IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF THE STATE OF WASHINGTON

                                      DIVISION I

KUSUM L. BATEY,                             )  No. 57513-9-I
                                            )
                      Appellant,            )
                                            )
            v.                              )  
                                            )  PUBLISHED OPINION
STATE OF WASHINGTON,                        )
EMPLOYMENT SECURITY                         )
DEPARTMENT,                                 )
                                             )
                      Respondent.           )  FILED:  MARCH 12, 2007

       BECKER, J.  --  Under our state constitution, portions of a bill not fairly 

expressed by its title are stricken as unconstitutional.  At issue in this appeal is a 

bill changing the criteria for determining when an employee has good cause for 

a voluntary quit.  The title of the bill is: "AN ACT Relating to making adjustments 

in the unemployment insurance system to enhance benefit and tax equity; 
reenacting RCW 50.20.050; and creating a new section."1  Because the title 

does not express the subject, the statute is unconstitutional.

       1 EHB 3278, 59th Leg. (Wash. 2006).   

No. 57513-9-I/2

       It has long been a feature of the unemployment compensation system that 

workers who have "left work voluntarily without good cause" are disqualified from 

receiving unemployment benefits for a specified period of time.  RCW 

50.20.050(2)(a).  The voluntary quit statute as it existed in 2002 set out four 

specific situations that constituted good cause for leaving work.  In addition, the 

Employment Security Department had discretion to find good cause for reasons 

not specified in the statute.  In a particular case, the commissioner might 

determine that changes in other work-related circumstances had caused 

hardship or deterioration in working conditions sufficient to justify the claimant's 

decision to quit:

       Good cause shall not be established . . . because of any other 
       significant work factor which was generally known and present at 
       the time he or she accepted employment, unless the related 
       circumstances have so changed as to amount to a substantial 
       involuntary deterioration of the work factor or unless the 
       commissioner determines that other related circumstances would 
       work an unreasonable hardship on the individual were he or she 
       required to continue in the employment.  

Former RCW 50.20.050(3) (2002), in part (emphasis added).  

       During a special session in 2003, the Legislature decided to tighten up 

the voluntary quit criteria.  The vehicle for the change was Second Engrossed 

Senate Bill 6097, a bill with 39 sections that amended RCW Title 50 in various 

ways.  2ESB 6097, 58th Leg., 2d Spec. Sess. (Wash. 2003).  The fourth section 

of the bill amended the voluntary quit statute, RCW 50.20.050.  With respect to

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 claims with an effective date on or after January 4, 2004, the bill set out six

more situations that would constitute good cause for leaving work.  But the bill

also removed the commissioner's discretion. Under the new scheme, a good 

cause for quitting had to be within the 10 scenarios listed in the statute.  

       The appellant in this case, Kusum Batey, worked as an advocate for the 

Snohomish County Center for Battered Women.  She quit voluntarily in January

2005 and applied for unemployment benefits.  Her reasons for quitting did not fit 

within the 10 "good cause" categories in RCW 50.20.050, and the Employment 

Security Department denied her application.  Batey petitioned for review in 

superior court.  She argued that 2ESB 6097, the bill that removed the 

discretionary language, was unconstitutional because it was passed in 

contravention of the subject-in-title requirement of Const. art. II, § 19.  The title of 

the bill referred to "creating forty rate classes for determining employer 
contribution rates."2  2ESB 6097, 58th Leg., 2d Spec. Sess. (Wash. 2003).  

Batey took the position that this title clearly does not encompass the subject 

       2 The full title of 2ESB 6097 was:  AN ACT Relating to revising the 
unemployment compensation system through creating forty rate classes for 
determining employer contribution rates; amending RCW 50.01.010, 50.20.010, 
50.20.050, 50.04.293, 50.20.060, 50.20.065, 50.20.240, 50.20.120, 50.20.100, 
50.29.025, 50.04.355, 50.29.026, 50.29.062, 50.29.070, 50.12.220, 50.16.010, 
50.16.015, 50.24.014, 50.20.190, 50.04.206, 50.20.140, 50.20.043, 50.20.160, 
50.32.040, and 28B.50.030; reenacting and amending RCW 50.29.020; adding 
new sections to chapter 50.04 RCW; adding new sections to chapter 50.20 
RCW; adding new sections to chapter 50.29 RCW; creating new sections; 
repealing RCW 50.20.015, 50.20.045, 50.20.125, and 50.29.045; providing an 
expiration date; and declaring an emergency.

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matter of voluntary quits. Batey sought to have her case remanded to the 

Employment Security Department for consideration under the discretionary 

language of the statute as it existed before the enactment of 2ESB 6097.  This 

court accepted the superior court's certification for direct review in February of

2006.  See RCW 34.05.518; RAP 6.3.  

       On review, the Department does not defend the title of 2ESB 6097 

against Batey's subject-in-title challenge.  Instead, the Department says that the 

Legislature remedied any subject-in-title problem that may have existed with

2ESB 6097 by reenacting its provisions retroactively in 2006 in a bill with a 
proper title.3  

       Batey does not dispute that the Legislature could have cured the defect in 

the title of 2ESB 6097 by reenacting it retroactively in a bill with a proper title.  

She contends, however, that the Legislature's attempt to cure the defect likewise 

fails the subject-in-title test. 

       The 2006 bill is Engrossed House Bill 3278 with the title "AN ACT 

Relating to making adjustments in the unemployment insurance system to 

       3 The 2003 bill amends an earlier act, while the 2006 bill reenacts an 
earlier act.  Because the Department does not defend Batey's subject-in-title 
challenge to the 2003 bill, we need not enter what the Department at oral 
argument referred to as the "dark and bloody ground" of City of Fircrest v. 
Jensen, 158 Wn.2d 384, 143 P.3d 776 (2006) (three separate opinions about 
whether the relevant title in a challenge to an amendatory act is the one 
belonging to the original act or the one belonging to the amendatory act).

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enhance benefit and tax equity; reenacting RCW 50.20.050; and creating a new 

section."  EHB 3278, 59th Leg. (Wash. 2006). As passed by the House on 

February 14, 2006, the bill's objective was modest: to extend by two months the 

deadline for a previously created "joint legislative task force on unemployment 

insurance benefit equity" to report its findings and recommendations to the 

Legislature. H. Amendment 939, 59th Leg. (Wash. 2006).

       The subject matter of House Bill 3278 changed dramatically on March 3, 

2006 when the Senate adopted a striking amendment.  After stripping out all of 

the language pertaining to the task force and its deadline, the Senate 

amendment inserted language reenacting the substance of the voluntary quit 

amendments contained in 2ESB 6097 (the bill passed in 2003).  The Senate 

amendment provided that the bill would apply retroactively "to claims that have 

an effective date on or after January 4, 2004."  Laws of 2006, ch. 12, § 2.  As 

shown by a note to the Senate amendment, it was designed to deflect Batey's 

pending lawsuit:  "EFFECT:  Reenacts, retroactively, the 'good cause quit'

section of Second Engrossed Senate Bill No. 6097 (a section that was 

potentially under challenge in Batey v. Employment Security Department)."  S. 

Amendment 365, 59th Leg. (Wash. 2006). The House and Senate both passed

Engrossed House Bill 3278 on March 3, 2006, with the House concurring in the 

Senate amendment.  

       Our constitution states: "No bill shall embrace more than one subject, and 

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that shall be expressed in the title." Const. art. II, §19. In this case we are 

concerned only with the subject-in-title requirement of this provision, not the 

single-subject rule.  The Supreme Court has long interpreted article II, §19 as 

requiring a bill's title to give concise information about the contents of the bill.  

"The wisdom of the rule suggests itself, in that the reader, whether a member of 

the legislature or otherwise, may, by a mere glance at a few catch words in the 

title, be apprised of what the act treats, without further search."  State ex rel. 

Seattle Elec. Co. v. Superior Court, 28 Wash. 317, 321, 68 P. 957 (1902).  The 

title should "most especially" be sufficient to give notice to parties whose rights 

and liabilities are affected by the bill.  Patrice v. Murphy, 136 Wn.2d 845, 854, 

966 P.2d 1271 (1998).  The title need not be an index to the contents of the bill. 

It is sufficient if the title "gives such notice as should reasonably lead to an

inquiry into the body of the act itself, or indicates, to an inquiring mind, the scope 

and purpose of the law."  State ex rel. Wash. Toll Bridge Auth. v. Yelle, 32

Wn.2d 13, 26, 200 P.2d 467 (1948). 

       To decide whether a title gives adequate notice, a court must first 

determine whether the title is broad or narrow. Where a bill's title is general, 

"'any subject reasonably germane to such title may be embraced within the body 

of the bill.'" Citizens for Responsible Wildlife Management v. State, 149 Wn.2d 

622, 633, 71 P.3d 644 (2003) (quoting DeCano v. State, 7 Wn.2d 613, 627, 110 

P.2d 627 (1941)). A restrictive title will be more carefully scrutinized: 

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No. 57513-9-I/7

       If the title is general and comprehensive, it will be given a liberal 
       construction; in such case, no elaborate statement of the subject of 
       the act is necessary, and a few well-chosen words suggestive of 
       the general subject treated is all that is required.  If, however, the 
       title is a restricted one, it will not be regarded so liberally, and 
       provisions which are not fairly within such restricted title will not be 
       given force.  

State ex rel. Wash. Toll Bridge Auth., 32 Wn.2d at 26.  Examples of bill titles 

judged to be restrictive are: "Shall criminals who are convicted of 'most serious 

offenses' on three occasions be sentenced to life in prison without parole?"  

State v. Thorne, 129 Wn.2d 736, 757, 921 P.2d 514 (1996); "An Act Relating to 

the acquisition of property by public agencies . . . ."  Daviscourt v. Peistrup, 40 

Wn. App. 433, 437, 698 P.2d 1093 (1985); "AN ACT Relating to increasing 

penalties for armed crimes . . . ."  State v. Broadaway, 133 Wn.2d 118, 123, 942 

P.2d 363 (1997).  

       The Department argues that EHB 3278's title is broad and general, but in 

doing so the Department focuses only on that part of the title referring to "making 

adjustments in the unemployment insurance system." The full title is: "AN ACT 

Relating to making adjustments in the unemployment insurance system to 

enhance benefit and tax equity; reenacting RCW 50.20.050; and creating a new 

section." In specifying that the adjustments are intended "to enhance benefit 

and tax equity", the title becomes restrictive; it does not suggest a bill that might 

embrace any and all manner of changes to the unemployment insurance system.

       The Department contends that even if the title is judged to be restrictive, it 

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No. 57513-9-I/8

still should be construed as giving fair notice that the bill changes eligibility 

requirements for unemployment benefits.  Any change in eligibility, according to 

the Department, is likely to have some effect upon benefits paid to employees 

and tax premiums paid by employers.  This argument is not persuasive.  The title 

says the adjustments in the bill will enhance "benefit and tax equity".  

Employees -- a group particularly affected by EHB 3278 -- would not reasonably 

be expected to recognize this phrase as a signal that legislators had decided to 

change the good cause criteria for voluntary quits.

       The Supreme Court has held that the title "AN ACT Relating to court 

costs" violated the subject-in-title rule because the title, while appearing to refer 

to procedural matters, disguised a "hidden effect"  --  the bill imposed upon local 

government a new substantive duty to hire sign language interpreters to assist 

with police investigations.  Patrice, 136 Wn.2d at 855. This came about 

because the Legislature picked up the substance of a bill requiring interpreters,

which could not pass on its own due to time constraints, and rolled it into a bill 

on court costs that was still within time limits and eligible for consideration.  

Similarly here, changing the voluntary quit criteria is a hidden effect of EHB 

3278.  The title's reference to "benefit and tax equity" disguised the fact that the 

bill no longer had anything to do with the special committee study on benefit 

equity, and had become instead a last minute vehicle to change the good cause 

criteria for voluntary quits.  

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No. 57513-9-I/9

       The title's reference to RCW 50.20.50 as the statute being reenacted is 

also insufficient to give proper notice.  A "mere reference" to a section in the title 

of an act does not state a subject.  Fray v. Spokane County, 134 Wn.2d 637, 

654-655, 952 P.2d 601 (1998) (quoting State ex rel. Seattle Elec. Co., 28 Wash. 

at 325).

       We conclude Chapter 12, Laws of 2006 must be struck down because the 

enacting bill, EHB 3278, does not meet the constitutional subject-in-title 

requirement.  Because EHB 3278 is unconstitutional, it cannot cure the 

undisputed subject-in-title defect in 2ESB 6097 as it relates to Section 4 of that 

bill. Therefore, we also hold unconstitutional Section 4 of Chapter 4, Laws of 
2003, Second Special Session.4  

       Batey requests attorney's fees as provided by RCW 50.32.160 when a 

court reverses or modifies a decision by the commissioner.  We reject this 

request because it was made for the first time in her reply brief.  RAP 18.1(b).

       Reversed and remanded to determine whether Batey's reasons for 

quitting constitute good cause under RCW 50.20.050 as it existed in 2002.

WE CONCUR:

       4 We make no determination as to other provisions of Chapter 4, Laws of 
2003, Second Special Session. See Patrice v. Murphy, 136 Wn.2d 845, 855, 
966 P.2d 1271 (1998).

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