Montgomery County Hospital District v. Brown

In Montgomery County Hospital District v. Brown, 965 S.W.2d 501, 502, 41 Tex. Sup. Ct. J. 537 (Tex. 1998), the Court reiterated that employment is presumed to be at-will in Texas: For well over a century, the general rule in this State, as in most jurisdictions, has been that absent a specific agreement to the contrary, employment may be terminated by the employer or the employee for good cause, bad cause, or no cause at all. In Montgomery County, the employee testified that she had been told that she would keep her job "as long as she was doing her job and that she would not be fired unless there was a good reason or good cause . . . ." Montgomery County, 965 S.W.2d at 502. The Court concluded that these statements were too vague to overcome the presumption of employment at-will. We stated that the employer must "unequivocally indicate a definite intent . . . to be bound not to terminate the employee except under clearly specified circumstances." Id.