Beasley v. Food Fair of North Carolina, Inc 8212 1597

• Decision Date: 15 May 1974
• Docket Number: No. 72,72
• Citation: 40 L.Ed.2d 443,416 U.S. 653,94 S.Ct. 2023
• Parties: Ulysses Vernon BEASLEY et al., Petitioners, v. FOOD FAIR OF NORTH CAROLINA, INC., et al. —1597
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

416 U.S. 653

94 S.Ct. 2023

40 L.Ed.2d 443

Ulysses Vernon BEASLEY et al., Petitioners,

v FOOD FAIR OF NORTH CAROLINA, INC., et al.

No. 72—1597.

Argued Feb. 19, 1974.

Decided May 15, 1974.

Syllabus

Following discharge of petitioners, managers of meat departments in respondent Food Fair's stores, because of their union membership, the union filed unfair labor practice charges with the National Labor Relations Board, which were dismissed on the ground that the protection of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) did not extend to 'supervisors' like petitioners.Thereupon petitioners brought suit in state court under § 95—83 of North Carolina's right-to-work law.The trial court granted respondents' motion for summary judgment.On the ground that enforcing the state law in favor of petitioners was barred by the second clause of § 14(a) of the NLRA('no employer . . . shall be compelled to deem individuals defined herein as supervisors as employees for the purpose of any law, either national or local, relating to collective bargaining'), the State Supreme Court ultimately upheld that ruling.Held: The second clause of § 14(a) applies to any law requiring an employer to accord to supervisors like petitioners, who are 'the front line of management,' the 'anomalous status of employees,' and enforcement of the North Carolina law would thus flout the national policy against compulsion upon employers from either federal or state authorities to treat supervisors as employees.Pp. 656—662.

282 N.C. 530, 193 S.E.2d 911, affirmed.

BRENNAN, J., delivered the opinion for a unanimous Court.

Larry L. Eubanks, Winston-Salem, N.C., for petitioners.

Ralph Madison Stockton, Jr., Winston-Salem, N.C., for respondents.

Mr. Justice BRENNANdelivered the opinion of the Court.

Taft-Hartley amendments¹ of the National Labor Relations Act excluded supervisors from the protections of the Act and thus freed employers to discharge supervisors without violating the Act's restraints against discharges on account of labor union membership.The question in this case is whether those amendments also freed the employer from liability in damages to the discharged supervisors under §§ 95—81and95—83 of North Carolina's right-to-work law that provides such an action for employees discharged for union membership.²

RespondentFood Fair of North Carolina, Inc.(Food Fair), a grocery chain, operates stores throughout North Carolia.Petitioners were managers of meat departments in Food Fair Stores in the Winston-Salem area.When Local 525 of the Amalgamated Meat Cutters and Butcher Workmen of North America, AFL—CIO, organized the stores' meatcutters, petitioners also joined the union.Food Fair discharged them, allegedly on account of their union membership, immediately after Local 525 won a representation election conducted by the National Labor Relations Board.The Local claimed that the discharges constituted an unfair labor practice and filed charges with the Regional Director of the NLRB.The Regional Director refused to issue a complaint on the ground that petitioners were 'supervisors' excluded from the Act's protection.On appeal, the NLRB General Counsel refused to issue a complaint, on the same ground.³Petitioners thereupon brought this suit in state court against Food Fair under § 95—83.Food Fair contended successfully that the second clause of § 14(a) of the National Labor Relations Act,29 U.S.C. § 164(a)—'but no employer . . . shall be compelled to deem individuals defined herein as supervisors as employees for the purpose of any law, either national or local, relating to collective bargaining'—prohibited enforcement of the state law in favor of supervisors, and was granted summary judgment.The North Carolina Court of Appeals reversed in reliance upon Hanna Mining Co. v. District 2, Marine Engineers Beneficial Ass'n, AFL—CIO, 382 U.S. 181, 86 S.Ct. 327, 15 L.Ed.2d 254(1965).15 N.C.App. 323, 190 S.E.2d 333(1972).The North Carolina Supreme Court in turn reversed the Court of Appeals and reinstated the summary judgment.282 N.C. 530, 193 S.E.2d 911(1973).We granted certiorari, 414 U.S. 907, 94 S.Ct. 217, 38 L.Ed.2d 145(1973).We affirm.

Petitioners concede that the Taft-Hartley amendments exclude supervisors from the protection of the Act.And it is undisputed that petitioners' status as 'supervisors' has been settled by the determinations of the Regional Director and General Counsel of the NLRB.See n. 3, supra;Hanna Mining Co. v. Marine Engineers Beneficial Ass'n, AFL—CIO, supra, 382 U.S., at 190, 86 S.Ct., at 332; Brief for Respondents 7.The Act therefore did not protect petitioners against discharge by Food Fair solely because of their membership in Local 525.Oil City Brass Works v. NLRB, 357 F.2d 466(CA51966);NLRB v Fullerton Publishing Co., 283 F.2d 545(CA91960).SeeNLRB v. Inter-City Advertising Co., 190 F.2d 420(CA41951);NLRB v. Griggs Equipment, Inc., 307 F.2d 275(CA51962);NLRB v. Big Three Welding Equipment Co., 359 F.2d 77(CA51966); Brief for Petitioners 8—9.

Our inquiry is thus narrowed to the determination of whether Congress, in addition to denying the protections of the federal law to supervisors discharged for union membership, should be taken as having also precluded North Carolina from affording petitioners its state damages remedy for such discharges.Section 14(a) does not wholly foreclose state regulations respecting the status of supervisors, but its two clauses require individualized consideration in view of the Court of Appeals' reliance on Hanna Mining.Hanna, construing the first clause—'Nothing herein shall prohibit any individual employed as a supervisor from becoming or remaining a member of a labor organization'—held that 'certainly Congress made no considered decision generally to exclude state limitations on supervisory organizing,'382 U.S., at 190, 86 S.Ct., at 332.The Court accordingly held that the Wisonsin antipicketing statutes—that furthered, not hindered, the Act's limitations—could be applied to activity by a union of supervisors.

That construction, of course, is consistent with the objectives of the section.But the second clause is a broad command that no employer shall be compelled to treat supervisors as employees for the purpose of 'any law, either national or local, relating to collective bargaining.'Consistently with this broader command, and Hanna's further statement that 'Congress' propelling intention was to relieve employers from any compulsion under the Act and under state law to countenance or bargain with any union of supervisory employees,'382 U.S., at 189, 86 S.Ct., at 332, the North Carolina Supreme Court concluded that §§ 95—81and95—83 of the State's right- -to-work law contravened the congressional objective.That court held: 'To permit a state law to deprive an employer of his right to discharge his supervisor for membership in a union would completely frustrate the congressional determination to leave this weapon of self-help to the employer.'282 N.C., at 541, 193 S.E.2d, at 918.

Petitioners argue, however, that Congress must have meant that the reach of the limitation of the second clause that 'no employer . . . shall be compelled to deem . . . supervisors as employees for the purpose of any law, either national or local, relating to collective bargaining'(emphasis supplied) did not bar state damages remedies for the discharge of supervisors for union membership but was a limited prohibition against state regulations that compel the employer to bargain collectively with unions that include supervisors as members.The legislative history of § 14(a), read with its companion amendments, §§ 2(3)and2(11), satisfies us that Congress embraced laws like North Carolina's §§ 95—81and95—83 within the prohibition against 'any (local) law . . . relating to collective bargaining.'

Section 2(3) of the National Labor Relations Act before the 1947 Taft-Hartley amendments provided that '(t)he term 'employee' shall include any employee . . ..'49 Stat. 450.The NLRB, after much vacillation,⁴ interpreted this term as including supervisors.Packard Motor Car Co. v. NLRB, 330 U.S. 485, 67 S.Ct. 739, 91 L.Ed. 1040(1947), sustained the Board.Congress reacted by amending §§ 2(3)and2(11), and enacting § 14(a) for the express purpose of relieving employers of obligations under the Act when supervisors, if employees under the Act, would be the focus of concern.Hanna Mining Co. v. District 2, Marine Engineers Beneficial Ass'n, AFL CIO, supra, 382 U.S., at 188, 86 S.Ct., at 331.Those amendments were the product of compromise of H.R. 3020andS. 1126, 80th Cong., 1st Sess.(1947).There were differences in the specific provisions addressed to supervisory employees,⁵ but no difference in objective.Employers were not to be obliged to recognize and bargain with unions including or composed of supervisors,⁶ because supervisors were manage- ment obliged to be loyal to their employer's interests, and their identity with the interests of rank-and-file employees might impair that loyalty and threaten realization of the basic ends of federal labor legislation.Thus the House Report stated:

'Management, like labor, must have faithful agents.—If we are to produce goods competitively and in such large quantities that many can buy them at low cost, then, just as there are people on labor's side to say what workers want and have a right to expect, there must be in management and loyal to it persons not subject to influence or control of unions, not only to assign people to their work, to see that they keep at their work and do it well, to correct them when they are at fault, and to settle their complaints and grievances, but to determine how much work employees should do, what pay they should receive for it, and to carry on the whole of labor relations.'H.R.Rep.No.245, 80th Cong., 1st Sess., 16(1947).

Further:

'The bill does not forbid anyone to organize....