Court Opinion

ID: 9498566
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 17:20:50.887305+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:58:54.393621
License: Public Domain

HEANEY, Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
I would affirm the district court and require GKN to submit to arbitration the question of whether it was required to permit Robert Anderson to return to a position as a journeyman electrician.
The majority correctly reads the Supreme Court’s decisions in stating that the determinative question is whether the collective bargaining agreement is susceptible of an interpretation that covers the grievance at issue, and that this question is one for judicial determination. But the majority is incorrect in opining that this analysis allows the court to consider the potential merits of the underlying claim. This ignores the admonition of the Supreme Court that we are not to rule on the potential merits of the underlying claim in deciding arbitrarily and does precisely that. AT & T Techs., Inc. v. Commc’ns Workers, 475 U.S. 643, 649, 106 S.Ct. 1415, 89 L.Ed.2d 648 (1986).
The collective bargaining agreement between the union and GKN contains a broad arbitration clause requiring that grievances arising during the length of the agreement be adjusted at the earliest possible time, and if not adjusted, be submitted to arbitration. (J.A. at 25-27.) Here, the dispute is whether a supervisor has a right to return to the position of journeyman pursuant to the provisions of Article XVIII, Section 9A of the agreement, which reads as follows:
An employee covered by this agreement who on or after its effective date, accepts a supervisory position over members of this Bargaining Unit shall continue to accumulate seniority for a period of one (1) year following his transfer or reassignment. After one (1) year, the accumulation of seniority shall cease, but each such employee shall retain all seniority accumulated to that time as long as he remains in a supervisory position over members of this Bargaining Unit. If an employee leaves the position of supervisor over such members, all accumulated seniority shall be forfeited unless he returns to the Bargaining Unit at that time.
(J.A. at 22.)
GKN argues that this clause must be read literally so that the collective bargaining agreement between the union and GKN signed on January 2, 2002 preserved seniority rights only for those employees who were promoted from a journeyman electrician to a supervisor after the effective date of the agreement. Here the supervisor in question was promoted before GKN and the union negotiated the collective bargaining agreement. The company further argues that because the language is so clear, the dispute is not arbitrable. The union takes the position that the clause must be read in light of the history of collective bargaining and other relevant factors, and that thus read, it requires the company to transfer the person to a journeyman position. The union further contends that the company agreed to arbitrate disputes between the parties and should thus be held to its commitment.
The cases cited by the majority do not support its conclusion that Anderson’s case is not subject to arbitration. It initially relies on Litton Financial Printing Division v. NLRB, 501 U.S. 190, 111 S.Ct. 2215, 115 L.Ed.2d 177 (1991). In that case, the collective bargaining agreement contained a broad arbitration clause similar to the clause in the instant case. The agreement expired in October 1979. The parties had not yet negotiated a new agreement when the company laid off ten *632of its workers, including six of its most senior employees, in August and September of 1980. The union filed a grievance claiming a violation of the agreement. Litton refused to negotiate the grievance or to submit the dispute to arbitration under any circumstance. The NLRB found that Litton’s action violated Sections 8(a)(1) and (5) of the National Labor Relations Act. It ordered Litton to bargain over the layoffs, but refused to order that it .submit the dispute to arbitration because the collective bargaining agreement had expired before the layoffs. The court of appeals affirmed and the Supreme Court upheld that court. The court held, therefore, only grievances involving rights that accrued or vested prior to expiration were arbitrable. Litton Fin. Printing Div., 501 U.S. at 209, 111 S.Ct. 2215. The Court stated:
We acknowledge that where an effective bargaining agreement exists between the parties, and the agreement contains a broad arbitration clause, “there is a presumption of arbitrability in the sense that ‘[a]n order to arbitrate the particular grievance should not be denied unless it may be said with positive assurance that the arbitration clause is not susceptible of an interpretation that covers the asserted dispute.’ ”
Id. at 209, 111 S.Ct. 2215 (quoting AT & T Tech., Inc. v. Communications Workers, 475 U.S. 643, 650, 106 S.Ct. 1415, 89 L.Ed.2d 648 (1986), and Steelworkers v. Warrior & Gulf Navigation Co., 363 U.S. 574, 582-83, 80 S.Ct. 1347, 4 L.Ed.2d 1409 (1960)).
Litton is not this case. Here, a collective bargaining agreement with a broad grievance and arbitration clause was in full effect at the time the union sought to protect the right of a twenty-five year employee to return to the bargaining unit. The union had a right, pursuant to the collective bargaining agreement, to grieve and arbitrate the rights of the employee. The company had a similar obligation and should not now be permitted to avoid this responsibility. The union may win or lose at arbitration, but it deserves a chance.
The majority next cites Peerless Pressed Metal Corp. v. International Union of Electrical, Radio & Machine Workers, 451 F.2d 19 (1st Cir.1971). It concedes that the result in that case is contrary to the GKN view, and I believe that the rationale of that case supports the view that arbitration is appropriate in the instant case. There, an employee who was in the bargaining unit for thirteen years was promoted to a supervisor. Five years later he was laid off (not discharged for cause). The company refused to arbitrate on the grounds that the collective bargaining agreement did not cover supervisors. There, as here, the court determined that an argument could be made that under the agreement, employees who became supervisors retained seniority accrued before their promotion. Therefore, they remained employees for the purpose of exercising their seniority rights when seeking reinstatement. Thus, arbitration was not plainly barred by the clause of the contract that provided for the inclusion of employees and the exclusion of supervisors. The court then restated the obvious: that for a court “[t]o say that [one seeking reinstatement] may be an employee for the purpose of reinstatement is not to conclude that he is entitled to reinstatement.” Peerless Pressed Metal Co., 451 F.2d at 21. That decision is for the arbiter to make.
The majority then cites United Steelworkers of America v. General Fireproofing Co., 464 F.2d 726 (6th Cir.1972). The facts in that case are different than those in Peerless. In General Fireproofing, an employee of twenty-two years was promoted to supervisor in 1967. In June of 1971, he was discharged because the company *633had found him to be disloyal. The employee and the union, however, believed that he was discharged because he was just one day short of qualifying for his pension. The union sought to rely on the collective bargaining agreement’s seniority and retention provisions to protect the employee from being discharged for cause. Finding that this issue was clearly outside the purview of the collective bargaining agreement, the court stated:
Article X, which speaks of certain rights of supervisory personnel, is equally clear in providing that an employee who has accumulated seniority is then promoted to supervisor, and later is returned to production and maintenance work, retains his previously accumulated seniority. Nevertheless, by its terms it does not impose upon the Company any duty to arbitrate a dispute concerning discharge of a supervisor.
Gen. Fireproofing Co., 464 F.2d at 729.
To summarize, neither Litton nor General Fireproofing supports the majority’s view that the dispute between the union and GKN is not arbitrable. Litton involved the right of the union to arbitrate a dispute that arose after a collective bargaining agreement terminated, and General Fireproofing involved the union’s attempt to arbitrate the discharge for cause of an employee by way of its interpretation of a collective bargaining agreement’s seniority clause. In contrast, Anderson was seeking to use the seniority and reinstatement provisions of his collective bargaining agreement to permit him to return to work as a journeyman electrician. Like in Peerless, our task is not to determine the merits of that position, but rather to consider whether the agreement is susceptible to that construction. In my view, it clearly is. Peerless is indistinguishable from the instant case, and supports the district court’s view that this dispute is arbitrable.
In this case, the majority has abandoned this circuit’s long-standing approach in favor of arbitrating labor disputes, advancing its own opinion of the merits of this case instead of enforcing the parties’ agreement to leave that to the arbiter. That is not our role; we are to consider whether the matter is subject to arbitration (which, in this case, it is), and then leave the decision on the merits to the arbiter. If the majority’s view is sustained, the courts in this circuit will feel free to examine the merits of every labor dispute. If after that examination the court believes that the grievant has a weak case, it will feel free to grant summary judgment to an employer on the theory that the dispute is not arbitrable. This would be inconsistent not only with the Supreme Court decisions on arbitration, but of this court as well. It is an approach that we should not take.