Court Opinion

ID: 9473440
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 04:29:56.006896+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:43:31.880683
License: Public Domain

A. LEON HIGGINBOTHAM, Jr., Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
Relying on DelCostello v. International Brotherhood of Teamsters, 462 U.S. 151, 103 S.Ct. 2281, 76 L.Ed.2d 476 (1983), the majority holds that appellant’s hybrid section 301/unfair representation suit to enforce an arbitration award is barred by the NLRA’s six-month limitations period for unfair labor practice claims. As the majority notes, however, DelCostello involved a hybrid suit to vacate an arbitration award. Though the majority cannot “conceive of any convincing reason” to distinguish suits to vacate arbitration awards from suits to enforce, I believe that such a distinction has — for cogent reasons — long been recognized by state and federal law, with the result that limitations periods for suits to enforce are generally longer than those governing suits to vacate. DelCostello does not require that we eviscerate this distinction. I therefore respectfully dissent.
The Supreme Court in DelCostello made it quite clear that their holding was not to be extended mechanically:
We stress that our holding today should not be taken as a departure from prior practice in borrowing limitations periods for federal causes of action, in labor law or elsewhere. We do not mean to suggest that federal courts should eschew use of state limitations periods anytime state law fails to provide a perfect analogy____ Nevertheless, when a rule from elsewhere in federal law clearly provides a closer analogy than available state statutes, and when the federal policies at stake and the practicalities of litigation make that rule a significantly more appropriate vehicle for interstitial lawmaking, we have not hesitated to turn away from state law.
462 U.S. at 171-172, 103 S.Ct. at 2294. Thus, we must look to the “federal policies at stake” and the “practicalities of litigation” before we may conclude that the NLRA’s six-month limitations period is a “significantly more appropriate vehicle for interstitial lawmaking” than the six-year state limitations period that we found to be applicable to appellant’s cause of action in Taylor I. See also Adams v. Gould, Inc., *935739 F.2d 858, 867 (3d Cir.1984), cert. denied, — U.S. -, 105 S.Ct. 806, 83 L.Ed.2d 799 (1985). In carrying out this analysis, I think we must be cognizant of the fact that the practical effect of borrowing the federal rather than the state statute of limitations in DelCostello was to extend (from three to six months) the period in which an employee could bring a suit to vacate, whereas here the effect would be to drastically reduce (from six years to six months) the applicable limitations period. I believe that both the practicalities of litigation and the federal policies at stake militate in favor of a significantly longer period for actions to enforce arbitration awards than the six months allowed for bringing an action to vacate under DelCostello.
When an employee seeks to vacate an arbitration award in a section 301/unfair representation hybrid suit, the gravamen of the unfair representation claim will generally be the union’s mishandling of grievance and arbitration procedures, and the cause of action will accrue at a fairly definite date — the date the adverse arbitration decision is issued. Cf. DelCostello, 462 U.S. at 172, 103 S.Ct. at 2294. In a suit to enforce, however, the gravamen of the complaint will be the union’s conduct after the arbitration process is complete, and the claim will not accrue until the futility of further union appeals becomes apparent or should have become apparent. Scott v. Local 863, 725 F.2d 226, 229 (3d Cir.1984). Judge Becker has recently described the dilemma the employee confronts:
The problem is that, unlike other situations where the twin defenses of failure to exhaust and the statute of limitations combine to give the litigant a narrow window in which to file suit, here there is no guarantee that statutes, regulations, or other form of clear, written notice will exist that warn the plaintiff of his per-il____ [U]nion officials may well be equivocal or contradictory in their communications to dissatisfied members and may send such communications through persons within the internal union hierarchy whose authority to bind the union is at best hazy. As a result, the potential suitor will not know when exhaustion is futile.
Scott, 725 F.2d at 230 (concurring opinion).
Scott was a case where the union refused to bring a grievance to arbitration, and this court applied DelCostello to the employees’ hybrid action. I submit, however, that in cases such as this one — where the grievance has been arbitrated and the employee has won — the “whipsaw” Judge Becker described becomes intolerable and a more generous limitations period is needed. Where the union has assisted an employee in successfully processing a grievance through to arbitration, it is only natural that the employee will continue to rely on the union rather than the courts, for assistance in enforcing the award, even in the face of evidence that the union may go no further. As we said in Taylor I:
It is the union ... to whom Taylor looked to protect his recall interest. The union provided the arbitration process procedure as a means for a member to resolve a grievance over such an interest. After a union member exhausts the union’s procedure for dispute resolution through arbitration, it is reasonable for that member to expect the union to follow the necessary steps to conclude the dispute.
703 F.2d at 743.
The employee’s dilemma is well-illustrated by the present case. Even assuming that the majority is correct in holding that appellant’s claim accrued when he received the letter from the Local president stating that the union would go no further, it is apparent that he continued to pursue internal appeals in good faith. There is evidence of record to indicate that appellant could reasonably have believed that the International might take a different view of the matter. This suit was filed shortly after it became apparent that the International would not intercede. The longer limitations period afforded by state law would mitigate the consequences of erroneously relying — as did the appellant — on the union’s continued efforts, by opening the section 301/unfair representation “window” somewhat wider. The window should not be precipitously closed on employees who, having won the first battle *936side-by-side with their union — and often without the aid of independent counsel— fail to appreciate that their union has suddenly deserted them.
The policies underlying federal labor law point to the same result. The Court in DelCostello emphasized the “national interests in stable bargaining relationships and finality of private settlements,” 103 S.Ct. at 2294 (quoting United Parcel Service v. Mitchell, 451 U.S. 56, 70, 101 S.Ct. 1559, 1567, 67 L.Ed.2d 732 (1980)). Stable bargaining relationships require, among other things, that all parties abide by arbitration awards. See Federation of Westinghouse Independent Salaried Unions v. Westinghouse Electric Corporation, 736 F.2d 896, 901 (3d Cir.1984). Thus, actions to enforce stand on a very different footing from actions to vacate. The finality of private settlements, which is undermined by actions at law to vacate, is actually promoted by the availability of actions to compel compliance. Indeed, achieving “finality” is a preeminent goal of all arbitration— whether commercial, labor, or any other— and in all of these contexts actions to enforce have been accorded more dignity, in the form of longer limitations periods, than actions to vacate. See e.g., 9 U.S.C. §§ 9, 12 (1982) (one year to confirm award, three months to vacate); Uniform Arbitration Act §§ 11,12 (1978) (no limitation on confirmation, ninety days to vacate); Taylor I (under New Jersey law six-year breach of contract limitations period applies to confirmation, ninety-day limitation on actions to vacate). Thus, the “analogy” between actions to enforce commercial arbitration awards and actions to enforce labor arbitration awards is much stronger than the analogy between actions to vacate. Further, I believe that in the context of enforcing arbitration awards, the national interests in stable bargaining relationships and the finality of private settlements override the interests in “expeditious dispute resolution in the labor arena and ... uniform procedural treatment of similar claims” that the majority emphasizes.
For the foregoing reasons I conclude that the DelCostello rule should not be applied to hybrid actions to enforce an arbitration award, and for the reasons given in this court’s opinion in Taylor I, I would hold that appellant’s claim against Local 980 is not time barred.
SUR PETITION FOR REHEARING
Before ALDISERT, Chief Judge, SEITZ, ADAMS, GIBBONS, HUNTER, WEIS, GARTH, HIGGINBOTHAM, SLOYITER, BECKER, STAPLETON and MANS-MANN, Circuit Judges.
The petition for rehearing filed by
Appellant Granville B. Taylor, Jr., in the above entitled case having been submitted to the judges who participated in the decision of this court and to all the other available circuit judges of the circuit in regular active service, and no judge who concurred in the decision having asked for rehearing, and a majority of the circuit judges of the circuit in regular active service not having voted for rehearing by the court in banc, the petition for rehearing is denied.
Judge Gibbons would grant the petition for rehearing.
Judge Higginbotham votes for rehearing in banc for the reasons noted in his dissent.
Judge Becker would have granted rehearing to decide the question whether a hybrid section 301/unfair representation suit to enforce rather than vacate an arbitration award is barred by the NLRA’s six-month limitations period for unfair labor practice claims.