Opinion ID: 2599628
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Did the District Terminate or Suspend the Teachers' Power to Accept Any Offer?

Text: An offeror, by manifesting an intention not to enter into a proposed contract, can terminate the offeree's power of acceptance. [28] Invoking that principle, the district argues that even if there was an offer, the district's communications with the teachers revoked the offer or terminated their power to accept it. The teachers assert that only the board had the power to revoke the offer. Recognizing the calculation error, administrators and an individual school board member tried to prevent teachers from accepting the incentive. Their communications, discussed above, did not use words that expressly revoked the offer. We think the issue of the effect of the district's communications raises questions that should not be resolved in this appeal as a matter of law. First, because the meaning of the words in the district's communications was not adequately litigated in the superior court, we decline to hold that those words are fairly susceptible to only one interpretation. The district gave the issue of their meaning only cursory attention in the superior court. The teachers did not address the issue there, nor have they on appeal. In holding that the district's statements did not revoke the April 2 offer, the superior court did not discuss or rely on the meaning of the statements. It relied instead on the proposition that only the board had authority to revoke a board offer. The absence of express words of revocation is not necessarily controlling. [29] The history of past dealingsalso relevant to whether the board's motion was an offeris relevant to interpreting the words of the administrators and individual board members. It therefore appears that there may be genuine, material fact disputes about the meaning and effect of these communications. We consequently cannot decide as a matter of law whether these communications revoked any offer or otherwise terminated the teachers' power to accept a board-made offer. Second, we cannot hold as a matter of law that only board action could terminate or suspend offerees' ability to accept a board-made offer. The teachers point out that the school board could only act as a collective body. Board bylaws state that [b]oard members have authority only when acting as a body in regular or special sessions. The bylaws also state that [t]he Board shall not be bound in any way by any statement or action on the part of any individual Board member or employee of the District except when such statement or action is in pursuance of special instructions by the Board or under specified delegation of responsibility. Corporate and municipal organizations, by their nature, require executive actors to make just this sort of decision. The district has such executive actors, consisting of the superintendent and his staff; the school board endows them with the authority and powers necessary for carrying out board decisions, as noted above. This case does not turn exclusively on whether only the school board could revoke a board-made offer. Instead, the question is whether the administrators could permissibly do things short of revocation that nonetheless had the legal effect of suspending the offer until the board could act or could otherwise terminate the teachers' power to accept the offer. The bylaws did not explicitly grant the superintendent the power to revoke a board offer upon learning it was based on erroneous information. Rather, the superintendent had the responsibility of executing the policy of the Board. It could be argued that powers of general supervision and policy interpretation to school staff encompass the authority to revoke a school board offer or hold it in abeyance. While the superintendent does not have the authority to bind the board, he may have the authority to unbind it pending further consideration. This is an issue to be resolved on remand. The dissent would reverse and remand with directions to enter judgment for the school district. The dissent reasons that communications received by the teachers suspended their power to accept any offer here. Absent a valid acceptance, of course, no contract was formed. Although we agree with the dissent's legal analysis, we decline to rule on this question as a matter of law. The dissent relies heavily on the principles discussed in the Restatement (Second) of Agency (1958). [30] The parties did not discuss these propositions in their appellate briefs except in the most cursory fashion and did not cite the provisions the dissent finds persuasive. We prefer not to reverse for entry of judgment for the appellant in this circumstance. Moreover, we decline to hold as a matter of law that the language used or the representatives' ostensible or inferred authority was necessarily sufficient to deprive the teachers (and each teacher individually) of any power to accept the alleged offer. We leave it to the parties on remand to assert any argument, not made to date, that the representatives' words were susceptible to more than one meaning or that one or more of the teachers should have realized that no offer could be accepted pending further school board action. Finally, the district contends that, in accordance with comment d to Restatement section 43, [t]he basic standard to which the offeree is held is that of a reasonable person acting in good faith. We agree with that principle. On remand the conduct of the teachers in accepting the offer should be considered in light of that standard.