Source: http://www.chanrobles.com/usa/us_supremecourt/512/246/case.php
Timestamp: 2018-07-18 22:23:55
Document Index: 227643974

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 378', '§ 378', '§ 151', '§ 151', '§ 152', '§ 153', '§ 301', '§ 301']

HAWAIIAN AIRLINES, INC. v. NORRIS - US SUPREME COURT DECISIONS ON-LINE
US Supreme Court Decisions - On-Line> Volume 512 > HAWAIIAN AIRLINES, INC. v. NORRIS
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*Together with Finazzo et al. v. Norris, also on certiorari to the same court (see this Court's Rule 12.2).cralaw
Briefs of amici curiae urging affirmance were filed for the State of Hawaii et al. by Robert A. Marks, Attorney General of Hawaii, and Stevencralaw
S. Michaels, Deputy Attorney General, Grant Woods, Attorney General of Arizona, Richard Blumenthal, Attorney General of Connecticut, Robert A. Butterworth, Attorney General of Florida, Roland W Burris, Attorney General of Illinois, Pamela Fanning Carter, Attorney General of Indiana, Robert T. Stephan, Attorney General of Kansas, Michael E. Carpenter, Attorney General of Maine, Frank J. Kelley, Attorney General of Michigan, Jeremiah W (Jay) Nixon, Attorney General of Missouri, Joseph P. Mazurek, Attorney General of Montana, Tom Udall, Attorney General of New Mexico, Ernest D. Preate, Jr., Attorney General of Pennsylvania, Darrell V. McGraw, Jr., Attorney General of West Virginia, and Richard Weil, Acting Attorney General of the Northern Mariana Islands; for the Allied Educational Foundation by Bertram R. Gelfand and Jeffrey C. Dannenberg; for the National Employment Lawyers Association by Mary Ann B. Oakley, Janette Johnson, and Robert B. Fitzpatrick; and for the Railway Labor Executives' Association by John O'B. Clarke, Jr.cralaw
1 In response, the FAA initiated a comprehensive investigation, proposed a civil penalty of $964,000 against HAL, proposed the revocation of the license of the supervisor who terminated respondent, and ultimately settled all charges for a substantial fine.cralaw
2 The Hawaii Whistleblower Protection Act forbids an employer to "discharge, threaten, or otherwise discriminate against an employee ... because ... [t]he employee ... reports or is about to report to a public body ... a violation or a suspected violation of a law or rule adopted pursuant to law of this State, a political subdivision of this State, or the United States, unless the employee knows that the report is false." § 378-62(1). The Act authorizes an employee to file a civil action seeking injunctive relief and actual damages. § 378-63(a).cralaw
3 These managerial officers, petitioners here, are Paul J. Finazzo, Howard E. Ogden, and Hatsuo Honma.cralaw
Congress' purpose in passing the RLA was to promote stability in labor-management relations by providing a comprehensive framework for resolving labor disputes. Atchison, T. & S. F. R. Co. v. Buell, 480 U. S. 557, 562 (1987); see also 45 U. S. C. § 151a. To realize this goal, the RLA establishes a mandatory arbitral mechanism for "the prompt and orderly settlement" of two classes of disputes. 45 U. S. C. § 151a. The first class, those concerning "rates of pay, rules or working conditions," ibid., are deemed "major" disputes. Major disputes relate to "'the formation of collective [bargaining] agreements or efforts to secure them.'" Conrail, 491 U. S., at 302, quoting Elgin, J. & E. R. Co. v. Burley, 325 U. S. 711, 723 (1945). The second class of disputes, known as "minor" disputes, "gro[w] out of grievances or out of the interpretation or application of agreements covering ratescralaw
The Court's inquiry into the scope of minor disputes begins, of course, with the text of the statute. Petitioners point out that the statute defines minor disputes to include "disputes ... growing out of grievances, or out of the interpretation or application of [CBA's]." Petitioners argue that this disjunctive language must indicate that "grievances" means something other than labor-contract disputes, else the term "grievances" would be superfluous. Accordingly, petitioners suggest that "grievances" should be read to mean all employment-related disputes, including those based on statutory or common law. Even if we were persuaded that the word "or" carried this weight, but cf. United States v. Olano, 507 U. S. 725, 732 (1993) (reading "error or defect" to create one category of "error"), citing United States v. Young, 470 U. S. 1, 15, n. 12 (1985); McNally v. United States, 483 U. S. 350, 358-359 (1987) (second phrase in disjunctive added simply to make the meaning of the first phrase "unmistakable"), petitioners' interpretation produces an overlap not unlike the one it purports to avoid. Theircralaw
We think it more likely that "grievances," like disputes over "the interpretation or application" of CBA's, refers to disagreements over how to give effect to the bargained-for agreement. The use of "grievance" to refer to a claim arising out of a CBA is common in the labor-law context in general, see, e. g., Paperworkers v. Misco, Inc., 484 U. S. 29, 36 (1987), and it has been understood in this way in the RLA context. See H. R. Rep. No. 1944, 73d Cong., 2d Sess., 2-3 (1934) (referring to RLA settlement of "minor disputes known as 'grievances,' which develop from the interpretation and/or application of the contracts between the labor unions and the carriers"). Significantly, the adjustment boards charged with administration of the minor-dispute provisions have understood these provisions as pertaining only to disputes invoking contract-based rights. See, e. g., NRAB Fourth Div. Award No. 4548 (1987) (function of the National Rail Adjustment Board (Board) is to decide disputes in accordance with the controlling CBA); NRAB Third Div. Award No. 24348 (1983) (issues not related to the interpretation or application of contracts are outside the Board's authority); NRAB Third Div. Award No. 19790 (1973) ("[T]his Board lacks jurisdiction to enforce rights created by State or Federal Statutes and is limited to questions arising out of interpretations and application of Railway Labor Agreements"); Northwest Airlines/Airline Pilots Assn., Int'l System Bd. of Adjustment, Decision of June 28, 1972, p. 13 ("[B]oth the traditional role of the arbitrator and admonitions of the courts require the Board to refrain from attempting to construe any of the provisions of the [RLA]"); United Airlines, Inc., 48 LA 727, 733 (BNA) (1967) ("Thecralaw
5 Petitioners cite the statute's reference to the parties' general duties as including "settl[ing] all disputes, whether arising out of the application of [collective bargaining] agreements or otherwise." 45 U. S. C. § 152 First. This provision, which is phrased more broadly than the operative language of § 153 First (i), does not clearly refer only to minor disputes. But even if this provision is read to require parties to try to settle certain issues arising out of the employment relationship but not specifically addressed by the CBA, this does not compel the conclusion that all issues touching on the employment relationship must be resolved through arbitration or that all claims involving rights and duties that exist independent of the CBA are thereby pre-empted. Our precedents squarely reject this pervasive pre-emption.cralaw
Moreover, we have held that the RLA's mechanism for resolving minor disputes does not pre-empt causes of action to enforce rights that are independent of the CBA. More than 60 years ago, the Court rejected a railroad's argument that the existence of the RLA arbitration scheme preempted a state statute regulating the number of workers required to operate certain equipment. Missouri Pacific R. Co. v. Norwood, 283 U. S. 249, 258 (1931) ("No analysis or discussion of the provisions of the Railway Labor Act of 1926 is necessary to show that it does not conflict with the Arkansas statutes under consideration"). Not long thereafter, the Court rejected a claim that the RLA pre-empted an order by the Illinois Commerce Commission requiring cabooses on all trains; the operative CBA required cabooses only on some of the trains. Terminal Railroad Assn. of St. Louis v. Train-cralaw
6 Buell, of course, involved possible RLA preclusion of a cause of action arising out of a federal statute, while this case involves RLA pre-emption of a cause of action arising out of state law and existing entirely independent of the CBA. That distinction does not rob Buell of its force in this context. See Lingle v. Norge Div. of Magic Chef, Inc., 486 U. S. 399, 412 (1988) (Buell principles applicable to determine whether federal labor law pre-empts a state statute). Principles of federalism demand no less caution in finding that a federal statute pre-empts state law. See Fort Halifax Packing Co. v. Coyne, 482 U. S. 1, 21 (1987) (pre-emption of state statute "should not be lightly inferred in this [labor] area, since the establishment of labor standards falls within the traditional police power of the State").cralaw
7 Section 301(a) provides federal-court jurisdiction over controversies involving CBA's and "authorizes federal courts to fashion a body of federallaw for the enforcement of these collective bargaining agreements." Textile Workers v. Lincoln Mills of Ala., 353 U. S. 448, 451 (1957).cralaw
8The Court applies these principles in Livadas v. Bradshaw, in which we reject the claim that an employee's state-law right to receive a penalty payment from her employer was pre-empted under § 301 because the penalty was pegged to her wages, which were determined by the governing CBA. The Court states that "when the meaning of contract terms is not the subject of dispute, the bare fact that a collective-bargaining agreement will be consulted in the course of state-law litigation plainly does not require the claim to be extinguished." Ante, at 124, citing Lingle v. Norge Div. of Magic Chef, Inc., 486 U. S., at 413, n. 12. In addition, it reaffirms that "§ 301 cannot be read broadly to pre-empt nonnegotiable rights conferred on individual employees as a matter of state law." Ante, at 123.cralaw
The Court's ruling in Lingle that the LMRA pre-empts state law only if a state-law claim is dependent on the interpretation of a CBA is fully consistent with the holding in Buell, 480 U. S., at 564-565, that the RLA does not pre-empt "substantive protection ... independent of the [CBA]," with the holding in Terminal Railroad, 318 U. S., at 7, that the RLA does not pre-empt basic "protection ... laid down by state authority," with the conclusion in Andrews, 406 U. S.,cralaw
Lower courts, too, have recognized the appropriateness of the Lingle standard to RLA pre-emption analysis. See, e. g., Anderson v. American Airlines, Inc., 2 F.3d 590, 595 (CA5 1993) (applying Lingle to analyze RLA pre-emption); Davies v. American Airlines, Inc., 971 F.2d 463, 466467 (CAW 1992) (same), cert. denied, 508 U. S. 950 (1993); O'Brien v. Consolidated Rail Corp., 972 F.2d 1, 4 (CA1 1992) (same), cert. denied, 506 U. S. 1054 (1993); Maher v. New Jersey Transit Rail Operations, Inc., 125 N. J. 455, 472-473, 593 A. 2d 750, 758 (1991) (same). But see, e. g., Hubbard v. United Airlines, Inc., 927 F.2d 1094, 1097 (CA9 1991) (Lingle does not govern in RLA cases); Lorenz v. CSX Transp., Inc., 980 F.2d 263, 268 (CA4 1992) (same).cralaw
10 See Detroit & Toledo Shore Line R. Co. v. Transportation Union, 396 U. S. 142, 154-155 (1969) ("Where a condition is satisfactorily tolerable to both sides, it is often omitted from the agreement, and it has been suggested that this practice is more frequent in the railroad industry than in most others") (emphasis added); Consolidated Rail Corporation v. Railway Labor Executives' Assn., 491 U. S. 299, 311-312 (1989) (recognizing that CBA's include implied terms arising from "'practice, usage and custom' "); see also Steelworkers v. Warrior & Gulf Nav. Co., 363 U. S. 574, 578-579 (1960) (a CBA is "more than a contract; it is a generalized code to govern a myriad of cases which the draft[ers] cannot wholly anticipate").cralaw
Petitioners, however, pin their hopes on the observation that "[w]here an employer asserts a contractual right to take the contested action, the ensuing dispute is minor if the action is arguably justified by the terms of the parties' collective-bargaining agreement." 491 U. S., at 307 (emphasis added). They argue that this action involves a minor dispute because the termination of respondent was "arguably justified" by the CBA's provision permitting termination for "just cause." This "arguably justified" standard, however, was employed only for policing the line between major and minor disputes. Recognizing that accepting a party's characterization of a dispute as "minor" ran the risk of under-cralaw