AIRCRAFT MECHANICS FRAT. ASS'N v. United Airlines, Inc.

• Decision Date: 15 October 1975
• Docket Number: No. C-75-2060SC.,C-75-2060SC.
• Parties: AIRCRAFT MECHANICS FRATERNAL ASSOCIATION et al., Plaintiffs, v. UNITED AIRLINES, INC., Defendant.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Northern District of California

406 F. Supp. 492

AIRCRAFT MECHANICS FRATERNAL ASSOCIATION et al., Plaintiffs, v. UNITED AIRLINES, INC., Defendant.

No. C-75-2060SC.

United States District Court, N. D. California.

January 6, 1976.

Order Dissolving Temporary Restraining Order made from Bench October 15, 1975.

COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED

Thornton C. Bunch, Jr., San Francisco, Cal., Andrew E. Zelman, Surrey, Karasik, Morse & Seham, New York City, for plaintiffs.

Arnold T. Aikens, Michael A. Katz, Washington, D.C., Robert S. Rankin, Jr., United Airlines, Inc., Chicago, Ill., John B. Marchant, Sedgwick, Detert, Moran & Arnold, San Francisco, Cal., for defendant.

AMENDED MEMORANDUM DECISION

CONTI, District Judge.

This action for injunctive relief is brought by the Aircraft Mechanics Fraternal Association (AMFA) and four individuals employed by United Air Lines, Inc. in the class or craft of mechanics and related employees, within the meaning of the Railway Labor Act (Act or RLA), 45 U.S.C. §§ 151-188. Plaintiffs would have this court enjoin, pending final disposition of plaintiffs' "Application for Investigation of Representation Dispute" which is now before the National Mediation Board (NMB), (1) any negotiations concerning a new collective bargaining agreement between defendant United Air Lines and intervenor International Association of Machinists (IAM), which is the current NMB-certified exclusive bargaining representative of the class and craft of mechanics and related employees of United Air Lines throughout the United States; (2) United's enforcement of its policy prohibiting its employees from distributing union campaign literature on United property, insofar as it extends to the distribution of such literature in non-working areas and on non-working time; and (3) United's alleged discrimination in allowing IAM employee and non-employee supporters, but not AMFA supporters, to engage in election, organizational and campaign activities on United property.

At the present time, United is a party to a collective bargaining agreement with the representative of its employees in the mechanics and related employees class or craft. That representative is IAM, having been certified as such by the National Mediation Board in July of 1945. United is also a party to separate collective bargaining agreements with its ramp and stores employees, food service employees and dispatchers. IAM is the certified bargaining representative for each of these groups as well. All four of the collective agreements are subject to change on November 1, 1975. Historically, United and IAM have negotiated these agreements simultaneously and bargaining considerations often overlap.

On August 20, 1975, AMFA petitioned the NMB alleging the existence of a representation dispute among the employees of United, presently represented by the IAM, in the craft or class of airline mechanics and related employees. In accordance with NMB Rules and Regulations, 29 C.F.R. § 1206.2, AMFA submitted authorization cards from over 50% of the employees in the craft or class designating it as the representative for purposes of collective bargaining of the signatory employees. On September 19, 1975, the NMB notified AMFA of its determination that a labor dispute existed with respect to representation, authorizing an election by mail ballot, to be held following NMB's determination of employee voting eligibility and preparation of ballots. On September 25, 1975, United notified the NMB of its objection to the NMB's prior exclusion of the ramp servicemen and storekeepers from the mechanics and related employees craft or class. United requested the NMB to reconsider the craft determination, which, if granted, could bear directly on AMFA's card majority status, since some 5,000 additional employees would come into the class or craft.

Upon receiving the NMB's determination that a dispute existed with respect to representation, AMFA made a demand upon United that it cease negotiating with IAM. This demand United refused to honor. AMFA thereupon came into this court seeking relief in the form of a temporary restraining order, which was granted on September 30, 1975. The effect of the order was to terminate United's negotiations with IAM, which had begun in early September pursuant to a pre-arranged expedited bargaining schedule which it had been hoped would produce an agreement on a new contract prior to November 1, 1975, the date of expiration of the old contract. Plaintiffs now request that this court extend the effect of its order "freezing" the status quo until such time as the NMB resolves the dispute over bargaining representation.¹

Having carefully and assiduously researched the question here presented, the court concludes that it is without jurisdiction in this matter and directs that the earlier order be dissolved.

This case, one of first impression, presents in clear focus the issue of the relative roles of the district courts and the National Mediation Board in effectuating the purposes of the Railway Labor Act of 1926, as amended, 45 U.S.C. §§ 151-188. As will be seen, it has been necessary for this court to draw fine distinctions between provisions of the Act as to which judicial intervention is proper and those whose enforcement Congress has left exclusively to the NMB.

The history of the present Railway Labor Act begins with Title III of the Transportation Act of 1920, Chap. 91, 41 Stat. 456, 469, in which, inter alia, Congress established the Railroad Labor Board as a means for the peaceful settlement, by agreement or by arbitration, of labor controversies between interstate carriers and their employees. The Act sought "to encourage settlement without strikes, first by conference between the parties, failing that, by reference to adjustment boards of the parties' own choosing and, if this is ineffective, by a full hearing before a national board . . ." Pennsylvania R. Co. v. United States R. Labor Board, 261 U.S. 72, 43 S.Ct. 278, 67 L.Ed. 536 (1923). The decisions of the Board were supported by no legal sanctions, however. The disputants were not in any way "to be forced into compliance with the statute or with the judgments pronounced by the Labor Board, except through the effect of adverse public opinion." Pennsylvania R. System v. Pennsylvania R. Co., 267 U.S. 203, 45 S.Ct. 307, 69 L.Ed. 574 (1925).

The Railroad Labor Board had jurisdiction to hear and decide disputes over rules and working conditions upon the application of either side, when the parties had failed to agree and an adjustment board had not been organized. The board also had jurisdiction to decide who might represent the employees in the conferences contemplated by the statute and to make reasonable rules for ascertaining the employees' will in this respect. But judicial interference by injunction with the exercise of the discretion of the Board in the matters committed to it, and with the publication of its opinion, was decided to be unwarranted. Pennsylvania R. Co. v. United States R. Labor Bd., supra. Publication of the Board's decision was thought by Congress to be sufficient to arouse such public criticism of the party felt to be at fault as to vindicate, through moral constraint, "the economic interest of every member of the public in the undisturbed flow of interstate commerce and the acute inconvenience to which all must be subjected by an interruption caused by a serious and widespread labor dispute . . ." Id., 261 U.S. at 79-80, 43 S.Ct. at 281. Congress assumed that the parties would comply voluntarily with the Board's decisions, and thus did not grant the courts jurisdiction to compel compliance.

Voluntary compliance was not forthcoming.² Thus Congress undertook to enact legislation with a stronger bite. The result was the Railway Labor Act of 1926. It embodied an agreement of a large majority of representative committees of railroad presidents and of executives of railroad labor organizations. See Report by the Committee of Interstate and Foreign Commerce to the House of Representatives, 69th Cong., 1st Sess., H.R.Rep.No.328. The Act substituted a United States Board of Mediation for the old Railroad Labor Board. Congress in the new statute adhered to the policy of providing for the amicable adjustment of labor disputes, and for voluntary submissions to arbitration as opposed to compulsory arbitration, but provided that an award pursuant to arbitration before the Board was to be enforceable in the courts, with the Board's determination accorded conclusive status. See 45 U.S.C. § 159. In addition, the board was directed, once it had found that a labor dispute, which had not been adjusted under the provisions of the act, threatened an interruption of interstate commerce, to notify the President who, in his discretion, could create an emergency board of investigation to report, within thirty days, with respect to the dispute. See 45 U.S.C. § 160. After the creation of such board and for thirty days after its report to the President, there was to be no change by the parties in the conditions out of which the dispute arose. Id. This section thus provided a mechanism to prevent strikes which could threaten the national interest, and it was clear that Congress intended that the provision be enforceable in the courts. See, Texas & N. O. R. Co. v. Brotherhood of Ry. & S. S. Clerks, 281 U.S. 548, 563-66, 50 S.Ct. 427, 74 L.Ed. 1034 (1929).

It was in the context of the finding that Congress, in enacting the 1926 legislation, clearly intended to impose, and did impose, certain definite obligations enforceable by judicial proceedings, that the Supreme Court in 1929 held that a judicial remedy also existed under subdivision third of Section 2 of the Act (45 U.S.C. § 152, Third) which provides in part that "Representatives, for the purposes of this Act, shall be designated by the respective parties . . . without interference, influence, or coercion exercised by either party over the self-organization...