Opinion ID: 1364283
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The nature and basis for plaintiff's cause of action.

Text: In resolving these conflicting contentions it is first necessary to consider the nature and basis of plaintiff's alleged cause of action. If such a cause of action must rest upon the provisions of ORS 659.410, which makes it an unlawful employment practice to discriminate against an employee who has filed a claim for workers' compensation benefits, it may be that any such cause of action for damages in a court of law must be implied from that statutory provision and that plaintiff's sole redress is to file a complaint with the Commissioner of the Bureau of Labor and pursue the administrative remedies provided by ORS ch. 659, at least unless such administrative remedies are demonstrably inadequate. On the other hand, if, as contended by plaintiff, his cause of action need not be based upon or implied from ORS 659.410, but instead plaintiff had a cause of action for damages for wrongful discharge based upon previously existing principles of common law, then the primary focus of the problem is not so much whether adequate administrative remedies were provided by ORS ch. 659 at the time of plaintiff's discharge, but whether by the enactment of that statute the Oregon legislature abolished a previously existing common law cause of action. In determining whether such a common law cause of action existed prior to the time the legislature enacted ORS 659.410, the following chronology should be noted. Plaintiff alleges that he was wrongfully discharged on or about July 1, 1975. On June 12, 1975, this court in Nees v. Hocks, 272 Or. 210, 536 P.2d 512 (1975), after a discussion of common law principles applicable to cases involving wrongful discharges of employees by their employers, held (at 218, 536 P.2d at 515) that: We conclude that there can be circumstances in which an employer discharges an employee for such a socially undesirable motive that the employer must respond in damages for any injury done.    [2] Upon the application of that rule to the facts in Nees, we held that an employee who was discharged on March 1, 1973 because she went on jury duty contrary to the wishes of her employer had at that time a common law cause of action for damages. There was no statute applicable to such a case, however, much less any applicable administrative remedy under any such statute. On October 5, 1973, approximately seven months after that March 1, 1973 date, the statute involved in this case, ORS 659.410, as enacted by the 1973 session of the Oregon legislature, became effective. ( See Or. Laws 1973, ch. 660.) That statute declared it to be an unlawful employment practice for an employer to discharge an employee for the filing of a claim for workers' compensation. It follows, in our view, that if the discharge of an employee for making a claim for workers' compensation is a discharge for such a socially undesirable motive as to fall within the rule of Nees, then a common law cause of action for such a discharge existed prior to the enactment of ORS 659.410. We are of the opinion that the discharge of an employee by his employer for the filing of a claim for workers' compensation is a discharge for such a socially undesirable motive as to come within the rule as stated in Nees. We agree with the holding by the Supreme Court of Indiana in Frampton v. Central Indiana Gas Co., 260 Ind. 249, 297 N.E.2d 425, 428, 63 A.L.R.3d 973 (1973), in which that court said: Retaliatory discharge for filing a workmen's compensation claim is a wrongful, unconscionable act and should be actionable in a court of law.    [3] In addition, by the enactment of ORS 659.410 the Oregon legislature has declared, in effect, that the discharge of an employee for the filing of a claim for workers' compensation is a discharge of an employee for a socially undesirable motive. We do not mean to say that, as a result, plaintiff's cause of action must be based upon or implied from ORS 659.410. Instead, we refer to that statutory provision, in our analysis of this case, as a recognition by the Oregon legislature of a public policy which provides a proper basis for application of the rule as stated in Nees to the discharge of an employee for making a claim for workers' compensation. [4] For these reasons, we hold that a common law cause of action for wrongful discharge for the filing of a claim for workers' compensation existed at the time of plaintiff's discharge on July 1, 1975, unless that cause of action had been abolished by the Oregon legislature by the enactment in 1973 of ORS 659.410 et seq. In deciding that question we must next consider the legislative history of the Oregon statutes relating to the enforcement of civil rights and to unlawful employment practices.