Leus v. St. Scholastica's College (2015): Pregnancy Outside Marriage

St. Scholastica's College Westgrove, a Catholic school in Silang, Cavite, hired Cheryll Santos Leus in May 2001 as an assistant to the director of its lay apostolate and community outreach office, a non-teaching position. In 2003, she and her boyfriend had a child on the way. The school's directress advised her to resign. She refused.

The school asked her to explain in writing why she should not be dismissed for pre-marital sexual relations and the resulting pregnancy, which it called serious misconduct and conduct unbecoming of an employee of a Catholic school. She asked for a copy of any school policy on the matter. The school replied that, pending its own staff handbook, it followed the 1992 Manual of Regulations for Private Schools, whose Section 94(e) lists "disgraceful or immoral conduct" as a ground for dismissal in addition to the just causes in the Labor Code. Through her lawyer, she explained that the two were adults with no legal impediment to marry and later married each other. In June 2003, the school dismissed her. She and the father of her child had married before the dismissal.

She filed a complaint for illegal dismissal. The Labor Arbiter dismissed it, and the NLRC affirmed, holding that the pregnancy was disgraceful and immoral conduct under the manual. The Court of Appeals affirmed, saying the manual and not the Labor Code governed school employees, and that the pregnancy was "scandalous in itself" given her work environment. She went to the Supreme Court.

Does the 1992 Manual of Regulations for Private Schools validly govern the dismissal of school personnel? Is an employee's pregnancy out of wedlock a valid ground for dismissal as disgraceful or immoral conduct?

The Supreme Court granted the petition and reversed the Court of Appeals.

The manual is valid. The employee argued for the first time on appeal that Section 94 of the manual went beyond the Education Act of 1982. The Court said issues raised for the first time on appeal are barred, and in any case found the manual a valid rule issued under that law.

A neutral and secular approach. The Court said it "will assess the matter from a strictly neutral and secular point of view", looking at the employment relationship, the causes for dismissal provided by law and the evidence.

The two-step test. The fact of a pregnancy out of wedlock, "without more", is not enough. The Court said "the determination of whether a conduct is disgraceful or immoral involves a two-step process: first, a consideration of the totality of the circumstances surrounding the conduct; and second, an assessment of the said circumstances vis-à-vis the prevailing norms of conduct, i.e., what the society generally considers moral and respectable." The labor tribunals had done only the first step.

Public and secular morality. Relying on its earlier rulings in Estrada v. Escritor (2003) and Anonymous v. Radam (2007), the Court held that "when the law speaks of immoral or, necessarily, disgraceful conduct, it pertains to public and secular morality". It contrasted Santos v. NLRC (1998), where a teacher's extra-marital affair with a married co-teacher was held disgraceful and immoral. Here, the employee and the father had no legal impediment to marry, and they married before her dismissal. The Court said her conduct "is not denounced by public and secular morality." It may conflict with the teachings of the school's church, but it is not disgraceful or immoral "within the contemplation of the law."

No proof of scandal. The school said the pregnancy caused grave scandal. The Court found nothing in the records beyond the school's bare allegation. As a non-teaching employee, her contact with students was very limited. The burden of proving a valid cause for dismissal is on the employer, and the labor tribunals' findings without substantial evidence amounted to grave abuse of discretion.

Not a valid [management prerogative](/law/glossary/management-prerogative). Management prerogative must be exercised in good faith and with due regard to the rights of labor. The school also admitted it had no policy at the time against employees who have pre-marital relations and conceive a child. With no basis in law or in its own rules, the dismissal was "despotic and arbitrary."

Reliefs. Instead of reinstatement, because of the strained relations, the Court awarded separation pay of one month's pay for every year of service, with a fraction of at least six months counted as one whole year, and full backwages, both up to the finality of the decision. It added attorney's fees of 10% of the total award and legal interest of 6% a year from finality, and remanded the case to the Labor Arbiter for computation. Moral and exemplary damages were denied because bad faith was not proven by clear and convincing evidence.

Whether an employee's conduct is "disgraceful or immoral" as a ground for dismissal is decided by a two-step test, the totality of the circumstances measured against the prevailing norms of conduct, and those norms are public and secular morality, not religious morality; pre-marital relations between two adults with no impediment to marry, and the resulting pregnancy, are not disgraceful or immoral conduct, and the employer bears the burden of proving the cause for dismissal by substantial evidence.

Leus is the leading ruling on dismissal for pregnancy outside marriage. It sets a secular standard for "immoral conduct" that applies even to employees of religious institutions, and it requires the employer to prove any claimed scandal with evidence. The case was decided under the school manual and the just causes of the Labor Code, which the decision cited as Article 282 and which is today Article 297 [282]. It was not decided under the Labor Code article that makes it unlawful to discharge a woman on account of her pregnancy, today Article 135 [137]. For maternity benefits, see maternity leave rights.

Here is a made-up illustration, with invented names. Joy, a single office clerk at a private school, becomes pregnant by her boyfriend, who is also single. The school dismisses her for "immoral conduct" and points only to its religious values. Under the reasoning in Leus, the question would be whether her conduct is disgraceful or immoral under public and secular morality, and the school would have to prove its cause with substantial evidence. Different facts could lead to a different result, so each case depends on its own circumstances and evidence.

For a case of your own, see where to find legal help.