Court Opinion

ID: 9858775
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 16:38:05.533424+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:55:52.002086
License: Public Domain

HARRIS, Justice
(dissenting).
We should first place in perspective the exact question presented in this appeal. The question is whether a woman must be paid disability benefits if unable to work as a result of pregnancy. It seems to me the majority opinion necessarily presupposes women alone are left to face the economic consequences of pregnancy. I am unsure any such premise is valid, even in this factual situation. It occurs to me the financial burdens resulting from pregnancy are the concern of men as well as women. This is certainly true in the family situation. And our statutes provide at least some tools in the hope of making it true as to fathers of children born out of wedlock. Chapters 675 and 252A, The Code. It is not enough to point out that only women become pregnant. The men involved with them are also left to share the economic consequences.
I cannot entirely share the confidence the majority expresses in the authority of this court to “have the final say in such matters” as this. The majority concedes both the ordinance upon which the opinion rests and § 601A.6(l)(a), The Code, are in all material respects identical with provisions of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. 42 U.S.C. § 2000e, et seq.
The majority also points out Geduldig v. Aiello, 417 U.S. 484, 94 S.Ct. 2485, 41 L.Ed.2d 256 (1974) decided provisions such as are involved in the ordinance are not violative of the equal protection clause of the federal constitution. And the majority *869points out General Electric Co. v. Gilbert, 429 U.S. 125, 97 S.Ct. 401, 50 L.Ed.2d 343 (1976) holds the identical provisions contained in the Civil Rights Act are not violated by an identical exclusion of pregnancy benefits. Finally the majority concedes the General Electric opinion all but withdraws the authority upon which we principally relied for our decision in Cedar Rapids Community School District v. Parr, 227 N.W.2d 486 (Iowa 1975). Our power in the matter may not prove to be absolute. The economic stakes in the question are not those of women alone.
In any event it is clear we should now pay as much respectful attention to the federal interpretations as we did in Cedar Rapids Community School District v. Parr, supra. The effect in general of federal interpretations of statutes similar to ours was explained in detail in Hubbard v. State, 163 N.W.2d 904, 909-912 (Iowa 1969).
I believe the trial court was right in its reliance on General Electric Co. I find nothing to show the exclusion of pregnancy disability benefits by Quaker Oats Co. was a pretext designed to effect an invidious discrimination against the members of the female sex.
I would affirm.
MASON, J., joins in this dissent.