Opinion ID: 269315
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: alleged abuse of discretion

Text: 11 Appellants contend that the district court was limited to approving the stipulation offered by the Regional Director and abused its discretion in granting the temporary injunction instead. They argue that the injunctive relief available pursuant to Section 10( l ) is merely ancillary to the proceedings before the NLRB and that relief under Section 10( l ) cannot be broader than that determined by the Regional Director to be necessary to preserve the status quo pending NLRB determination of the unfair labor practice charges. Appellants would limit the discretion of the district court to the power to deny the Regional Director's petition for injunctive relief, but not to broaden the scope of relief sought or to grant the prayed for injunction after the Regional Director has changed his mind about its desirability. 12 Such a limitation would make the district court's action a mere rubber stamp for the Regional Director. The basic error in this position, as applied to the present controversy, has already been shown: under Section 10( l ), the Regional Director's duty to seek an injunction when he has reasonable cause to believe that one of the sections of the National Labor Relations Act enumerated in Section 10( l ) has been violated is mandatory. In this case he did in fact seek such an injunction. The district court had a petition for temporary injunction before it when the Regional Director decided to ask for something less. But Section 10 ( l ) gives this discretion as to whether or not an injunction should issue to the district court, not to the Regional Director, and neither requires nor suggests that the court should abdicate its responsibility and adopt the proposal of the Regional Director. By its terms Section 10( l ), after making it obligatory for the Regional Director to petition the district court for appropriate injunctive relief, states: Upon the filing of any such petition the district court shall have jurisdiction to grant such injunctive relief or temporary restraining order as it deems just and proper, notwithstanding any other provision of law:   . (Emphasis added.) 13 The district court was thus faced with a situation where the Regional Director at first complied with the mandate placed upon him by Section 10( l ) by seeking injunctive relief, and then sought to defeat the discretion vested in the district court under Section 10( l ) by contending that the district court was powerless to do more than approve or disapprove the stipulation which the Regional Director, in his own discretion, sought to substitute for his earlier prayer for injunctive relief. In thus attempting to substitute his own discretion for that of the district court, the Regional Director misconceives the statutory scheme of a Section 10( l ) proceeding. In such a proceeding, the Regional Director's discretion as to whether or not injunctive relief should be sought is limited to determining whether or not reasonable cause exists to believe that one of the unfair labor practice provisions enumerated in Section 10( l ) has been violated. While it may be true that the Regional Director could not be compelled to institute proceedings under Section 10( l ) 3 it does not follow that once having petitioned the court for injunctive relief pursuant to Section 10( l ) the Regional Director retains discretion to dictate the precise form of relief to be granted by the district court. 4 Such a construction of Section 10( l ) files in the face of the statutory language which obligates the Regional Director to seek appropriate injunctive relief, and places in the district court the discretion as to the form of relief to be granted. 14 Nor does the fact that injunctive relief pursuant to Section 10( l ) is ancillary to proceedings before the NLRB to determine the truth of the unfair labor practice charges at issue mean that the recommendations of the Regional Director of the Board must be followed by the district court. Section 10( l ) reflects a Congressional determination that the unfair labor practices enumerated therein are so disruptive of labor-management relations and threaten such danger of harm to the public that they should be enjoined whenever a district court has been shown reasonable cause to believe in their existence and finds that the threatened harm or disruption can best be avoided through an injunction. Schauffler for and on Behalf of N. L. R. B. v. Local 1291, Internat'l Longshoremen's Ass'n, 292 F.2d 182, 187 (3d Cir. 1961); Comment, 111 Pa.L.Rev. 460, 463-4 (1963). It is not for the Regional Director to substitute his own ideas of how best to deal with alleged unfair labor practices for those of the Congress. 15 When the district court issued its temporary injunction, it had before it: (1) the petition of the Regional Director alleging that he had reasonable cause to believe that the breach of the Clerks Union's earlier stipulation against arbitration and the contemplated arbitration of the collective bargaining agreement which they were attempting to compel constituted further Section 8(e) violations; (2) the Regional Director's Memorandum of Points and Authorities in Support of Petition for Injunction, which includes an elaborate discussion of Board and court decisions holding that arbitration or attempts to compel arbitration of contract clauses alleged to constitute unfair labor practices are themselves Section 8(e) violations; and (3) evidence introduced by the charging parties at the hearing on the temporary injunction which tended to show that the points sought to be arbitrated by agreement between Local 770 of the Clerks Union and the employers were substantially the same as those clauses the arbitration of which the Regional Director had sought in his petition to have enjoined. In light of the allegations and evidence before the district court, the reliance of the court on McLeod for and on Behalf of N. L. R. B. v. American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, 234 F.Supp. 832 (S.D.N.Y.1964), in which arbitration of the contract clauses giving rise to Section 8(e) charges were enjoined, seems entirely proper and justified, and the decision to grant the temporary injunction, rather than approve the stipulation, was a valid exercise of the court's discretion. 16