Source: https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/449/268
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POTOMAC ELECTRIC POWER COMPANY, Petitioner, v. DIRECTOR, OFFICE OF WORKERS' COMPENSATION PROGRAMS, UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF LABOR et al. | US Law | LII / Legal Information Institute
Supreme Court aboutsearch liibulletin subscribe previews POTOMAC ELECTRIC POWER COMPANY, Petitioner, v. DIRECTOR, OFFICE OF WORKERS' COMPENSATION PROGRAMS, UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF LABOR et al.
449 U.S. 268 (101 S.Ct. 509, 66 L.Ed.2d 446)
Argued: Oct. 8, 1980.
[HTML] Syllabus Under the Longshoremen's and Harbor Workers' Compensation Act, compensation for a permanent partial disability must be determined in one of two ways. First, if the injury is of a kind specifically identified in the schedule set forth in §§ 8(c)(1)-(20) of the Act, the injured employee is entitled to receive two-thirds of his average weekly wages for a specific number of weeks, regardless of whether his earning capacity has been impaired. Second, in "all other cases," § 8(c)(21) authorizes compensation equal to two-thirds of the difference between the employee's preinjury average weekly wages and his postinjury wage-earning capacity, during the period of his disability. Respondent employee (an employee covered by the Act) in the course of his employment suffered a permanent partial loss of the use of his left leg, an injury specified in the statutory schedule. But the Administrative Law Judge, rather than awarding him compensation under the schedule, allowed him the larger recovery under § 8(c)(21), and the Benefits Review Board affirmed. The Court of Appeals also affirmed, concluding that the "all other cases" language in § 8(c)(21) provided a "remedial ALTERNATIVE" MEASURE OF COMPENSATION for cases in which the scheduled benefits failed adequately to compensate for a diminution in wage-earning capabilities.
Under the Longshoremen's and Harbor Workers' Compensation Act (LHWCA), 44 Stat. (part 2) 1424, as amended, 33 U.S.C. 901-950 (1976 ed. and Supp. III), compensation for a permanent partial disability must be determined in one of two ways. First, if the injury is of a kind specifically identified in the schedule set forth in §§ 8(c)(1)-(20) of the Act, 33 U.S.C. 908(c)(1)-(20), the injured employee is entitled to receive two-thirds of his average weekly wages for a specific number of weeks, regardless of whether his earning capacity has actually been impaired. Second, in all other cases, § 8(c)(21), 33 U.S.C. 908(c)(21), authorizes compensation equal to two-thirds of the difference between the employee's preinjury average weekly wages and his postinjury wage-earning capacity, during the period of his disability.
The question in this case is whether a permanently partially disabled employee, entitled to compensation under the statutory schedule, may elect to receive a larger recovery under § 8(c)(21) measured by the actual impairment of wage-earning capacity caused by his injury. Although Congress could surely authorize such an election, it has not yet done so. We therefore hold that respondent Cross' recovery must be limited by the statutory schedule.
Cross is employed by Potomac Electric Power Co. (Pepco) as a cable splicer-a job that requires strength and agility. In 1974, he earned a total of $21,959.38, including overtime pay of $8,543.30. In December of that year, he injured his left knee in the course of his employment, thereby suffering a permanent partial loss of the use of his leg. The physical impairment is described as a 5 to 20% loss of the use of one leg, but the resulting impairment of his earning capacity is apparently in excess of 40%.
Although Cross has retained his job, he has not been able to perform all of the strenuous duties required of a cable splicer and therefore he has received no overtime and has not qualified for certain pay increases.
Because he worked in the District of Columbia, respondent Cross is entitled to compensation under the LHWCA.
It is undisputed that the injury to his leg is a "permanent partial disability" within the meaning of § 8(c) of the Act; he therefore has an unquestioned right to a compensation award measured by a fraction of his earnings for 288 weeks.
His claim, however, is for the larger amount measured by two-thirds of the difference between his average weekly earnings before the injury and his present wage-earning capacity, multiplied by the number of weeks that his disability continues.
The United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit also affirmed. 196 U.S.App.D.C. 417, 606 F.2d 1324 (1979). Recognizing that the Act "must be construed in light of its humanitarian objectives," and noting a "recent trend in workmen's compensation law away from the idea of exclusivity of scheduled benefits," the court concluded that the "all other cases" language in § 8(c)(21) provided a "remedial alternative" measure of compensation for cases in which "the scheduled benefits fail adequately to compensate for a diminution in wage-earning capabilities."
While expressing sympathy for the result reached by the majority, one judge dissented.
* The language of the Act plainly supports the view that the character of the disability determines the method of compensation. Section 8 identifies four different categories of disability and separately prescribes the method of compensation for each.
In the permanent partial disability category, § 8(c) provides a compensation schedule which covers 20 different specific injuries. It then adds an additional subparagraph, § 8(c)(21), that applies to any injury not included within the list of specific injuries. There is no language in that additional subparagraph indicating that it was intended to provide an alternative method of compensation for the cases described in the preceding subparagraphs; quite the contrary, by its terms, subparagraph (21) is applicable "In all other cases."
It is also noteworthy that the statutory direction that precedes the schedule of specifically described partial disabilities mandates that the compensation prescribed by the schedule "shall be paid to the employee, as follows."
We are not free to read this language as though it granted the employee an election. Nor are we free to read the subsequent words "all other cases" as though they described "all of the foregoing" as well; the use of the word "other" forecloses that reading.
The legislative history of the Act is entirely consistent with the conclusion that it was intended to mean what it says. Although that history contains no specific consideration of the precise question before us,
one aspect of the Act's history is somewhat enlightening. The relevant language was enacted in 1927.
It was patterned after a similar "scheduled benefits" provision in the New York Workmen's Compensation Law enacted in 1922.
A few years after enactment of the LHWCA, the New York Court of Appeals was confronted with the same question of construction under the New York statute that is now presented to us under the federal statute. The New York Court of Appeals apparently considered the statutory language so clear on its face that little discussion of this issue was necessary:
Nothing in the original legislative history of the Federal Act or in the legislative history of subsequent amendments
indicates that Congress did not intend the plain language of the federal statute to receive the same construction as the substantially identical language of its New York ancestor.
During the first half century of administration of the LHWCA, federal tribunals consistently construed the schedule benefits provision as exclusive. Although the exclusivity question did not explicitly arise until 1964, prior to that time evidence of loss of wages or wage-earning capacity was considered irrelevant in cases of permanent partial disability falling within the schedule provisions.
In 1964, in Williams v. Donovan, 234 F.Supp. 135 (ED La.), aff'd, 367 F.2d 825 (CA5 1966), cert. denied, 386 U.S. 977, 87 S.Ct. 1174, 18 L.Ed.2d 139 (1967), the first federal court to address the exclusivity issue found that "the form and language of the Act" indicated that compensation under § 8(c)(21) for loss of wage-earning capacity was not available in cases covered by the schedule. 234 F.Supp., at 139. This construction of the Act went unchallenged for the next decade.
It was not until 1975 that the Benefits Review Board announced its dissatisfaction with the Williams construction of the statute and concluded that claimants suffering from a permanent partial disability may elect to proceed under either the schedule or § 8(c)(21).
The Board has since applied its construction of the Act in a series of decisions of which the instant case is a member.
The divided opinion of the Court of Appeals is apparently the first and only federal court decision accepting that construction. The notion that the plain language of the LHWCA might not mean what it says is thus a relatively recent development surfacing for the first time almost 50 years after its enactment. The relevant judicial authority prior to 1975, although not abundant, indicates that the schedule benefits were considered exclusive.
While the federal decisional authority on this question is scarce, state-law authority apparently is not. The lower court cited, and the respondents rely upon the "recent trend in workmen's compensation law away from the idea of exclusivity of scheduled benefits." 196 U.S.App.D.C., at 421, 606 F.2d, at 1328.
Although this "trend" unquestionably exists, it is neither uniform nor based entirely on cases presenting issues comparable to the precise issue before us.
More importantly, a proper understanding of the judicial role in this case reveals that the recent trend actually supports a literal reading of the federal statute. Our task is to ascertain the congressional intent underlying the schedule benefit provisions enacted in 1927; we are not free to incorporate into those provisions subsequent state-law developments that we may consider sound as a matter of policy. In attempting to ascertain the legislative intent underlying a statute enacted over 50 years ago, the view that once "dominated the field" is more enlightening than a recent state-law trend that has not motivated subsequent Congresses to amend the federal statute.
The once dominant view is entirely consistent with a literal reading of the Act.
Respondents correctly observe that prior decisions of this Court require that the LHWCA be liberally construed in order to effectuate its remedial purposes.
Respondents accordingly argue that the Act should be interpreted in a manner which provides a complete and adequate remedy to an injured employee. Implicit in this argument, however, is the assumption that the sole purpose of the Act was to provide disabled workers with a complete remedy for their industrial injuries. The inaccuracy of this implicit assumption undercuts the validity of respondents' argument.
The LHWCA, like other workmen's compensation legislation, is indeed remedial in that it was intended to provide a certain recovery for employees who are injured on the job. It imposes liability without fault and precludes the assertion of various common-law defenses that had frequently resulted in the denial of any recovery for disabled laborers. While providing employees with the benefit of a more certain recovery for work-related harms, statutes of this kind do not purport to provide complete compensation for the wage earner's economic loss.
On the contrary, they provide employers with definite and lower limits on potential liability than would have been applicable in common-law tort actions for damages. None of the categories of disability covered by the LHWCA authorizes recovery measured by the full loss of an injured employee's earnings; even those in the most favored categories may recover only two-thirds of the actual loss of earnings. It therefore is not correct to interpret the Act as guaranteeing a completely adequate remedy for all covered disabilities. Rather, like most workmen's compensation legislation, the LHWCA represents a compromise between the competing interests of disabled laborers and their employers.
The use of a schedule of fixed benefits as an exclusive remedy in certain cases is consistent with the employees' interest in receiving a prompt and certain recovery for their industrial injuries as well as with the employers' interest in having their contingent liabilities identified as precisely and as early as possible.
It is true, however, that requiring resort to the schedule may produce certain incongruous results. Unless an injury results in a scheduled disability, the employee's compensation is dependent upon proving a loss of wage-earning capacity; in contrast, even though a scheduled injury may have no actual effect on an employee's capacity to perform a particular job or to maintain a prior level of income, compensation in the schedule amount must be paid. Conversely, the schedule may seriously undercompensate some employees like respondent Cross.
The result seems particularly unfair when his case is compared with an employee who suffers an unscheduled disability resulting in an equivalent impairment of earning capacity. Indeed, it is possible that the award for a serious temporary partial disability could exceed the amount scheduled for a permanent disability of like character.
As this Court has observed in the past, it is not to be lightly assumed that Congress intended that the LHWCA produce incongruous results. Baltimore & Phila. Steamboat Co. v. Norton, 284 U.S. 408, 412-413, 52 S.Ct. 187, 188, 76 L.Ed. 366 (1932). But if "compelling language" produces incongruities, the federal courts may not avoid them by rewriting or ignoring that language. Id., at 413, 52 S.Ct., at 188. Such compelling statutory language is present in this case. See Part I, supra. The fact that it leads to seemingly unjust results in particular cases does not give judges a license to disregard it.
If anomalies actually do occur with any frequency in the day-to-day administration of the Act, they provide a persuasive justification for a legislative review of the statutory compensation schedule. It would obviously be sound policy for Congress to re-examine the schedule of permanent partial disability benefits more frequently than every half century.
In such a re-examination the extent and importance of hypothetical cases such as those described by respondents could be fairly evaluated. In this judicial proceeding, however, concern with such hypothetical cases is less compelling than sympathy for the actual plight of the individual litigant in the case before us. Nonetheless, that sympathy is an insufficient basis for approving a recovery that Congress has not authorized.
Soon after the Longshoremen's and Harbor Workers' Compensation Act (LHWCA), 44 Stat. (part 2) 1424, 33 U.S.C. 901-950, became law in 1927, this Court unanimously announced the principles to be applied in resolving questions of statutory construction that arise under it:
Today's decision departs from these principles by reaching, rather than avoiding, a harsh and incongruous result.
It is undisputed that respondent Cross has suffered an injury that will reduce his weekly earnings by $130.13 for the rest of his working life. To compensate him for this injury, the Benefits Review Board awarded him two-thirds of his lost earnings-$86.76 per week or approximately $4,500 per year-for as long as he continues to work. Under the Court's decision, however, the most that Cross will receive is a total of about $12,800,
less than three years' compensation as awarded by the Board. If the Board now accepts petitioner's argument that Cross has lost only 5% of the use of his leg, he will receive about $3,200, less than one year's compensation.
Of course, if Congress really intended such a result, the Court would be powerless to change it. I believe, however, that neither the language of the statute nor its legislative history warrants the interpretation that the Court adopts.
The starting point, of course, is the statute's definition of "disability." Section 2(10) of the Act, 33 U.S.C. 902(10), defines "disability" as "incapacity because of injury to earn the wages which the employee was receiving at the time of injury in the same or any other employment." As used in the Act, therefore, "disability" is an economic concept, rather than a medical one. An injury is not compensable under the Act unless it results in some diminution in the employee's earning power.
The Act's treatment of permanent partial disability should be read against this background. As the Court notes, § 908(c) contains 20 subsections establishing compensation for permanent partial disability caused by particular injuries. That compensation is two-thirds of the worker's weekly wages for a specified number of weeks for the injury listed. Subsection (21) then provides that "in all other cases in this class of disability" an employee shall receive two-thirds of the difference between his average weekly wages before the injury and his wage-earning capacity thereafter. The Court prefers to construe "other cases" to mean that the compensation specified for the injuries listed in subsections (1) to (20) is the exclusive method of compensating workers who are permanently, but partially, disabled by these injuries. I believe that "other cases" includes any case in which the worker does not wish to accept the compensation offered in subsections (1) to (20), but elects to bear the burden of proving the difference between his wages before the injury andhis wage-earning capacity afterwards.
This interpretation is farmore in harmony with the overall purpose of the Act than is the Court's construction. The House Committee that considered the legislation explained that workers' compensation "has come to be universally recognized as a necessity in the interest of social justice between employer and employee," and that this Act would provide an injured worker with "compensation during the period of his illness or inability to pursue his usual employment. . . ." (Emphasis added.) H.R.Rep.No.1767, 69th Cong., 2d Sess., 19-20 (1927).
The compensation that the Court's decision provides to respondent Cross falls far short of this goal.
An additional purpose of the statute was to afford prompt relief to covered workers "without the delay and expense which an action at law entails." Id., at 20. The inclusion of a schedule of benefits in § 908(c) serves this goal by providing an easily ascertainable award to a person who suffers one of the scheduled injuries.
There is no indication in the legislative history, however, that providing prompt and certain relief is to be regarded as more important than providing adequate relief, especially in a case, such as this one, in which it is undisputed that the schedule of benefits will not compensate respondent Cross for the wages he has lost and will lose because of his injury.
Although the Court statesthat the "weight of judicial authority" supports its view, it is able to cite only a single Federal District Court decision in point,
namely, Williams v. Donovan, 234 F.Supp. 135 (ED La.1964), aff'd, 367 F.2d 825 (CA5 1966), cert. denied, 386 U.S. 977, 87 S.Ct. 1174, 18 L.Ed.2d 139 (1967).
This contrasts with the consistently held view of the Benefits Review Board,
the agency established to administer the LHWCA. Sokolowski v. Bank of America, 261 N.Y. 57, 184 N.E. 492 (1933), of course, provides scant support for today's decision. That case was decided after the LHWCA was enacted, and is an uncertain guide, at best, to the intent of the Congress that passed the Act six years earlier.
Thus, the anomalous results the Court's decision imposes upon respondent Cross and other claimants under the LHWCA
are not mandated, in my view, by the statute. It is possible to construe the statute to allow a claimant seeking compensation for permanent partial disability to choose between the schedule and the provisions of § 908(c)(21). I think we should follow Baltimore & Phila. Steamboat Co. v. Norton, 284 U.S. 408, 52 S.Ct. 187, 76 L.Ed. 366 (1932), and adopt a liberal construction of the statute so as to avoid the amazingly incongruous result approved by the Court.
Section 8, as set forth in 33 U.S.C. 908, provides, in part, as follows:
This computation is derived from § 8(c)(21), 33 U.S.C. 908(c)(21), quoted in n. 1, supra. It should be noted that "wage-earning capacity" under § 8(c)(21) is not necessarily measured by an injured employee's actual postinjury earnings. Section 8(h) of the Act, as set forth in 33 U.S.C. 908(h), provides:
In addition to permanent partial disability, the Act provides for permanent total, temporary total, and temporary partial disability. The remedies for permanent and temporary total disability-essentially two-thirds of the employee's average weekly wages during the period of the disability-are set forth in subsections (a) and (b) of § 8, 33 U.S.C. 908(a) and (b). The remedy for temporary partial disability-two-thirds of the difference between the employee's preinjury average weekly wages and his postinjury wage-earning capacity during the period of disability, up to a maximum of five years-is set forth in § 8(e), 33 U.S.C. 908(e).
33 U.S.C. 908(c) (emphasis supplied). See n. 1, supra.
Act of Mar. 4, 1927, 44 Stat. 1424, 33 U.S.C. 901 et seq.
In 1972, Congress considered and failed to pass an amendment to § 8(c) that would have permitted an employee suffering from a permanent partial disability caused by a scheduled injury to recover both the schedule benefits and two-thirds of his lost wage-earning capacity after expiration of the schedule period. See S. 2318, § 7, 92d Cong., 2d Sess. (1971), reprinted in Longshoremen's and Harbor Workers' Compensation Act Amendments of 1972: Hearings before the Subcommittee on Labor of the Senate Committee on Labor and Public Welfare, 92d Cong., 2d Sess., 7 (1972); H.R. 12006, § 7, 92d Cong., 1st Sess. (1971), and H.R. 15023, § 7, 92d Cong., 2d Sess. (1972), reprinted in Longshoremen's and Harbor Workers' Compensation Act: Hearings before the Select Subcommittee on Labor of the House Committee on Education and Labor, 92d Cong., 2d Sess., 27, 38 (1972). Although Pepco relies heavily upon Congress' rejection of this proposed amendment as support for its position that schedule benefits are exclusive, this action is of marginal relevance in this case because the amendment would have authorized cumulative, not alternative, remedies. Pepco's reliance upon 1949 and 1966 amendments to the Federal Employees Compensation Act (FECA), 5 U.S.C. 8101 et seq., is similarly misplaced. These amendments, authorizing cumulative remedies under the FECA, shed little light upon Congress' intention with respect to alternative remedies under the LHWCA. See Act of Oct. 14, 1949, ch. 691, § 104, 63 Stat. 855; Act of Sept. 6, 1966, Pub.L. 89-554, 80 Stat. 536.
Mason v. Old Dominion Stevedoring Corp., 1 BRBS 357, 363-365 (1975). In Mason, the Board rejected Williams in favor of American Mutual Insurance Co. v. Jones, 138 U.S.App.D.C. 269, 426 F.2d 1263 (1970), a decision upon which the court below also relied. See 196 U.S.App.D.C., at 421, 606 F.2d, at 1328. The opinion in Jones, however, does not address the exclusivity issue presented in this case. Rather, Jones held merely that a scheduled injury can give rise to an award for permanent total disability under § 8(a) where the facts establish that the injury prevents the employee from engaging in the only employment for which he is qualified. 138 U.S.App.D.C., at 271-272, 426 F.2d, at 1265-1266. This conclusion is entirely consistent with the statute which, in § 8(a), directs that "permanent total disability shall be determined in accordance with the facts." 33 U.S.C. 908(a). Indeed, since the § 8(c) schedule applies only in cases of permanent partial disability, once it is determined that an employee is totally disabled the schedule becomes irrelevant. The question presented in Mason and in this case is the very different question of whether § 8(c) permits an employee suffering from a disability determined to be partial in character to choose between recovery under the schedule and recovery under § 8(c)(21). The Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit recently recognized this distinction when it noted that Williams and Jones are in no way inconsistent, because the former concerns partial disability while the latter concerns total disability. See Jacksonville Shipyards, Inc. v. Dugger, 587 F.2d 197, 198 (1979).
It is possible that, had Cross' disability been temporary in duration, he might have been entitled to a larger recovery than is available under the schedule for his permanent disability. On the basis of the evidence presented below, the maximum award available to Cross under the schedule is approximately $12,800. Because compensation for temporary partial disability under § 8(e) is based upon lost wage-earning capacity rather than a schedule, Cross could have received approximately $22,400 for a temporary partial disability, assuming that the loss of wage-earning capacity demonstrated in this case was found to continue for the 5-year maximum temporary partial disability period. See 33 U.S.C. 908(e).