International Longshoremen Association v. Allied International, Inc

• Decision Date: 20 April 1982
• Docket Number: AFL-CIO,No. 80-1663,80-1663
• Citation: 72 L.Ed.2d 21,102 S.Ct. 1656,456 U.S. 212
• Parties: INTERNATIONAL LONGSHOREMEN'S ASSOCIATION,, et al., Petitioners, v. ALLIED INTERNATIONAL, INC
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

456 U.S. 212

102 S.Ct. 1656

72 L.Ed.2d 21

INTERNATIONAL LONGSHOREMEN'S ASSOCIATION, AFL-CIO, et al., Petitioners,

v ALLIED INTERNATIONAL, INC.

No. 80-1663.

Argued Jan. 18, 1982.

Decided April 20, 1982.

Syllabus

Respondent is an American importer of Russian wood products and had contracts with an American shipper for shipment of the products from the Soviet Union to American ports. The shipper in turn employed a stevedoring company to unload its ships. The stevedore's employees were members of petitioner longshoremen's union (hereafter petitioner). Petitioner, as a protest against the Russian invasion of Afghanistan, refused to handle cargoes arriving from or destined for the Soviet Union. As a result respondent's shipments and business were disrupted completely. Respondent then brought an action in Federal District Court for damages under § 303 of the Labor Management Relations Act, claiming that petitioner's refusal to unload respondent's shipments constituted an illegal secondary boycott under § 8(b)(4)(B) of the National Labor Relations Act. Section 8(b)(4)(B) prohibits a labor union from engaging in activities designed to influence individuals employed by "any person engaged in commerce or in an industry affecting commerce," and from inducing such employees to refuse to handle goods with the object of forcing any person "to cease using, selling, handling, transporting, or otherwise dealing" in the products of, or "to cease doing business" with, another person. The District Court dismissed the complaint, holding that petitioner's boycott was a purely political, primary boycott of Russian goods and thus not within the scope of § 8(b)(4)(B). The Court of Appeals reversed.

Held : Petitioner's boycott was an illegal secondary boycott under § 8(b)(4)(B). Pp. 218-227.

(a) Petitioner's activity was "in commerce" and within the scope of the National Labor Relations Act. Its refusal to unload respondent's shipments in no way affected the maritime operations of foreign ships, was not aimed at altering the terms of employment of foreign crews, and did not seek to extend the bill of rights of American workers and employers to foreign seamen or shipowners. Accordingly, the longstanding tradition of restraint in applying United States laws to foreign ships is irrele- vant. Benz v. Compania Naviera Hidalgo, 353 U.S. 138, 77 S.Ct. 699, 1 L.Ed.2d 709; Windward Shipping (London) Ltd. v. American Radio Assn., 415 U.S. 104, 94 S.Ct. 959, 39 L.Ed.2d 195; and American Radio Assn. v. Mobile S.S. Assn., 419 U.S. 215, 95 S.Ct. 409, 42 L.Ed.2d 399, distinguished. Pp. 219-222.

(b) By its terms, § 8(b)(4)(B)'s prohibition against secondary boycotts applies to the facts of this case. Petitioner's sole complaint was with the Soviet Union's foreign and military policy, and however commendable its objectives might have been, the effect of its action was to impose a heavy burden on neutral employers. It is just such a burden that the secondary boycott provisions were designed to prevent. Pp. 222-224

(c) That the specific purpose of petitioner's action was not to halt business between respondent, its shipper, and the stevedore, but to free union members from handling goods from an objectionable source, does not place the action outside the prohibition of secondary boycotts. When a purely secondary boycott reasonably can be expected to threaten neutral parties with ruin or substantial loss, the pressure on those parties must be viewed as at least one of the objects of the boycott or the statutory prohibition would be rendered meaningless. P. 224.

(d) Neither is it a defense to the application of § 8(b)(4)(B) that the reason for petitioner's boycott was not a labor dispute with a primary employer but a political dispute with a foreign nation. Section 8(b)(4)(B) contains no exception for "political" secondary boycotts, and its legislative history does not indicate that political disputes should be excluded from its scope. Pp.224-226

(e) That respondent has alleged a violation of § 8(b)(4)(B) does not infringe the First Amendment rights of petitioner or its members. Conduct designed not to communicate but to coerce merits little consideration under that Amendment. Pp. 226-227

1st Cir., 640 F.2d 1368, affirmed.

Ernest L. Mathews, Jr., New York City, for petitioners.

Duane R. Batista, Boston, Mass., for respondent.

Lawrence G. Wallace, Washington, D. C., for the U. S. as amicus curiae, by special leave of Court.

Justice POWELL delivered the opinion of the Court.

The question for our decision is whether a refusal by an American longshoremen's union to unload cargoes shipped from the Soviet Union is an illegal secondary boycott under § 8(b)(4) of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), 61 Stat. 141, as amended, 29 U.S.C. § 158(b)(4).

I

On January 9, 1980, Thomas Gleason, president of the International Longshoremen's Association (ILA), ordered ILA members to stop handling cargoes arriving from or destined for the Soviet Union. Gleason took this action to protest the Russian invasion of Afghanistan.¹ In obedience to the order longshoremen up and down the east and gulf coasts refused to service ships carrying Russian cargoes.²

Respondent Allied International, Inc. (Allied), is an American company that imports Russian wood products for resale in the United States. Allied contracts with Waterman Steamship Lines (Waterman), an American corporation operating ships of United States registry, for shipment of the wood from Leningrad to ports on the east and gulf coasts of the United States. Waterman, in turn, employs the stevedoring company of John T. Clark & Son of Boston, Inc. (Clark), to unload its ships docking in Boston. Under the terms of the collective-bargaining agreement between ILA Local 799 and the Boston Shipping Association, of which Clark is a member, Clark obtains its longshoring employees through the union hiring hall.³

As a result of the boycott, Allied's shipments were disrupted completely. Ultimately, Allied was forced to renegotiate its Russian contracts, substantially reducing its purchases and jeopardizing its ability to supply its own customers. App. 24a-28a. On March 31, 1980, after union officials informed Allied that ILA members would continue to refuse to unload any Russian cargo, Allied brought this action in the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts. Claiming that the boycott violated the prohibition against secondary boycotts in § 8(b)(4) of the NLRA, 29 U.S.C. § 158(b)(4),⁴ Allied sued for damages under § 303 of the Labor Management Relations Act, 1947 (LMRA), 61 Stat. 158, as amended, 29 U.S.C. § 187,⁵ which creates a private damages remedy for the victims of secondary boycotts.⁶

At about the same time, Allied filed an unfair labor practice charge with the National Labor Relations Board under § 10(b) of the NLRA, 29 U.S.C. § 160(b).⁷

Finding that Allied had not alleged a violation of § 8(b)(4)(B), the District Court dismissed Allied's complaint. 492 F.Supp. 334 (1980). The court characterized the ILA boycott as a purely political, primary boycott of Russian goods.⁸ So described, the boycott was not within the scope of § 8(b)(4).⁹

The Court of Appeals for the First Circuit reversed the dismissal of Allied's complaint and remanded for further proceedings. 640 F.2d 1368 (1981). As an initial matter, and in agreement with the District Court, the court found that the effects of the ILA boycott were "in commerce" within the meaning of the NLRA as interpreted by a long line of deci- sions of this Court.¹⁰ The court held further that the ILA boycott, as described in Allied's averments, was within § 8(b)(4)'s prohibition of secondary boycotts, despite its political purpose, and that resort to such behavior was not protected activity under the First Amendment.¹¹

We granted certiorari to determine the coverage of the secondary boycott provisions of the NLRA in this setting. 454 U.S. 814, 102 S.Ct. 90, 70 L.Ed.2d 83 (1981). We affirm.

II

Our starting point in a case of this kind must be the language of the statute. By its exact terms the secondary boycott provisions of § 8(b)(4)(B) of the NLRA would appear to be aimed precisely at the sort of activity alleged in this case. Section 8(b)(4)(B) governs activities designed to influence individuals employed by "any person engaged in commerce or in an industry affecting commerce." ¹² Certainly Allied, Wa- terman, and Clark were engaged "in commerce," and Allied alleges that the effect of the ILA action was to obstruct commerce up and down the east and gulf coasts.¹³ Just as plainly, it would appear that the ILA boycott fell within § 8(b)(4)(B)'s prohibition of secondary boycotts. Allied alleges that by inducing members of the union to refuse to handle Russian cargoes, the ILA boycott was designed to force Allied, Waterman, and Clark "to cease doing business" with one another and "to cease using, selling, handling, transporting, or otherwise dealing in" Russian products.

Notwithstanding the language of the statute, petitioners argue that their conduct was not "in commerce" as our decisions have interpreted that term. They argue as well that even if the ILA activity were within the jurisdictional scope of § 8(b)(4), the boycott was not the sort of secondary boycott Congress intended to proscribe. We address these arguments in turn.

A.

In a line of cases beginning with Benz v. Compania Naviera Hidalgo, 353 U.S. 138, 77 S.Ct. 699, 1 L.Ed.2d 709 (1957),¹⁴ the Court has held that the "maritime operations of foreign-flag ships employing alien seamen are not in 'commerce' " as this term is used in the NLRA.¹⁵ Thus, in Benz the Court held that picketing by an American union in support of striking foreign crewmembers of a foreign-flag vessel was not governed by the Act. Relying upon the legislative history of the NLRA and the longstanding principles of comity in the treatment of foreign vessels, the Court held that the labor laws were not designed ...