, the hearing officer relied on 30 U.S.C. § 921(c) (4), which provides for a rebuttable presumption of disabling pneumoconiosis if: (1) the miner was employed for fifteen years or more in one or more underground coal mines; (2) his chest x-rays do not show "complicated" pneumoconiosis; and (3) other evidence demonstrates the existence of a totally disabling respiratory or pulmonary impairment. The third requirement is at issue here. The Corporation contends that a regulation, 20 C.F.R. § 410.414, promulgated under the authority of § 921 defines the words "other evidence" contained in the third requirement to mean only medical evidence. Since the hearing examiner, in addition to the medical evidence, relied on the claimant's testimony to establish disability, the Corporation argues that the hearing officer's findings are in violation of the regulation.
The regulation in question contains three separate and independent methods for proving the existence of pneumoconiosis. The first part allows pneumoconiosis to be established solely through medical evidence; the second provides for a presumption identical to that contained in 30 U.S.C. § 921(c) (4); and, the third part, containing the definition cited by the Steel Company, permits a finding of pneumoconiosis "if other relevant evidence establishes the existence of a totally disabling chronic respiratory or pulmonary impairment, and that such impairment arose out of employment in a coal mine." It is clear from the language contained in the regulation that the method provided for in the third part is operative only when pneumoconiosis is not established by one of the methods given in the first two parts and that the stated definition of "other relevant evidence" is to be used only in reference to the third part. Even if this definition excludes the claimant's testimony from consideration as "other relevant evidence," a matter we need not...
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