UNITED STEELWORK., LOC. NO. 1617 v. General Fireproofing Co., 72-1139.
Decision Date | 12 July 1972 |
Docket Number | No. 72-1139.,72-1139. |
Parties | UNITED STEELWORKERS OF AMERICA, LOCAL NO. 1617, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. The GENERAL FIREPROOFING COMPANY, Defendant-Appellant. |
Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Sixth Circuit |
Eldon S. Wright, Youngstown, Ohio, Harrington, Huxley & Smith, Youngstown, Ohio, on brief, for defendant-appellant.
Eugene Green, Youngstown, Ohio, Anthony P. Sgambati, II, Green, Schiavoni, Murphy & Haines, Youngstown, Ohio, on brief, for plaintiff-appellee.
Before WEICK and PECK, Circuit Judges, and O'SULLIVAN, Senior Circuit Judge.
Plaintiff labor union, United Steelworkers of America, Local No. 1617, the duly recognized bargaining agent for production and maintenance employees of defendant General Fireproofing Company, at its Youngstown, Ohio plant, brought this action in the District Court under § 301 of the Labor Management Relations Act, 29 U.S.C.A. § 185, for breach of the provisions of a collective bargaining agreement in effect between the parties. The union sought an order requiring the company to arbitrate the discharge of one of its supervisors, Edward Kopstoffer, or, in the alternative, that the company be ordered to restore Kopstoffer to his employment with back pay. The District Court overruled the Company's motion for summary judgment, and summarily ordered that the dispute concerning Kopstoffer's rights to continued employment be submitted to binding arbitration, as provided in the collective bargaining agreement although the union had filed no motion for summary judgment. The Company appealed.
The relevant provisions of the collective bargaining agreement are as follows:
ARTICLE XII continues and describes various steps in the grievance procedure. One portion of that procedure is:
Kopstoffer was first employed by the company in January of 1941, and in the fall of 1963 was offered a promotion to a supervisory position. Before he would accept the position, however, Kopstoffer wanted assurances that:
The union contends that various company management officials agreed to these demands.
Kopstoffer began working as a supervisor in October, 1963, and continued to do so until January 12, 1971, when he was discharged from further employment with the company. This discharge date left Kopstoffer one day short of 30 years of service, which would have qualified him for the pension for employees with 30 or more years of service. The company alleges that Kopstoffer was discharged because of disloyalty to the company, whereas the appellee union contends that the discharge was due to his activity as President of the company's Foremen's Club. The alleged disloyalty occurred at the time when Kopstoffer was a supervisor.
After the discharge, the union filed a grievance under the collective bargaining agreement, but the company refused arbitration contending that Kopstoffer was not an "employee" as defined in Article II of the collective bargaining agreement, and that therefore the company had never agreed to arbitration in this kind of a dispute. It maintained that any rights that Kopstoffer might have arise under the alleged private agreement, and not through the terms of the collective bargaining agreement. After the company refused arbitration, the union filed the present suit.
A federal court, when considering the applicability of arbitration in a labor management dispute, faces a strong policy favoring arbitration. Thus, the court must order arbitration "unless it may be said with positive assurance that the arbitration clause is not susceptible of an interpretation that covers the asserted dispute." United Steelworkers of America v. Warrior & Gulf Navigation Co., 363 U.S. 574, 582-583, 80 S.Ct. 1347, 1353, 4 L.Ed.2d 1409 (1960). Indeed, a main thrust of the decisions by the Supreme Court in the steelworker's trilogy was that any possible doubts as to arbitrability are to be resolved in favor of arbitration. See United Steelworkers v. American Manufacturing Co., 363 U.S. 564, 80 S.Ct. 1343, 4 L.Ed.2d 1403 (1960); United Steelworkers v. Warrior and Gulf, supra; United Steelworkers v. Enterprise Wheel & Car Corp., 363 U.S. 593, 80 S. Ct. 1358, 4 L.Ed.2d 1424 (1960).
John Wiley & Sons v. Livingston, 376 U.S. 543, 549, 84 S.Ct. 909, 914, 11 L.Ed.2d 898 (1964).
Nevertheless, arbitration is a matter of contract between the parties, and one cannot be required to submit to arbitration a dispute which it has not agreed to submit to arbitration. Under § 301 of the Labor Management Relations Act, 29 U.S.C. § 185, federal courts have the duty to determine if a party to a labor contract has breached its promise to arbitrate, although such a judicial inquiry is strictly confined to the question of whether or not the parties have agreed to arbitration. Warrior & Gulf, supra at 582, 80 S.Ct. 1347. It is not for the arbitrator to decide whether the dispute is arbitrable.
In John Wiley & Sons, supra, 376 U.S. at 547, 84 S.Ct. at 913, the Supreme Court made the judicial obligation quite clear when it stated:
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