Court Opinion

ID: 9603072
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 02:03:08.928084+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:02:08.400320
License: Public Domain

*493RICHARDSON, J.
— I respectfully dissent. Prior to the majority decision, it had generally been assumed that a private employer had a free hand in adopting and implementing its own employment policies, so long as the employer complied with the antidiscrimination provisions of the Fair Employment Practices Act (FEPA) (Lab. Code, § 1420, subd. (a)). The majority herein concedes that FEPA is inapplicable here, for sexual orientation is not specified as one of the prohibited bases for discrimination in employment. Nonetheless, the majority, relying on certain constitutional and statutory provisions (Cal. Const., art. I, § 7; Pub. Util. Code, § 453, subd. (a); Lab. Code, §§ 1101, 1102) having no bearing whatever on the subject of the employment of homosexuals, concludes that plaintiffs’ complaint states a cause of action on allegations that Pacific Telephone and Telegraph Company (PT&T) discriminated against “manifest homosexuals” in its hiring and promotion policies. In my opinion there is no sound basis for so holding.
1. Equal Protection of the Laws
The majority, relying upon the equal protection clause of the state Constitution (art. I, § 7), holds that a public utility such as PT&T has a constitutional obligation “to refrain from all forms of arbitrary employment discrimination.” {Ante, p. 466.) Yet the majority cites no case whatever, and I have found none, suggesting, directly or indirectly, that a public utility, or any other private employer, is constitutionally mandated to ignore the manifest homosexuality, or any other physical trait or behavioral characteristic, of a job applicant or employee in making its employment decisions.
The majority apparently acknowledges that the due process and equal protection guarantees of our state Constitution (art. I, § 7, subd. (a)) protect only against state action, not private conduct. (See Garfinkle v. Superior Court (1978) 21 Cal.3d 268, 281-282 [146 Cal.Rptr. 208, 578 P.2d 925]; Kruger v. Wells Fargo Bank (1974) 11 Cal.3d 352, 366-367 [113 Cal.Rptr. 449, 521 P.2d 441, 65 A.L.R.3d 1266].) In Garfinkle, we unanimously declined to apply the due process provision of section 7 to measure the validity of a bank’s nonjudicial foreclosure procedures, because such procedures did not involve or constitute state action. Similarly, in Kruger, we unanimously held that the due process provision did not apply to a bank’s setoff of charge account debts against a depositor’s checking account. We concluded in Kruger that “To construe article I, section 13 [now section 7], to apply to private action would *494involve a judicial innovation which, as of this date, is without precedent.” (P. 367, italics added.)
Nevertheless, the majority reasons that employment decisions made by PT&T constitute state action because “the state has granted [PT&T] a monopoly over a significant segment of the telephonic communications industry in California” {ante, p. 468), and also because “the breadth and depth of governmental regulation of a public utility’s business practices inextricably ties the state to a public utility’s conduct. . .” {ante, p. 469). Accordingly, under the majority’s analysis, the arbitrary exclusion of homosexuals from employment opportunities by PT&T constitutes state action which violates the equal protection provisions of article I, section 7, of the California Constitution. The majority’s analysis is faulty in two respects.
a) PT&T’s Status As A Regulated Monopoly.
First, for purposes of legal analysis, it is irrelevant that PT&T enjoys closely regulated monopoly power in the telephone industry. But for such power and regulation, the telephone communications business would be apportioned among a handful of competing private firms, each of which would have the right to hire, fire, promote and demote whomever they choose, subject only to the specific limitations of FEPA which, as the majority concedes, do not include discrimination based upon sexual orientation. Why should PT&T’s regulated monopoly status automatically abrogate this freedom of choice?
Moreover, it cannot be fairly argued that PT&T’s “monopoly” position in the industry extends to the area of employment opportunity. Although some PT&T technicians may work at specialized tasks not useful to other employers, surely most of its employees (including managerial, clerical and secretarial personnel, accountants, economists, lawyers and general technicians) enjoy more generalized skills. There is substantial and continuing movement of employees across the whole employment spectrum, public and private. As to these employment opportunities which is the critical relationship here, PT&T’s “monopoly” control plays no role whatever. Accordingly, the state action principle should be wholly inapplicable to employment decisions affecting the substantial majority of PT&T personnel. Yet the majority opinion inexplicably seems to indicate that its equal protection holding shields all PT&T employees from “arbitrary” employment decisions.
*495b) Applicability of Article I, Section 8.
The majority stops too soon in its reading of article I of the state Constitution. It fails to appreciate the force and significance of the very next section, section 8, which immediately follows the general equal protection provision on which the majority relies. Section 8 provides that “A person may not be disqualified from entering or pursuing a business, profession, vocation, or employment because of sex, race, creed, color, or national or ethnic origin.” (Italics added.) As is the case statutorily with the FEPA, it will be seen that conspicuously absent from the prohibition, constitutionally, is any reference whatever to sexual orientation. The implication is clear: A person has no constitutional right to challenge employment discrimination unless he or she falls within one of the categories specified in article I, section 8. Accordingly, the majority’s reliance upon section 7 is wholly misplaced. The specific subject of discrimination in employment is not covered by section 7 but by section 8, a provision equally applicable to private or public employers, and with the same omission as FEPA.
2. Public Utilities Code Section 453, Subdivision (a)
Section 453, subdivision (a), provides that “No public utility shall, as to rates, charges, service, facilities, or in any other respect, make or grant any preference or advantage to any corporation or person or subject any corporation or person to any prejudice or disadvantage.” The majority urges that the foregoing language, read in the light of relevant legislative history, analogous common law principles and “constitutional considerations,” includes by necessary implication a prohibition against discrimination in employment practices. Examining in turn each of the elements considered by the majority, I suggest that none of them justifies the majority’s strained interpretation of the section.
a) The Statutory Language. On its face, it is readily apparent that section 453 is limited to the subject of discrimination against, or preference toward, a utility’s customers, not its employees, as evidenced by the specific references to “rates, charges, service, facilities . . . .” Consideration of this issue invokes the familiar rule of statutory construction, ejusdem generis, which we have previously defined as follows: “It is the rule of construction that where general words follow the enumeration of particular classes of persons or things, the general words will be construed as applicable only to persons or things of the same *496general nature or class as those enumerated. [Citations.]” (Pasadena University v. Los Angeles Co. (1923) 190 Cal. 786, 790 [214 P. 868]; see also Matter of Petition of Johnson (1914) 167 Cal. 142, 145 [138 P. 740]; 2A Sutherland, Statutory Construction (4th ed. 1973) § 47.18 et seq.) Therefore, properly construed, section 453 prohibits discrimination or preference with respect to rates, charges, service, facilities and any other transaction of the same general nature. It must be concluded, accordingly, that, as a matter of proper statutory construction, employment policy.as it relates to homosexuals, being a subject wholly unrelated to a utility’s treatment of its customers, is beyond the reach of section 453.
The foregoing conclusion is entirely consistent with our own previous judicial interpretations in related areas. It is well established that, with exceptions not pertinent here, the courts and the Public Utilities Commission share concurrent jurisdiction over controversies involving alleged violations of the Public Utilities Act. (See Pub. Util. Code, §§ 735, 2106; Vila v. Tahoe Southside Water Utility (1965) 233 Cal.App.2d 469, 477-479 [43 Cal.Rptr. 654].) Thus, the majority’s interpretation of section 453 necessarily will apply to proceedings before the commission, as well as to civil litigation. Yet, despite section 453’s proscription against discrimination or preferences, we have long held that the commission lacks any authority to regulate a utility’s labor policies. This principle was well expressed in Pac. Tel. & Tel. Co. v. Public Utilities Com. (1950) 34 Cal.2d 822 [215 P.2d 441], by then Justice Traynor, who, writing for the majority, noted that “. . . there is. great public interest in the relations between labor and management, for wages invariably affect rates, and disputes over them or other matters are bound to affect services. Accordingly there has been considerable state and federal legislation to diminish economic warfare between labor and management. In the absence of statutory authorization, however, it would hardly be contended that the commission has power to formulate the labor policies of utilities, to fix wages or to arbitrate labor disputes. ” (P. 829, italics added.)
The fact that section 453 affords no “statutory authorization” to interfere with a utility’s general labor practices under the foregoing principle of Pac. Tel. & Tel. Co., supra, is confirmed be a recent decision of the Public Utilities Commission, NAACP, Western Region, et al. v. All Regulated Public Utilities (1970) 71 Cal. P.U.C. 460. Complaints were filed with the commission alleging that defendant utilities engaged in discriminatory employment practices which excluded certain minority groups and females. As does the present majority, the complainants *497relied in part on section 453 of the Public Utilities Code. The commission’s decision explained, however, that although the commission possessed broad powers to regulate utilities “vis-á-vis the consumer, i.e., regulation of rates and services and the manner in which service is rendered in order to protect the ability to serve the public,” the commission doubted that it possessed the power to regulate a utility’s hiring practices. (Id., at p. 462.) As for section 453, the commission noted that an examination of the cases interpreting that section “discloses that the conduct that is forbidden is in regard to discrimination in rates or service by the utility toward various groups or classes of its customers .... [N]o interpretation of. . . [§'453] has been discovered which makes [it] applicable to the subject of minority hiring practices of utilities.” (Id., at pp. 463-464, italics added.) We denied issuance of a writ of review in the NAACP case, and properly so, but the majority herein now “disapproves” that case as “obviously faulty.” To the contrary, any other interpretation of section 453 would violate the well recognized and controlling doctrine of ejusdem generis, discussed above. The majority’s bending of the principle in this case ill serves the rational and logical development of the law.
I acknowledge that the commission has recently determined that its statutory authority to supervise the efficiency of operation and level of rates of a public utility permits it to inquire regarding a utility’s alleged discriminatory employment practices, but only insofar as they relate to utility efficiency or rates. (See Pacific Tel. & Tel. Co. (1977) 82 Cal.P.U.C. 422, 423.) The foregoing commission decision does not rely, however, upon section 453, and the question of the commission’s jurisdiction over employment discrimination which affects utility efficiency or rates is not presently before us.
b) The Legislative History. The majority attempts to support its interpretation of section 453 by resort to legislative history, but its own analysis of the predecessor sections of section 453 is wholly inconclusive. None of the prior versions of that section indicates any intent to include employment discrimination within the statutory proscriptions. Indeed, more recent legislative history conclusively establishes a contrary intent. Shortly after the NAACP decision became final in 1971, two bills were introduced in the 1972 session of the Legislature (Sen. Bill No. 333 and Assem. Bill No. 195) which would have amended section 453, subdivision (a), to include a prohibition against discrimination in “employment and promotional opportunities.” The Legislature refused to enact these bills. *498Quite clearly, this legislation was prepared to circumvent the holding of the NAACP decision. Equally clear, I suggest, is the legislative intent, in defeating these bills, to restrict section 453 to discrimination or preference toward utility customers. (See Williams v. Industrial Acc. Com. (1966) 64 Cal.2d 618, 620 [51 Cal.Rptr. 577, 414 P.2d 405]; Kusior v. Silver (1960) 54 Cal.2d 603, 618 [7 Cal.Rptr. 129, 354 P.2d 657]; Kirby v. Alcoholic Bev. etc. Appeals Bd. (1975) 47 Cal.App.3d 874, 877 [121 Cal.Rptr. 572].) As observed in Kirby, a legislative intent to adopt or acquiesce in a particular administrative or judicial interpretation of a statute (such as the NAACP decision) becomes “unmistakably clear” when, as here, the Legislature subsequently has rejected bills aimed at changing that interpretation. (See also 2A Sutherland, Statutory Construction, supra, § 49.10, at pp. 261-262.) The majority elects to ignore these facts.
As noted above, one unfortunate effect of the majority’s holding herein will be to enmesh the Public Utilities Commission in future disputes between disappointed applicants for employment or promotion within various public utilities throughout the state. Predictably and inevitably, the commission will find itself besieged with complaints from asserted victims of employment discrimination. Necessarily, the commission will be required to develop procedures to resolve these disputes. This will entail valuable commission resources consumed in hearing and determining matters in which the commission has neither experience nor expertise. The majority’s decision makes no sense policy-wise.
The majority’s thesis creates another anomaly, namely — homosexuals claiming to be victims of utility employment discrimination may obtain relief from the Public Utilities Commission; every other victim of claimed discrimination must follow the procedures of the Fair Employment Practices Commission.
The applicable legislative history conclusively establishes an intent to limit section 453 to discrimination against, or preference toward, utility customers. Control of discrimination in public utility employment should be confined exclusively to the agency properly charged with and equipped to handle such responsibility, namely, the Fair Employment Practices Commission.
c) The Common Law Authorities. The majority attempts to bolster its expansive reading of section 453 of the Public Utilities Code by reference to what it terms “analogous common law authorities,” primarily James v. *499Marinship Corp. (1944) 25 Cal.2d 721 [155 P.2d 329, 160 A.L.R. 900]. In Marinship, we held that by reason of its monopoly over the supply of labor, a labor union may not arbitrarily exclude blacks from membership. The Marinship doctrine did not involve, nor was it fashioned to control, the employer’s own independent decision whether to hire or fire particular employees. Instead, Marinship and the subsequent cases cited by the majority, prohibit discriminatory membership practices in such “monopolistic” employee organizations as labor unions, guilds, professional societies and hospitals, which stand as obstacles to future employment with others.
The majority speculates that section 453, “codified” the common law doctrine expressed in Marinship. This cannot be true, however, for it ignores history. Marinship, the first case to deal with labor discrimination, was decided in 1944, long after the pertinent language of section 453 was adopted. Moreover, as noted above, section 453 is entirely silent on the subject of a utility’s labor practices and makes no mention whatever of the “monopoly power” requirement of the Marinship doctrine. Does the majority seriously suggest that section 453 applies only to those utilities having monopolistic control over the labor market? If, as the majority insists, Marinship is the controlling “common law authority,” then presumably the majority’s holding herein would be inapplicable to those smaller, independent utilities which lack such monopolistic control over labor. The majority cannot have it both ways.
The majority needs not struggle so to find the applicable common law principle for it is both very clear' and very well established. Recently speaking for our unanimous court, and quoting from 9 Williston on Contracts, Justice Sullivan wrote: “ ‘[T]he courts have not deemed it to be their function, in the absence of contractual, statutory or public policy considerations, to compel a person to accept or retain another in his employ ....’[§ 1017, p. 134.]” (Consolidated Theatres, Inc. v. Theatrical Stage Employees Union (1968) 69 Cal.2d 713, 727, fn. 12 [73 Cal.Rptr. 213, 447 P.2d 325]; Swaffield v. Universal Ecsco Corp. (1969) 271 Cal.App.2d 147, 167 [76 Cal.Rptr. 680]; Marin v. Jacuzzi (1964) 224 Cal.App.2d 549, 553 [36 Cal.Rptr. 880].) Thus, as a general common law proposition, an employer can hire or fire whomever he pleases, with or without cause, and regardless of the apparently arbitrary nature of his decision in a particular case.
*500By reason of the enactment of FEPA and its specific anti-discrimination provisions, the foregoing traditional common law rule has been substantially modified in respects not pertinent here. As the majority explains, FEPA now protects certain enumerated classes from arbitrary discrimination in employment practices. The legislative intent to exclude homosexuals from the protections of FEPA was made clear by the Legislature’s rejection in 1975 of proposed legislation (Assem. Bill No. 633) which would have added “sexual orientation” to the act. The Legislature took this action for reasons satisfying to itself. Similarly, in 1978 Senate Bill No. 2053, which would have forbidden employers from discriminating against workers because of “sexual preference for any adult person,” was abandoned by its author. The appropriate battleground for resolution of this issue is Sacramento. By virtue of today’s decision the majority has elected to impose what the Legislature specifically and very recently refused to impose. With all due respect, I must suggest that this is “judicial legislation” in its purest form.
d) The “Constitutional Considerations.” Finally, the majority refers back to its reliance upon article I, section 7, of the California Constitution as justifying its tortured interpretation of section 453 as applying to discrimination in employment. As I have noted, no case has ever held that a public utility or any other private employer is constitutionally compelled to ignore the manifest homosexuality of a job applicant or employee in making its employment decisions.
3. Labor Code Sections 1101 and 1102
The majority holds that the present complaint states a cause of action against PT&T for abridging plaintiffs’ political freedom. Labor Code section 1101 prohibits an employer from “(a) Forbidding or preventing employees from engaging or participating in politics .... [U] (b) Controlling or directing, or tending to control or direct the political activities or affiliations of employees.” Section 1102 prohibits an employer from coercing or influencing his employees by threat of discharge “to adopt or follow or refrain from adopting or following any particular course or line of political action or political activity.”
The majority’s reliance on these sections is invalid, and the very fact that it makes the attempt betrays the fundamental weakness of its legal position. It is readily apparent that the complaint herein fails to allege any attempted control or coercion by PT&T of any employee or applicant *501with respect to any “political” activity whatever. Significantly, plaintiffs’ appellate briefs do not even raise the point. They cite neither section 1101 nor 1102 in support of their complaint. The “political” argument has never been advanced nor apparently even thought of by either lawyers or litigants.
The gist of plaintiffs’ allegations in the complaint herein is that plaintiffs have been damaged by reason of PT&T’s alleged refusal to hire or promote “manifest homosexuals.” As the “introduction” to the first amended complaint alleges, “PT&T has, since at least 1971, had an articulated policy of excluding homosexuals from employment opportunities with its organization.” Again, in the “fact allegations” of the complaint, it is alleged that “. . . PT&T has maintained and enforced a policy of employment discrimination against homosexuals .... PT&T refuses to hire any ‘manifest homosexual’ which |>zc] may apply to it for employment at any occupational level or category.” Nowhere in the complaint, from, beginning to end, do plaintiffs allege that PT&T’s asserted policy of discrimination is directed toward any of plaintiffs’ political activity or affiliations. Rather, plaintiffs contend, and the gravamen of their complaint is, that employment discrimination is based solely on the overt and manifest nature of their sexual orientation itself.
4. Conclusion
I fully concur in the majority’s concern toward homosexuals who have suffered the detriment, trauma, or indignity of employment discrimination. They are entitled to all of the rights, protections, and privileges of other citizens, no less and no more. In the contemplation of the law, homosexuals stand neither burdened by prejudice nor blessed with preference. Nonetheless, it is not our function to tell employers, large or small, whom to employ. Courts should not attempt to police general employment practices in the absence of some clear constitutional or statutory authority. Neither exists in the matter before us.
I would affirm the judgment in its entirety.
Clark, J., and Manuel, J., concurred.
The petition of respondent Pacific Telephone and Telegraph Company for a rehearing was denied July 25, 1959. Clark, J., Richardson, J., and Manuel, J., were of the opinion that the petition should be granted.