Court Opinion

ID: 9426449
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:17:59.561183+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:23:00.924281
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Stewart,
with whom Mr. Justice Rehnquist joins, dissenting.
The respondent, Mobil Oil Corp., is a New York corporation with its home office in New York City. The Gulf-East Coast Operations Division of Mobil’s Marine Transportation Department, located in Beaumont, Tex., operates eight oceangoing American-flag tankers. These ships transport petroleum products between Texas and various ports on the Atlantic coast. Every month each tanker normally makes two round-trip voyages. On the average voyage a ship is at sea for four or five days and spends approximately 18 to 30 hours in port to load or unload its cargo.
The petitioner Maritime Local 8-801 of the Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers International Union represents the 289 blue-water seamen who man the tankers. When this lawsuit began, 123 of these 289 employees claimed Texas as their residence,1 and 152 of them had requested *423the company to list Beaumont as their home port. Although 40% of the seamen had first applied for work in New York, the remainder had applied for the jobs in Texas, and the final hiring decision for all of them had been made in Beaumont. Texas has collected unemployment compensation insurance premiums for all of these employees, regardless of what State any of them might have designated as his home address or shipping port.
The seamen perform all of their duties aboard ship. They work for approximately 85 days and then receive 37 days of paid shore leave. Eighty to 90% of their work is performed on the high seas.
In 1969 Mobil and the Union concluded a collective-bargaining agreement in New York that covered these seagoing employees. Among other provisions, the agreement contained an agency-shop clause that required all the employees to become “members of the union and/ or in the alternative pay the regular union dues and initiation fees within 31 days from the employment date.” App. 281. In a challenge to this clause, Mobil brought the present suit under § 301 of the Labor Management Relations Act, 1947, 29 U. S. C. § 185, and under 28 U. S. C. § 2201, seeking a declaratory judgment that the clause is invalid because it violates the “right-to-work” laws of Texas.2
The District Court, agreeing with Mobil that Texas was more intimately involved with the employment relationship than any other State, held that Texas' right-to-work laws applied to the agreement. It accordingly declared the agency-shop provision invalid and unenforceable. A divided panel of the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit initially reversed this judgment, 483 F. 2d 603 (1973), but on rehearing en banc, that court af*424firmed the judgment of the District Court. 504 F. 2d 272 (1974). The en banc appellate court analyzed all the relevant contacts that Texas has with the employees in question and concluded that “federal labor legislation, the predominance of Texas contacts over any other jurisdiction, and the significant interest which Texas has in applying its right to work law to this employment relationship warrant application of the Texas law and, consequently, invalidation of the agency shop provision.” Id., at 275.
I
Sections 8 (a) (3) and 14 (b) of the National Labor Relations Act, 29 U. S. C. §§ 158 (a) (3) and 164 (b), delineate the federal interest in union-security arrangements. The first proviso of Section 8(a)(3)3 says *425that no law of the United States “shall preclude an employer from making an agreement with a labor organization ... to require as a condition of employment membership therein on or after the thirtieth day” of employment. The second proviso qualifies the first:
“[N]o employer shall justify any discrimination against an employee for nonmembership in a labor organization (A) if he has reasonable grounds for believing that such membership was not available to the employee on the same terms and conditions generally applicable to other members, or (B) if he has reasonable grounds for believing that membership was denied or terminated for reasons other than the failure of the employee to tender the periodic dues and the initiation fees uniformly required as a condition of acquiring or retaining membership.”
Together, these two provisions sanction a “union shop” agreement, which, although permitting employment of those who are not union members, requires employees to join the union (or pay dues in lieu of membership) 30 days after employment has begun. But they outlaw a “closed shop” agreement, which requires union membership as a precondition to both initial and continued employment. NLRB v. General Motors Corp., 373 U. S. 734, 738-739 (1963).
These provisions modified § 8 (3) of the National Labor Relations Act, 49 Stat. 452, which permitted not only union shops, but closed shops as well. See NLRB v. General Motors Corp., supra, at 739-740; S. Rep. *426No. 105, 80th Cong., 1st Sess., 6 (1947); H. R. Conf. Rep. No. 510, 80th Cong., 1st Sess., 41 (1947). Section 8 (a) (3) was designed to curb the abuses of compulsory unionism, which “create [d] too great a barrier to free employment,” S. Rep. No. 105, supra, at 6, but at the same time, to continue to afford unions a measure of security by enabling them to prevent “free riders.” Id., at 7. As the Court stated in the General Motors case, supra, at 740-741:
“These additions [to § 8 (a)(3)] were intended to accomplish twin purposes. On the one hand, the most serious abuses of compulsory unionism were eliminated by abolishing the closed shop. On the other hand, Congress recognized that in the absence of a union-security provision ‘many employees sharing the benefits of what unions are able to’ accomplish by collective bargaining will refuse to pay their share of the cost.’ ”
Section 8 (a) (3) thus accommodated the competing interests by eliminating the union hiring hall while assuring that “[a]s far as the federal law was concerned, all employees could be required to pay their way.” 373 U. S., at 741; see S. Rep. No. 105, supra, at 6-7.
But Congress chose not to establish a uniform national rule permitting the union shop. States were to be left free to determine that security arrangements of any sort were against the public interest. Algoma Plywood Co. v. Wisconsin Board, 336 U. S. 301, 313-314 (1949). This was made clear in § 14 (b) of the National Labor Relations Act, as added by the Labor Management Relations Act, 29 U. S. C. § 164 (b), which states:
“Nothing in this Act shall be construed as authorizing the execution or application of agreements requiring membership1 in a labor organization as a condition of employment in any State or Territory *427in. which such execution or application is prohibited by State or Territorial law.”
Congress added this section to the Act “to forestall the inference that federal policy was to be exclusive.” Algoma Plywood Co., supra, at 314. Section 14 (b) “was designed to prevent other sections of the Act from completely extinguishing state power over certain union-security arrangements. ... It was desired to 'make certain’ that § 8 (a) (3) could not ‘be said to authorize arrangements of this sort in States where such arrangements were contrary to the State policy.’ ” Retail Clerks v. Schermerhorn, 373 U. S. 746, 751 (1963), quoting H. R. Conf. Rep. No. 510, supra, at 60.
To summarize, §§ 8 (a) (3) and 14(b) together exhaust the federal interest in the types of union-security agreements employers and unions may make. The closed shop is absolutely prohibited. And any lesser security arrangement, though consistent with the federal interest, is sanctioned only if it harmonizes with state policy.
It is undisputed that Texas law forbids union-shop agreements.4 The issue presented by this case, then, is whether this Texas law may extend to bar the security provision contained in the collective-bargaining agreement between the petitioners and the respondent. The petitioners contend that the applicability of state right-to-work laws depends upon where the work is to be performed. They conclude that because the employees in question perform 80% to 90% of their work on the high seas, the federal policy “favoring” union-shop provisions should prevail.5 The Government as amicus curiae, *428agreeing with the petitioners, asserts that Texas does not have a substantial enough interest to apply its labor policies since little work is performed within its borders. The respondent, in turn, relying upon the decisions of the District Court and the Court of Appeals, claims that the place of hiring is the key to analyzing the choice-of-law problem.
The language of § 14 (b) provides no clear guidance for determining whose law should prevail in a multijurisdictional situation. Section 14 (b) does prescribe a threshold: In order to apply its right-to-work laws, a State must be the place of “execution” or “application” of the union-security agreement. “Execution” and “application” are, however, broadly inclusive nouns. It is hardly conceivable that a State would wish to enforce its right-to-work laws unless the collective-bargaining agreement was iii some sense either executed or applied in the State. Yet clearly each of a number of States in a multistate situation could plausibly argue that it is the situs of “application” or “execution.” The State *429of “execution,” for example, could be considered to be either the State where the contract was signed or the State where the terms of the contract are to be carried out. “Application” could refer either to the hiring process or the performance of the work. In short, there is no intelligent way to infer from § 14 (b)’s expansive language which of a number of arguably relevant aspects of the employment relationship should be deemed the dispositive contact for deciding which State’s law is to apply.
The specific legislative history of § 14 (b) is of no greater aid in resolving the dilemma.6 Congress simply did not address the choice-of-law problems that would inevitably arise in multistate work force situations. We are, however, not entirely without signposts. When Congress legislated with respect to union-security agreements in 1947, it did not write on a clean slate, for few issues in American labor history had been as controverted as the moral legitimacy and, indeed, the legality, of union-security agreements. It is unnecessary for the purpose of this case to review the history of that long controversy.7 It is sufficient only to realize that Con*430gress did not resolve it, but instead left each individual State free to outlaw union-security agreements in the interest of a perceived policy of keeping industrial relations more individualistic, open, and free.
Although apparently no recorded legislative history exists to interpret the design of the Texas Legislature, the language of the statutes suggests that their principal purpose was, indeed, to democratize the hiring process. The Preamble of Public Policy contained in Art. 5154a, § 1, Tex. Rev. Civ. Stat. Ann. (1971), states in part:
“Because of the activities of labor unions affecting the economic conditions of the country and the State, entering as they do into practically every business and industrial enterprise, it is the sense of the Legislature that such organizations affect the public interest and are charged with a public use. The working man, unionist or non-unionist, must he protected. The right to work is the right to live.” (Emphasis added.)
Article 5207a states in part:
“Section 1. The inherent right of a person to work and bargain freely with his employer, individually or collectively, for terms and conditions of his employment shall not be denied or infringed by law, or by any organization of whatever nature.
“Sec. 2. No person shall be denied employment on account of membership or nonmembership in a labor union.”
Finally, Art. 5154g, § 1, states:
“It is hereby declared to be the public policy of the State of Texas that the right of persons to work shall not be denied or abridged on account of mem*431bership or non-membership in any labor union or labor organization and that in the exercise of such rights all persons shall be free from threats, force, intimidation or coercion.”
Each of these passages bespeaks an interest in a free hiring process and in preserving the freedom of the working man or woman to pursue and continue in employment, unhindered by coerced but unwanted union association.8
In Lunsford v. City of Bryan, 297 S. W. 2d 115, 117 (1957), the Supreme Court of Texas interpreted these statutes: “The intent seems obvious to protect employees in the exercise of the right of free choice of joining or not joining a union. The purpose of the statute is to afford equal opportunity to work to both classes of employees.” This authoritative state judicial interpretation thus confirms what seems manifest from the language of the statutes: Texas’ right-to-work laws are concerned with the process by which employees are hired and the conditions which, after their hiring, may burden their employment.
In the light of these purposes I agree with the District Court and the Court of Appeals that the laws of Texas govern the union-security agreement in this case. It is true that a number of States might legitimately assert an interest in the hiring process. The State where the employees reside, the State where the conditions of employment were negotiated, and the State where the hiring decision actually took place all have their claims. I. believe, however, that the State where *432the hiring actually takes place is, so far as the issue now before us goes, the most relevant jurisdiction for choice-of-law purposes, and that State in this case is Texas.9
In the first place, it seems clear that the State where the hiring actually takes place is the State most deeply concerned with the conditions of hire. The policy of a State such as Texas, which favors unrestricted hiring, will be seriously undermined when union-security agreements control the hiring that takes place within its jurisdiction. Moreover, the State where the hiring actually occurs normally provides the bulk of the work force from which the employees are drawn. And while a rule designating the laws of the State where the bargaining agreement was negotiated would provide for ease of application, it would also encourage forum shopping by both unions and management seeking the sanction of state laws that would most favor their interests.
Against this analysis, both the Government, as amicus, and the petitioners contend that job situs should be the determining factor in applying right-to-work laws. The parties do not explain, however, what the relevance of job situs is to laws that concern themselves exclusively *433with the hiring process. Cf. A. Von Mehren & D. Traut-man, The Law of Multistate Problems 76-79, 102-105 (1965). Indeed, the place where work is actually performed is probably the least relevant factor in the entire employment relationship for resolving conflicts over the legality of union-security agreements. It is undeniable, as the petitioners point out, that the job situs is where most of the day-to-day contact between employer and employees occurs. But right-to-work laws do not reflect a concern with job safety, or work rules, or hours of employment, or grievance procedures, or other similar conditions of employment with which the jurisdiction where the work actually takes place is legitimately concerned.10 *434A job situs test for the resolution of which State’s union-security law applies is, therefore, so arbitrary in my view as to approach irrationality.
II
But even if I could agree with the petitioners that the jobsite is the critical factor in determining what law should control the legality of union-security agreements, I would still find the laws of Texas applicable in this case. Quite simply, the employees here involved clearly perform a larger share of their employment duties in Texas than in any other State.
By contrast, the petitioners perceive this case as presenting a vertical conflict between Texas law and “federal law.” If the law of the jurisdiction where the work is performed controls, then, according to that perception, the “federal” rule ipso facto prevails, since 80% to 90% of the work is performed on the high seas.
The petitioners suggest alternative and somewhat inconsistent theories to justify the intrusion of “federal law” into this case. The first is that the high seas are, like the District of Columbia, a federal territory over which Congress exercises exclusive, pre-emptive jurisdiction.11 This theory is untenable. Congress undoubtedly has power under the Admiralty Clause, Art. Ill, § 2, to *435pre-empt the entire field of maritime law. E. g., Panama R. Co. v. Johnson, 264 U. S. 375, 386 (1924); Knickerbocker Ice Co. v. Stewart, 253 U. S. 149, 160 (1920); see G. Gilmore & C. Black, The Law of Admiralty 45-47 (1975); Currie, Federalism and the Admiralty: “The Devil’s Own Mess,” 1960 Sup. Ct. Rev. 158, 158-165. It has exercised this power liberally to regulate, for example, various aspects of maritime employment. See 46 U. S. C. §§ 563-568. Nevertheless, as Mr. Justice Frankfurter stated for the Court in Romero v. International Terminal Operating Co., 358 U. S. 354, 373 (1959):
“Although the corpus of admiralty law is federal in the sense that it derives from the implications of Article III evolved by the courts, to claim that all enforced rights pertaining to matters maritime are rooted in federal law is a destructive oversimplification of the highly intricate interplay of the States and the National Government in their regulation of maritime commerce. It is true that state law must yield to the needs of a uniform federal maritime law when this Court finds inroads on a harmonious system. But this limitation still leaves the States a wide scope.”
It is unnecessary here to delineate the “wide scope” within which the States may legislate about things maritime. To refute the notion that the high seas are a species of federal enclave, it is sufficient to point out that the Court has found state legislation pre-empted only when the nature of the problem required the application of a uniform rule or when the state law unduly hampered maritime commerce. See, e. g., Askew v. American Waterways Operators, Inc., 411 U. S. 325, 337-344 (1973); Kossick v. United Fruit Co., 365 U. S. 731, 738-739 (1961); Huron Cement Co. v. Detroit, 362 U. S. 440, 444 (1960). The Court has never struck *436down a state law on the ground that the States are juris-dictionally incompetent to legislate over matters that occur within the ocean “territory.”
The petitioners appear also to argue, however, that even if the high seas are not a territory over which Congress exercises exclusive lawmaking power, the Texas rule outlawing union shops must fall because the Federal Government has pre-empted the field of maritime labor relations. Cf. Southern Pacific Co. v. Jensen, 244 U. S. 205, 216 (1917); Currie, supra, at 165 passim. It is true that Congress has deeply involved itself in the affairs of seamen. Federal maritime law covers, among other things, maritime liens for the collection of wages, 46 U. S. C. § 953, the rights of seamen to receive at every port half of unpaid wages earned, 46 U. S. C. § 597, and double payment of wages withheld without sufficient cause, 46 U. S. C. § 596, physical qualifications and requirements for seamen, 46 U. S. C. § 672, and disciplinary problems, 46 U. S. C. §§ 701-710.
Despite this manifest federal interest in many' aspects of the maritime employment relationship, I think that Texas law still controls. Section 14 (b) on its face clearly settles any apparent conflict between state and federal law in favor of the state rule. In enacting § 14 (b) Congress concluded that diversity in the area of union-security agreements would compromise no federal interest. “By making the matter one of state law, Congress has not only authorized multiformity on the subject, but practically guaranteed it.” Motor Coach Employees v. Lockridge, 403 U. S. 274, 317 (1971) (White, J., dissenting).
When Congress has in the past determined that the nature of an interstate industry requires application of a uniform rule to govern union-security agreements, it has not hesitated to act. For example, before 1951 the Railway Labor Act, 45 U. S. C. § 152 Fifth, prohibited the *437union shop. Fully aware of § 14 (b) of the National Labor Relations Act, Congress amended the Railway Labor Act in 1951 to permit railroad carriers and their employees to enter into union-shop agreements “[notwithstanding any other provisions of this [Act], or of any other statute or law of the United States, or Territory thereof, or of any State . . . 45 U. S. C. § 152 Eleventh. See Railway Employes’ Dept. v. Hanson, 351 U. S. 225 (1956). That Congress has not similarly legislated for the maritime industry is compelling evidence that it finds compatible with federal interests diversity among the States as to permissible union-security agreements.
In conclusion, I believe that the place of hiring is the critical factor in determining the choice of law for union-security agreements. But even if the place where the work is to be performed is the criterion, Texas law should still be applied, since under this collective-bargaining agreement more work is performed in that State than in any other, and Congress has refrained from either establishing or indicating a need for a uniform rule to the contrary in maritime employment. I would, therefore, affirm the judgment before us.

 Sixty of the employees listed New York as their residence, 21 New Jersey, 16 Florida, 13 Louisiana, 10 Maine, and 10 Rhode Island. The remainder resided in 16 other States.

 It is conceded that these state laws prohibit an agency-shop agreement of the kind here involved. See n. 4, infra.

 Section 8 (a) (3) reads in full:
“It shall be an unfair labor practice for an employer—
“(3) by discrimination in regard to hire or tenure of employment or any term or condition of employment to encourage or discourage membership in any labor organization: Provided, That nothing in this subchapter, or in any other statute of the United States, shall preclude an employer from making an agreement with a labor organization (not established, maintained, or assisted by any action defined in this subsection as an unfair labor practice) to require as a condition of employment membership therein on or after the thirtieth day following the beginning of such employment or the effective date of such agreement, whichever is the later, (i) if such labor organization is the representative of the employees as provided in section 159 (a) of this title, in the appropriate collective-bargaining unit covered by such agreement when made; and (ii) unless following an election held as provided in section 159 (e) of this title within one year preceding the effective date of such agreement, the Board shall have certified that at least a majority of the employees eligible to vote in such election have voted to rescind the authority of such labor organization to make such an agreement: Provided further, That no employer shall justify any discrimination against an employee for nonmembership in a labor organization (A) if he has *425reasonable grounds for believing that such membership was not available to the employee on the same terms and conditions generally applicable to other members, or (B) if he has reasonable grounds for believing that membership was denied or terminated for reasons other than the failure of the employee to tender the periodic dues and the initiation fees uniformly required as a condition of acquiring or retaining membership. . .

 In Opinion No. WW-1018 (1961), the Attorney General of Texas held that union-shop agreements violate Art. 5154a, § 8a, Art. 5207a, § 2, and Art. 5154g, § 1, Tex. Rev. Civ. Stat. Ann. (1971).

 It is not at all obvious that federal policy favors union-shop agreements. It is true that such agreements are legal in States that *428have not passed legislation forbidding them, whereas Congress might have reversed the burden by making all union-security agreements illegal except in States that choose to permit them. Burdens in the law, however, are allocated for a variety of reasons, only one of which is to make more difficult the achievement of a disfavored result. Another, equally plausible explanation for the wording of § 14 (b) is that Congress might have determined that less disruption in the state lawmaking process would result if union-shop agreements were permitted absent state legislation. In 1947, when Congress was considering the Labor Management Relations Act, only 12 States barred the union shop. S. Rep. No. 105, 80th Cong., 1st Sess., 6 (1947). Had Congress placed the burden of legislating on States wishing to legalize the union shop, three-fourths of the States would have had to enact legislation. As § 14 (b) was in fact worded, no state legislation was required to preserve the status quo. In sum, there is simply no way of deducing from the construction of § 14 (b) whether, despite leaving the issue to the States, Congress preferred or disfavored the union shop.

 The en bane opinion of the Court of Appeals relied upon language in the House Report that condemned the evils of the union hiring hall in the maritime industry to support the proposition that the place of hiring is the critical factor in determining the choice of law. 504 F. 2d 272, 277, and n. 10 (CA5 1974). As the context of the cited language makes clear, however, see S. Rep. No. 105, supra, at 6-7, Congress’ concern over the hiring hall led it to outlaw the closed shop. Having forbidden agreements making union membership a precondition to employment, Congress exhausted the federal interest in the union hiring hall.

 See generally R. Morris, Government and Labor In Early America, 136-207 (1946); P. Sultan, Right-To-Work Laws: A Study in Conflict 12-30 (1958); J. Toner, The Closed Shop 1-92 (1942); Dempsey, The Right-To-Work Controversy, 16 Lab. L. J. 387 (1965); Warshal, “Right-to-Work,” Pro and Con, 17 Lab. L. J. 131 *430(1966); Simons, Some Reflections on Syndicalism, 52 J. Pol. Econ. 1 (1944).

 For an analysis of the effect of the Texas right-to-work laws, see Meyers, Effects of “Right-To-Work” Laws: A Study of the Texas Act, 9 Ind. & Lab. Rel. Rev. 77, 84 (1955) (concluding that laws had had “little effect” on the rate of union organization in all but a few selected industries).

 The final hiring decision for all of the employees here involved was made in Beaumont, Tex. It could be argued that the interests of both Texas and New York, where a minority of the employees applied for their jobs (and which permits union shops), could be accommodated through an arrangement by which the union-security laws of each State were applied to those of the work force who had applied for work within each jurisdiction. See Comment, 88 Harv. L. Rev. 1620, 1629-1630 (1975). Such a solution, however, which would likely place members of the same crew under different regimes, could easily disrupt the management of labor relations and would create unjustifiable uncertainties in the law. Cf. Dale System, Inc. v. Time, Inc., 116 F. Supp. 527 (Conn. 1953); A. Von Mehren & D. Trautman, The Law of Multistate Problems 395 (1965). I would hold, therefore, that a uniform rule must be applied to all employees who are governed by a single collective-bargaining agreement.

 The Court suggests, ante, at 419, that adopting a choice-of-law rule that focuses upon the place of hiring might result in the extraterritorial application of a State’s laws. This contention begs the question. It is true that some components of the employment relationship are found outside Texas. But this is inevitable in a mul-tijurisdictional collective-bargaining agreement. Since the one activity — hiring—that is relevant to the Texas statutes does take place in Texas, not at sea, their application under the facts of this case does not give extraterritorial effect to Texas’ laws.
The petitioners argue that if the place of hiring is dispositive for confliet-of-laws purposes, §14 (b)’s strictures will be evaded, since companies will simply relocate in that minority of States that have enacted right-to-work laws. The answer to this contention turns upon what is meant by evasion. The rule I would adopt centers upon where the actual, not some fictional, hiring decision is made. Thus, a sham relocation in a right-to-work State would not be sufficient to engage that State’s union-security rules if the actual hiring decisions continued to be made in a jurisdiction that permitted union-shop agreements.
If, on the other hand, evasion is used to characterize a genuine corporate relocation, including hiring, which is motivated by a quest for more favorable labor laws, then the short answer is that there is nothing illegitimate or devious about a company’s moving to a new location to take advantage of lower prevailing wage rates, taxes, raw materials, or production costs, or to operate under more favorable laws.

 It is worth noting that a conflict between the law of a federal Territory and that of a State is not a vertical conflict at all. A vertical conflict is characterized by the conflict between a superior and an inferior lawmaking authority, both of which may operate within the same territory. A state law legalizing the closed shop, for example, would conflict and have to give way to the federal law outlawing such arrangements. A horizontal conflict, on the other hand, exists when the laws of two or more equally competent lawmaking bodies, all of which have plenary jurisdiction within their respective territories, are in conflict. A conflict between the laws of two States would properly be characterized as horizontal, as would that between the laws of the District of Columbia and a State.