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NLRB V. ALLIS-CHALMERS MFG. CO., 388 U. S. 175 (1967) - US SUPREME COURT DECISIONS ON-LINE
US Supreme Court Decisions On-Line> Volume 388 > NLRB V. ALLIS-CHALMERS MFG. CO., 388 U. S. 175 (1967)
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358 F.2d 656, reversed. chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
The question here is whether a union which threatened and imposed fines, and brought suit for their collection, against members who crossed the union's picket line and went to work during an authorized strike against their employer committed the unfair labor practice under § 8(b)(1)(A) of the National Labor Relations Act of engaging in conduct "to restrain or coerce" employees in the exercise of their right guaranteed by § 7 to "refrain from" concerted activities. [Footnote 1] chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
Allis-Chalmers filed unfair labor practice charges against the locals alleging violation of § 8(b)(1)(A). [Footnote 2] chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
The panel and the majority en banc of the Court of Appeals thought that reversal of the NLRB order would be required under a literal reading of §§ 7 and 8(b)(1)(A); under that reading, union members who cross their own picket lines would be regarded as exercising their rights under § 7 to refrain from engaging in a particular concerted activity, and union discipline in the form of fines for such activity would therefore "restrain or coerce" in violation of § 8(b)(1)(A) if the section's proviso is read to sanction no form of discipline other chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
than expulsion from the union. The panel rejected that literal reading. The majority en banc adopted it, stating that the panel "mistakenly took the position that such a literal reading was unwarranted in the light of the history and purposes" of the sections, 358 F.2d 659, and holding that
Ford Motor Co. v. Huffman, 345 U. S. 330, 345 U. S. 338. chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
Integral to this federal labor policy has been the power in the chosen union to protect against erosion its status under that policy through reasonable discipline of members who violate rules and regulations governing membership. [Footnote 7] That power is particularly vital when the members engage in strikes. The economic strike against the employer is the ultimate weapon in labor's arsenal for achieving agreement upon its terms, and "[t]he power to fine or expel strikebreakers is essential if the union is to be an effective bargaining agent. . . ." [Footnote 8] Provisions in chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
In addition, the judicial view current at the time § 8(b)(1)(A) was passed was that provisions defining punishable conduct and the procedures for trial and appeal constituted part of the contract between member and union, and that "The courts' role is but to enforce the contract." [Footnote 10] In Machinists v. Gonzales, 356 U. S. 617, 356 U. S. 618, we recognized that "[t]his contractual conception of the relation between a member and his union widely prevails in this country. . . ." Although state courts were reluctant to intervene in internal union affairs, a body of law establishing standards of fairness in the enforcement of union discipline grew up around this contract chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
To say that Congress meant in 1947 by the § 7 amendments and § 8(b)(1)(A) to strip unions of the power to fine members for strikebreaking, however lawful the strike vote and however fair the disciplinary procedures and penalty, is to say that Congress preceded the Landrum-Griffin amendments with an even more pervasive regulation of the internal affairs of unions. It is also to attribute to Congress an intent at war with the understanding of the union-membership relation which has been at the heart of its effort "to fashion a coherent labor policy" and which has been a predicate underlying action by this Court and the state courts. More importantly, it is to say that Congress limited unions in the powers necessary to the discharge of their role as exclusive statutory bargaining agents by impairing the usefulness of labor's cherished strike weapon. It is no answer that the proviso to 8(b)(1)(A) preserves to the union the power to expel the offending member. Where the union is strong, and membership therefore valuable, to require expulsion of the member visits a far more severe penalty upon the member than a reasonable fine. Where the union is weak, and membership therefore of little value, the union, faced with further depletion of its ranks, may have no real choice except to condone the member's disobedience. [Footnote 12] chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
What legislative materials there are dealing with § 8(b)(1)(A) contain not a single word referring to the chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
93 Cong.Rec. 4016, II Leg.Hist. 1018. Senator Ball gave numerous examples of the kind of union conduct the amendment was to cover. Each one related to union conduct during organizational campaigns. [Footnote 14] chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
It was one week after this debate between Senator Taft and Senator Pepper that § 8(b)(1)(A) was adopted by the Senate as an amendment to the bill. There was no further reference in the debates to the applicability of the section to internal union affairs, by Senator Taft or anyone else, despite the repeated statements by Senator Ball that it bore no relationship to the conduct of such affairs. At one point, Senator Saltonstall asked Senator Taft to provide examples of the kind of union conduct covered by the section. Senator Taft responded with examples of threats of bodily harm, economic coercion, and mass picketing in organizational campaigns and coercion which prevented employees not involved in a labor dispute from going to work. [Footnote 25] But any inference chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
It is true that there are references in the Senate debate on § 8(b)(1)(A) to an intent to impose the same prohibitions on unions that applied to employers as regards restraint and coercion of employees in their exercise of § 7 rights. [Footnote 26] However apposite this parallel might be when applied to organizational tactics, it clearly is inapplicable chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
Cogent support for an interpretation of the body of 8(b)(1) as not reaching the imposition of fines and attempts at court enforcement is the proviso to § 8(b)(1). It states that nothing in the section shall "impair the right of a labor organization to prescribe its own rules with respect to the acquisition or retention of membership therein. . . ." Senator Holland offered the proviso during debate, and Senator Ball immediately accepted it, stating that it was not the intent of the sponsors in any way to regulate the internal affairs of unions. [Footnote 28] At the very least, it can be said that the proviso preserves the rights of unions to impose fines, as a lesser penalty than chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
There may be concern that court enforcement may permit the collection of unreasonably large fines. [Footnote 30] However, chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
The 1959 Landrum-Griffin amendments, thought to be the first comprehensive regulation by Congress of the conduct of internal union affairs, [Footnote 33] also negate the reach chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
The 1959 provisions are significant for still another reason. We have seen that the only indication in the debates over § 8(b)(1)(A) of a reach beyond organizational tactics which restrain or coerce nonmembers was Senator Taft's concern with arbitrary and undemocratic chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
Thus, this history of congressional action does not support a conclusion that the Taft-Hartley prohibitions against restraint or coercion of an employee to refrain from concerted activities included a prohibition against the imposition of fines on members who decline to honor an authorized strike and attempts to collect such fines. Rather, the contrary inference is more justified in light of the repeated refrain throughout the debates on § 8(b)(1)(A) and other sections that Congress did not propose any limitations with respect to the internal affairs of unions, aside from barring enforcement of a union's internal regulations to affect a member's employment status. chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
358 F.2d 660. But the relevant inquiry here is not what motivated a member's full membership, but whether the Taft-Hartley amendments prohibited disciplinary measures against a full member who crossed his union's picket line. It is clear that the fined employees involved herein enjoyed full union membership. Each executed the pledge of allegiance to the UAW constitution and took the oath of full membership. Moreover, the record of the Milwaukee County Court case against Benjamin Natzke discloses that two disciplined employees testified that they had fully participated in the proceedings leading to the strike. They attended the meetings at which the secret strike vote and the renewed strike vote were taken. It was upon this and similar evidence that the Milwaukee County Court found that Natzke "had, by his actions, become a member of the union for all purposes. . . ." Allis-Chalmers offered no evidence in this proceeding that any of the fined employees enjoyed other than full union membership. We will not presume the contrary. Cf. Machinists v. Street, 367 U. S. 740, 367 U. S. 774. [Footnote 36] Indeed, it chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
It is true that § 8(b)(1)(A) makes it an unfair labor practice for a union to restrain or coerce any employees in the exercise of § 7 rights, but the proviso permits the union to make its own rules with respect to acquisition and retention of membership. Hence, a union may expel to enforce its own internal rules, even though a particular rule limits the § 7 rights of its members and chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
I do not mean to indicate, and I do not read the majority opinion otherwise, that every conceivable internal union rule which impinges upon the § 7 rights of union members is valid and enforceable by expulsion and court action. There may well be some internal union rules which, on their face, are wholly invalid and unenforceable. chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
The United Automobile Workers went on a lawful economic strike against the Allis-Chalmers Manufacturing Co. Some union members, refusing to engage in the concerted strike activities, crossed the picket lines, and continued to work for Allis-Chalmers. The right to refrain from engaging in such "concerted activities" is guaranteed all employees by the language of § 7 of the National Labor Relations Act, as amended, 61 Stat. 140, and § 8(b)(1)(A) of the Act, 61 Stat. 141, makes it an unfair labor practice for a union to "restrain or coerce" employees in their exercise of their § 7 rights. Despite these emphatic guarantees of the Act, the union filed charges against the employees and imposed fines against those who had crossed its picket lines to go back to work. Though the proviso to § 8(b)(1)(A) preserves the union's "right . . . to prescribe its own rules with respect to the . . . retention of membership therein," the union did not attempt to exercise its right under the proviso to expel the disciplined members when they refused to pay the fines. Instead, it brought legal proceedings in state courts to compel the payment of the fines. The Court now affirms the Labor Board's action in refusing to find the union guilty of an unfair labor practice under 8(b)(1)(A) for fining its members because they chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
With no reliance on the proviso to § 8(b)(1)(A) or on the meaning of § 7, the Court's holding boils down to this: a court-enforced reasonable fine for nonparticipation in a strike does not "restrain or coerce" an employee in the chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
Even were I to agree with the Court's three observations about the legislative history of § 8(b)(1)(A), I do not think they alone justify disregarding the plain meaning of the section, and it seems perfectly clear to me that the Court does not think so either. The real reason for the Court's decision is its policy judgment that unions, especially weak ones, need the power to impose fines on strikebreakers and to enforce those fines in court. It is not enough, says the Court, that the unions have the power to expel those members who refuse to participate in a strike or who fail to pay fines imposed on them for such chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
Even on the assumption that § 8(b)(1)(A) permits a union to fine a member as long as the fine is only enforceable by expulsion, the fundamental error of the Court's opinion is its failure to recognize the practical and theoretical difference between a court-enforced fine, as here, and a fine enforced by expulsion or less drastic chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
In this case, each strikebreaking employee was fined from $20 to $100, and the union initiated a "test case" in state court to collect the fines. In notifying the employees of the charges against them, however, the union warned them that each day they crossed the picket line and went to work might be considered a separate offense punishable by a fine of $100. In several of the cases, the strikes lasted for many months. Thus, although the union here imposed minimal fines for the purpose of its "test case," it is not too difficult to imagine a case where the fines will be so large that the threat of their imposition will absolutely restrain employees from going to work during a strike. Although an employee might be willing to work even if it meant the loss of union membership, he would have to be well paid indeed to work at the risk that he would have to pay his union $100 a day for each day worked. Of course, as the Court suggests, he might be able to defeat the union's attempt at judicial enforcement of the fine by showing it was "unreasonable" or that he was not a "full member" of the union, but few employees would have the courage or the financial means to be willing to take that risk. Cf. Ex parte Young, 209 U. S. 123. chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
The Court disposes of this tremendous practical difference between court-enforced and union-enforced fines by suggesting that Congress was not concerned with "the permissible means of enforcement of union fines," and that court-enforcement of fines is a necessary consequence of the "contract theory" of the union-member relationship. And then the Court cautions that its holding may only apply to court enforcement of "reasonable fines." Apparently the Court believes that these considerations somehow bring reasonable court-enforced fines within the ambit of "internal union affairs." There is no basis either historically or logically for this conclusion or the considerations upon which it is based. First, the Court says that disciplinary fines were commonplace at the time the Taft-Hartley Act was passed, and thus Congress could not have meant to prohibit these "traditional internal union discipline" measures without saying so. Yet there is not one word in the authorities cited by the Court that indicates that court enforcement of fines was commonplace or traditional in 1947, and, to the contrary, until recently, unions rarely resorted to court enforcement of union fines. [Footnote 2/3] Second, Congress' unfamiliarity in 1947 with this recent innovation and consequent failure to make any distinction between union-enforced and court-enforced fines cannot support the conclusion that Congress was unconcerned with the "means" a union uses to enforce its fines. Congress was expressly concerned with enacting "rules of the game" for unions to abide by. 93 Cong.Rec. 4436, II Leg.Hist. 1206. As noted by the Labor Board the year after § (b)(1)(A) chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
was passed, "[i]n that Section Congress was aiming at means, not at ends." Perry Norvell Co., 80 N.L.R.B. 225, 239. At the very least, Congress intended to preclude a union's use of certain means to collect fines. It is clear, as the Court recognizes, that Congress, in enacting § 8(b)(2), was concerned with insulating an employee's job from his union membership. If the union here had attempted to enforce the payment of the fines by persuading the employer to discharge the nonpaying employees or to withhold the fines from their wages, it would have clearly been guilty of an unfair labor practice under § 8(b)(2). [Footnote 2/4] If the union here, operating under a union shop contract, had applied the employees' dues to the satisfaction of the fines and then charged them extra dues, that, under Board decisions, would have been a violation of § 8(b)(1)(A), since it would have jeopardized the employees' jobs. [Footnote 2/5] Yet here, the union has resorted to equally effective outside assistance to enforce the payment of its fines, and the Court holds that within the ambit of "internal union discipline." I have already pointed to the impact that $100 per day court-enforced fines may have on an employee's job -- they would totally discourage him from working at all -- and I fail to see how court enforcement of union fines is any more "internal" than employer enforcement. The undeniable fact is that the union resorts to outside help when it is not strong enough to enforce obedience internally. And even if the union does not resort to outside help, but uses threats of physical violence by its officers or other members to compel payment of its fines, chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
Finally, the Court attempts to justify court-enforcement of fines by comparing it to judicial enforcement of the provisions of an ordinary commercial contract -- a comparison which, according to the Court's own authority, is simply "a legal fabrication." [Footnote 2/6] The contractual theory of union membership, at least until recently, was a fiction used by the courts to justify judicial intervention in union affairs to protect employees, not to help unions. I cannot believe that Congress intended the effectiveness of § 8(b)(1)(A) to be impaired by such a fiction, [Footnote 2/7] or that it was content to rely on the state courts' use of this fiction to protect members from union coercion. [Footnote 2/8] Particularly is that so where the "contract" between the union and the employee is the involuntary chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
The repeated refrain of the debates on § 8(b)(1)(A) was actually that it was aimed to secure "equality . . . between employers and employees." [Footnote 2/9] Over and over chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
93 Cong.Rec. 4023, II Leg.Hist. 1028. (Emphasis added.) chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
It is true that the Senate sponsors of § 8(b)(1)(A) were primarily concerned with coercive organizational tactics of unions, and that most of the examples of abuse referred to in the debates concerned threats of violence chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
Twice during the debate, Senator Taft emphatically stated that the section guarantees employees who wished to work during a strike the right to do so. [Footnote 2/16] Though on neither occasion did he expressly chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
Third, the Court recognizes -- without holding chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
The Court seeks further support for its holding by reference to the fact that the 1959 Landrum-Griffin chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
The union here had a union security clause in its contract with Allis-Chalmers. That clause made it necessary chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
The Court suggests that this problem is not present here, because the fined employees failed to prove they enjoyed other than full union membership, that their role in the union was not, in fact, limited to the obligation of paying dues. For several reasons, I am unable to agree with the Court's approach. Few employees forced to become "members" of the union by virtue of the union security clause will be aware of the fact that they must somehow "limit" their membership to avoid the union's court-enforced fines. Even those who are brash enough to attempt to do so may be unfamiliar with how to do it. Must they refrain from doing anything but paying dues, or will signing the routine union pledge still leave them with less than full membership? And finally, it is clear that what restrains the employee from going to work during a union strike is the union's threat that it will fine him and collect the fine from him in court. How many employees in a union shop whose names appear on the union's membership rolls will be willing to ignore that threat in the hope that they will later be able to convince the Labor Board or chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
The National Labor Relations Act, as originally passed and amended from time to time, is the work product of draftsmen skilled by long experience in labor affairs. These draftsmen thoroughly understood labor legislation terminology, especially the oft-used words "restrain or coerce." Sections 7 and 8 together bespeak a strong purpose of Congress to leave workers wholly free to determine in what concerted labor activities they will engage or decline to engage. This freedom of workers to go their own way in this field, completely unhampered by pressures of employers or unions, is and always has been a basic purpose of the labor legislation now under consideration. In my judgment, it ill behooves this Court to strike so diligently to defeat this unequivocally declared purpose of Congress merely because the Court believes that too much freedom of choice for workers will impair the effective power of unions. Cf. Vaca v. Sipes, 386 U. S. 171, 386 U. S. 203 (dissenting opinion). A court-enforced fine is certainly coercive, certainly affects the employee's job, and certainly is not a traditional method of internal union discipline. When applied by a union to an employee who has joined it as a condition of obtaining employment in a union shop, it defeats the provisions of the Act designed to prevent union security clauses chanroblesvirtualawlibrary
See 388 U. S. 1, supra; statement by Senator Taft quoted in n 25 of the Court's opinion.