Opinion ID: 1330609
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Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Common Law Right To Damages

Text: The hospital asserts the broad proposition that since it is generally held that public employees have no right to strike, that it follows that such a strike is illegal and as a consequence it may recover damages as a result of the strike. [2] We do not agree with this reasoning. Whether there is a right to sue for damages in this case will depend upon common law labor principles. [3] In Krystad v. Lau, 65 Wash.2d 827, 400 P.2d 72 (1965), the Washington Supreme Court, sitting en banc, made a rather exhaustive analysis of the common law surrounding labor unions and took particular pains to point out that in general American courts have not followed the English common law surrounding the suppression of labor unions: American courts gave scant heed to the common-law rules for the suppression of labor unions. Only two states of the United States seem to have accepted the curious view that a combination of workmen to raise wages constituted a criminal conspiracy. People v. Melvin, 2 Wheeler's Crim.Cases 262 (New York, 1810); People v. Trequier, 1 Wheeler's Crim.Cases 142 (New York, 1823); Philadelphia's Cordwainers' Case (Pennsylvania, 1805), reported 41 Yale L.Jour. 165 (1931). Despite dicta to the contrary, the idea that a labor union is a criminal conspiracy seems not to have taken root in this country. Witte, Early American Labor Cases, 35 Yale L.Jour. 825 (1926); Nelles, The First American Labor Case, 41 Yale L.Jour. 165 (1931). Any lingering doubts that the roots of the idea were shallow indeed, if they can be said to have taken hold at all in American law, may be put to rest by a reading of Commonwealth v. Hunt, 45 Mass. (4 Metcalf) 111, 38 Am.Dec. 346 (1842), a landmark in the field of labor law, and quite possibly the foundation upon which the American law of labor unions is built. (65 Wash.2d at 835, 400 P.2d at 77) [4] Commonwealth v. Hunt, 45 Mass. (4 Met.) 111, 134 (1842), cited in Krystad, contains these statements which in effect test the lawfulness of a union's conduct as reflected by its activities: [A]ssociations may be entered into, the object of which is to adopt measures that may have a tendency to impoverish another, that is, to diminish his gains and profits, and yet so far from being criminal or unlawful, the object may be highly meritorious and public spirited. The legality of such an association will therefore depend upon the means to be used for its accomplishment. If it is to be carried into effect by fair or honorable and lawful means, it is, to say the least, innocent; if by falsehood or force, it may be stamped with the character of conspiracy.... if criminal and indictable, it is so by reason of the criminal means intended to be employed for its accomplishment; and as a further legal consequence, ... those means must be stated in the indictment. We have made much the same point in Parker Paint & Wall Paper Co. v. Local Union No. 813, 87 W.Va. 631, 642, 105 S.E. 911, 915 (1921), where we quoted with approval the following statement from Pierce v. Stablemen's Union, 156 Cal. 70, 76, 103 P. 324, 327 (1909): A body of workmen are dissatisfied with the terms of their employment. They seek to compel their employer to come to their terms by striking. They may legally do so. The loss and inconvenience he suffers he cannot complain of. But when they seek to compel third persons, who have no quarrel with their employer, to withdraw from all association with him by threats that unless such third persons do so the workmen will inflict similar injury on such third persons, the combination is oppressive, involves duress, and, if injury results, it is actionable. [5] In United Maintenance and Manufacturing Co., Inc. v. United Steelworkers of America, Inc., 157 W.Va. 788, 204 S.E.2d 76 (1974), and Ohio Valley Advertising Corp. v. Union Local 207, 138 W.Va. 355, 76 S.E.2d 113 (1953), we recognized that since Thornhill v. Alabama, 310 U.S. 88, 60 S.Ct. 736, 84 L.Ed. 1093 (1940), there exists under the First Amendment a constitutionally protected right of association and free expression for employees who are in a union or desire to join one. Admittedly, the foregoing opinions involved union activity in the private sector. In Smith v. Arkansas State Highway Employees, 441 U.S. 463, 99 S.Ct. 1826, 60 L.Ed.2d 360 (1979), however, the court recognized that public employees do enjoy some First Amendment rights in regard to their organizational attempts: The public employee surely can associate and speak freely and petition openly, and he is protected by the First Amendment from retaliation for doing so. See Pickering v. Board of Education, 391 U.S. 563, 574-575, 88 S.Ct. 1731 [1737-1738], 20 L.Ed.2d 811 (1968); Shelton v. Tucker, 364 U.S. 479, 81 S.Ct. 247, 5 L.Ed.2d 231 (1960). But the First Amendment does not impose any affirmative obligation on the government to listen, to respond or, in this context, to recognize the association and bargain with it. (441 U.S. at 465, 99 S.Ct. at 1828, 60 L.Ed.2d at 363) (footnote omitted) Thus, while some constitutional protection is extended under the First Amendment to public employees to organize, speak freely and petition, it is clear that a public employer is not required to recognize or bargain with a public employee association or union in the absence of a statutory requirement. These decisions, however, do not resolve the question presented in this case. Oddly enough there are few decisions that address the precise issue before us, whether a common law cause of action exists for damages arising from a peaceful work stoppage against the employer by public employees. In the leading case of Lamphere Schools v. Lamphere Federation of Teachers, 400 Mich. 104, 252 N.W.2d 818 (1977), the Supreme Court of Michigan found no common law right and declined to create a common law remedy for damages against a teacher's union for a peaceful work stoppage: The proposed remedies in tort which the School District asserts, in the case at bar, are heretofore unknown to the Michigan common law. Although couching its cause in such familiar tort terms as `causing a breach of a common law and statutory duty', `intentional interference with individual contractual relationships' and `civil conspiracy', the School District attempts to recover monetary damages from teacher federations for conduct not presently actionable, to wit: the withholding of services through peaceful concerted action of public employees. [footnote omitted] Plaintiff School District fails to cite to this Court any prior case in this jurisdiction which has considered the instant question under any tort theory. Moreover, in other states which have statutes prohibiting public employee strikes, the principle permitting a cause of action in tort for damages has not been judicially adopted. [Citing Annot., 37 A.L.R.3d 1147 (1971), in a footnote.]       In no manner does the Detroit case or any known Michigan case even suggest that monetary damages can be obtained by a school district from the teachers or the teachers' federation under any theory, in the event of a peaceful strike. There has been no case which would support the contention that there is a common law tort of `public teacher strikes' with an attendant remedy. On the contrary, there is a total absence of any such preexistent common law remedy. (400 Mich. at 124-29, 252 N.W.2d at 827-29) The only other decision that has a bearing on this issue is Pasadena Unified School District v. Pasadena Federation of Teachers, 72 Cal.App.3d 100, 140 Cal.Rptr. 41 (1977), where the court reversed the dismissal of the School District's complaint which sought damages for breach of contract. The reversal was predicated on the existence of written employment contracts between the teachers and the school district. The teachers had engaged in a work stoppage during the school year while they were under contract. Here there are no written employment contracts which are alleged to have been breached. We have not been cited any case where a court has held that a peaceful strike by public employees under the conditions existing in this case gives rise to a damage action. [6] The assertion that the strike is illegal only serves to confuse the issue. The term illegal in the present case is much like the term unfair, which concerned this Court in the Ohio Valley Advertising case, supra. Its meaning must be derived from the context in which it is used. [7] Here we consider the term illegal against the narrow band of common law labor principles where damages are sought for a peaceful strike. We conclude that where public employees who have no employment contracts with their employer, engage in a work stoppage which is peaceful and directed only against the employer with no attempt to interfere with his customers or bar ingress to other employees there is no common law right to damages. In this context, the work stoppage is not illegal in the sense that it gives rise to a common law action for damages. We, also, adopt the view of the Michigan Supreme Court in Lamphere and decline to judicially extend under our common law powers a remedy for damages. See Morningstar v. Black & Decker Manufacturing Co., W.Va., 253 S.E.2d 666 (1979). In so declining, we note that in most other states the legislature has made an effort to make some statutory accommodations to the labor relation problems that exist in the public sector. Indeed, it was the initial inability of the courts to judicially resolve the competing interests of private employees and private employers that led to federal legislation in the labor law field. Most if not all commentators in the labor law area agree that the complex issues in this field are ill suited to any comprehensive judicial solution. [8]