Court Opinion

ID: 9466816
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 01:28:38.90454+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:39:58.590601
License: Public Domain

OAKES, Circuit Judge
(concurring):
I think that the question whether Ford Central is “church-operated” within NLRB v. Catholic Bishop of Chicago, 440 U.S. 490, 504, 99 S.Ct. 1313, 1320, 59 L.Ed.2d 533 (1979), is not nearly as clear as Judge Mulligan’s opinion seems to suggest. Lay administrators rather than “clergy-administrators,” id. at 502, 503, 99 S.Ct. at 1319, 1320, are here involved. Although Brother Maher was to remain as principal on the transfer from the diocesan entity, Hald, to Ford Central, the by-laws of Ford Central’s predominantly lay board of trustees stated that his chief responsibility was to “implement policy decisions made by the Board.” Moreover, the contract effectuating the transfer provided that “[m]anagement and control of the premises shall rest exclusively with” Ford Central.
On the other hand, that “management and control” were conditioned by the transfer contract “so long as the grantee continues the operation of a Roman Catholic high school upon the premises.” And, most significantly to me, reverter takes place if such operation ceases. Thus, a real string is held by the Diocese and it is in this light, with the attendant indirect control that this condition gives the Diocese, that the entanglement considerations thought significant by the 5-4 majority in Catholic Bishop, supra, would also be applicable here. As Judge Mulligan’s opinion is careful to point out, supra at 822, the analogy to the public-aid-to-parochial-school cases is instructive and, like him, I have never read them to be confined to church owned and managed schools. Accordingly I concur in the judgment.