Source: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/372/517/
Timestamp: 2019-04-19 20:18:27+00:00

Document:
Justia › US Law › US Case Law › US Supreme Court › Volume 372 › Truck Drivers Union v. Riss & Co.
v. Riss & Company, Inc.
Predicating jurisdiction on § 301 of the Labor Management Relations Act, 1947, petitioners, a union and six of its members, sued in a Federal District Court to compel respondent to comply with a ruling of the Joint Area Cartage Committee directing that the individual petitioners be reinstated with full seniority and back pay. They alleged that the Committee's ruling had been handed down in accordance with grievance procedures established in a collective bargaining agreement between the union and the employer, and that it was final and binding. After filing its answer, respondent moved to dismiss the complaint for want of jurisdiction. The District Court granted the motion on the pleadings as supplemented at pretrial conference by excerpts from the Local Cartage Agreement between the union and the employer.
Held: it erred in doing so, since the District Court would have jurisdiction under § 301, if the award of the Joint Area Cartage Committee is final and binding under the collective bargaining agreement, as petitioners allege; and this allegation cannot be rejected on the basis merely of what the present record shows. Pp. 372 U. S. 517-520.
298 F. 2d 341, reversed and cause remanded.
United States District Court for the Western District of Kentucky, and jurisdiction was predicated on § 301 of the Labor Management Relations Act, 1947, 29 U.S.C. § 185. In their complaint, petitioners alleged that the respondent had refused to comply with a ruling of the Joint Area Cartage Committee, directing that the individual petitioners be reinstated with full seniority and back pay. The Committee's ruling was asserted to have been handed down in accordance with the grievance procedures established in the collective bargaining agreement between the union and the employer. The relief demanded in the complaint included the reinstatement of the individual petitioners, with full back pay and fringe benefits to the time of reinstatement.
Respondent, after filing its answer, moved to dismiss the complaint. The District Court granted the motion on the pleadings as supplemented at pretrial conference by excerpts from the Local Cartage Agreement between the union and the employer. The District Court's ground for dismissing the complaint was want of federal jurisdiction, a result deemed compelled by our decision in Association of Westinghouse Salaried Employees v. Westinghouse Elec. Corp., 348 U. S. 437. The Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit affirmed, 298 F.2d 341, but added two more grounds in support of the order of dismissal: (1) that the determination of the joint Area Cartage Committee was not an arbitration award, and so not enforceable under § 301; (2) that, on the merits, petitioners were not entitled to the relief ordered by the Joint Area Cartage Committee. We granted certiorari, 371 U.S. 810. We reverse and remand to the District Court for trial.
"It is agreed that all matters pertaining to the interpretation of any provisions of this contract shall be referred at the request of any party at any time, for final decision to the Joint Area Cartage Committee. . . ."
United Steelworkers v. American Mfg. Co., 363 U. S. 564, 363 U. S. 566; cf. Retail Clerks v. Lion Dry Goods, Inc., 369 U. S. 17. Thus, if the award at bar is the parties' chosen instrument for the definitive settlement of grievances under the Agreement, it is enforceable under § 301. And if the Joint Area Cartage Committee's award is thus enforceable, it is, of course, not open to the courts to reweigh the merits of the grievance. American Mfg. Co., supra, at 363 U. S. 567-568.
Of course, if it should be decided after trial that the grievance award involved here is not final and binding under the collective bargaining agreement, no action under § 301 to enforce it will lie. Then, should petitioners seek to pursue the action as a § 301 suit for breach of contract, there may have to be considered questions unresolved by our prior decisions. We need not reach those questions here. But since the courts below placed so much reliance on the Westinghouse decision, we deem it appropriate to repeat our conclusion in Smith v. Evening News Assn., 371 U. S. 195, 371 U. S. 199, that "subsequent decisions . . . have removed the underpinnings of Westinghouse, and its holding is no longer authoritative as a precedent."

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