Case Title: Collier v. Insignia Financial Group

Citation: 

Docket Number: 90482

State: oklahoma

Court: Oklahoma Supreme Court

Date: 1999-05-25T00:00:00Z

Document:
Collier v. Insignia Financial Group  Collier v. Insignia Financial Group 1999 OK 49 981 P.2d 321 70 OBJ 1804 Case Number: 90482 Decided: 05/25/1999 Supreme Court of Oklahoma JILL COLLIER, Plaintiff, v. INSIGNIA FINANCIAL GROUP d/b/a INSIGNIA COMMERCIAL GROUP, Defendant. [981 P.2d 322] CERTIFIED QUESTION FROM A UNITED STATES COURT. ¶ 0 Plaintiff, Jill Collier, alleges she was sexually harassed in the workplace by supervisory personnel and ultimately constructively discharged. She seeks damages under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 [as amended by the Civil Rights Act of 1991] and 25 O.S.1991 §§ 1101 et seq. [Oklahoma's Anti-Discrimination Act] and for wrongful discharge. The United States District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma certified a question of unsettled state law concerning whether the Burk public-policy tort can be maintained for quid pro quo sexual harassment which results in constructive discharge if there are adequate remedies available under federal and state anti-discrimination laws. CERTIFIED QUESTION ANSWERED. Mark Hammons of Hammons & Associates, Inc., Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, for plaintiff. William B. Federman and Bill P. Guest of Day Edwards Federman Propester & Christensen, P.C., Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, for defendant. LAVENDER, J. ¶ 1 Pursuant to the Uniform Certification of Questions of Law Act, 20 O.S.1991 §§1601 et seq., the United States District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma certified the following question : May a plaintiff pursue a public policy tort claim under Burk v. K-Mart Corp., 189 OK 22, 770 P.2d 24 (1989), for quid pro quo sexual harassment and retaliatory constructive discharge in light of the remedies available under federal and state anti-discrimination laws? I RELEVANT FACTS ¶ 2 While employed by Insignia Financial Corporation [Insignia], Collier was allegedly subjected to unwelcome sexual remarks and actions by her supervisors. She also claims that management suggested she flirt with prospective customers. Collier contends that although she reported the questionable conduct, her employer undertook no remedial acts and in fact retaliated against her by not timely paying commissions which were her due. She resigned her position, alleging that she was constructively discharged.1 II THE COURT'S FUNCTION WHEN RESPONDING TO A CERTIFIED QUESTION FROM A FEDERAL COURT THE COURT'S FUNCTION WHEN RESPONDING TO A CERTIFIED QUESTION FROM A FEDERAL COURT ¶ 3 Inherent in the question posited by the certifying court is the implication that [981 P.2d 323] under the case's facts the plaintiff [Collier] has adequate civil remedies under applicable federal and state statutory regimes for any harm which she might have suffered. Nonetheless, because of the Burk tort's underpinnings the adequacy of the state-law remedy for quid pro quo sexual harassment must be assayed in order to resolve the certified question. Since the case is not before us for decision, we refrain (1) from applying the declared state-law response to the facts elicited in the federal-court litigation and (2) from passing upon the effect of federal procedure on the issues, facts and proof in the case. We have briefly outlined the case's factual underpinnings to place the certified question in a proper perspective. It is the federal district court that must analyze our answer's impact on the facts ultimately before it.2 III THE BURK PUBLIC-POLICY TORT: AN EXCEPTION TO THE EMPLOYMENT-AT-WILL DOCTRINE THE BURK PUBLIC-POLICY TORT: AN EXCEPTION TO THE EMPLOYMENT-AT-WILL DOCTRINE ¶ 4 The submitted query's essence is whether quid pro quo sexual harassment which culminates in an employee's "constructive discharge" is actionable under an exception - first enunciated in Burk v. K-Mart Corp., 1989 OK 22, 770 P.2d 24 - to the common law's employment-at-will doctrine. The Burk exception's availability to support a claim for wrongful discharge based upon sexual harassment has been considered but a few times since 1989. ¶ 5 Oklahoma's jurisprudence has historically evinced a great respect - which abides even to this day - for the common-law doctrine that an employment contract of indefinite duration may be terminated "for good cause, for no cause, or even for cause morally wrong" with no liability for breach of contract.3 It was in this context that the Court in Burk first crafted a narrow tort-based exception to the employment-at-will doctrine. A private cause of action for wrongful discharge was made necessary because of "unchecked employer power" to disregard, and hence frustrate, public-policy mandates which had been articulated by Oklahoma's legislature.4 Because the exception stands in derogation of the common-law terminable-at-will doctrine and further because public policy is oftentimes amorphous in nature, the Burk court limited a discharged employee's use of the public-policy tort to situations falling within narrowly prescribed guidelines. The Burk tort only lies when an employer violates [by wrongful discharge] public-policy goals which are clearly articulated in existing law - constitutional, statutory or jurisprudential - and then only if there is no adequate, statutorily-expressed remedy for the same. At a minimum the common-law tort embraces situations where an employee is "discharged for refusing to act in violation of an established and well-defined public policy."5 IV CERTIFIED QUESTION ANSWERED ¶ 6The certified question calls the Court to address two issues, i.e., (1) whether a constructive retaliatory discharge is actionable within the Burk tort's parameters and (2) whether a Burk claim may be pressed for a wrongful discharge occasioned by quid pro quo sexual harassment if there are available federal and state statutory remedies. A WITHIN THE PARAMETERS SET FORTH BELOW A RETALIATORY CONSTRUCTIVE DISCHARGE CAN SERVE AS A PREDICATE FOR A BURK TORT ¶ 7 Since its first appearance as a labor law concept under the National Labor [981 P.2d 324] Relations Act, the constructive discharge doctrine has been accorded acceptance among the various U.S. Circuit Courts of Appeal in Title VII discrimination cases. Today Collier urges Oklahoma to allow a retaliatory constructive discharge to suffice as the basis for bringing a Burk-type claim. ¶ 8While the concept of retaliatory "constructive discharge" has been considered in conjunction with several Burk claims, Oklahoma's extant jurisprudence has never specifically approved it as a basis for bringing the public-policy tort. The public-policy tort has as its focus the remediation of wrongful discharges (as that term is delimited by Burk), regardless whether they are explicit or constructive. Discharges falling within the latter class are nonetheless more problematic. Until now the Court has not been called upon to succinctly define the criteria for determining when a constructive discharge has occurred and whether the same will suffice for purposes of the Burk exception to the employment-at-will doctrine. ¶ 9 In Marshall v. OK Rental & Leasing, Inc.6 the Court observed that a constructive discharge occurs when an employer deliberately makes or allows the employee's working conditions to become so intolerable that a reasonable person7 subject to them would resign.8 While accurate, this statement does not adequately define the outside parameters under which a constructive discharge will support a Burk-type claim. ¶ 10 Initially, it must be observed that the Burk tort encompasses a broader range of wrongful discharges that just those involving one of the proscribed categories of discrimination articulated in Title VII or the Oklahoma Anti-Discrimination Act. The Burk tort is available to redress employer violations of any state-declared public policy which culminate in civilly unremedied employee terminations. The test today adopted for ascertaining whether a constructive discharge has occurred is an objective one which assays the complained of employer's conduct through the eyes of a reasonable person standing in the employee's shoe and applies to all constructive discharges pressed under the Burk tort's guise. The focus of today's test is upon the impact of the employer's actions, whether deliberate or not, upon a "reasonable" employee. The test requires the trial court to inquire (1) whether the employer either knew or should have known of the "intolerable" work conditions and (2) if the permitted conditions were so intolerable that a reasonable person subject to them would resign. This imposes upon the trial court the obligation to survey the totality of the circumstances which allegedly prompted the constructive discharge, including (but not limited to) the "frequency of the discriminatory conduct; its severity; whether it is physically threatening or humiliating; or a mere offensive utterance; and whether it unreasonably interferes with an employee's work performance."9 If the employer's behavior is so objectively offensive as to alter the conditions of the plaintiff's employment (causing the employee to resign), a retaliatory constructive discharge can be said to have occurred and may serve as a predicate for bringing a Burk-type claim, assuming the tort's other preconditions have been satisfied. B QUID PRO QUO SEXUAL HARASSMENT IS REMEDIABLE UNDER THE BURK TORT'S ¶ 11 Oklahoma's Anti-Discrimination Act (see 25 O.S.1991 §1302) clearly [981 P.2d 325] articulates a public policy which castigates sexual harassment in the workplace10 when it provides in pertinent part: A. It is a discriminatory practice for an employer: 1. To . . . discharge[ ] or otherwise discriminate against an individual with respect to compensation or the terms, conditions, privileges or responsibilities of employment, because of race, color, religion, sex, national origin, age, or handicap . . . .[Emphasis added.] This statutory language condemns conditioning continued employment upon the grant of sexual favors requested of an employee by an employer or supervisor - the essence of quid pro quo sexual harassment.11 Hence, were a discharged employee able to prove quid pro quo sexual harassment he/she would be able to satisfy one of the public-policy tort's predicates, i.e., an employer's violation of a state-declared public policy. ¶ 12The other predicate to assertion of the Burk exception is the absence of a state-statutory remedy for the public-policy violation. If the Oklahoma Anti-Discrimination Act provides an adequate remedy for the offending sexual harassment, there can be no Burk tort. It does not. ¶ 13 Central to assessment of the remedial schemes provided for by the Act is the language of 25 O.S.1991 § 1101, which provides in pertinent part: A. The general purposes of this act are to provide for execution within the state of the policies embodied in the federal Civil Rights Act of 1964, the federal Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967, and Section 504 of the federal Rehabilitation Act of 1973 to make uniform the law of those states which enact this act, and to provide rights and remedies substantially equivalent to those granted under the federal Fair Housing Law. [Emphasis added.] Construction of this language leads inescapably to the conclusion that while the Legislature meant to incorporate the policies of Title VII (among other federal acts), it intended that the Act's primary remedial scheme be that afforded by the Fair Housing Law. This distinction explains the dichotomous remedial treatment afforded victims under the Act - victims of housing discrimination may elect to pursue a civil cause of action under the terms of 25 O.S.1991 §§1502.14 & 1502.15 while those suffering gender-based harassment are provided only an administrative remedy.12 The statute's text amply evidences that its drafters understood that policies and remedies are distinct since its language differentiates between the two. Should the Legislature wish to direct that the federal remedies provided for in the cited acts are to be the exclusive remedies for violations of the articulated anti-discriminatory policies, it is within its power to do so.13 Nonetheless, until such time as it so acts, the Court must apply the law as adopted. ¶ 14 When called upon to construe a statutory provision susceptible of more than one meaning, it is incumbent upon the Court to give it that interpretation which frees it from constitutional infirmity. In [ 981 P.2d 326] Tate v. Browning-Ferris , Inc.14 the Court held that "for remedial purposes, discrimination victims [under the Act] comprise a single class." Nonetheless, while the Act gives discharged victims of handicap discrimination a private cause of action against the offending employer,15 it only provides an administrative remedy for victims of quid pro quo sexual harassment.16 Were we to hold that the Oklahoma Anti-Discrimination Act provides the exclusive remedial scheme for wrongful discharges which are the product of sexually discriminatory practices, we would in effect be sanctioning unequal remedies for members of the same class. Oklahoma's Constitution17 interdicts the passage of special law which would authorize disparate remedies for like-situated (employment-discrimination) victims.18 Hence, we must conclude that the Legislature did not intend the administrative remedy afforded to sexual-discrimination victims by the Act to be an exclusive remedy.19 Rather the administrative remedy provided by the Act to employees whose discharge is caused by quid pro quo sexual harassment is cumulative of the common-law Burk remedy.20 The Burk tort gives the discharged victim a private cause of action for quid pro quo sexual harassment comparable to that statutorily accorded to victims of handicap discrimination. Hence, our adopted construction of the Act - i.e., that it does not provide the exclusive remedy for quid pro quo sexual harassment which culminates in wrongful discharge - avoids the pitfall of according asymmetrical remedies to members of a single class of employment-discrimination victims. V SUMMARY ¶ 15 The victim of quid pro quo sexual harassment who has been discharged - either explicitly or constructively - from employment, can maintain a Burk-type claim for wrongful discharge. Had the Oklahoma Anti-Discrimination Act - the source of the [981 P.2d 327] articulated public policy proscribing gender-based discriminatory practices in the workplace - afforded victims of sexual harassment the same remedy as that statutorily given to handicap-discrimination victims, the Burk tort would not have been available to Collier. ¶ 16 CERTIFIED QUESTION ANSWERED. ¶ 17 HODGES, LAVENDER, OPALA, WILSON and WATT, JJ., concur. ¶ 18 SUMMERS, C.J., dissent in part. ¶ 19 HARGRAVE, V.C.J., SIMMS and KAUGER, JJ., dissent. FOOT