FARLOO,
APPELLEE,
vs.
CHAMPION SPARK PLUG CO.;
BOARD OF REVIEW, BUREAU OF
UNEMPLOYMENT COMPENSATION,
APPELLANT
No. 30140
SUPREME COURT OF OHIO
61 N.E.2d 313, 145 Ohio St. 263, 30 Ohio Op. 482
May 16, 1945, Decided
APPEAL from the Court of Appeals of
Lucas county.
HEADNOTE
Unemployment compensation -- Benefits not payable, when --
Individual quit work voluntarily because of marital obligations --
Section 1345-6, General Code -- Wife resigned employment to join
husband stationed with armed forces.
SYLLABUS
1. Under the provisions of Section 1345-6, General Code, no
individual may serve a waiting period or be paid benefits for the
duration of any period of unemployment with respect to which the
administrator finds such individual quit work voluntarily because
of marital obligations.
2. When a wife resigns her position of employment to be with her
husband in another state where he is stationed as a member of the
armed forces of the United States, such termination of employment
constitutes quitting work voluntarily because of marital
obligations within the provisions of Section 1345-6, General
Code.
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
This action originated in the Court of Common Pleas as an appeal
from the decision of the Board of Review of the Bureau of
Unemployment Compensation denying compensation to Mrs. Jeanette
Farloo, a former employee of the Champion Spark Plug Company of
Toledo. Mrs. Farloo had been regularly employed by the Champion
Spark Plug Company as an inspector. Her husband was a member of the
armed forces of the United States, and on or about November 5,
1942, Mrs. Farloo requested and obtained leave of absence for the
period beginning November 6 and ending November 21, 1942, for the
purpose of visiting her husband who expected to be transferred to
foreign duty.
Her husband was thereafter transferred to an army camp near
Abilene, Texas, for additional training, and Mrs. Farloo requested
her employer to extend her leave of absence for a period of three
months. The employer granted her, however, only two additional
weeks, so that her leave of absence terminated December 14, 1942.
Mrs. Farloo decided to remain with her husband as long as he was
stationed in this country and notified her employer on December 10,
1942, that she was resigning her job and would not return to
work.
On November 19, 1942, she registered for work with the United
States Employment Service at Abilene, Texas, and filed a continuing
claim for benefits. She continued to report regularly thereafter
until February 18, 1943, when she obtained work in the local branch
store of the W. T. Grant Company. This employment continued until
March 15, 1943, when she was laid off due to lack of work. She
reported to the employment office on March 18, 1943, and continued
to do so for the next three weeks.
Mrs. Farloo did not obtain any other employment in Texas, and on
April 17, 1943, she returned to Toledo, Ohio, and secured immediate
employment.
The administrator of The Bureau of Unemployment Compensation, on
January 20, 1943, found that the claimant voluntarily quit her
employment on November 19, 1942, because of marital obligations and
suspended her benefit rights as of that date.
An appeal was perfected to the Board of Review, a hearing was
held and the decision of the administrator was affirmed.
Thereafter the claimant perfected an appeal to the Court of
Common Pleas of Lucas county, and that court reversed the decision
of the Board of Review and found that Mrs. Farloo was "entitled to
participate in the state unemployment compensation fund, as
provided under the unemployment compensation law."
An appeal from this decision was taken to the Court of Appeals
and that court, on August 14, 1944, found that Mrs. Farloo
voluntarily quit her work with the Champion Spark Plug Company
without just cause and that the potential maximum weeks of benefits
for the benefit year should be reduced by six weeks, thus awarding
her twelve weeks of compensation benefits, and concluded that the
claimant "should be allowed credits for unemployment properly
reported beginning December 4, 1942, and not November 19, 1942,"
and affirmed the decision of the Court of Common Pleas as thus
modified.
The case is before this court upon the allowance of a motion to
certify the record of the Court of Appeals.
COUNSEL
Mr. James H. Fox and Mr. M. L.
Okun, for appellee.
Mr. Hugh S. Jenkins, attorney general, and
Mr. John M. Woy, for appellant.
JUDGES
MATTHIAS, J. WEYGANDT, C. J., ZIMMERMAN, BELL, WILLIAMS, TURNER and
HART, JJ., concur.
AUTHOR: MATTHIAS
OPINION
{*265} The single question presented by the record in
this case is whether Mrs. Jeanette Farloo was entitled to
participate in the benefits provided by the unemployment
compensation statutes. The statutes of Ohio providing for such
compensation are {*266} found in Section 1345-1 et
seq., General Code. It is to be observed that these
statutes are extremely liberal and unemployment benefits are
thereby provided even where the employee is discharged for just
cause in connection with his work or voluntarily quits his work
without just cause, but in such instances the employee shall have a
waiting period of three additional weeks during which no benefits
are payable, and also a reduction in the number of weeks
compensation is payable.
Section 1345-6,
General Code, which is the portion of the unemployment compensation
law pertinent here, provides as follows:
"Each eligible
individual shall receive benefits as compensation for loss of
remuneration due to total or involuntary partial unemployment in
the amounts and subject to the conditions stipulated in this act;
but no benefits shall be paid for total or partial unemployment
occurring prior to January 1, 1939.
"a. No individual
shall be entitled to any benefits unless he or she * * *
"(4) is able to work
and available for work in his usual trade or occupation, or in any
other trade or occupation for which he is reasonably fitted;
and
"(5) is unable to
obtain work in his usual trade or occupation or any other
employment for which he is reasonably fitted including employments
not subject to this act.
"b. An individual
suffering total or partial unemployment shall be eligible for
benefits for unemployment occurring subsequent to a waiting period
of two weeks and no benefits shall be or become payable during this
required waiting period, but no more than a total of two weeks of
waiting period or periods shall be required of any such individual
in any benefit year in order to establish his eligibility for total
or partial unemployment benefits under this act; except
that:
{*267} "An
individual who has been discharged for just cause in connection
with his work or who has voluntarily quit his work without just
cause and thereafter is unable to secure other employment, shall
have a waiting period of three additional weeks during which no
benefits shall be payable. * * *
"c. An individual's
maximum weeks of benefits per year shall be reduced by six weeks in
the event his unemployment results from discharge for just cause in
connection with his work, or from voluntarily quitting his work
without just cause in connection with such work."
However, a clear
exception to the above stated general provision was made by the
specific provision of part "d" of Section 1345-6, General Code, as
then in effect, which is in part as follows:
"d. Notwithstanding
the provisions of subsection (a) of this section, no individual may
serve a waiting period or be paid benefits for the duration of any
period of unemployment with respect to which the administrator
finds that such individual: * * *
"(7) quit work
voluntarily to marry or because of marital obligations."
By amendment
effective September 28, 1943 (120 Ohio Laws, 682), the word
"voluntarily" was eliminated from this subsection. Other amendments
were made to the act, but are immaterial here.
The right of the
claimant to participate in this fund rests upon and must be
determined by this latter section. Its language is clear and
unambiguous. In express and specific terms it absolutely prohibits
and precludes the payment of unemployment benefits to one who "quit
work" voluntarily to marry or because of marital obligations. This
provision constitutes a clear exception to parts "b" and "c" under
which unemployment benefits are payable to one quitting his
{*268} work without just cause in connection with such
work.
This exception seems
to apply even in cases where the availability of the employee for
other employment is clearly established. Under the clear and
express terms of the statute a person who has so quit work cannot
establish availability. The unequivocal statement therein that "no
individual may * * * be paid benefits for the duration of any
period of unemployment with respect to which the administrator
finds that such individual * * * quit work voluntarily * * *
because of marital obligations" leaves for determination the single
question whether Mrs. Farloo quit work "because of marital
obligations."
The phrase "marital
obligations" is very broad and applicable to many situations other
than the particular one involved in this case. Any attemt to define
the term generally would be gratuitous. Bouvier's Law Dictionary,
Rawle's Third Revision, defines "marital" as "That which belongs to
marriage; as marital rights, marital duties."
The finding of the
administrator that Mrs. Farloo had quit her work because of marital
obligations was based upon evidence before him. That conclusion was
approved by the majority of the board of review; with that
conclusion we are in accord. It is apparent that when the claimant
resigned her position and thereby definitely quit work to remain in
the South with her husband it was because she conceived such action
to be her marital obligation. A marital obligation presumably
arises from the marital relation itself, and when a wife definitely
quits her work to live with her husband in another part of the
country, it is pursuant to her marital obligation. Therefore, under
the provisions of Section 1345-6, part "d," General Code, Mrs.
Farloo was completely ineligible for unemployment benefits during
the period prior to March {*269} 15, 1943, which is the
only period involved in this controversy. Her status with reference
to such compensation was not altered by her act of registering
during that period for subsequent employment.
Other states have
had a variety of statutory provisions covering the subject of
unemployment compensation, some of which, in dealing with the
question of disqualification, particularly as to the effect of
quitting work because of marital obligation, are substantially the
same as the provisions of the Ohio statute above quoted. Although
there appears to have been no decisions of courts of last resort
construing and applying those provisions, they have generally been
administered in accordance with the conclusion to which we are
impelled by force of the clear and unequivocal language employed in
these statutory provisions. In our view, a contrary construction
and application would be tantamount to legislative action, which is
the province of the legislative and not the judicial branch of the
government.
Other questions
presented by the record become unimportant and are therefore not
discussed or decided.
It follows that the
judgment of the Court of Appeals should be and is hereby reversed,
and final judgment is rendered against the claimant.
Judgment
reversed.
DISPOSITION
Judgment
reversed.