Opinion ID: 1505488
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: The Effect of Brotherhood Representation on Constitutional Rights of Federation Members.

Text: The fourth contention of the Federation is that certain rules of the Brotherhood so proscribe the role colored men may play in that organization that representation by it of the coach cleaners will deprive members of the Federation of the equal protection of the laws and of property without due process of law in violation of the 14th amendment, U.S.C.A.Const. The constitution of the Brotherhood provides, in Section 6 (c), as follows: On railroads where the employment of colored persons has become a permanent institution, they shall be admitted to membership, in separate lodges. Where these separate lodges of negroes are organized they shall be under the jurisdiction of and represented by the delegates of the nearest white local in any meeting of the Joint Protective Board, Federation, or convention where delegates may be seated. Its constitution thus seems to indicate that colored participation in the Brotherhood is limited to membership in these separate lodges, and the Federation contends that Brotherhood representation means that the officers bargaining with the carrier in behalf of the coach cleaners will not be colored. Would such a limitation by the Brotherhood on the rights of its colored members operate here to deprive members of the Federation of any constitutional rights? The guarantees of the 14th amendment, U.S.C.A.Const., relate solely to action by a state government, [13] clearly absent here. Hence, any constitutional rights pertinent to the instant case are those guaranteed by the 5th amendment. Decisive of this constitutional issue is the established proposition that the 5th amendment relates only to governmental action, federal in character, not to action by private persons. Corrigan v. Buckley, 271 U.S. 323, 330, 46 S.Ct. 521, 70 L.Ed. 969. Thus the Brotherhood, a private association, acting on its own initiative and expressing its own will, may limit the rights of its colored members, without thereby offending the guarantees of the Constitution. Cf. Grovey v. Townsend, 295 U.S. 45, 55 S.Ct. 622, 79 L.Ed. 1292, 97 A.L.R. 680. The only governmental action in respect to the instant case consisted in the enactment of the Railway Labor Act and the functioning of the Board thereunder. Section 2 of the Act provides that the majority of any craft    shall have the right to determine who shall be the representative of the craft   . and the Board is authorized to conduct elections to determine such representative. The term representative, as found in the act, is defined to mean any person or persons, labor union, organization, or corporation designated    by    employees, to act for    them. Thus, under the Act, employees are guaranteed the right to select a common bargaining representative and that representative may be a person of any race or color (or an association made up of persons of any race or color). The quality of opportunity thus guaranteed is the complete antithesis of discrimination. To hold that colored employees could be represented only by colored persons for bargaining purposes would be to introduce into the administration of the Act the very discrimination which the Federation seeks to avoid. In the election at hand a craft of 86 coach cleaners, 70 of whom were colored, by a vote of 42 to 35 chose as their collective bargaining agent or representative the Brotherhood of Railway Carmen. It may be that certification of the Brotherhood will mean that white, rather than colored, men will represent the coach cleaners in negotiations with the carrier. If so, that condition will obtain because a majority of the coach cleaners voted for it, and not by reason of any governmental action. Moreover, it can continue only so long as they desire it. It cannot be that the Constitution denies colored workmen the right to select a white representative or vice versa. The argument that the Brotherhood is not a proper representative for colored coach cleaners therefore spent its force in the pre-election campaign, and, the result indicates, to no avail. In the last analysis, the Federation's contention reduces itself to the proposition that the members of every race in a craft of workmen have a constitutional right to representation by one of their own race, which neither the majority of the craft nor their own race may take from them. Acceptance of such a principle would certainly destroy the bargaining advantage of the united front secured to employees by the provision of the Act that a majority of any craft shall select the representative for the craft. [14] The Federation really objects to the principle of majority rule as applied to the selection of the bargaining agency or representative. It is clear beyond doubt that constitutional objection to majority rule in the selection of an employee bargaining agency cannot prevail. Virginian Ry. Co. v. System Federation, 300 U.S. 515, 516, 548, 57 S.Ct. 592, 81 L.Ed. 789; National Labor Relations Board v. Jones & Laughlin Steel Corp., 301 U.S. 1, 44, 57 S.Ct. 615, 81 L.Ed. 893, 108 A.L.R. 1352. Cf. Grovey v. Townsend, supra. We conclude that the action of the district court in dismissing the complaint was proper and that the judgment should be affirmed. Affirmed.