Court Opinion

ID: 9717794
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 07:10:22.505447+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:23:55.460976
License: Public Domain

O’Connor, J.
(concurring in part, dissenting in part.) I concur in the court’s decision directing the entry of judgment for the defendants as to the plaintiff’s claims under the Federal and State Constitutions, as to her claim for a civil rights violation under G. L. c. 12, § 111 (1984 ed.), and as to her claims for wrongful discharge and breach of contract, but I do not agree with the court’s rationale that it must reach that decision because the decision to fire Madsen “can only be construed as a religious one” to which, under the First Amendment, the court must defer. See ante at 722-723. I dissent from that part of the *728court’s decision which directs that the plaintiff be permitted to amend her complaint by repleading her tort claims.
The court has repeatedly said that it will not decide constitutional questions “unless they must necessarily be reached.” Commonwealth v. Paasche, 391 Mass. 18, 21 (1984). “[I]f a case can be decided on either of two grounds, one involving a constitutional question, the other a question of statutory construction or general law, the Court will decide only the latter.” Commonwealth v. Bartlett, 374 Mass. 744, 749 (1978), quoting Ashwander v. TV A, 297 U.S. 288, 347-348 (1936) (Brandeis, J., concurring). This case is a perfect example of the wisdom of that rule. Entirely apart from First Amendment considerations, the complaint fails to state against any defendant a claim for which relief may be granted. A careful analysis of the complaint — an analysis missing from the court’s opinion — makes that clear. Furthermore, in my view, both the court’s analysis of the constitutional question that it unnecessarily reaches and the court’s conclusion are highly questionable.
I set forth the facts as alleged in Madsen’s complaint. On or about December 12, 1981, the defendant Earl W. Foell, editor of the Monitor, discussed with the defendant Pamela O. Marsh, quality control editor of the Monitor and Madsen’s immediate superior, a rumor that Madsen had either asked a manager’s wife to attend a lesbian meeting or had enticed a manager’s wife into a lesbian relationship. Foell and Marsh decided to discuss the rumor with J. Anthony Periton, manager of the Christian Science Publishing Society, publisher of the Monitor. On or about December 14, 1981, Marsh told Madsen about the manager’s wife rumor and asked Madsen if she was a lesbian. Madsen denied the rumor but told Marsh that she was a lesbian. Marsh said that she had thought so, and that she would have to make a report to Foell, who had been asked by Periton to check out the situation.
On or about December 15, 1981, Marsh and Madsen again discussed the rumors. Marsh told Madsen that a certain newsroom editor had telephoned Marsh to say that he was upset that Madsen had changed her name from Terp to Madsen be*729cause of a homosexual marriage. Marsh said that Foell had also called her to find out whether Madsen had changed her name because of a homosexual marriage. Marsh told Madsen that she had told both the newsroom editor and Foell that Madsen had simply changed her name to a family name she preferred.
On or about December 16, 1981, Foell, Periton, and Marsh met and discussed the manager’s wife rumor. Periton asked the other two if Madsen was a lesbian, if she went to “gay” meetings, and if she lived with a lover. Marsh told Periton that Madsen lived alone. Periton said that he would have to find out if Madsen went to “gay” meetings because that would indicate whether Madsen was a lesbian.
On December 18, 1981, Madsen met with Periton and complained about what had been taking place. Periton told her that they were following appropriate procedures because someone had made an accusation to Periton privately. Periton said to Madsen that Madsen had tried to entice a manager’s wife into a lesbian relationship, that Madsen attended “gay” meetings, and that Madsen was “gay.” Madsen responded that she would not discuss the matter without adherence to Church by-laws. Periton demanded to know if the information he had was accurate, and Madsen reluctantly replied by denying the manager’s wife rumor and admitting she was “gay.” Periton thanked Mad-sen for her honesty and said that it was Church policy to “let the employee go in cases like this.”
On December 23, 1981, Periton gave Madsen a pamphlet entitled “Morals of Today,” and asked Madsen to “heal herself’ of homosexuality. Periton told Madsen that he would have to discuss with Warren D. Silvemail, personnel manager of the Church, Madsen’s refusal to heal herself. On or about December 29, 1981, Madsen met with Karen Gould, the employee relations manager of the Church who was responsible for “employee problems” within the Church and the Society. Gould repeated to Madsen the accusations about the manager’s wife, attendance at “gay” meetings, and Madsen being a lesbian, and she told Madsen that the problem was not the mmors, but rather that Madsen was “gay.” Gould asked Madsen if she was *730seeking healing and Madsen replied that she was not. Gould told her that she had until December 31, 1981, to resign, that, if she did not resign by then, she would be fired, and that, either way, her departure would be described as a “mutual termination, citing religious differences.”
On or about December 30, 1981, the defendant Curtis J. Sitomer, editor of the special sections department of the Monitor, Madsen’s department, told Madsen that he would talk with Gould in an effort to arrange a leave of absence for Madsen. On or about January 4, 1982, Gould told Madsen that a leave of absence would be possible only if Madsen were seeking healing. When Madsen told Gould that she was not seeking healing, Gould told Madsen that that would be her last day and told her what her severance and vacation pay would be. Gould put a memorandum into Madsen’s employment file stating that Madsen was “not recommended for rehire unless [a] radical change in views on homosexuality takes place.”
Other than claims of damages resulting from the events recited above, the complaint sets forth no other material allegations. Briefly but fairly summarized, the complaint alleges that rumors about Madsen’s homosexuality and homosexual activities came to the attention of the defendant Periton, who was the manager of the Monitor’s publisher, and to the defendants Foell and Marsh, who were editors of the Monitor, and that those defendants discussed those rumors with each other, with Madsen, and with the defendant Gould, who was employee relations manager of the Church, with the result that Madsen was fired from her position as a writer at the Monitor1 because of her refusal to seek “healing” of her homosexuality.
After its statement of facts, the complaint sets out numerous claims of injury resulting from constitutional, statutory, and *731contract violations, and from various torts. Each and every one of those claims expressly relies on the defendants’ “aforementioned conduct.” A typical claim is: “The defendants’ aforementioned conduct constituted an unlawful invasion of plaintiff’s privacy in violation of M.G.L. Chapter 214, § IB, and Constitutions of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and the United States.”
A complaint need not set forth facts with great specificity. See Mass. R. Civ. P. 8 (a), 365 Mass. 749 (1974). As we observed in Spence v. Boston Edison Co., 390 Mass. 604, 615 (1983), “[t]he rules of pleading in Massachusetts are generous.” However, if, as in this case, the complaint sets out a detailed statement of facts as the facts on which the plaintiff relies, and those facts do not support any claim entitling the plaintiff to relief, it is appropriate to allow a motion to dismiss or a motion for summary judgment (because there can be no genuine issue of material fact if the complaint fails to state a claim for which relief can be granted). Id. Fabrizio v. Quincy, 9 Mass. App. Ct. 733, 734 (1980). 5 C.A. Wright & A.R. Miller, Federal Practice and Procedure § 1357 (1969). Such is the case here.
Madsen alleges that she was fired “on the basis of [her] sexual and affectional preferences.” That discharge, she claims, constituted “an unlawful breach of [her] employment agreement with the defendants, . . . without cause or justification . . . [and] in bad faith.” Furthermore, she claims that the discharge constituted “an unlawful and wrongful termination of [her] employment agreement with the defendants . . . contrary to the public policy of . . . the Commonwealth of Massachusetts,” and that her Federal and State constitutional rights and civil rights were violated. The court rightly states, ante at 725, that, because Madsen was an employee at will, the Monitor lawfully fired her, because nothing in the Federal or State Constitutions, in Federal or State statutes, or in public policy,2 prohibits an employer from firing an at will employee *732on the facts of this case. Therefore, the court rightly concludes, ante at 726, that there is no legal basis for Madsen’s claims of wrongful discharge, breach of contract, deprivation of constitutional rights, or deprivation of civil rights under G. L. c. 12, § 111.
The correctness of those conclusions, however, does not in any way depend on the First Amendment. Those conclusions would be correct if the controversy were entirely unrelated to a church or to church personnel. For that reason alone, the court’s discussion of the First Amendment is inappropriate. The court’s analysis may be incorrect as well. It is true, as the court says, ante at 722-723, that the First Amendment prohibits civil courts from intervening in disputes concerning religious doctrine, discipline, faith, or internal organization, Jones v. Wolf, 443 U.S. 595, 602 (1979); Serbian E. Orthodox Diocese v. Milivojevich, 426 U.S. 696, 709 (1976); Alberts v. Devine, ante 59, 72 (1985), and that courts cannot question the verity of religious doctrines or beliefs. United States v. Ballard, 322 U.S. 78, 86 (1944). Thus, Madsen cannot invoke the jurisdiction of the courts of the Commonwealth to determine the morality of homosexuality or to determine whether membership in the Church requires adherence to the view that homosexuality is immoral. However, whether Madsen, a writer (presumably a sportswriter, see note 1, supra) for a church-offiliated newspaper, is entitled to continued employment despite her nonconformity to the Church’s beliefs, does not appear to be a dispute about religious doctrine, discipline, faith, or internal organization, within the decided cases. Although the United States Supreme Court has held that the assessment of an individual’s qualifications to be a minister, and the appointment and retirement of ministers, are ecclesiastical matters entitled to constitutional protection against judicial or other State interference, Kedroff v. St. Nicholas Cathedral of *733the Russian Orthodox Church, 344 U.S. 94, 116 (1952); Gonzalez v. Roman Catholic Archbishop of Manila, 280 U.S. 1, 16-17 (1929), the Supreme Court has never held that civil courts cannot intervene in similar matters involving lay church employees. While the beliefs and practices of a minister are of critical importance to the church in which the minister functions, making judicial involvement in decisions affecting a minister’s tenure inappropriate, it is far from clear that the same is true with respect to a sportswriter on the staff of a church-affiliated newspaper. Compare McClure v. Salvation Army, 460 F.2d 553, 558-561 (5th Cir. 1972) (First Amendment precludes application of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. § 2000e et seq. [1976] to employment relationship between a church and its minister), withE.E.O.C. v. Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, 651 F.2d 277, 281-287 (5th Cir. 1981) (First Amendment does not preclude application of Title VII to employment relationship between church and its non-ministerial employees).
I incline to the view that, if it were appropriate for us to reach the First Amendment question, we should not conclude, as the court has done, that “the decision to fire Madsen because of her sexual preference can only be construed as a religious one” and that, therefore, the court “must defer to that decision.” Ante at 722-723. Rather, I tend to think that the First Amendment would not preclude judicial intervention in this matter and that whether the First Amendment would protect the employer in this case requires a judicial balancing of the competing Church and State interests.3 “A law, legislatively or judicially created, that would regulate or prevent religiously motivated conduct does not violate the First Amendment if the State’s interest in the law’s enforcement outweighs the burden that the law im*734poses on the free exercise of religion.” Alberts v. Devine, supra at 73. See Wisconsin v. Yoder, 406 U.S. 205, 215-219 (1972); Prince v. Massachusetts, 321 U.S. 158, 164-170 (1944). Cantwell v. Connecticut, 310 U.S. 296, 307 (1940). Heeding my own advice that the court should not reach the constitutional question, I refrain from taking a firm position on what our approach to the constitutional question ought to be. I also refrain from considering whether, if we were to choose the balancing of interests approach, the State’s interest in the enforcement of its citizens’ contracts is sufficiently compelling to justify the burden, if any, that would be imposed on the defendants’ free exercise of religion were we to enforce Madsen’s alleged contract rights. I only point out that the First Amendment question is far from simple, that the court confronts it unnecessarily, and that the court answers it, perhaps, incorrectly.
I turn now to Madsen’s common law tort claim and to her claim for invasion of privacy in violation of G. L. c. 214, § IB (1984 ed.). The court concludes, without discussing its reasoning, that those allegations “do not survive attack by motion to dismiss.” Ante at 726. Apparently, the court does not conclude that the religion clauses of the First Amendment preclude judicial resolution of the tort claims, as distinguished from other claims, but the court does not explain why the First Amendment precludes the courts from imposing damages on the defendants for the wrongful termination of her contract but not for wrongful tortious conduct. In any event, I agree, without reliance on the First Amendment, that Madsen has not stated any valid tort claims.
There was no defamation. The only defendants alleged to have made statements were Foell, Marsh, Periton, and Gould, all of whom, by virtue of their positions, were conditionally privileged to discuss among themselves and with their superiors the allegations regarding Madsen’s sexual preference. Bratt v. International Business Machs. Corp., 392 Mass. 508, 513 (1984). See Restatement (Second) of Torts §§ 594 and 595 (1977). Nothing in Madsen’s complaint even suggests that any of the defendants abused their conditional privilege by speaking *735with “malice in fact,” Doane v. Grew, 220 Mass. 171, 176 (1915), nor “by an unnecessary, unreasonable or excessive publication of the defamatory matter.” Galvin v. New York, N.H. & H.R.R., 341 Mass. 293, 297 (1960). Statements made privately to Madsen are not actionable.
Neither was there any intentional infliction of emotional distress. Madsen alleges that the conduct of the defendants that she described in her complaint constituted “an unlawful, intentional, extreme and outrageous and/or reckless infliction of emotional distress.” The described conduct falls far short of being “so outrageous in character, and so extreme in degree, as to go beyond all possible bounds of decency, and to be regarded as atrocious, and utterly intolerable in a civilized community.” Richey v. American Auto. Ass’n, 380 Mass. 835, 838 (1980), quoting Restatement (Second) of Torts § 46 comment d (1965). See Agis v. Howard Johnson Co., 371 Mass. 140, 144-145 (1976).
The defendants Silvemail and Gould did not, as alleged, tortiously interfere with Madsen’s contract or with her “advantageous business relationship” with the Monitor. The complaint contains no allegations concerning Silvemail’s conduct, and all of Gould’s alleged conduct was clearly within the scope of her employment responsibilities. Nothing in the statement of facts in the complaint suggests that Gould “acted out of malevolence, that is, with ‘actual’ malice.” Gram v. Liberty Mut. Ins. Co., 384 Mass. 659, 663 (1981).
Madsen alleges that the conduct she sets out in her complaint constituted an unlawful invasion of her privacy in violation of G. L. c. 214, § IB (1984 ed.). It did not. That statute provides, in relevant part, that “[a] person shall have a right against unreasonable, substantial or serious interference with his privacy.” Madsen appears to base her privacy claim on the defendants’ questioning her about her sexual preference and about other allegations made against her regarding her sexual preference. Because the defendants could lawfully have discharged Madsen on the basis of her sexual preference, when allegations surfaced about Madsen’s sexual preference the defendants had a right to question her about it. Bratt v. International Business *736Machs. Corp., 392 Mass. 508, 520(1984). See Cort v. Bristol-Myers Co., 385 Mass. 303, 307 (1982); Galvin v. New York, N.H. & H. R.R., 341 Mass. 293, 294-298 (1960). Madsen’s complaint clearly does not set forth questioning that involves an “unreasonable, substantial or serious interference with [her] privacy.” G. L. c. 214, § IB (1984 ed.). In her brief, Madsen asserts that the defendants also invaded her privacy by “[making] public certain information about her personal life which intruded upon her solitude, involved a private matter and put the plaintiff in a false light” (emphasis in original). The facts set forth in Madsen’s complaint, however, do not support that statement. Nothing in the complaint suggests that the defendants discussed Madsen with anyone other than those entitled to discuss her. Compare Alberts v. Devine, supra at 62.
Because the plaintiff expressly stated in her complaint that all of the facts on which she relies are therein set forth, and because those facts do not constitute a legal wrong entitling the plaintiff to any form of relief, I would reverse in its entirety the order of the judge denying the defendants’ motion to dismiss or for summary judgment, and I would remand the case to the Superior Court with instructions to enter an order dismissing the complaint. The interests of justice are not served by permitting Madsen to amend her complaint by pleading the tort claims anew as the court directs. Nothing in the complaint suggests that there may be facts, in addition to those alleged, which would support the plaintiff’s claims.

 Nothing in the complaint suggests that Madsen wrote about religious or moral topics. On the contrary, her complaint alleges: “On or about June 3, 1982, the plaintiff received notification that she had been awarded first place honors in the Best Sportswriter category of the New England Woman’s Press Association ... for a four-part series entitled ‘Women In Sports,’ which appeared in the Monitor in May, 1981.”

In G. L. c. 151B, § 4 (1984 ed.), the Legislature has set out the Commonwealth’s public policy regarding employment discrimination. That stat*732ute provides: “It shall be an unlawful practice . . . [f]or an employer . . ., because of the race, color, religious creed, national origin, sex or ancestry of any individual, to refuse to hire or employ or to bar or to discharge from employment such individual. . . .” The statute does not preclude employment discrimination based on sexual preference.

 After concluding that the First Amendment prohibits the court from becoming involved in the controversy about whether the Monitor could lawfully fire Madsen, the court inconsistently relies on Walker v. First Presbyterian Church, 22 Fair. Empl. Prac. Cas. (BNA) 762, 764 (Cal. Super. Ct. 1980), and Lewis ex rel. Murphy v. Buchanan, 21 Fair Empl. Prac. Cas. (BNA) 696 (Minn. Dist. Ct. 1979), cases in which the tribunals entertained similar questions, and applied the balancing test.