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In 1926, the Missouri legislature enacted the Workers’ Compensation System, which entitled workers to compensation for accidental injuries that occurred on the job without requiring them to file a claim in civil court. Since then, the Missouri Supreme Court and the legislature have broadened the scope of this system several times. In 2005, the legislature amended thirty sections of the Workers’ Compensation System through Senate Bills Nos. 1 and 130.1 These amendments narrowed the scope of the type of “injury” that falls within the definition of an “accident,” thereby narrowing the scope of the act.2 

In response to the amendments to the Workers’ Compensation System, sixty-six labor unions, four labor councils and one not-for-profit corporation filed a nine-count petition against the Workers’ Compensation Division in the Cole County Circuit Court challenging the constitutionality of the amendments.3 The circuit court granted judgment as a matter of law to the Workers’ Compensation Division on two counts and summary judgment to the Workers’ Compensation Division on the other seven counts. The plaintiffs appealed, arguing that the amended Workers’ Compensation System was unconstitutional as a whole and that the other claims in their petition were justiciable. The Missouri Supreme Court heard oral arguments in 2007 and issued an opinion in February, 2009, affirming the circuit court’s decision in part and reversing it in part.4

The supreme court held, in a plurality opinion with one justice dissenting, that the plaintiffs had presented no facts supporting their claim “that specific provisions of the act as amended are unconstitutional because they are so narrow and restrictive that they provide no adequate remedy for an injured worker.”5 Because no actual workers’ compensation claims were at issue, the court held that plaintiffs’ assertions were merely hypothetical and not justiciable.6 The court also held that the issues raised by the plaintiffs’ claim that certain provisions of the act render the act as a whole violative of the open courts or due process provisions of the Missouri constitution were not ripe for review, as there had been no judicial interpretations of the individual amended provisions.7

Further, the court held that the plaintiffs’ request for declaratory judgment addressing whether the exclusivity provision in the act bars workers’ ability to pursue negligence tort actions against their employers was ripe for review because no factual development was necessary to address this legal question.8 Resolution of this question “require[d] only that the Court review the changes in the scope of the act’s exclusivity provisions as applied to ‘injuries’ resulting from an ‘accident.’”9 The court held that workers who suffered an “injury” that did not fall within the scope of an “accident” under the amended Workers’ Compensation System were no longer governed by the act.10 The court noted, however, that workers excluded from the act by the narrowed definition of “accidental injury” could still seek relief under the common law, just as they could prior to the initial adoption of the act.11 The court did not express an opinion as to which injuries fall within the definition of accident under either the workers’ compensation laws or the common law, holding that whether or not workers have a remedy should be determined by the finders of fact on a case-by-case basis.12

* Jennifer Wolsing is a litigation associate in St. Louis, Missouri 

 

Endnotes

1 Mo. Alliance for Retired Ams. v. Dep’t of Labor and Indus. Relations, 277 S.W.3d 670, 674 (Mo. 2009). 

2 Id.

3 Id.

4 Id. at 680.

5 Id. at 677.

6 See id. at 674.

7 See id. at 678.

8 See id. at 678-79.

9 Id. at 679.

10 See id.

11 See id. at 680.

12 See id. 

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