Court Opinion

ID: 9613995
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 04:21:36.422253+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:03:33.631687
License: Public Domain

Forrest, J.
(concurring) — I have joined in Judge Baker's cogent opinion. I write separately only to emphasize the lack of a sound foundation in legal theory for the Eserhut I6 decision and the pernicious consequences that could follow if it remains the law in Washington.
The United States Congress and the Washington Legislature have passed legislation to eliminate discrimination on the basis of race, gender, age, handicap and religion from the workplace. Additionally, there is detailed regulation of the safety aspects of the workplace and to protect union activity by employees. In view of this pervasive regulation and in the total absence of any legislative direction, I find it inappropriate for the courts to expand the parameters of tortious interference to include unsociable conduct of coemployees as a basis for such a claim.
There is no constitutional, statutory, or common law duty requiring an employee to be socially friendly with his or her coemployees. Conversely, an employee does not have any "right" to social friendship from his coem-*17ployees. Eserhut makes no claim to come within any statutory protection. Here, there is no claim or proof that Eserhut was prevented from performing his duties by lack of cooperation by coemployees. Indeed, his employer was satisfied with his work and would like for him to have continued. This is not a case where Eserhut was physically or economically prevented from performing his contract, but merely a case where he was unhappy with his treatment by his coemployees. Such purely subjective unhappiness would be an insufficient basis to justify his breach of a contract with his employer and is likewise an insufficient basis for asserting tortious interference with his employment contract. Such a cause of action would not only spawn workplace litigation between coemployees but would have other ramifications which are impossible to forecast. Clearly, if this conduct supports a tortious interference claim, it would furnish a justifiable reason for terminating employment and thus support a claim for unemployment compensation. Additionally, if Eserhut was justified in breaching his contract, so would any tenant who felt socially ostracized by the joint action of his neighbors be justified in breaching his lease and then suing the neighbors. Strikingly, plaintiff has been unable to cite a single case sustaining a claim for tortious interference on facts substantially similar to those here present. The lack of such authority might not be fatal if there were strong policy reasons justifying expansion of the tor-tious interference claim. Here there are none.

Eserhut v. Heister, 52 Wn. App. 515, 762 P.2d 6 (1988).