HOPKINS,
APPELLEE,
vs.
GILES, ADMR., APPELLANT;
CAMPBELL, CHMN., ET AL., APPELLEES
No. C-810537
COURT OF APPEALS OF OHIO, FIRST APPELLATE DISTRICT, HAMILTON
COUNTY
454 N.E.2d 175, 7 Ohio App. 3d 79, 7 Ohio B. Rep. 92
April 14, 1982, Decided
HEADNOTE
Unemployment compensation -- Labor -- Strike -- Layoff in
anticipation of strike -- Right to receive benefits -- Statutory
disqualification applicable, when -- R.C. 4141.29(D)(1)(a),
construed.
SYLLABUS
When an employee is laid off at the end of a workday because the
employer anticipates a strike beginning the next day, and the
strike does take place as anticipated, the employee is not entitled
to unemployment compensation as the statutory disqualification
provision of R.C. 4141.29(D)(1)(a) is applicable, because his
unemployment was due to a labor dispute.
COUNSEL
Messrs. Kircher & Phalen and Mr.
Gary M. Eby, for Harrison T. Hopkins.
Mr. William J. Brown, attorney general, and
Mr. Eugene P. Nevada, for Albert G. Giles,
Admr.
JUDGES
BLACK, J. PALMER, P.J., and DOAN, J., concur.
AUTHOR: BLACK
OPINION
{*79} Plaintiff-appellee Harrison T. Hopkins's application
for unemployment compensation was denied by the Ohio Bureau of
Employment Services ("OBES") under R.C. 4141.29(D)(1)(a), because
OBES found that his unemployment was due to a labor dispute.1 Upon
appeal under R.C. 4141.28(O), the court of common pleas held that
OBES's denial was against the manifest weight of the evidence,
reversed that decision, and ordered OBES to pay Hopkins
unemployment compensation. OBES appealed to this court, citing
three assignments of error.2 We reverse the decision of the court
of common pleas and reinstate the decision of the Board of Review
of OBES.
We find no significant factual dispute. When Hopkins's
supervisor told him that the company's workforce at the Stewart
Power Plant needed a welder, he said he would go. At the conclusion
of his fourth workday there (May 31, 1979), he was laid off, and
the next day (June 1, 1979) a strike began at the power plant.
Hopkins said, "I was told by Ed Brookbank, foreman, that he was
laying me off because they were anticipating a strike by the
Portsmouth local." The company's representatives said, "Laid off
due to labor dispute. Would not have been laid off if no labor
dispute existed."
{*80} The central issue before us may be phrased in the
following alternative forms: Is an employee's unemployment "due to
a labor dispute" when he is laid off at the end of a workday
because the employer anticipates a strike beginning the next day,
and the strike takes place as anticipated? Or, does the strike
cause the layoff even though the layoff occurs first in sequence?
We answer both questions in the affirmative.3
For any individual to be disqualified from receiving
unemployment benefits under R.C. 4141.29(D)(1)(a), the unemployment
must be "caused by" a labor dispute. Baugh v.
. United Tel. Co. (1978), 54 Ohio St. 2d 419 [8
O.O.3d 427]. Hopkins argues that the company cannot subjectively
anticipate a strike scheduled to start at or before the beginning
of the next day, and that to be the cause of unemployment under the
statute, the strike must be in progress at the moment of the
layoff. While the Supreme Court used the term "proximate cause" in
its syllabus, we do not interpret Baugh to require
any fixed sequence of events or any unalterable order of cause and
effect. We do not believe that the employer must wait until the day
of the strike before advising workers that their work is shut
down.
In examining the issue of whether a complainant is disqualified
for unemployment benefits, we are concerned with the dynamics of
the relationship between employer and employee in the circumstances
surrounding the work and the workplace. We are not analyzing
physical causation as we would, for instance, in a negligence
action for personal injuries, where cause and effect are more
rigidly sequenced. The law acknowledges the almost limitless
variety of circumstances affecting relationships between persons in
the dynamics of commercial and industrial affairs; the law
recognizes the legal consequences of anticipatory breaches of
contracts by allowing the injured party, once the other contracting
party has repudiated the contract, to sue for damages or
rescission, without waiting for the contractual time of
performance.4 We believe the law should, equally, view with favor
the reasonable anticipation of a labor dispute that will stop work
the next day, when in fact the anticipated event takes place.
Common sense and a realistic appraisal of what is just leads us to
conclude that Hopkins's layoff was caused by the next day's strike
under the circumstances disclosed by the record.
We reverse the judgment of the court of common pleas and,
rendering the judgment to which the appellant is entitled, we
reinstate the decision of the Board of Review of OBES.
Judgment accordingly.
DISPOSITION
Judgment
accordingly.
OPINION
FOOTNOTES
1 R.C. 4141.29 provides, in pertinent part:
"(D) Notwithstanding division (A) of this section, no individual
may serve a waiting period or be paid benefits under the following
conditions:
"(1) For any week with respect to which the administrator finds
that:
"(a) His unemployment was due to a labor dispute other than a
lockout at any factory, establishment, or other premises located in
this or any other state and owned or operated by the employer by
which he is or was last employed; and for so long as his
unemployment is due to such labor dispute. * * * If it is
established that the claimant * * * was separated by the employer
prior to the dispute for reasons other than the labor dispute, * *
* such labor dispute shall not render the employee ineligible for
benefits."
2 The three assignments of error are:
"(1) The Common Pleas Court erred in misconstruing the 'labor
dispute' provisions of 4141.29(D)(1)(a).
"(2) The Common Pleas Court erred in substituting its judgment
for that of the trier-of-fact, the Board of Review, on a factual
question.
"(3) The Common Pleas Court erred in citing, and relying upon, a
misquoted statement by the employer."
3 We sustain OBES's first assignment of error, it being our
understanding that the intent was to raise the legal issue of
causation, but we overrule the other two assignments of error
because in our opinion the trial court's error lay in misapplying
the statute, not in factual mistakes.
4 Smith v. . Sloss Marblehead Lime
Co. (1898), 57 Ohio St. 518; Diem v.
. Koblitz (1892), 49 Ohio St. 41.