Watson v. Burnett
| Decision Date | 13 November 1939 |
| Docket Number | 27259. |
| Citation | 23 N.E.2d 420,216 Ind. 216 |
| Parties | WATSON v. BURNETT. |
| Court | Indiana Supreme Court |
Appeal from Sullivan Circuit Court; Martin L. Pigg, Judge.
Hays & Hays, of Sullivan, for appellant.
Charles H. Bedwell, of Sullivan, for appellee.
This is an appeal from the judgment of the Sullivan Circuit Court granting appellee a temporary mandatory injunction against the appellant as trustee of Turman School Township of Sullivan County. By this injunction appellant was restrained from continuing his acts in denying to the appellee a definite written contract as a public school teacher in the public schools of said school township and was ordered to prepare, execute, as such trustee, and tender to the appellee for her signature a definite written contract employing appellee as a teacher in said schools for the year 1939-1940.
In the year 1928 the appellee, having served under written contract as a teacher in such school township for the past five consecutive years, entered into a written teacher's contract for further service as a teacher in the public schools of said school township for the school year of 1928-1929 and thereby became and was a permanent tenure teacher of such school corporation and the holder of an indefinite contract under the terms of the Teachers' Tenure Act of 1927. Ch. 97, p. 259, Acts 1927. Thereafter the appellee continued to teach in the public schools of said school township until the close of the school year of 1936-1937, when she was discharged by appellant and informed that she would not thereafter be permitted to teach in the public schools of said township. The appellant, as trustee of said school township, failed and refused to enter into a definite contract with the appellee for the school years of 1937-1938 and of 1938-1939, although appellee repeatedly demanded of appellant such a definite contract and that she be permitted to teach in such schools.
On March 19, 1938, the appellant, as trustee of said school township, pursuant to § 2 of said Teachers' Tenure Act supra, served notice on the appellee of his intention to consider, on April 25, 1938, the matter of the cancellation of appellee's permanent teacher's contract. Thereupon the appellee, pursuant to the terms of said statute requested a hearing on such consideration and a written statement of the reasons for the consideration of the cancellation of her contract. Pursuant to this request the appellant furnished appellee the following written statement of reasons:
'To Julia C. Burnett:
On the date set for said hearing the appellee appeared and filed her written objections to the jurisdiction and power of the appellant to cancel her contract. The appellant then considered the matter of the cancellation of said contract and did then and there cancel the same. An appeal from this decision was taken by appellee to the county superintendent of schools and at the hearing on such appeal both parties were present and represented by counsel. On May 31, 1938, the said county superintendent of schools rendered a written opinion which attempted to determine the legal questions involved in the controversy and stated that a decrease in the number of teachers was justified, but failed to make any statement or finding that the justifiable decrease in the number of teachers made it necessary to dispense with the services of a tenure teacher.
Appellee was not permitted to teach in said schools during the school year 1938-1939 and in June, 1939, appellee again demanded of appellant that she be given a definite written contract, be reinstated as a teacher in said schools and be permitted to teach during the school year of 1939-1940. On the refusal of the appellant to accede to this demand this action for a mandatory injunction was brought by appellee. The cause was submitted to and tried by the court on the verified complaint and the affidavits filed by both parties and by the agreement of the parties no other evidence was offered. The court ordered that:
'* * * the defendant be and he hereby is restrained from continuing his acts in denying to the plaintiff a definite written contract as a public school teacher in the public schools of Turman School Township of Sullivan County, Indiana, and that the defendant be and he hereby is mandated to prepare and tender to the plaintiff for her signature a definite written contract authorizing the plaintiff to teach in the public schools of such school township for and during the school year of 1939-1940, which definite written contract shall be signed by the defendant as Township Trustee of such school township and which shall state the date of the beginning of the school term, the number of months in the school term, the total amount of salary to be paid during the school year, and the number of payments of such salary that shall be made during the school year, all until the final hearing of this cause, or the further order of this court.'
When the appellant was called upon, pursuant to the statute, to state his reasons in writing for the proposed cancellation of appellee's contract he assigned only two reasons: (1) justifiable decrease in the number of teachers, and (2) the fact that appellee held only a primary teacher's license which would permit her to teach only in the first four grades. It is not denied by appellant, however, that one-tenure teachers are being hired by appellant to teach in grades for which the appellee is licensed. The first reason assigned by appellant is one of the reasons recognized by the 1927 statute as justifying the cancellation of the contract of a permanent tenure teacher. This case, however, presents the question of whether a justifiable decrease in teachers authorizes the retention by the trustee of a teacher who has not acquired a permanent tenure status and the cancellation of the contract of a teacher who has acquired such status and who is qualified to teach in the position for which the non-tenure teacher is retained? It is our opinion that this question must be answered in the negative. To hold otherwise would be contrary to the entire spirit and purpose of the Act. The principal purpose of the Act was to secure permanency in the teaching force. If a justifiable decrease in the number of teaching positions should be held to give to the trustee the power to choose between tenure aud non-tenure teachers, both of whom are licensed to teach in the teaching position which remains, he is thereby given the power to nullify the Teachers' Tenure Act, and to discharge without cause a teacher who has, by reason of having served satisfactorily as a teacher during the...
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