Opinion ID: 687261
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Rationalizing Brooks and Feres

Text: 68 First came Brooks, which, despite the existence of a federal statutory scheme of military death and disability benefits, permitted members of the armed services to recover under the FTCA so long as their injuries [were] not caused by their service except in the sense that all human events depend upon what has already transpired. Brooks, 337 U.S. at 52, 69 S.Ct. at 920. Then came Feres, which strongly intimated that the existence of a federal compensation scheme should bar all suits against the United States government by military personnel, just as workers' compensation laws regularly barred injured employees from suing their employers. See Feres, 340 U.S. at 144-45, 71 S.Ct. at 158-59. As we have already noted, the Court's earlier result in Brooks--reaffirmed in later cases--has always seemed out of line with Feres. In fact, however, this seeming inconsistency is more apparent than real. 69 There is a fundamental difference between the government's compensation scheme for its military employees and workers' compensation laws. The government's compensation scheme is not limited to compensating military employees who are injured in ways that arise out of or in the scope of employment. It covers servicemembers' injuries, as well as diseases, that are completely unrelated to the military enterprise. See, e.g., 38 C.F.R. Sec. 3.1(m) (regulation defining in line of duty coverage as coverage for injury or disease incurred or aggravated during a period of active military, naval, or air service unless such injury or disease was a result of the veteran's own willful misconduct.). Workers' compensation laws, instead, only compensate employees for injuries that arise out of or in the course of their employment. And under these laws, it is only this limited class of injuries that give rise to a Feres-like prohibition of suits by employees against their employers. 70 A helpful way of understanding the significance of this difference is to consider the military's death and disability benefits as essentially two different plans combined into one statutory scheme. The first component is analogous to a workers' compensation system, and covers military employees who are injured in ways that arise out of or in the scope of their employment. The second component is like a supplemental health and disability plan that an employer voluntarily provides to its employees. This latter plan covers employees regardless of how or when they are injured, and, specifically, whether or not the injury arises out of the employer's enterprise. 11 71 No one has ever imagined that the existence of a voluntary benefits plan for private employees means that such employees, if they should be injured outside the scope of their employment (but in ways covered by the voluntary plan), may not sue their employers in tort. 12 Since the compensation provided under such voluntary plans is not a function of workers' compensation laws (because the injuries are not work related ), tort actions are not barred. 13 72 Brooks and Feres make the same distinction. Feres bars suits where compensation is given under a military analogue to workers' compensation. Brooks allows suits when compensation occurs, for non-work related injuries, i.e., those that would not be covered by workers' compensation. Read this way, Brooks, Feres and their respective progeny are not only substantially consistent with each other, but they also achieve a rough parity with workers' compensation laws. That is, thus understood, they accomplish the very result that the Court sought in Feres. 73 Whether this desire to make the FTCA conform with workers' compensation laws was wise, and whether, in any event, it was too willful is, of course, not for us to say. Similarly, it is not for us to say whether Feres, even if wise and appropriate when decided, yields appropriate or sensible results today. We can note, however, that both the military and the workers' compensation schemes have fallen significantly out of line with ordinary tort recoveries 14 and, thus treat injured employees unlike other injured parties. We can speculate on whether this fact undermines the original intent of such laws to treat injured employees at least as well as other injured parties. See, e.g., Andrea Giampetro-Meyer & Ann M. Balcerzak, Renegotiating the Bargain: An Analysis and Evaluation of Alternatives for Revising the Exclusive Remedy Provision in Maryland's Workers' Compensation Act, 21 U.Balt.L.Rev. 51, 54-55 (1991) (noting that workers' compensation laws were enacted in response to employee-obstacles to recovery for job-related injuries) (hereinafter, Renegotiating the Bargain ); Prosser & Keeton, Sec. 80 at 572-74 (brief history of workers' compensation legislation). Finally, we may notice that the increasing difference in tort and workers' compensation recoveries has led many state courts to find creative (and perhaps wilful) ways around the traditional statutory bar on employee-employer lawsuits. Notably, if this judicial trend toward permitting employee end-runs around the workers' compensation laws continues, see generally, Renegotiating the Bargain, 21 U.Balt.L.Rev. at 57-58; Brad A. Elward, Comment, The Interplay Between Contribution and Workers' Compensation in Illinois: Putting An End to Backdoor Recoveries, 13 S. Ill. U. L.J. 103 (1988), civilian employees will receive greater benefits under porous state statutory schemes than will military employees under the Feres doctrine that ironically, itself, had stretched the FTCA in order to achieve rough parity between military and civilian employees. 15 74 But such considerations, if they are relevant at all, are for the Supreme Court to ponder. For us it is enough to say that the Feres doctrine remains the law, and that the distinction between Feres, Brooks, and the decisions that followed each, can be understood in the light of Feres's original objectives. Viewed in this way, the distinction becomes an effective guide for district courts adjudicating these types of cases. This distinction, moreover, withstands the after-added factor of military discipline. When used with appropriate moderation, see Johnson, 481 U.S. at 688-91, 107 S.Ct. at 2067-69, discipline can add its own unique flavor to the Feres sauce without destroying the original taste.