Victory Baptist Temple, Inc. v. Industrial Com'n of Ohio
| Decision Date | 24 March 1982 |
| Citation | 442 N.E.2d 819,2 Ohio App.3d 418,2 OBR 510 |
| Parties | , 2 O.B.R. 510 VICTORY BAPTIST TEMPLE, INC., Appellant, v. INDUSTRIAL COMMISSION OF OHIO et al., Appellees. * |
| Court | Ohio Court of Appeals |
Syllabus by the Court
1. The General Assembly intended to include religious institutions and their employees within the protection of the Workers' Compensation Act. (R.C. 4123.01, construed.)
2. The state has an "overriding governmental interest" in compensating workers and their dependents for death, occupational disease and injury occurring during the course of employment; thus, application of the Workers' Compensation Act to religious institutions is not violative of the First Amendment.
Charles E. Craze, Cleveland, for appellant.
William J. Brown, Atty. Gen., and Bernard C. Fox, Jr., Cincinnati, for appellees.
Victory Baptist Temple, Inc., plaintiff-appellant, appeals a judgment of the court of common pleas that the Ohio workers' compensation laws as applied to the appellant are constitutional. We affirm.
The stipulations and affidavits of the parties reveal the following facts. The defendants-appellees, the Industrial Commission of Ohio (commission) and the Bureau of Workers' Compensation (bureau) are duly authorized agencies of the state of Ohio which are empowered to administer the workers' compensation law. R.C. Chapter 4123.
The appellant, Victory Baptist Temple, Inc. (Victory Baptist or church), is a nonprofit corporation organized under the laws of the state of Ohio which operates a church and a Christian day school in Elyria, Ohio. The church school is not separately incorporated. In addition to volunteer help, Victory Baptist has persons who are regularly employed to operate the church and the church day school and who receive financial remuneration for their services.
At appellant's request, appellees conducted a rating inspection and assessed premiums pursuant to the workers' compensation law for those persons who receive remuneration from the church. The commission notified the church that it must submit the payroll report and remit the assessed premiums to the commission. Further, the church was informed that if it did not comply with the provisions of the law, enforcement proceedings would be commenced under R.C. 4123.37 and 4123.99(C).
Victory Baptist refused to submit to these demands on the grounds that the law interfered with teh sincerely held religious beliefs of the church and its members. The appellant claimed it could not, in good conscience, contribute church monies intended solely for expenditures for religious purposes to the workers' compensation fund. It asserted that to do so would be a "sin." Rather, the church proposed to accomplish the goals of the law by voluntarily caring for its ill or disabled employees.
Appellant brought this action in the court below requesting a declaratory judgment and injunctive relief from the application of the law. Each party filed a motion for summary judgment pursuant to Civ.R. 56. Based on the motions and the accompanying stipulations and affidavits the trial court issued an order and opinion granting appellees' motion and denying that of appellant. The lower court held: (1) that the state's interest in insuring that fair compensation for an employee injured or killed in the course of his employment is a compelling interest, (2) that R.C. 4123.01(A) and (B) include churches and their paid employees, (3) that application of the law to Victory Baptist does not violate the freedoms of religion guaranteed in the United States and Ohio Constitutions, and (4) that the provisions of the law itself are the least burdensome methods of accomplishing the compelling state purpose.
Relying on the general principle of construing statutes to avoid unnecessary constitutional decisions, the United States Supreme Court in NLRB v. Catholic Bishop of Chicago (1979), 440 U.S. 490, 501, 99 S.Ct. 1313, 1319, 59 L.Ed.2d 533, held:
Thus, appellant argues that unless the General Assembly expressly included religious institutions within its definition of "employer" (R.C. 4123.01[B] ) and "employee" (R.C. 4123.01[A] ), the law must be construed to exempt churches and their ministries from coverage. We do not agree.
Congress did not specifically include church schools in its grant of jurisdiction to the National Labor Relations Board. However, this lack of an express inclusion was not dispositive of the issue before the high court. Rather, the court in Catholic Bishop of Chicago, supra, examined the language and the legislative history of the National Labor Relations Act to determine Congressional intent. In the instant case the language and legislative history admit to no other conclusion than that the General Assembly intended to include churches and their employees within the protection of the workers' compensation law.
Section 35, Article II of the Ohio Constitution, states:
"For the purpose of providing compensation to workmen and their dependents, for death, injuries or occupational disease, occasioned in the course of such workmen's employment, laws may be passed establishing a state fund to be created by compulsory contribution thereto by employers, and administered by the state, determining the terms and conditions upon which payment shall be made therefrom. * * * "
Because its purpose is remedial, the Act must be liberally construed. R.C. 1.11. See, also, R.C. 4123.95.
R.C. 4123.01(A) states in relevant part:
Victory Baptist admits that it is a private corporation and that persons are regularly employed to operate the church and church day school. These people are paid money by the church for performing these services. Thus, the persons receiving pay for operating the church and school fall within the plain language of the statute's definition of employees. Likewise, the church comes within the statutory definition of an employer.
The workers' compensation law has been characterized by the broadest possible coverage with frequent amendments to insure that no class of employers or employees was unintentionally excluded. If the legislature had intended to exclude religious institutions, it had ample opportunity to do so. We believe that the legislature intended for employees of religious institutions to come under the protection of the Act.
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