Court Opinion

ID: 9473190
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 04:22:16.58937+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:43:22.642396
License: Public Domain

SPROUSE, Circuit Judge,
dissenting:
I agree that the district court had jurisdiction in this matter but dissent from that portion of the majority opinion which reverses the district court and which instructs it to enforce the arbitrator’s award.
Mobay discharged Hill for failing to qualify for positions within the plant — a reason not permitted by the collective bargaining contract. Its discharge letter stated:
This letter is written in confirmation of our discussion of Friday, February 20, 1981.
For the past year you have been training for qualification on three (3) different operational jobs. You have failed to qualify on all three (3), the third being Polyester I. As you have been earlier advised, you were hired for chemical operational duties. A failure to be able to perform this work satisfactorily and safely would make you ineligible for employment.
In accordance with Article 25, Job Posting, Section 4, of the Labor Management Agreement between Local 566 and Mo-bay Chemical Corporation, provisions and penalties are included for two (2) disqualifications. A third disqualification is not allowed by the Agreement. In such a situation, it is apparent the person is either unable or unwilling to perform an operational job.
Therefore, in light of this third disqualification, which due to either your inability or unwillingness to demonstrate job performance, you are separated from employment with Mobay Chemical Corporation effective February 20, 1981.
*1113Mobay, therefore specifically discharged Hill under Article XXV of the collective bargaining contract. There is, however, no authority to discharge under Article XXV. It provides in pertinent part:
In the event that he does not qualify on the permanently assigned job, he will again be returned to Utility (non-bid) and lose all of his Production Department seniority and shall be permitted to bid on a Production Department vacancy only after a period of one (1) year from the date of his most recent disqualification.
The arbitrator clearly recognized this and correctly interpreted the contract, stating:
On the other hand, failure to qualify in a job into which one has bid has never been a basis for discharge in this arbitrator’s experience or reading____
Nevertheless, at the May 26 hearing, we had an employee who, whether or not she had given the Company sufficient reason to discharge, was in fact discharged under a provision of the Labor Agreement that is not related to discharge.
Having reached that inevitable conclusion, the arbitrator could have decided only that the discharge was improper. The contract provides the four step grievance procedure that is common to most labor contracts. In the third step of a grievance proceeding, both the union and company must state their positions in writing. Section 3 of Article XXIX provides in pertinent part:
In the event that no satisfactory settlement of the alleged grievance is arrived at in Step 2 of this procedure, the alleged grievance shall be reduced to writing____ Management shall answer the grievance in writing within five (5) scheduled days ... of the date of presentation.
In this case, the union stated its position that Hill was wrongfully discharged. Mo-bay replied:
After further review and consideration of all the facts in this case, Management cannot agree to the adjustment desired. The separation was due to her disqualifying three times as a chemical operator.
There was no question as to the parameter of the issue. It, however, remained unresolved through step four of the grievance procedures, so Article XXIX required submission of the articulated issue to an impartial arbitrator. The arbitrator properly could no more substitute his version of the issue than he could alter the terms of the contract. In doing so, he simply “dispense[d] his own brand of industrial justice.” United Steelworkers of America v. Enterprise Wheel & Car Corp., 363 U.S. 593, 597, 80 S.Ct. 1358, 1361, 4 L.Ed.2d 1424 (1960).
In the majority’s view, however, the union assented to altering the submitted issue after arbitration proceedings had begun. I simply disagree. The union lawyer stated his understanding that the issue was only the propriety of Mobay’s stated reason for discharge. He did not abandon that position but merely insisted on the right to rebut any other evidence which would be offered.
The arbitrator obviously felt that Hill should not continue in her position with Mobay, and rendered that Solomonic industrial justice without regard to whether his decision comported with the contract, the formulation of the arbitration issued by the parties, or established principles of labor law. That resolve on his part could not have been clearer. He said:
However, having said the foregoing, it is our opinion that no arbitrator should force an employer, particularly one who operates a potentially dangerous chemical plant, to rehire an employee such as Sherri Hill. In our opinion, Sherri Hill has very effectively demonstrated that she should not be working in the chemical industry, at least not in the production phase of it.
The legal problem an arbitrator faces in light of the discussion up to this point is how to reconcile the inadequate basis for the discharge with the conclusion *1114that the employer should not be forced to continue the grievant in her employment.
By this language in his opinion, the arbitrator forcefully demonstrates that he realized that the employer must lose the arbitration issue as formulated by the parties, but felt that he must go behind that issue to render justice. He may well have been right that Hill was an undesirable employee, but that decision should have been made in a future arbitration proceeding upon the union’s challenge in her discharge for “just cause” under Article III of the contract.
Arbitration is not restricted by the formal rules of procedure that bind courts. Certain basic rules of decision-making, however, must be observed even under the most informal dispute resolution procedure. One of the fundamental principles of labor law is that an arbitration award must be limited to the issues submitted by the parties. Textile Workers Union v. American Thread Co., 291 F.2d 894 (4th Cir.1961). I agree with the district court that in this case the arbitrator did not so limit his award. The issue was framed by the discharge letter, the union’s grievance, the company’s denial of this grievance, and the submission to the arbitrator of the issues framed in the grievance. That issue was whether the company could discharge an employee for failures under Article XXV of the contract. The “just cause” required by Article III was prior to the arbitration hearing never articulated by the company to Hill nor to the union. If we were to affirm the district court and order Hill reinstated, and there indeed existed “just cause” to discharge Hill, Mobay could discharge her simply by complying with the contract and advising her of the reasons. There is no basis in the law, however, for an award to a party to an existing dispute based upon its prospects for winning a future arbitration on a different issue. The employer may have had just cause to discharge Hill but neither an arbitrator nor a court has the right to circumvent the admittedly informal, but, nonetheless essential rules governing arbitration.
In my opinion, the arbitrator based his decision on matters so extraneous to the issue submitted by the parties that his award failed to “draw its essence” from the agreement that he purported to interpret. United Steelworkers of America v. Enterprise Wheel & Car Corp., 363 U.S. 593, 597, 80 S.Ct. 1358, 1361, 4 L.Ed.2d 1424 (1960); Clinchfield Coal Co. v. District 28, United Mine Workers, 720 F.2d 1365, 1368 (4th Cir.1983). I would affirm the district court.