Court Opinion

ID: 9621574
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 06:00:45.386021+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:42:22.289087
License: Public Domain

TOAL, Justice:
I respectfully dissent.
I agree with the majority that the phrase “return directly to employment” in the statute is ambiguous. Where a statute is ambiguous, this Court must construe the terms of the statute. Lester v. South Carolina Workers’ Compensation Comm’n, 334 S.C. 557, 514 S.E.2d 751 (1999).
Initially, the majority errs in relying so heavily on the Retirement Systems’s interpretation of the term “directly” in this case. While this Court will give the statutory construction of the officials charged with its administration respectful consideration, an agency’s position is accorded less weight in situations, such as the current one, where the interpretation of the statute does not involve the exercise of administrative expertise. See Knight v. Board of Trustees of Firemen’s Retirement and Pension Fund of Columbia Fire Dep’t., 269 S.C. 671, 239 S.E.2d 720, 721 (1977); see also Stone Mfg. Co. v. South Carolina Employment Sec. Comm’n, 219 S.C. 239, 64 S.E.2d 644, 648 (1951) (“At most, administrative practice is a *404weight in the scale, to be considered, but not to be inevitably followed ... ”).
This Court’s primary function in interpreting a statute is to ascertain the intent of the legislature. Roche v. Young Bros., Inc. of Florence, 332 S.C. 75, 504 S.E.2d 311, 314 (1998). Here, the legislature intended to give state employees who left state employment to pursue higher education and then return to state employment the opportunity to purchase retirement credit. When interpreting such a statute offering a benefit to state employees, we must remember the purposes of the state’s retirement act are remedial and beneficent. Knight, 269 S.C. 671, 239 S.E.2d 720. Accordingly, the statutes will be liberally construed in favor of those to be benefitted and the objects sought to be accomplished. Id., at 822, 461 S.E.2d at 823.
While the Retirement Systems’s 90 day grace period may be a liberal interpretation of the phrase, it is not a rational one. The relevant group- for analysis in this case is all state employees who leave for higher education. Interpreting the phrase “directly” to mean immediately while having a 90 day grace period allows one class of employees, school teachers getting graduate degrees, to purchase retirement credit while denying that opportunity to another similarly situated class, employees pursuing a law degree. The question for this Court is whether it is improper to single out a portion of the overall group for different treatment.
The requirements of equal protection are met if: (1) the classification bears a reasonable relationship to the legislative purpose sought to be effected; (2) the members of the class are treated alike under similar circumstances; and (3) the classification rests on a reasonable basis. Robinson v. Richland County Council, 293 S.C. 27, 358 S.E.2d 392 (1987). In order to practice law* in this state, all law school graduates must take and pass the South Carolina Bar exam. See Rule 402, SCACR; Rule 410, SCACR. Under the Retirement Systems’s approach, state employees graduating from law school are able to purchase retirement credit only if they return to employment before passing the bar exam.1 In other *405words, the Retirement Systems’s interpretation prevents law school graduates from using their graduate degree if they desire to return to state employment and purchase retirement credit. Such a position directly conflicts with the legislative purpose of granting a benefit to employees seeking higher education and is not an interpretation “liberally construed in favor of those to be benefitted.”
Also, the adoption of a grace period reveals the Retirement Systems understood the Legislature did not intend for “directly” to mean graduates would have to be employed the first day they were available after graduation. However, choosing an arbitrary 90 day limit that covers only a portion of the returning employees does not have a rational basis. While there is no doubt that a policy focusing solely on a 90 day limitation is simpler to administer than a policy that actually looks to see whether an employee returns directly to work after obtaining a graduate degree, choosing such a date is arbitrary where under the limit certain groups of employees are guaranteed to be excluded from obtaining the benefit.
Furthermore, the 90 day restriction was not included in the statute nor in any regulation adopted by the Retirement Systems. The Retirement Systems’s failure to follow the State Register and Administrative Procedures Act in adopting a 90 day grace period should alone be enough to prevent enforcement of the Retirement Systems’s restriction.2 Failing to officially adopt the 90 day restriction as a regulation so that *406there would be notice of the deadline even led to the initiation of Stuckey’s case. She discovered the possibility of purchasing the credit when an employee of the Retirement System told her she would qualify for the credit. Also, if Mrs. Stuckey had read the statute and all pertinent regulations while planning to attend law. school, she would have received no notice that she would face a strict day limitation that she could not meet.
Based on the foregoing, I would reverse the decision of the trial court.
FINNEY, C.J., concurs.

. The majority points out that often law school graduates are employed by the State before the bar results are delivered. Such kind treatment *405cannot be counted upon for all law graduates. Furthermore, during this period the employee cannot be employed as a practicing lawyer without violating the law. The legislation itself does not violate equal protection, the agency's use of a 90 day time period violates equal protection as applied.

. This act states:
There shall be filed with the Legislative Council and published in the State Register:
(1) All regulations promulgated or proposed to be promulgated by state agencies which have general public applicability and legal effect, including all of those which include penalty provisions. Provided, however, that the text of regulations as finally promulgated by an agency shall not be published in the State Register until such regulations have been approved by the General Assembly in accordance with § 1-23-120
S.C.Code Ann. § 1-23-40 (Supp.1998).