Court Opinion

ID: 9446194
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-03 21:48:55.360884+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:30:33.866463
License: Public Domain

HEALY, Circuit Judge
(dissenting).
I am unable to go along with the holding of my associates that the Board made no disposition of the merits of appellant’s complaint.
The Union, in its submission to the Board, admitted that appellant left Nip-ton and returned to Las Vegas; and it was not disputed that in doing so he deliberately disobeyed an order of the dispatcher. The Union sought to justify this admitted infraction of an operating order by reference to Section (b) of Article 32 of the Agreement, quoted by my associates in their footnote 5. In disposing of the case the Board, among other things, stated: “If the carrier is to have efficient operations on its railroad, employees must be relied on to obey operating instructions and orders.”
It appears to me plain that the Board was of opinion, and in substance held, that the asserted violation by the Company of Article 32, even if true, would *668not serve to justify an employee’s violation of direct operating instructions and his abandonment of his post. Such a ruling would appear to promote safety in-railroad operations, which must always take into account considerations of that nature.1 With its intimate knowledge of the field, the Board is peculiarly equipped to make such a decision.

. Section one of the Railway Labor Act, 45 U.S.C.A. § 151, under subdivision “Fifth” defines “employee” thus:
“The term ‘employee’ as used herein includes every person in the service of a carrier (subject to its continuing authority to supervise and direct the manner of rendition of his service) * * *
Section two of the Act, 45 U.S.C.A. § 151a (1), under the heading “General purposes,” states one of its purposes ti> be:
“to avoid any interruption to commerce or to the operation of any carrier engaged therein; * *