Court Opinion

ID: 9447630
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-03 22:39:46.547733+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:31:07.229641
License: Public Domain

EDGERTON, Circuit Judge.
A private corporation, M & M Restaurants, Inc., under a contract with government officers, operated a cafeteria in the Naval Gun Factory, property of the United States. The corporation employed appellant Brawner, a civilian, as a cook. Without a hearing of any sort, the Superintendent and the Security Officer of the Naval Gun Factory excluded her from the premises and thereby deprived her of her job. They said she did not meet the “security requirements”. No one told either her or the corporation which employed her what the security requirements were, or why she was believed not to meet them. The employer asked for “a hearing relative to the denial of admittance to the Naval Gun Factory of Rachel Brawner.” The request was refused.
*194Brawner and her labor union sued the Secretary of Defense, the Secretary of the Navy, the Superintendent and the Security Officer of the Gun Factory, and also Brawner’s employer, for the loss of her job, and have appealed from a summary judgment dismissing the complaint.
Except with respect to the employer, the District Court erred. This has now become clear. On June 29, 1959, the Supreme Court determined that the Secretary of Defense and his subordinates have not been empowered to deny a contrac- ' tor’s employee access to his work, and thereby deprive him of his job, on security grounds, “in a proceeding in which he was not afforded the safeguards of confrontation and cross-examination.” Greene v. Mc-Elroy, 360 U.S. 474, 79 S.Ct. 1400, 3 L.Ed.2d 1377. What government officers are not empowered to do in such a proceeding, which includes a limited sort of hearing, they are not empowered to do in a proceeding that includes no hearing at all. As in the Greene ease, if the action of the government officers was in accordance with Navy regulations, the regulations were unauthorized and invalid.
It is immaterial that Greene’s working place does not appear to have been, as Brawner’s was, on government property. From the premise that “the United States could validly exclude all persons from access to the Naval Gun Factory”, appellees draw the conclusion that the Secretary of Defense could validly exclude Brawner from her work there, on “security” grounds, without giving her a hearing. If the conclusion followed from the premise, it would likewise follow that the Secretary could deprive government employees of their jobs on similar grounds, without giving them a hearing, by simply excluding them from the places where they work. But neither Congress nor the President has authorized any such thing. And it is clear that government officials may not deprive government employees of their jobs on security grounds except as authorized by Congress or the President. Peters v. Hobby, 349 U.S. 331, 75 S.Ct. 790, 99 L.Ed. 1129; Cole v. Young, 351 U.S. 536, 76 S.Ct. 861, 100 L.Ed. 1396.
The government challenges the standing of appellant labor union to sue. We think the union here had standing to protect the interests of its members.1 Cf. Nat’l Ass’n for the Advancement of Colored People v. Alabama, 357 U.S. 449, 459-460, 78 S.Ct. 1163, 1170, 2 L.Ed.2d 1488; MacArthur Liquors, Inc. v. Palisades Citizens Ass’n, 105 U.S.App.D.C. 180, 265 F.2d 372.
Since Brawner’s employer could not employ her within the Naval Gun Factory, the only place where it had contracted to employ her, when the government appellees would not let her enter the place, it is not responsible for ceasing to employ her. Appellants’ claim against the employer is for alleged breach of contract, and impossibility of performance defeats the claim. The judgment in favor of M & M Restaurants, Inc., is therefore affirmed. The judgment in favor of the government appellees is *195reversed and the case is remanded to the District Court for proceedings consistent herewith.
So ordered.

. The union was the recognized representative of the employees of M & M Restaurants, Inc., under a collective bargaining agreement between the union and the Restaurants. The agreement authorized the union to participate in any dispute arising thereunder, including a dispute over discharge of any employee. When Implant Foods, Inc., replaced the Restaurants as the operator of the cafeteria, the new collective bargaining contract included a provision whereby Implant agreed to reinstate appellant with full rights should this suit be determined in her favor. Cf. Fishgold v. Sullivan Drydock & Repair Corp., 328 U.S. 275, 283, 66 S.Ct. 1105, 1110, 90 L.Ed. 1230.