Source: https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/403/333
Timestamp: 2015-07-07 06:53:13
Document Index: 623814188

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 402', '§ 402', '§ 402', '§ 401', '§ 401', '§ 401', '§ 401', '§ 402', '§ 402', '§ 402', '§ 402', '§ 402', '§ 481', '§ 482']

James D. HODGSON, Secretary of Labor, Petitioner, v. NotFound | US Law | LII / Legal Information Institute
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403 U.S. 333 (91 S.Ct. 1841, 29 L.Ed.2d 510)
James D. HODGSON, Secretary of Labor, Petitioner, v.
[HTML] No. 655.
Failure of labor union member's election complaint to include an objection to meeting-attendance rule during his pursuit of internal union remedies when the member was aware of the existence of the rule bars the Secretary of Labor from later challenging that rule in an action under § 402 of the Labor-Management Reporting and Disclosure Act, which provides that once a member challenging an election has exhausted his internal union remedies and filed a complaint with the Secretary of Labor, the Secretary 'shall investigate such complaint and, if he finds probable cause to believe that a violation * * * has occurred and has not been remedied, he shall * * * bring a civil action against the labor organization.' Pp. 336341.
Petitioner, the Secretary of Labor, instituted this action under § 402(b) of the Labor-Management Reporting and Disclosure Act of 1959, 73 Stat. 534, 29 U.S.C. 482(b), against Local 6799, United Steelworkers of America, to set aside a general election of officers conducted by the union.
After failing to obtain relief through the internal procedures of either union organization, Hantzis filed a complaint with the Secretary of Labor pursuant to § 402(a) of the Act, 29 U.S.C. 482(a). The complaint repeated the charge that union facilities had been used to promote the candidacy of the incumbent president and raised, for the first time, an additional objection concerning a meeting-attendance requirement imposed as a condition of candidacy for union office.
At no time during his internal union protests did Hantzis challenge the attendance requirement.
Following an investigation of the complaint, the Secretary concluded that union facilities had been used improperly to aid the re-election of the incumbent president in violation of § 401(g) of the Act, 29 U.S.C. 481(g). The Secretary also concluded that § 401(e) had been violated because the meeting-attendance requirement had not been uniformly administered and because the requirement itself was not a reasonable qualification on the right of union members to hold office. Respondents were advised of these conclusions and were asked to take voluntary remedial action. When they failed to comply with the request, the Secretary brought this proceeding in the District Court for the Central District of California.
The District Court held that § 401(g) had been violated by the use of union facilities for the benefit of the incumbent president's campaign and ordered a new election for the office of president.
The District Court also held, however, that the meeting-attendance rule was reasonable and that Local 6799 had not violated § 401(e) by imposing the rule as a qualification on candidacies fur union office.
Section 402(b) provides that once a member challenging an election has exhausted his internal union remedies and filed a complaint with the Secretary of Labor, the Secretary 'shall investigate such complaint and, if he finds probable cause to believe that a violation of this title has occurred and has not been remedied, he shall, within sixty days after the filing of such complaint, bring a civil action against the labor organization * * *.'
At the outset, petitioner contends that the language of the section empowers the Secretary to investigate and litigate any and all violations that may have affected the outcome of an election once a union member has exhausted his internal union remedies concerning any violation that occurred during that election. Emphasis is placed on the fact that the Secretary is authorized to act if his investigation uncovers 'a violation'this, it is said, means that the Secretary is not limited to seeking redress only in respect of the claims earlier presented by the union member to his union. However, the statutory language is not so devoid of ambiguity that it alone can bear the weight of the Secretary's expansive view of his authority. While the words 'a violation' might mean 'any violation whatever revealed by the investigation,' the words are susceptible of other readings. In particular, they can fairly be read to mean 'any of the violations raised by the union member during his internal union election protest.' In Wirtz v. Local Union No. 125 Laborers' International Union, 389 U.S. 477, 88 S.Ct. 639, 19 L.Ed.2d 716 (1968), this Court noted that the range of the Secretary's authority under § 402(b) must be determined 'by inference since there is lacking an explicit provision regarding the permissible scope of the Secretary's complaint,' 389 U.S., at 481, 88 S.Ct., at 641. We must, therefore, examine the legislative history and statutory policies behind § 402 and the rest of the Act to decide the issue presented by this case.
Examination of the relevant legislative materials reveals a clear congressional concern for the need to remedy abuses in union elections without departing needlessly from the longstanding congressional policy against unnecessary governmental interference with internal union affairs, Wirtz v. Local 153, Glass Bottle Blowers Assn., 389 U.S. 463, 470471, 88 S.Ct. 643, 647648, 19 L.Ed.2d 705 (1968). The introduction to the Senate report accompanying the Act summarizes the general objectives of Congress:
However, under petitioner's limited view of congressional objectives, the exhaustion requirement of § 402(a) is left with virtually no purpose or part to play in the statutory scheme. 'Exhaustion' would be accomplished given any sort of protest within the union, no matter how remote the complaint made there from the alleged violation later litigated. The obvious purpose of an exhaustion requirement is not met when the union, during 'exhaustion,' is given no notice of the defects to be cured. Indeed, the primary objective of the exhaustion requirement is to preserve the vitality of internal union mechanisms for resolving election disputesmechanisms to decide complaints brought by members of the union themselves. To accept petitioner's contention that a union member, who is aware of the facts underlying an alleged violation, need not first protest this violation to his union before complaining to the Secretary would be needlessly to weaken union self-government. Plainly petitioner's approach slights the interest in protecting union self-regulation and is out of harmony with the congressional purpose reflected in § 402(a).
Of course, any interpretation of the exhaustion requirement must reflect the needs of rank and file union membersthose people the requirement is designed ultimately to serve. We are not unmindful that union members may use broad or imprecise language in framing their internal union protests and that members will often lack the necessary information to be aware of the existence or scope of many election violations. Union democracy is far too important to permit these deficiencies to foreclose relief from election violations; and in determining whether the exhaustion requirement of § 402(a) has been satisfied, courts should impose a heavy burden on the union to show that it could not in any way discern that a member was complaining of the violation in question.
I dissent. The Court acknowledges that 29 U.S.C. 482(b), in permitting the Secretary to bring a civil action against the union if his investigation discloses 'a violation' of § 481, might well mean 'any violation whatever revealed by the investigation.' Ante, at 338. Nonetheless, it concludes that 'a violation' is limited to 'any of the violations raised by the union member during his internal union election protest,' ibid., because the broader interpretation would disregard the congressional purpose in imposing the exhaustion requirement. It is in giving controlling significance to the exhaustion requirement rather than to the clear and primary policy judgment enacted by Congress that the Court, in my view falls into error.
Wirtz v. Local 153, Glass Bottle Blowers Assn., 389 U.S. 463, 88 S.Ct. 643, 19 L.Ed.2d 705 (1968), and Wirtz v. Local Union No. 125, Laborers' International Union, 389 U.S. 477, 88 S.Ct. 639, 19 L.Ed.2d 716 (1968), comprehensively analyzed the policy Congress meant to further in enacting the Secretary's enforcement powers under 29 U.S.C. 482. We said that 'Title IV's special function in furthering the over-all goals of the LMRDA is to insure 'free and democratic' elections,' 389 U.S., at 470, 88 S.Ct., at 647, an interest 'vital' not alone to union members but also to the general public. 389 U.S., at 475, 483, 88 S.Ct., at 650, 642. While we recognized that Congress desired to further this basic policy with minimal interference with a union's management of its own affairs, we made clear that where governmental intrusion was necessary to realize the vital public policy favoring free and democratic elections, 'it would be anomalous to limit the reach of the Secretary's cause of action by the specifics of the union member's complaint.' 389 U.S., at 483, 88 S.Ct., at 642. We accordingly held that 'it is incorrect to read (the exhaustion provision) * * * as somehow conditioning (the Secretary's) right to relief once that intervention has been properly invoked.' 389 U.S., at 473, 88 S.Ct., at 649.
That holding fits precisely the situation before us. Intervention was properly invoked when the dissident union member pursued his complaint through the union's internal procedures. When the Secretary's subsequent investigation uncovered another Title IV violation, surely it was 'a violation' that Congress meant should also be corrected. Indeed, 29 U.S.C. 482(b) provides that if the Secretary's investigation leads him to conclude that there is 'probable cause to believe that a violation of this subchapter has occurred' the Secretary should seek in a civil action an order to set the election aside and 'to direct the conduct of an election * * * in accordance with the provisions of this subchapter.' (Emphasis added.) The new election must, under § 482(c), be conducted 'so far as lawful and practicable in conformity with the constitution and bylaws of the labor organization.' (Emphasis added.) These provisions make inescapable the conclusion that Congress authorized the Secretary to ground an action for a new election not only in violations processed by the union member but also on other violations uncovered in his investigation. The Court's contrary construction ignores 'the fact that Congress, although committed to minimal intervention, was obviously equally committed to making that intervention, once warranted, effective in carrying out the basic aim of Title IV.' 389 U.S., at 473, 88 S.Ct., at 649.
If, as in this case, a new election is ordered because a candidate used union facilities when he should not have, the Act directs a new election 'under supervision of the Secretary and, so far as lawful and practicable, in conformity with the constitution and bylaws of the labor organization.' 29 U.S.C. 482(c). I take it, then, that the Secretary is under no obligation, indeed forbidden, to follow a provision of the bylaws or constitution that is unlawful. If, in proceedings that order a new election, the Secretary discovers in the bylaws or constitution a provision regulating elections that he deems unlawfulsuch as the meeting-attendance rulebut the union insists that it is entirely lawful, does the Secretary simply ignore the provision in holding the election, may he or the union secure a judicial ruling on it, or is court action foreclosed and the Secretary required to follow the provision simply because a member in challenging the election failed to attack the meeting-attendance rule, probably because it did not affect him?
'Sec. 402. (a) A member of a labor organization
'(c) If, upon a preponderance of the evidence after a trial upon the merits, the court finds