Flaherty v. McDonald
| Decision Date | 18 November 1959 |
| Docket Number | No. 1072/58.,1072/58. |
| Citation | 178 F. Supp. 544 |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Southern District of California |
| Parties | Thomas H. FLAHERTY, Robert D. Koch, George Jiminez, Matthew W. Yerkey, Joseph M. Luksich, James Elliott, and William V. Youngblood, individually and for the Members of Local 2869, United Steelworkers of America, AFL-CIO, Plaintiffs, v. David J. McDONALD, individually and as President of the International Union, United Steelworkers of America, AFL-CIO; I. W. Abel, individually and as Secretary-Treasurer of the International Union, United Steelworkers of America, AFL-CIO; and Harold A. Rasmussen, Defendants. |
Tony Geram, Fontana, Cal., for plaintiff.
Nutter, Arnold & Smith, Los Angeles, Cal., for defendant Harold A. Rasmussen.
This action arises out of a controversy between Local Union No. 2869 of the United Steelworkers of America and International Union, United Steelworkers of America. Hereinafter Local No. 2869 will be referred to as Local, and International Union, United Steelworkers of America will be referred to as International. Plaintiffs are citizens of the State of California, members of Local and of International. Local is composed of more than six thousand members employed by Kaiser Steel Corporation at Fontana, California.
On June 8, 1958 Local held an election and, as a result, plaintiff Thomas H. Flaherty was elected president, plaintiff Matthew W. Yerkey, financial secretary, and plaintiff William V. Youngblood, grievance man. Three months after being inducted into office plaintiffs, along with all other elected officers of Local, were deposed from office, and defendant Harold A. Rasmussen was placed in charge of Local as Administrator.
On November 19, 1958 this action was filed by plaintiffs against David J. McDonald, individually and as president of International, I. W. Abel, individually and as secretary-treasurer of International, and Harold A. Rasmussen. Plaintiffs allege the action is brought on behalf of plaintiffs as well as on behalf of each and all other persons similarly situated who are members of Local and demand that the control of Local be returned to its duly elected officers. Plaintiffs allege diversity as grounds for jurisdiction. Plaintiffs contend they were removed from office arbitrarily and without charge.
The Constitution of International, Article XIII, in part provides:
for the accused member to appear before a Trial Committee to answer the charges made.
Evidence in this case indicates no charge was ever filed against any of the officers of Local (including plaintiffs herein) and that there never was a hearing before a Trial Committee. Plaintiffs contend that as a consequence they were removed from office without compliance with the requirements of Article XIII of the Constitution of International.
At the trial of this action Alfred Kojetensky, District Director of St. Louis and one of a committee of two who made an investigation of the affairs of Local and recommended that an administrator be appointed, testified that they (the committee) were not proceeding under Article XIII but were proceeding under Article IX of the Constitution.
Article IX provides:
Nothing in the evidence indicates defendants attempted to comply with Article IX. Defendants contend that because of dissension within the Local Union and occurrence of many illegal work-stoppages and wild-cat strikes they were justified in removing officers of Local without charges, notice or trial, on the theory they were taking "such other action" as was "necessary to secure compliance with the Constitution."
Evidence introduced at the trial indicated Local was and has been full of dissension for some time. For years members of Local have not been able to agree, and at the time of the taking over of Local by defendant Rasmussen there were three well-defined groups or factions within Local. At the election held on June 8, 1958 the group headed by Thomas H. Flaherty seemed to be in ascension, and as a consequence Flaherty and the balance of his ticket were elected to office. The election of Flaherty and the balance of his ticket did not end dissension, as various members of Local refused to support the new administration. This resulted in difficulty in holding meetings of the membership. Some members refused to attend. Those who did attend were boisterous and noisy and refused to pay attention. In fact, at one time conditions were so bad officials of Local had to call in police to keep peace within the meeting.
Evidence at the trial further indicated that for many years Kaiser Steel Corporation has been plagued with unlawful work stoppages and wild-cat strikes. Although plaintiff Flaherty and his slate were in office for only three months before they were deposed, nevertheless, two very serious work stoppages and wild-cat strikes occurred during that period. The first occurred in the tin mill; the second in the railroad yards.
Kaiser Steel Corporation, wishing to place in operation a "second line" in the tin mill, attempted to transfer from the first line to the second line some of its older employees. Two of these older employees refused to man the second line when requested to do so and walked off the job. The grievance men of Local persuaded the two who had walked off the job to return, but when they returned to the tin mill they were given five-day suspension slips by management because of the unauthorized walk-off. When they received the five-day suspension slips these two men walked off the job for the second time, taking with them some ten or twelve others who were in sympathy.
Because of the walk-off and the wild-cat strike which lasted twenty-seven days it was necessary for management to lay off five hundred persons in the tin mill. This walk-out of disgruntled employees was not a minor matter. Officials of Kaiser Steel Corporation testified at the trial that because of the walk-out and lay-offs necessary because of it, the tin mill was closed down from September 13 to October 10, and some seventy-six thousand hours of work were lost by tin mill employees, aggregating $232,000 in loss of wages and in loss to the company of orders aggregating more than $10,000,000.
The walk-out in the railroad yards was the result of a minor infraction on the part of two railroad yard employees. On pay-days employees in the railroad yards were supposed to pick up their checks "at the gate." One crew in the railroad yards during working hours drove their engine near the gate and walked over to the gate to pick up their pay-checks. When the foreman discovered the engine had been abandoned by the crew during working hours in order to pick up pay-checks, he gave the crew members suspension slips. As a result of these suspension slips there was an informal conference of all railroad yard employees, after which they walked off the job and proceeded to Local headquarters several miles distant to discuss the situation.
Although these men were advised by grievance men of Local to return to work and not leave the yard unattended, nevertheless, they continued the discussion for some four hours before returning to work. After they did return to work, several who had walked off the job were given suspension notices, with the result that all railroad yard employees with the exception of one crew walked off the job for the second time.
While the employees were discussing the railroad yard situation at Local headquarters, plant officials called Local headquarters and informed them that if the men did not return to work and attend the furnaces, there was the possibility of an explosion which might cause loss of life and damages running into millions of dollars. Finally, after much discussion, the employees returned to work. Although the walk-offs in question in the railroad yards lasted only a matter of hours, nevertheless, it was a serious work-stoppage and could have resulted in great damage to the plant.
Grievance men testified that in both walk-off incidents they directed the men to return to work but the men refused to do so. Both the walk-off in the tin mill and the walk-off in the railroad yard were unlawful under the agreement between Kaiser Steel Corporation and International.
International was the bargaining agent for Local. The agreement between Kaiser Steel Corporation and International had been reduced to writing and was binding not only upon Kaiser Steel Corporation but also upon International, Local, and every member thereof. Locals and their members must realize that they are bound by contracts negotiated by Union bargaining agents. They do not have any right to disregard the terms of contracts made in their behalf. Labor Unions may be liable and held to respond in damages for illegal walk-outs or wild-cat strikes. It is of the utmost importance that Labor organizations see to it that individual Locals and their members live up to contract terms in order to avoid a claim for...
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