Westinghouse Elec. Corp. v. Board of Review, Division of Employment Sec., Dept. of Labor and Industry

• Decision Date: 24 October 1957
• Docket Number: No. A--14,A--14
• Citation: 135 A.2d 489,25 N.J. 221
• Parties: WESTINGHOUSE ELECTRIC CORPORATION, Appellant, v. BOARD OF REVIEW, DIVISION OF EMPLOYMENT SECURITY, DEPARTMENT OF LABOR AND INDUSTRY of the State of New Jersey, General Ceramics & Steatite Corporation, Violet H. Elko, and other employees of Westinghouse claiming benefits during the period of the strike, Respondents. WESTINGHOUSE ELECTRIC CORPORATION, Appellant, v. BOARD OF REVIEW, etc., Anthony Amico, et al., Respondents. WESTINGHOUSE ELECTRIC CORPORATION, Appellant, v. BOARD OF REVIEW, etc., Frank Klaus, et al., Respondents. WESTINGHOUSE ELECTRIC CORPORATION, Appellant, v. BOARD OF REVIEW, etc., Thomas P. Redmond, et al., Respondents. WESTINGHOUSE ELECTRIC CORPORATION, Appellant, v. BOARD OF REVIEW, etc., Cornelia E. Nagy, et al., Respondents.
• Court: New Jersey Supreme Court

Page 221

25 N.J. 221

135 A.2d 489

WESTINGHOUSE ELECTRIC CORPORATION, Appellant, v. BOARD OF REVIEW, DIVISION OF EMPLOYMENT SECURITY, DEPARTMENT

OF LABOR AND INDUSTRY of the State of New Jersey, General

Ceramics & Steatite Corporation, Violet H. Elko, and other

employees of Westinghouse claiming benefits during the

period of the strike, Respondents.

WESTINGHOUSE ELECTRIC CORPORATION, Appellant, v. BOARD OF REVIEW, etc., Anthony Amico, et al., Respondents.

WESTINGHOUSE ELECTRIC CORPORATION, Appellant, v. BOARD OF REVIEW, etc., Frank Klaus, et al., Respondents.

WESTINGHOUSE ELECTRIC CORPORATION, Appellant, v. BOARD OF REVIEW, etc., Thomas P. Redmond, et al., Respondents.

WESTINGHOUSE ELECTRIC CORPORATION, Appellant, v. BOARD OF REVIEW, etc., Cornelia E. Nagy, et al., Respondents.

No. A--14.

Supreme Court of New Jersey.

Argued Sept. 16 and Sept. 23, 1957.

Decided Oct. 24, 1957.

Walter F. Waldau, Newark, for appellant (Stryker, Tams & Horner, Newark, attorneys).

Sidney Reitman, Newark, for claimants-respondents (Kapelsohn, Lerner, Leuchter & Reitman, Newark, attorneys).

Clarence F. McGovern, Jersey City, for respondent Board of Review, Division of Employment Security, Department of Labor & Industry of the State.

The opinion of the court was delivered by

JACOBS, J.

These are consolidated appeals from decisions of the Board of Review which determined that the claimants were not disqualified under N.J.S.A. 43:21--5(d) from receiving unemployment compensation benefits. The appellant Westinghouse Electric Corporation and the individual claimants-respondents have entered into a stipulation which portrays the following circumstances.

In the course of a labor dispute, employees at certain Westinghouse plants struck in October 1955 and caused stoppages of work. The striking employees were members of unions which had collective bargaining agreements with Westinghouse. In March and April 1956 the labor dispute and the work stoppages were terminated. The striking employees with whom we are concerned on this appeal (including claimants standing in the same position under N.J.S.A. 43:21--5(d)) took temporary employment elsewhere during the strike. Some of them had substantial periods of work with other employers, others had very short period of work during the Christmas season in 1955 with department stores and express companies, and still others 'shaped up' daily at breweries and other places of employment. None of the claimants resigned from Westinghouse or surrendered the right to return to work for Westinghouse upon termination of the strike. They all intended to return to Westinghouse as soon as the strike ended and in fact they did so. During the strike Westinghouse advanced contributions under its Social Insurance Plan for its striking employees in order to avoid cancellation or lapse of the insurance, and tendered loans which were accepted by some of the claimants. Westinghouse also offered work to the striking employees but they rejected it because of the continuance of the strike. Neither Westinghouse nor the striking employees did anything which was designed to effect a severance of their employment relationship; and all the parties concede that there was no such severance. See Browning King Co. of N.Y. v. Local 195, 34 N.J.Super. 13, 26, 111 A.2d 415 (App.Div.1955); Textile Workers Union of America v. Paris Fabric Mills, Inc., 22 N.J.Super. 381, 383, 92 A.2d 40 (App.Div.1952); Jeffery-De Witt Insulator Co. v. N.L.R.B., 91 F.2d 134, 112 A.L.R. 948 (4 Cir., 1937), certiorari denied 302 U.S. 731, 58 S.Ct. 55, 82 L.Ed. 565 (1937).

The claimants did not seek unemployment compensation benefits from the commencement of the strike in October 1955 and acknowledged that the labor-dispute disqualification (N.J.S.A. 43:21--5(d)) precluded such benefits. But they did seek benefits for subsequent periods during which they did not work after their interim or temporary work with other employers had terminated. They contended that the disqualification was inapplicable to these subsequent periods. The Board of Review held that the disqualification did not bar benefits to claimants who had in good faith obtained work elsewhere, even though their work was only 'stop-gap' in nature and was not intended to interfere with their eventual return to Westinghouse at the end of the strike. Westinghouse appealed and advances the contention that under a proper interpretation of N.J.S.A. 43:21--5(d) disqualification of a striking employee continues during the strike notwithstanding bona fide interim or temporary employment which is not intended to sever the employment relationship at the strike-bound plant. On the other hand the claimants advance the opposing contention that under a literal interpretation of N.J.S.A. 43:21--5(d) the disqualification is inapplicable to periods of unemployment after bona fide interim or temporary employment, notwithstanding the continuance of the employment relationship at the strike-bound plant.

New Jersey's Unemployment Compensation Law was adopted in 1936. L.1936, c. 270; R.S. 43:21--1, N.J.S.A. It designated, in section 4, those who would be eligible for benefits and, in section 5, those who would be disqualified. Paragraph (d) of section 5 contained the labor disqualification clause which now provides that an individual shall be disqualified for benefits:

'(d) For any week with respect to which it is found that his unemployment is due to a stoppage of work which exists because of a labor dispute at the factory, establishment, or other premises at which he is or was last employed; Provided, that this subsection shall not apply if it is shown that:

'(1) He is not participating in or financing or directly interested in the labor dispute which caused the stoppage of work; and

'(2) He does not belong to a grade or class of workers of which, immediately before the commencement of the stoppage, there were members employed at the premises at which the stoppage occurs, any of whom are participating in or financing or directly interested in the dispute; Provided, that if in any case in which (1) or (2) above applies separate branches of work which are commonly conducted at separate businesses in separate premises are conducted in separate departments of the same premises, each such department shall, for the purposes of this subsection, be deemed to be a separate factory, establishment, or other premises.'

Through the years many unsuccessful attempts have been made to amend paragraph (d). See Ablondi v. Board of Review, 8 N.J.Super. 71, 77, 73 A.2d 262, (App.Div.1950); Gerber v. Board of Review, etc., 36 N.J.Super. 322, 331, 115 A.2d 575 (App.Div.1955), affirmed 20 N.J. 561, 120 A.2d 436 (1956); Mortensen v. Board of Review, etc., 21 N.J. 242, 248, 121 A.2d 539 (1956). Indeed the only successful attempt was L.1945, c. 308 involving minor changes which have no bearing here. Similarly, the exceptions set forth in the proviso to paragraph (d) have no bearing here, for the parties have expressly agreed that 'the claimants on this appeal belong to different grades or classes of workers of which, immediately before the commencement of the stoppage at Westinghouse, there were members employed at the plants and premises where the work stoppages occurred, and that some of said members were participating in, financing or directly interested in said labor dispute.'

The labor disqualification clause has been the subject of many law review articles which have advanced arguments in favor of its restriction or abolition. See Fierst & Spector, 'Unemployment Compensation in Labor Disputes,' 49 Yale L.J. 461, 489 (1940); Lesser, 'Labor Disputes and Unemployment Compensation,' 55 Yale L.J. 167, 177 (1945). Cf. Williams, 'The Labor Dispute Disqualification--A Primer and Some Problems,' 8 Vand.L.Rev. 338, 353 (1955). Admittedly those arguments must be addressed to the Legislature rather than the courts. We are here concerned not with the wisdom of the disqualification clause but only with its meaning. Ablondi v. Board of Review, supra. Our judicial function is simply to carry out the legislative plan. Watson v. United States Rubber Co., 24 N.J. 598, 603, 133 A.2d 328 (1957). In performing our judicial function we may resort freely to the pertinent statutory history for such aid as it may furnish in ascertaining the true sense and meaning of the language used. Deaney v. Linen Thread Co., 19 N.J. 578, 584, 118 A.2d 28 (1955). And we are by no means confined to a literal interpretation of the statutory language. Lloyd v. Vermeulen, 22 N.J. 200, 205, 125 A.2d 393 (1956); Lane v. Holderman, 23 N.J. 304, 323, 129 A.2d 8 (1957). See Guiseppi v. Walling, 144 F.2d 608, 624, 155 A.L.R. 761 (2 Cir., 1944), affirmed sub nom. Gemsco v. Walling, 324 U.S. 244, 65 S.Ct. 605 89 L.Ed. 921 (1945) (concurring opinion). In the Walling case Judge Learned Hand made his well-known remark that (144 F.2d 624) 'there is no surer way to misread any document than to read it literally.' In the Lane case Justice Wachenfeld aptly noted that a statutory provision should be interpreted by a mind which is sympathetic to its aims and which recognizes the difficulties inherent in formulating a precise expression of legislative intent. In the course of his opinion he quoted approvingly from Waters v. Quimby, 27 N.J.L. 296, 311 (Sup.Ct.1859), affirmed 28 N.J.L. 533 (E. & A.1859), where the court said:

'When the words of a statute are susceptible of two meanings, the one favorable, and the other hostile to its principal design, the former should prevail and control the construction. Where the words are clear, and the difficulty is made by critical exposition, that exposition should not be adopted in clear contravention of the scope and policy of the act. Few statutes would stand if tried by the strictest standards of logic, grammar, or rhetoric.'

Various grounds have been advanced in support of the disqualification clause. In Tube Reducing Corporation v....