Colgan v. Board of County Commissioners

Menchine, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. Colin C. Colgan, appellant, a fire fighter of Prince George’s County, claimed workmen’s compensation benefits from the Board of County Commissioners for Prince George’s County, Employer and Self-Insurer. His claim was asserted under Article 101, § 64A. The Workmen’s Compensation Commission processed the claim as for an accidental injury arising out of and in the course of his employment and rejected it.

Colgan appealed to the Circuit Court for Prince George’s County. At the time of claimant’s alleged disability (September 9, 1971) Code Article 101, § 64A read as follows: 1 “Any condition or impairment of health of any paid municipal, county, airport authority or fire control district fire fighter caused by lung diseases, ³³³ heart diseases, or hypertension resulting in total or partial disability or death shall be presumed to be compensable under this article and to have been suffered in the line of duty and as a result of his employment. Notwithstanding any provision of this article any paid fire fighter whose compensable claim results from a condition or impairment of health caused by lung diseases, heart diseases or hypertension and has been suffered in the line of duty shall receive such benefits as are provided for in this article in addition to such benefits as he may be entitled to under the retirement system in which said fire fighter or police officer was a participant at the time of his claim. The benefits received under this article however, shall be adjusted so that the total of all weekly benefits shall not exceed one hundred percent of the weekly salary which was paid to said fire fighter or police officer.” Employer and Self-Insurer attacked the section on constitutional grounds, urging that it was violative of both the State and United States Constitutions.

The trial court, finding that § 64A was constitutionally infirm as in violation of Article III, Section 29 of the Constitution of Maryland, affirmed the Workmen’s Compensation Commission. He thus explained his decision: “My understanding of the Workmen’s Compensation Law is that the claims arise in two different categories: One is from accidental injuries and the other is from contracting an occupational disease. I conclude that it would be necessary, for anyone to receive compensation, to come under one or the other of those two categories. It is impossible to tell whether the Act itself, not mentioning occupational disease, means that these ailments would be considered to be occupational diseases and would follow the route of an occupational disease claim, or ³³⁴ whether jt is an accidental injury and would follow that route.

Obviously, there is no claim for an accidental injury here. Accordingly, I conclude that the Act is unconstitutional for the foregoing reasons and, therefore, the claimant in this case would not be entitled to recover. * * * ” It will be observed that the trial court did not reach the question of constitutionality of the section under the Constitution of the United States. The question was, however, presented below. We differ, for reasons to be stated infra, with the conclusion reached by the trial court that the section is violative of Article III, Section 29.

We shall, accordingly, deal as well with the validity of the section under the Constitution of the United States for the guidance of the lower court and to avoid the expense and delay of another appeal to this Court. Rule 1085. Maryland Constitution Article III, Section 29 of the Constitution of Maryland reads as follows: “The style of all laws of this State shall be, ‘Be it enacted by the General Assembly of Maryland:’ and all Laws shall be passed by original bill; and every Law enacted by the General Assembly shall embrace but one subject, and that shall be described in its title; and no Law, nor section of Law, shall be revived, or amended by reference to its title, or section only; nor shall any Law be construed by reason of its title, to grant powers or confer rights which are not expressly contained in the body of the Act; and it shall be the duty of the General Assembly, in amending any article, or section of the Code of Laws of this State, to enact the same, as the said article, or section would read when amended. And whenever the General Assembly shall enact any Public General Law, not amendatory of any section, or article in the said ³³⁵ Code, it shall be the duty of the General Assembly to enact the same, in articles and sections, in the same manner, as the Code is arranged, and to provide for the publication. of all additions and alterations, which may be made to the said Code.” Section 64A came into being as Chapter 695 of the Acts of 1971.

In the course of its passage through the legislature, both the title and the body of the Bill (H.B. 433) were amended. As introduced, the title of the bill had provided, inter alia, that its purpose was to “establish certain medical conditions where the death or disability of a fire fighter is presumed to be accidental and as a result of his employment.” (Emphasis added) An amendment to the title of the bill struck out the above quoted language and declared that its purpose was to “provide that there is a presumption of compensable occupational disease in cases of certain fire fighters sustaining temporary or total disability or death under certain conditions.” (Emphasis added) The body of the bill at introduction had contained the words: “presumed to have been accidental and to have been suffered in the course of his employment.” (Emphasis added) By amendment in the course of passage the above quoted language was stricken and the following words substituted: “presumed to be compensable under this Article and to have been suffered in the line of duty and as a result of his employment. 2 (Emphasis added) We find Shipley v. State, 201 Md. 96 , 93 A. 2d 67 , and MTA v. Baltimore County Revenue Authority, 267 Md. 687 , 298 A. 2d 413 , to be dispositive of the constitutional issue under Article III, Section 29 of the Constitution of Maryland. In Shipley it was said at page 103 [70]: “A title which is descriptive to some extent must go far to fix the understanding of its purpose among legislators and interested members of the public. ‘Bills are sometimes read, especially the first time, ³³⁶ by their titles only, and the titles only are spread upon the journal.’ Stiefel v. Maryland Institution for the Blind, 61 Md. 144, 148 . And it is the main purpose of the constitutional provision to prevent enactment under a misconception by reason of a misdescriptive title. ‘The object of the requirement of the Constitution is that legislators and the public may be informed by the title of the general nature of the provisions proposed to be enacted.’ Levin v. Hewes, 118 Md. 624, 632 , 86 A. 233, 235 .

It follows that a restriction in the title must either confine the operation of the act to conform to that description, if such a construction is possible, or render the act void to the extent of the conflict. * * * ” (Italics supplied) In MTA v. Baltimore County, supra, it was said at page 695-696 [418]: “* * * That the title of an act is relevant to ascertainment of its [the legislature’s] intent and purpose is well settled. * * * ” In the subject case there is no repugnancy between title and body of the act. The body of the act provides that certain conditions may be “compensated under this Article [Article 101].” The title of the act in no way conflicts with that purpose. The title simply makes clear that the act should be interpreted as granting such benefits in accordance with the provisions of that article as they relate to occupational diseases. Belschner v. Anchor Post, 227 Md. 89 , 175 A. 2d 419 , declared at page 91 [420] that: “* * * the provisions of Section 36 of Article 101 [Compensation Benefits Section] * * * are as applicable in a proper case to a disability resulting from an occupational disease as they are to a disability arising out of an accidental injury * * *.” Moreover, Article 101, § 22 (a) specifically provides that compensation benefits for occupational disease shall be the ³³⁷ same as that payable for accidental injury, except where otherwise provided in Article 101.

We hold, accordingly, that the legislative purpose in the passage of Section 64A was to amend the workmen’s compensation law in the field of occupational diseases and is not violative of Article III, Section 29 of the Constitution of Maryland. Appellee suggests also that the section offends the due process provisions of Article 23 of the Maryland Declaration of Rights. Article 23 has been equated to the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution of the United States. Anne Arundel County v. English, 182 Md. 514, 521 , 35 A. 2d 135, 139 .

We shall deal with this in our discussion of the validity of the section, vel non, under the Constitution of the United States. The Constitution of the United States 1. As to Workmen’s Compensation Generally Constitutionality of State legislation in the area of workmen’s compensation is too well-established to permit of further debate. In Solvuca v. Ryan and Reilly Co., 131 Md. 265 , 101 A. 710 , wherein constitutionality of Maryland’s workmen’s compensation law was upheld, it was said at page 270 [712]: “We have frequently said that the ‘law of the land,’ in the Constitution of this State, and ‘due process of law,’ in the Constitution of the United States mean the same thing.” The Court in Solvuca cited as its principal authority the case of N.Y. Central R.R. Co. v. White, 243 U. S. 188 , 61 L. Ed. 667 , wherein the Supreme Court of the United States had declared at page 207: “* * * laws regulating the responsibility of employers for the injury or death of employees, arising out of the employment, bear so close a relation to the protection of the lives and safety of those concerned that they properly may be ³³⁸ regarded as coming within the category of police regulations.” 2.

Due Process and Equal Protection (Fourteenth Amendment and Article 23 Maryland Declaration of Rights) We reject the contention of the appellee that the words “fire fighter” are vague and uncertain. Webster’s Third New International Dictionary 855 (1961 ed.) thus defines the words: “fire fighter, n: one who fights fires: as (a) a member of a municipal fire department (b) one of a crew that combats forest fires (c) one who fights mine fires.” Under the subject statute, of course, that definition is limited to those persons who are “paid municipal, county, airport authority or fire control district fire fighter[s].” The language used in Richards Furniture Corp. v. Board, 233 Md. 249 , 196 A. 2d 621 , is particularly apt in this case. It had been said at page 264 [629]: “* * * The Act is couched in plain and simple language, which may be easily understood by persons of ordinary intelligence. This is all that is required of a statute in order to prevent it from being vague and indefinite in a constitutional sense.” Indeed the words “fire fighter” were used by the late Chief Judge Bruñe to designate a member of the Baltimore City Fire Department in the case of Severn v. Baltimore City, 230 Md. 160, 162 , 186 A. 2d 199, 200 .

Statutes conferring benefits upon firemen and fire fighters generally, have been sustained as a natural and reasonable classification within constitutional limits. In Grosse Pointe Fire Fighters Association v. Village of Grosse Pointe, 6 N.W.2d 725 (S. Ct. Mich. 1942), a statute authorizing grant of holiday time exceeding the allowance to ³³⁹ other municipal employees was sustained. The Court said at page 726: “[The statute] applies in a statewide sense to every Michigan municipality, which maintains an organized paid or part paid fire department. A law of this type obviously need not apply, and probably in a practical sense could not be made to apply, indiscriminately to all employers or to all adult male employees.

But the legislature may enact a law which is applicable to a specified class or classes of employers or employees, provided the classification is sustainable in reason. Particularly is this true of the State’s power to regulate the affairs of its governmental units. We cannot say the statutory provision under consideration is invalid as being ‘special’ or local legislation or that it is ‘capricious and unreasonable class legislation.’ It applies in a state-wide manner to all ‘municipalities which maintain or may hereafter maintain an organized paid or part paid fire department.’ ” In Sullivan v. City of Omaha, 21 N.W.2d 510 (S. Ct. Neb. 1946), the constitutionality of a statute conferring special pension benefits to firemen was sustained, the Court saying at page 512: “We think that