Source: http://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/386/171
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Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 8', '§ 8', '§ 7', '§ 8', '§ 8', '§ 8', '§ 301', '§ 14', '§ 701', '§ 1', '§ 8', '§ 1443', '§ 301', '§ 301', '§ 301', '§ 301', '§ 301', '§ 203', '§ 203', '§ 301', '§ 301', '§ 301', '§ 301', '§ 10', '§ 1436']

Manuel VACA et al., Petitioners, v. Niles SIPES, Administrator of the Estate of Benjamin Owens, Jr., Deceased. | Supreme Court | LII / Legal Information Institute
Supreme Court aboutsearch liibulletin subscribe previews Manuel VACA et al., Petitioners, v. Niles SIPES, Administrator of the Estate of Benjamin Owens, Jr., Deceased.
386 U.S. 171 (87 S.Ct. 903, 17 L.Ed.2d 842)
Argued: Nov. 17, 1966.
[HTML] concurrence, FORTAS, HARLAN
[HTML] Syllabus from pages 171-172 intentionally omitted
and of its Kansas City Local No. 12 (the Union), in the Circuit Court of Jackson County, Missouri. Owens, a Union member, alleged that he had been discharged from his employment at Swift & Company's (Swift) Kansas City Meat Packing Plant in violation of the collective bargaining agreement then in force between Swift and the Union, and that the Union had 'arbitrarily, capriciously and without just or reasonable reason or cause' refused to take his grievance with Swift to arbitration under the fifth step of the bargaining agreement's grievance procedures.
Petitioners' answer included the defense that the Missouri courts lacked jurisdiction because the gravamen of Owens' suit was 'arguably and basically' an unfair labor practice under § 8(b) of the National Labor Relations Act (N.L.R.A.), as amended, 61 Stat. 141, 29 U.S.C. 158(b), within the exclusive jurisdiction of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB). After a jury trial, a verdict was returned awarding Owens $7,000 compensatory and $3,300 punitive damages. The trial judge set aside the verdict and entered judgment for petitioners on the ground that the NLRB had exclusive jurisdiction over this controversy, and the Kansas City Court of Appeals affirmed. The Supreme Court of Missouri reversed and directed reinstatement of the jury's verdict,
relying on this Court's decisions in International Assn. of Machinists v. Gonzales, 356 U.S. 617, 78 S.Ct. 923, 2 L.Ed.2d 1018, and in International Union, United Automobile, etc. Workers of America v. Russell, 356 U.S. 634, 78 S.Ct. 932, 2 L.Ed.2d 1030. 397 S.W.2d 658. During the appeal, Owens died and respondent, the administrator of Owens' estate, was substituted. We granted certiorari to consider whether exclusive jurisdiction lies with the NLRB and, if not, whether the finding of Union liability and the relief afforded Owens are consistent with governing principles of federal labor law. 384 U.S. 969, 86 S.Ct. 1863, 16 L.Ed.2d 1863. The American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFLCIO), Swift, and the United States have filed amicus briefs supporting petitioners. Although we conclude that state courts have jurisdiction in this type of case, we hold that federal law governs, that the governing federal standards were not applied here, and that the judgment of the Supreme Court of Missouri must accordingly be reversed.
On February 6, 1961, the Union sent Owens to a new doctor at Union expense 'to see if we could get some better medical evidence so that we could go to arbitration with his case.' R., at 107. This examination did not support Owens' position. When the Union received the report, its executive board voted not to take the Owens grievance to arbitration because of insufficient medical evidence. Union officers suggested to Owens that he accept Swift's offer of referral to a rehabilitation center, and the grievance was suspended for that purpose. Owens rejected this alternative and demanded that the Union take his grievance to arbitration, but the Union refused. With his contractual remedies thus stalled at the fourth step, Owens brought this suit. The grievance was finally dismissed by the Union and Swift shortly before trial began in June 1964.
In his charge to the jury, the trial judge instructed that petitioners would be liable if Swift had wrongfully discharged Owens and if the Union had 'arbitrarily * * * and without just cause or excuse * * * refused' to press Owens' grievance to arbitration. Punitive damages could also be awarded, the trial judge charged, if the Union's conduct was 'willful, wanton and malicious.' However, the jury must return a verdict for the defendants, the judge instructed, 'if you find and believe from the evidence that the union and its representatives acted reasonably and in good faith in the handling and processing of the grievance of the plaintiff.' R., at 161162. The jury then returned the general verdict for Owens which eventually was reinstated by the Missouri Supreme Court.
Although N.L.R.A. § 8(b) was enacted in 1947, the NLRB did not until Miranda Fuel interpret a breach of a union's duty of fair representation as an unfair labor practice. In Miranda Fuel, the Board's majority held that N.L.R.A. § 7 gives employees 'the right to be free from unfair or irrelevant or invidious treatment by their exclusive bargaining agent in matters affecting their employment,' and 'that Section 8(b)(1)(A) of the Act accordingly prohibits labor organizations, when acting in a statutory representative capacity, from taking action against any employee upon considerations or classifications which are irrelevant, invidious, or unfair.' 140 N.L.R.B., at 185. The Board also held that an employer who 'participates' in such arbitrary union conduct violates § 8(a)(1), and that the employer and the union may violate §§ 8(a)(3) and 8(b)(2), respectively, 'when, for arbitrary or irrelevant reasons or upon the basis of an unfair classification, the union attempts to cause or does cause an employer to derogate the employment status of an employee.'
'Congress did not merely law down a substantive rule of law to be enforced by any tribunal competent to apply law generally to the parties. It went on to confide primary interpretation and application of its rules to a specific and specially constituted tribunal * * *. Congress evidently considered that centralized administration of specially designed procedures was necessary to obtain uniform application of its substantive rules and to avoid these diversities and conflicts likely to result from a variety of local procedures and attitudes toward labor controversies. * * * A multiplicity of tribunals and a diversity of procedures are quite as apt to produce incompatible or conflicting adjudications as are different rules of substantive law.' Garner v. Teamsters, etc., Union, 346 U.S. 485, 490491, 74 S.Ct. 161, 165166, 98 L.Ed. 228.
This pre-emption doctrine, however, has never been rigidly applied to cases where it could not fairly be inferred that Congress intended exclusive jurisdiction to lie with the NLRB. Congress itself has carved out exceptions to the Board's exclusive jurisdiction: Section 303 of the Labor Management Relations Act, 1947, 61 Stat. 158, 29 U.S.C. 187, expressly permits anyone injured by a violation of N.L.R.A. § 8(b)(4) to recover damages in a federal court even though such unfair labor practices are also remediable by the Board; § 301 of that Act, 61 Stat. 156, 29 U.S.C. 185, permits suits for breach of a collective bargaining agreement regardless of whether the particular breach is also an unfair labor practice within the jurisdiction of the Board (see Smith v. Evening News Assn., 371 U.S. 195, 83 S.Ct. 267, 9 L.Ed.2d 246); and N.L.R.A. § 14, as amended by Title VII, § 701(a) of the Labor-Management Reporting and Disclosure Act of 1959, 73 Stat. 541, 29 U.S.C. 164(c), permits state agencies and courts to assume jurisdiction 'over labor disputes over which the Board declines, pursuant to paragraph (1) of this subsection, to assert jurisdiction' (compare Guss v. Utah Labor Relations Board, 353 U.S. 1, 77 S.Ct. 598, 609, 1 L.Ed.2d 601).
In addition to these congressional exceptions, this Court has refused to hold state remedies pre-empted 'where the activity regulated was a merely peripheral concern of the Labor Management Relations Act. * * * (or) touched interests so deeply rooted in local feeling and responsibility that in the absence of compelling congressional direction, we could not infer that Congress has deprived the States of the power to act.' San Diego Building Trades Council v. Garmon, 359 U.S., at 243244, 79 S.Ct. at 779. See, e.g., Linn v. United Plant Guard Workers, 383 U.S. 53, 86 S.Ct. 657, 15 L.Ed.2d 582 (libel); International Union, United Automobile, etc., Workers of America v. Russell, 356 U.S. 634, 78 S.Ct. 932, 2 L.Ed.2d 1030 (violence); International Assn. of Machinists v. Gonzales, 356 U.S. 617, 78 S.Ct. 923, 2 L.Ed.2d 1018 (wrongful expulsion from union membership); Allen-Bradley Local No. 1111, United Electrical, etc., Workers v. Wisconsin Employment Relations Board, 315 U.S. 740, 62 S.Ct. 820, 86 L.Ed. 1154 (mass picketing). See also Hanna Mining Co. v. District 2, Marine Engineers Beneficial Assn., 382 U.S. 181, 86 S.Ct. 327, 15 L.Ed.2d 254. While these exceptions in no way undermine the vitality of the pre-emption rule where applicable, they demonstrate that the decision to pre-empt federal and state court jurisdiction over a given class of cases must depend upon the nature of the particular interests being asserted and the effect upon the administration of national labor policies of concurrent judicial and administrative remedies.
A primary justification for the pre-emption doctrinethe need to avoid conflicting rules of substantive law in the labor relations area and the desirability of leaving the development of such rules to the administrative agency created by Congress for that purposeis not applicable to cases involving alleged breaches of the union's duty of fair representation. The doctrine was judicially developed in Steele and its progeny, and suits alleging breach of the duty remained judicially cognizable long after the NLRB was given unfair labor practice jurisdiction over union activities by the L.M.R.A.
Moreover when the Board declared in Miranda Fuel that a union's breach of its duty of fair representation would henceforth be treated as an unfair labor practice, the Board adopted and applied the doctrine as it had been developed by the federal courts. See 140 N.L.R.B., at 184 186. Finally, as the dissenting Board members in Miranda Fuel have pointed out, fair representation duty suits often require review of the substantive positions taken and policies pursued by a union in its negotiation of a collective bargaining agreement and in its handling of the grievance machinery; as these matters are not normally within the Board's unfair labor practice jurisdiction, it can be doubted whether the Board brings substantially greater expertise to bear on these problems than do the courts, which have been engaged in this type of review since the Steele decision.
In addition to the above considerations, the unique interests served by the duty of fair representation doctrine have a profound effect, in our opinion, on the applicability of the pre-emption rule to this class of cases. The federal labor laws seek to promote industrial peace and the improvement of wages and working conditions by fostering a system of employee organization and collective bargaining. See N.L.R.A. § 1, as amended, 61 Stat. 136, 29 U.S.C. 151. The collective bargaining system as encouraged by Congress and administered by the NLRB of necessity subordinates the interests of an individual employee to the collective interests of all employees in a bargaining unit. See, e.g., J. I. Case Co. v. N.L.R.B., 321 U.S. 332, 64 S.Ct. 576, 88 L.Ed. 762. This Court recognized in Steele that the congressional grant of power to a union to act as exclusive collective bargaining representative, with its corresponding reduction in the individual rights of the employees so represented, would raise grave constitutional problems if unions were free to exercise this power to further racial discrimination. 323 U.S., at 198199, 65 S.Ct., at 230231, 89 L.Ed. 173. Since that landmark decision, the duty of fair representation has stood as a bulwark to prevent arbitrary union conduct against individuals stripped of traditional forms of redress by the provisions of federal labor law. Were we to hold, as petitioners and the Government urge, that the courts are foreclosed by the NLRB's Miranda Fuel decision from this traditional supervisory jurisdiction, the individual employee injured by arbitrary or discriminatory union conduct could no longer be assured of impartial review of his complaint, since the Board's General Counsel has unreviewable discretion to refuse to institute an unfair labor practice complaint. See United Electrical Contractors Assn. v. Ordman, 366 F.2d 776 (C.A.2d Cir., 1966), cert. denied, 385 U.S. 1026, 87 S.Ct. 753, 17 L.Ed.2d 674.
The existence of even a small group of cases in which the Board would be unwilling or unable to remedy a union's breach of duty would frustrate the basic purposes underlying the duty of fair representation doctrine. For these reasons, we cannot assume from the NLRB's tardy assumption of jurisdiction in these cases that Congress, when it enacted N.L.R.A. § 8(b) in 1947, intended to oust the courts of their traditional jurisdiction to curb arbitrary conduct by the individual employee's statutory representative.
against the employer to compel arbitration of the employee's grievance, the adjudication of the claim by the arbitrator, or a suit to enforce the resulting arbitration award. See, e.g., United Steelworkers of America v. American Mfg. Co., 363 U.S. 564, 80 S.Ct. 1343, 4 L.Ed.2d 1403.
An obvious situation in which the employee should not be limited to the exclusive remedial procedures established by the contract occurs when the conduct of the employer amounts to a repudiation of those contractual procedures. Cf. Drake Bakeries, Inc. v. Local 50, Am. Bakery, etc., Workers, 370 U.S. 254, 260 263, 82 S.Ct. 1346, 13501352, 8 L.Ed.2d 474. See generally 6A Corbin, Contracts § 1443 (1962). In such a situation (and there may of course be others), the employer is estopped by his own conduct to rely on the unexhausted grievance and arbitration procedures as a defense to the employee's cause of action.
We think that another situation when the employee may seek judicial enforcement of his contractual rights arises, if, as is true here, the union has sole power under the contract to invoke the higher stages of the grievance procedure, and if, as is alleged here, the employee-plaintiff has been prevented from exhausting his contractual remedies by the union's wrongful refusal to process the grievance. It is true that the employer in such a situation may have done nothing to prevent exhaustion of the exclusive contractual remedies to which he agreed in the collective bargaining agreement. But the employer has committed a wrongful discharge in breach of that agreement, a breach which could be remedied through the grievance process to the employee-plaintiff's benefit were it not for the union's breach of its statutory duty of fair representation to the employee. To leave the employee remediless in such circumstances would, in our opinion, be a great injustice. We cannot believe that Congress, in conferring upon employers and unions the power to establish exclusive grievance procedures, intended to confer upon unions such unlimited discretion to deprive injured employees of all remedies for breach of contract. Nor do we think that Congress intended to shield employers from the natural consequences of their breaches of bargaining agreements by wrongful union conduct in the enforcement of such agreements. Cf. Richardson v. Texas & N.O.R. Co., 242 F.2d 230, 235236 (C.A.5th Cir.).
We may assume for present purposes that such a breach of duty by the union is an unfair labor practice, as the NLRB and the Fifth Circuit have held. The employee's suit against the employer, however, remains a § 301 suit, and the jurisdiction of the courts is no more destroyed by the fact that the employee, as part and parcel of his § 301 action, finds it necessary to prove an unfair labor practice by the union, than it is by the fact that the suit may involve an unfair labor practice by the employer himself. The court is free to determine whether the employee is barred by the actions of his union representative, and, if not, to proceed with the case. And if, to facilitate his case, the employee joins the union as a defendant, the situation is not substantially changed. The action is still a § 301 suit, and the jurisdiction of the courts is not pre-empted under the Garmon principle. This, at the very least, is the holding of Humphrey v. Moore, supra, with respect to pre-emption, as petitioners recognize in their brief. And, insofar as adjudication of the union's breach of duty is concerned, the result should be no different if the employee, as Owens did here, sues the employer and the union in separate actions. There would be very little to commend a rule which would permit the Missouri courts to adjudicate the Union's conduct in an action against Swift but not in an action against the Union itself.
For the above reasons, it is obvious that the courts will be compelled to pass upon whether there has been a breach of the duty of fair representation in the context of many § 301 breach-of-contract actions. If a breach of duty by the union and a breach of contract by the employer are proven, the court must fashion an appropriate remedy. Presumably, in at least some cases, the union's breach of duty will have enhanced or contributed to the employee's injury. What possible sense could there be in a rule which would permit a court that has litigated the fault of employer and union to fashion a remedy only with respect to the employer? Under such a rule, either the employer would be compelled by the court to pay for the union's wrongslight deterrence, indeed, to future union misconductor the injured employee would be forced to go to two tribunals to repair a single injury. Moreover, the Board would be compelled in many cases either to remedy injuries arising out of a breach of contract, a task which Congress has not assigned to it, or to leave the individual employee without remedy for the union's wrong.
Given the strong reasons for not pre-empting duty of fair representation suits in general, and the fact that the courts in many § 301 suits must adjudicate whether the union has breached its duty, we conclude that the courts may also fashion remedies for such a breach of duty.
A breach of the statutory duty of fair representation occurs only when a union's conduct toward a member of the collective bargaining unit is arbitrary, discriminatory, or in bad faith. See Humphrey v. Moore, supra; Ford Motor Co. v. Huffman, supra. There has been considerable debate over the extent of this duty in the context of a union's enforcement of the grievance and arbitration procedures in a collective bargaining agreement. See generally Blumrosen, The Worker and Three Phases of Unionism: Administrative and Judicial Control of the Worker-Union Relationship, 61 Mich.L.Rev. 1435, 14821501 (1963); Comment, Federal Protection of Individual Rights under Labor Contracts, 73 Yale L.J. 1215 (1964). Some have suggested that every individual employee should have the right to have his grievance taken to arbitration.
Though we accept the proposition that a union may not arbitrarily ignore a meritorious grievance or process it in perfunctory fashion, we do not agree that the individual employee has an absolute right to have his grievance taken to arbitration regardless of the provisions of the applicable collective bargaining agreement. In L.M.R.A. § 203(d), 61 Stat. 154, 29 U.S.C. 173(d), Congress declared that 'Final adjustment by a method agreed upon by the parties is * * * the desirable method for settlement of grievance disputes arising over the application or interpretation of an existing collective-bargaining agreement.' In providing for a grievance and arbitration procedure which gives the union discretion to supervise the grievance machinery and to invoke arbitration, the employer and the union contemplate that each will endeavor in good faith to settle grievances short of arbitration. Through this settlement process, frivolous grievances are ended prior to the most costly and time-consuming step in the grievance procedures. Moreover, both sides are assured that similar complaints will be treated consistently, and major problem areas in the interpretation of the collective bargaining contract can be isolated and perhaps resolved. And finally, the settlement process furthers the interest of the union as statutory agent and as coauthor of the bargaining agreement in representing the employees in the enforcement of that agreement. See Cox, Rights Under a Labor Agreement, 69 Harv.L.Rev. 601 (1956).
If the individual employee could compel arbitration of his grievance regardless of its merit, the settlement machinery provided by the contract would be substantially undermined, thus destroying the employer's confidence in the union's authority and returning the individual grievant to the vagaries of independent and unsystematic negotiation. Moreover, under such a rule, a significantly greater number of grievances would proceed to arbitration.
This would greatly increase the cost of the grievance machinery and could so overburden the arbitration process as to prevent it from functioning successfully. See NLRB v. Acme Industrial Co., 385 U.S. 432, 438, 87 S.Ct. 565, 569, 17 L.Ed.2d 495; Ross, Distressed Grievance Procedures and Their Rehabilitation, in Labor Arbitration and Industrial Change, Proceedings of the 16th Annual Meeting, National Academy of Arbitrators 104 (1963). It can well be doubted whether the parties to collective bargaining agreements would long continue to provide for detailed grievance and arbitration procedures of the kind encouraged by L.M.R.A. § 203(d), supra, if their power to settle the majority of grievances short of the costlier and more time-consuming steps was limited by a rule permitting the grievant unilaterally to invoke arbitration. Nor do we see substantial danger to the interests of the individual employee if his statutory agent is given the contractual power honestly and in good faith to settle grievances short of arbitration. For these reasons, we conclude that a union does not breach its duty of fair representation, and thereby open up a suit by the employee for breach of contract, merely because it settled the grievance short of arbitration.
In administering the grievance and arbitration machinery as statutory agent of the employees, a union must, in good faith and in a nonarbitrary manner, make decisions as to the merits of particular grievances. See Humphrey v. Moore, 375 U.S. 335, 349 350, 84 S.Ct. 363, 371372, 11 L.Ed.2d 370; Ford Motor Co. v. Huffman, 345 U.S. 330, 337339, 73 S.Ct. 681, 685687, 97 L.Ed. 1048. In a case such as this, when Owens supplied the Union with medical evidence supporting his position, the Union might well have breached its duty had it ignored Owens' complaint or had it processed the grievance in a perfunctory manner. See Cox, Rights under a Labor Agreement, 69 Harv.L.Rev., at 632634. But here the Union processed the grievance into the fourth step, attempted to gather sufficient evidence to prove Owens' case, attempted to secure for Owens less vigorous work at the plant, and joined in the employer's efforts to have Owens rehabilitated. Only when these efforts all proved unsuccessful did the Union conclude both that arbitration would be fruitless and that the grievance should be dismissed. There was no evidence that any Union officer was personally hostile to Owens or that the Union acted at any time other than in good faith.
Having concluded that the individual employee has no absolute right to have his grievance arbitrated under the collective bargaining agreement at issue, and that a breach of the duty of fair representation is not established merely by proof that the underlying grievance was meritorious, we must conclude that that duty was not breached here.
1. In my view, a complaint by an employee that the union has breached its duty of fair representation is subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of the NLRB. It is a charge of unfair labor practice. See Miranda Fuel Co., 140 N.L.R.B. 181 (1962);
Local 12, United Rubber Workers, 150 N.L.R.B. 312, enforced, 368 F.2d 12 (C.A.5th Cir., 1966).
As is the case with most other unfair labor practices, the Board's jurisdiction is preemptive. Garner v. Teamsters, Chauffeurs and Helpers Union, No. 776, 346 U.S. 485, 74 S.Ct. 161, 98 L.Ed. 228 (1953); Guss v. Utah Labor Board, 353 U.S. 1, 77 S.Ct. 598, 1 L.Ed.2d 601 (1957); San Diego Building Trades Council v. Garmon, 359 U.S. 236, 79 S.Ct. 773, 3 L.Ed.2d 775 (1959); Local 438, Constr. Laborers v. Curry, 371 U.S. 542, 83 S.Ct. 531, 9 L.Ed.2d 514 (1963); Local 100 of the United Association of Journeymen & Apprentices v. Borden, 373 U.S. 690, 83 S.Ct. 1423, 10 L.Ed.2d 638 (1963); Local No. 207 International Assoc. of Bridge etc., Iron Workers v. Perko, 373 U.S. 701, 83 S.Ct. 1429, 10 L.Ed.2d 646 (1963); Liner v. Jafco, Inc., 375 U.S. 301, 84 S.Ct. 391, 11 L.Ed.2d 347 (1964). Cf. Woody v. Sterling Alum. Prods., Inc., 365 F.2d 448 (C.A.8th Cir. 1966), pet. for cert. pending, No. 946, O.T. 1966. There is no basis for failure to apply the pre-emption principle in the present case, and, as I shall discuss, strong reason for its application. The relationship between the union and the individual employee with respect to the processing of claims to employment rights under the collective bargaining agreement is fundamental to the design and operation of federal labor law. It is not 'merely peripheral,' as the Court's opinion states. It 'presents difficult problems of definition of status, problems which we have held are precisely 'of a kind most wisely entrusted initially to the agency charged with the day-to-day administration of the Act as a whole." Local No. 207 International Assoc. of Bridge etc., Iron Workers v. Perko, supra, 373 U.S., at 706, 83 S.Ct. at 1432. Accordingly, the judgment of the Supreme Court of Missouri should be reversed and the complaint dismissed for this reason and on this basis. I agree, however, that if it were assumed that jurisdiction of the subject matter exists, the judgment would still have to be reversed because of the use by the Missouri court of an improper standard for measuring the union's duty, and the absence of evidence to establish that the union refused further to process Owens' grievance because of bad faith or arbitrarily.
2. I regret the elaborate discussion in the Court's opinion of problems which are irrelevant. This is not an action by the employee against the employer, and the discussion of the requisites of such an action is, in my judgment, unnecessary, sue the employer under L.M.R.A. § 301; and that to maintain such an action the employee would have to show that he has exhausted his remedies under the collective bargaining agreement, or alternatively that he was prevented from doing so because the union breached its duty to him by failure completely to process his claim. That may be; or maybe all he would have to show to maintain an action against the employer for wrongful discharge is that he demanded that the union process his claim to exhaustion of available remedies, and that it refused to do so.
I see no need for the Court to pass upon that question, which is not presented here, and which, with all respect, lends no support to the Court's argument. The Court seems to use its discussion of the employee-employer litigation as somehow analogous to or supportive of its conclusion that the employee may maintain a court action against the union. But I do not believe that this follows. I agree that the NLRB's unfair labor practice jurisdiction does not preclude an action under § 301 against the employer for wrongful discharge from employment. Smith v. Evening News Assn., 371 U.S. 195, 83 S.Ct. 267, 9 L.Ed.2d 246 (1962). Therefore, Owens might have maintained an action against his employer in the present case. This would be an action to enforce the collective bargaining agreement, and Congress has authorized the courts to entertain actions of this type. But his claim against the union is quite different in character, as the Court itself recognizes. The Court holdsand I think correctly if the issue is to be reachedthat the union could not be required to pay damages measured by the breach of the employment contract, because it was not the union but the employer that breached the contract. I agree; but I suggest that this reveals the point for which I contend: that the employee's claim against the union is not a claim under the collective bargaining agreement, but a claim that the union has breached its statutory duty of fair representation. This claim, I submit, is a claim of unfair labor practice and it is within the exclusive jurisdiction of the NLRB. The Court agrees that 'one of the available remedies (obtainable, the Court says, by court action) when a breach of the union's duty is proved' is 'an order compelling arbitration.' This is precisely and uniquely the kind of order which is within the province of the Board. Beyond this, the Court is exceedingly vague as to remedy: 'appropriate damages or equitable relief' are suggested as possible remedies, apparently when arbitration is not available. Damages against the union, the Court admonishes, should be gauged 'according to the damage caused by (its) fault'i.e., the failure to exhaust remedies for the grievance. The Court's difficulty, it seems to me, reflects the basic awkwardness of its position: It is attempting to force into the posture of a contract violation an alleged default of the union which is not a violation of the collective bargaining agreement but a breach of its separate and basic duty fairly to represent all employees in the unit. This is an unfair labor practice, and should be treated as such.
3. If we look beyond logic and precedent to the policy of the labor relations design which Congress has provided, court jurisdiction of this type of actions seems anomalous and ill-advised. We are not dealing here with the interpretation of a contract or with an alleged breach of an employment agreement. As the Court in effect acknowledges, we are concerned with the subtleties of a union's statutory duty faithfully to represent employees in the unit, including those who may not be members of the union. The Courtregrettably, in my opinionventures to state judgments as to the metes and bounds of the reciprocal duties involved in the relationship between the union and the employee. In my opinion, this is precisely and especially the kind of judgment that Congress intended to entrust to the Board and which is well within the pre-emption doctrine that this Court has prudently stated.
See cases cited, supra, especially the Perko and Borden cases, the facts of which strongly parallel the situation in this case. See also Linn v. Plant Guard Workers, 383 U.S. 53, 72, 86 S.Ct. 657, 15 L.Ed.2d 582 (1966) (dissenting opinion). The nuances of union-employee and union-employer relationships are infinite and consequential, particularly when the issue is an amorphous as whether the union was proved guilty of 'arbitrary or bad-faith conduct' which the Court states as the standard applicable here. In all reason and in all good judgment, this jurisdiction should be left with the Board and not be placed in the courts especially with the complex and necessarily confusing guidebook that the Court now publishes.
The Court recognizes as it must, that the jury in this case found at least that Benjamin Owens was fit for work, that his grievance against Swift was meritorious, and that Swift breached the collective bargaining agreement when it wrongfully discharged him. The Court also notes in passing that Owens
has a separate action for breach of contract pending against Swift in the state courts. And in Part IV of its opinion, the Court vigorously insists that 'there is no reason to exempt the employer from contractual damages which he would otherwise have had to pay,' that the 'employee should have no difficulty recovering these damages from the employer' for his 'unrelated breach of contract,' and that 'the employee (is) assured of direct recovery from the employer.' But this reassurance in Part IV gives no comfort to Owens, for Part IV is based on the assumption that the union breached its duty to Owens, an assumption which, in Part III of its opinion, the Court finds unsupported by the facts of this case. What this all means, though the Court does not expressly say it, is that Owens will be no more successful in his pending breach-of-contract action against Swift than he is here in his suit against the union. For the Court makes it clear 'that the question of whether a union has breached its duty of fair representation will * * * be a critical issue in a suit under L.M.R.A. § 301,' that 'the wrongfully discharged employee may bring an action against his employer' only if he 'can prove that the union * * * breached its duty of fair representation in its handling of the employee's grievance,' and 'that the employee, as part and parcel of his § 301 action, finds it necessary to prove an unfair labor practice by the union.' Thus, when Owens attempts to proceed with his pending breach-of-contract action against Swift, Swift will undoubtedly secure its prompt dismissal by pointing to the Court's conclusion here that the union has not breached its duty of fair representation. Thus, Owens, who now has obtained a judicial determination that he was wrongfully discharged, is left remediless, and Swift, having breached its contract, is allowed to hide behind, and is shielded by, the union's conduct. I simply fail to see how it should make one iota of difference, as far as the 'unrelated breach of contract' by Swift is concerned, whether the union's conduct is wrongful or rightful. Neither precedent nor logic supports the Court's new announcement that it does.
The rule announced in Maddox, I thought, was a 'brainchild' of the Court's recent preference for arbitration. But I am unable to ascribe any such genesis to today's rule, for arbitration is precisely what Owens sought and preferred. Today the Court holds that an employee with a meritorious claim has no absolute right to have it either litigated or arbitrated. Fearing that arbitrators would be overworked, the Court allows unions unilaterally to determine not to take a grievance to arbitrationthe first step in the contract grievance procedure at which the claim would be presented to an impartial third partyas long as the union decisions are neither 'arbitrary' nor 'in bad faith.' The Court derives this standard of conduct from a long line of cases holding that '(a) breach of the statutory duty of fair representation occurs only when a union's conduct toward a member of the collective bargaining unit is arbitrary, discriminatory, or in bad faith.' What the Court overlooks is that those cases laid down this standard in the context of situations where the employee's sole or fundamental complaint was against the union. There was not the slightest hint in those cases that the same standard would apply where the employee's primary complaint was against his employer for breach of contract and where he only incidentally contended that the union's conduct prevented the adjudication, by either court or arbitrator, of the underlying grievance. If the Court here were satisfied with merely holding that in this situation the employee could not recover damages from the union unless the union breached its duty of fair representation, then it would be one thing to say that the union did not do so in making a good-faith decision not to take the employee's grievance to arbitration. But if, as the Court goes on to hold, the employee cannot sue his employer for breach of contract unless his failure to exhaust contractual remedies is due to the union's breach of its duty of fair representation, then I am quite unwilling to say that the union's refusal to exhaust such remedieshowever non-arbitrarydoes not amount to a breach of its duty. Either the employee should be able to sue his employer for breach of contract after having attempted to exhaust his contractual remedies, or the union should have an absolute duty to exhaust contractual remedies on his behalf. The merits of an employee's grievance would thus be determined by either a jury or an arbitrator. Under today's decision it will never be determined by either.
And it should be clear that the Court's opinion goes much further than simply holding that an employee has no absolute right to have the union take his grievance to arbitration. Here, of course, the union supervised the grievance into the fourth step of the contract machinery and dropped it just prior to arbitration on its belief that the outcome of arbitration would be unfavorable. But limited only by the standard of arbitrariness, there was clearly no need for the union to go that far. Suppose, for instance, the union had a rule that it would not prosecute a grievance even to the first step unless the grievance were filed by the employee within 24 hours after it arose. Pursuant to this rule, the union might completely refuse to prosecute a grievance filed several days late. Thus, the employee, no matter how meritorious his grievance, would get absolutely nowhere. And unless he could prove that the union's rule was arbitrary (a standard which no one can define), the employee would get absolutely no consideration of the merits of his grievanceeither by a jury, an arbitrator, nor by the employer, or by the union. The Court suggests three reasons for giving the union this almost unlimited discretion to deprive injured employees of all remedies for breach of contract. The first is that 'frivolous grievances' will be ended prior to time-consuming and costly arbitration. But here no one, not even the union, suggests that Benjamin Owens' grievance was frivolous. The union decided not to take it to arbitration simply because the union doubted the chance of success. Even if this was a good-faith doubt, I think the union had the duty to present this contested, but serious, claim to the arbitrator whose very function is to decide such claims on the basis of what he believes to be right. Second, the Court says that allowing the union to settle grievances prior to arbitration will assure consistent treatment of 'major problem areas in the interpretation of the collective bargaining contract.' But can it be argued that whether Owens was 'fit to work' presents a major problem in the interpretation of the collective bargaining agreement? The problem here was one of interpreting medical reports, not a collective bargaining agreement, and of evaluating other evidence of Owens' physical condition. I doubt whether consistency is either possible or desirable in determining whether a particular employee is able to perform a particular job. Finally, the Court suggests that its decision 'furthers the interest of the union as statutory agent.' I think this is the real reason for today's decision which entirely overlooks the interests of the injured employee, the only one who has anything to lose. Of course, anything which gives the union life and death power over those whom it is supposed to represent furthers its 'interest.' I simply fail to see how the union's legitimate role as statutory agent is undermined by requiring it to prosecute all serious grievances to a conclusion or by allowing the injured employee to sue his employer after he has given the union a chance to act on his behalf.
See Hughes Tool Co., 147 N.L.R.B. 1573, 15891590 (Chairman McCulloch and Member Fanning, dissenting in part).
The public interest in effectuating the policies of the federal labor laws, not the wrong done the individual employee, is always the Board's principal concern in fashioning unfair labor practice remedies. See N.L.R.A. § 10(c), as amended, 61 Stat. 147, 29 U.S.C. 160(c); Phelps Dodge Corp. v. N.L.R.B., 313 U.S. 177, 61 S.Ct. 845, 85 L.Ed. 1271. Thus, the General Counsel will refuse to bring complaints on behalf of injured employees where the injury complained of is 'insubstantial.' See Administrative Decision of the General Counsel, Case No. K610, Aug. 13, 1956, in CCH N.L.R.B. Decisions, 19561957, at Transfer Binder, 54,059.
If a grievance and arbitration procedure is included in the contract, but the parties do not intend it to be an exclusive remedy, then a suit for breach of contract will normally be heard even though such procedures have not been exhausted. See Republic Steel Corp. v. Maddox, 379 U.S. 650, 657658, 85 S.Ct. 614, 13 L.Ed.2d 580; 6A Corbin, Contracts § 1436 (1962).
Under current grievance practices, an attempt is usually made to keep the number of arbitrated grievances to a minimum. An officer of the National Union testified in this case that only one of 967 grievances filed at all of Swift's plants between September 1961 and October 1963 was taken to arbitration. And the AFLCIO's amicus brief reveals similar performances at General Motors Corporation and United States Steel Corporation, two of the Nation's largest unionized employers: less than .05% of all written grievances filed during a recent period at General Motors required arbitration, while only 5.6% of the grievances processed beyond the first step at United States Steel were decided by an arbitrator.
The opinion by Judge Thornberry for the Fifth Circuit supports the views expressed herein. See also Cox, The Duty of Fair Representation, 2 Vill.L.Rev. 151, 172173 (1957); Wellington, Union Democracy and Fair Representation: Federal Responsibility in a Federal System, 67 Yale L.J. 1327 (1958).
The Court argues that since the employee suing the employer for breach of the employment contract would have to show exhaustion of remedies under the contract, and since he would for this purpose have to show his demand on the union and, according to the Court, its wrongful failure to prosecute his grievance, the union could be joined as a party defendant; and since the union could be joined in such a suit, it may be sued independently of the employer. But this is a non sequitur. As the Court itself insists, the suit against the union is not for breach of the employment contract, but for violation of the duty fairly to represent the employee. This is an entirely different matter. It is a breach of statutory dutyan unfair labor practiceand not a breach of the employment contract.