Court Opinion

ID: 9568952
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 20:08:58.408029+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T11:17:13.077599
License: Public Domain

Littlejohn, Justice
(dissenting) :
I respectfully dissent and would hold that the University had authority to inaugurate a retirement policy mandating that teaching faculty members retire at age 65.
The majority opinion, in my view, erroneously asserts: “The plain language of the statute allows for no interpretation restricting its application.” The statute does not specify a minimum age for retirement. Accordingly, the statute is ambiguous on that point and becomes a proper matter for interpretation by this court. The very fact that the boards of trustees of nine institutions of higher learning and the Bud*248get and Control Board, over a period of some 20 years, have given to the statute a different interpretation than that arrived at by the majority opinion, makes out a prima facie case of ambiguity.
The University is a creature of the General Assembly. It has such duties and authority as the legislature has allocated to it. Section 59-117-40 reads in pertinent part as follows:
“The board of trustees of the University of South Carolina is and is hereby constituted a body corporate and politic, in deed and in law under the name of the University of South Carolina. Such corporation has the following powers:
(6) To appoint or otherwise provide for the appointment of subordinate and assistant officers and agents, faculty members, instructors and other employees prescribing the terms of their employments, their duties, and fixing their compensations;
(7) To make bylaws and all rules and regulations deemed expedient for the management of its affairs and its own operations not inconsistent with the Constitution and laws of this State or of the United States;
(12) To assign any member of the faculty to additional duties in any other University department than that in which the faculty member may at the time be working and without additional salary;
(14) To adopt such measures and make such regulations as may in the discretion of the board of trustees be necessary for the proper operation of the University;
(16) To remove any officer, faculty member, agent or employee for incompetence, neglect of duty, violation of University’s regulations, or conduct unbecoming a person occupying such a position; . .
*249It is clear that the University board of trustees has broad general authority in the matter of dealing with its faculty and other employees. I am of the opinion that the University policy of retiring faculty members at age 65 is not inconsistent with the statutory retirement provision. The matter is well within the control of the University board of trustees under its statutory authority.
Such is consistent with the interpretation placed on the statute by nine of the institutions of higher learning over a period of many years. Counsel for the University submits in his brief, and such is not challenged by opposing counsel in written brief or in oral argument before us, that the following institutions have mandated retirement at age 65: University of South Carolina, Clemson University, Winthrop College, Francis Marion College, The Citadel, South Carolina State College, and Lander College. The Medical University and the College of Charleston have mandated retirement at age 70. The policy has been in effect at these institutions for varying periods of time, as much as 20 years. During all of this time, the General Assembly, presumably cognizant of the policy, has taken no action to bring about a change of the action of these institutions. In many cases, this court has held that “The construction of a statute by the agency charged with executing it is entitled to the most respectful consideration and should not be overruled without cogent reasons [cites omitted].” Faile v. South Carolina Employment Sec. Commission, 267 S. C. 536, 230 S. E. (2d) 219 (1976). I recognize, however, that in the last analysis interpretation is a matter for this court. The construction placed upon a statute by an administering agency or authority is merely one factor to be taken into consideration in interpreting a statute.
Our case law is consistent with the general law as found in 73 Am. Jur. (2d), Statutes, § 161:
“§ 161. Generally.
It is well settled, in case of doubt as to the meaning of a statute, that the courts may resort to contemporaneous con*250struction, especially where such construction has prevailed for a long period of time. This rule has been applied to a contemporaneous construction of another statute or another provision of the same statute, involving similar considerations.
It is sometimes declared that a particular statute, or a particular statutory provision, should be given a practical construction, or such a construction as would render the statute or provision practicable, or as practicable as possible. It has also been held that in the construction of a statute, the court may take into consideration the practical construction theretofore given the statute, or the manner in which the statute has been interpreted by the general public, or by those affected by the law, especially where such practical construction has been long continued.”
Under the facts of this case, this rule of construction is particularly meaningful because the retirement system is administered by the State Budget and Control Board, which is composed of the Governor, the Chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, the Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, the State Comptroller General, and the State Treasurer. The interpretation which the University seeks is the interpretation which has been given to the statute by the many institutions of higher learning enumerated hereinabove, and is also the interpretation of the State Budget and Control Board. A majority of the board are directly involved in the legislative process. Over the years, the board has obviously honored the retirement of university and college professors at age 65, by providing the funds and paying the benefits to which retirees are entitled under the retirement law.
Having concluded that the University retirement policy is proper under the statute, I need not justify the reason for the rule. It is not, however, amiss to state that there is rationale for the failure of the General Assembly to establish a minimum retirement age. Employees in all fields of work come under the retirement system. For most employees, sev*251enty may be an appropriate age for retirement, but there are types of employment where discretion should be allowed. For example, we doubt that members of a fire department at a state institution should be required to work until they are 70 years of age. Obviously, it is the consensus of thinking of the boards of trustees of the various institutions of higher learning that 65 is an appropriate age for professors to retire. The argument that some professors are highly competent until they are 70 cannot be refuted. However, others lose their energies and enthusiasms, so necessary to teaching, at a younger age. It is not sufficient to say that incompetent professors between 65 and 70 years of age may be discharged for incompetence or other cause. This approach ignores the practical aspects of the problem. It is not feasible to act upon each employee’s case based upon the particular facts, and therefore some established age limit is desirable under all retirement plans.
The defendants have argued that by amending the South Carolina Retirement Act, Statutes at Large No. 267 (1949), the legislature clearly evinced an intention that professors at institutions of higher learning not be required to retire until they reached the age of 70. The effect of this amendment was to reclassify college professors as “employees”, so that they might be allowed to work until age 70, rather than as “teachers”, who were not allowed to work past the age of 65. See §§ 9-1-10, 9-1-1530, 9-1-1520, 1976 Code. The defendants’ reliance on this statutory amendment is misplaced. The fact that college and university professors might thereafter be allowed to work until they reached the age of 70 should not be construed as granting them an absolute right to work until attaining that age. Rather, the effect of the amendment was merely to vest colleges and universities with the right to continue their professors in employment, at the option of the institution, until the professors reached the age of 70, rather than the age of 65.
I would hold that the University acted within its statutory authority in requiring the retirement of each of the defendants at age 65.