Johnson v. Colts, Inc.

• Decision Date: 07 July 1969
• Docket Number: Civ. No. 13052.
• Citation: 306 F. Supp. 1076
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Connecticut
• Parties: Gordon F. JOHNSON, Plaintiff, v. COLTS, INC., Defendant.

306 F. Supp. 1076

Gordon F. JOHNSON, Plaintiff, v. COLTS, INC., Defendant.

Civ. No. 13052.

United States District Court D. Connecticut.

July 7, 1969.

William S. Zeman, of Zeman Daly & Silvester, Hartford, Conn., for plaintiff.

Jay S. Siegel, Hartford, Conn., for defendant.

TIMBERS, Chief Judge.

In this action brought by an employee pursuant to Section 301(a) of the Labor Management Relations Act, 29 U.S.C. § 185(a), defendant employer has moved to dismiss pursuant to Rule 12(b) (6), Fed.R.Civ.P., on two grounds: (1) failure of plaintiff to utilize or exhaust the grievance and arbitration procedures provided in the collective bargaining agreement; and (2) failure of plaintiff to join his local union and its national, whom defendant alleges are indispensible parties. For the reasons more fully developed below, defendant's motion in all respects is denied.

FACTS

From 1943 until 1963 plaintiff was employed by defendant in various capacities, all within the bargaining unit as defined in the collective bargaining agreement. In 1963 he was promoted to foreman, a position out of his bargaining unit. In this capacity he was required to terminate his union membership. At the end of 1968 plaintiff's employment with defendant was terminated.

Under the collective bargaining agreement between defendant, Local 376 and the United Automobile, Aerospace and Agricultural Implement Workers of America, UAW-AFL-CIO, employees promoted out of the bargaining unit continue to accumulate seniority, "and such employees must return to the classification they occupied prior to leaving the bargaining unit or a like classification in the same grade." (Art. IX, § 10(a)). In his complaint plaintiff alleges that he requested defendant to observe this provision of the agreement; upon defendant's refusal to restore plaintiff to an appropriate position within the bargaining unit, plaintiff instituted the instant action.

CLAIMS OF THE PARTIES

The collective bargaining agreement, under which plaintiff asserts rights as a third party beneficiary, contains grievance and arbitration provisions. Plaintiff concedes that he did not attempt to utilize these provisions, justifying this on the ground that he no longer was "entitled" to use them, having ceased to be a member of the bargaining unit and of the union. The relevant parts of these provisions require that "differences as to the application or interpretation of the terms of this agreement . . . between . . . the Company and any employee in the bargaining unit . . . shall be handled in the manner hereinafter set forth." (Art. XIV, § 1) (emphasis added). The remainder of Article XIV details a three step grievance procedure; following this appears the arbitration article, which itself is limited to "disputes arising under Article XIV of this agreement . . .." (Art. XV, § 1).

Plaintiff contends that, by express limitation, the grievance and arbitration machinery is available only to members of the bargaining unit; and that since, at the time of his alleged wrongful termination, he was a supervisory employee no longer within the bargaining unit, pursuit of such procedures was unnecessary and would have been improper under the agreement. In short, he argues that the parties to the agreement expressly limited its coverage to members of the bargaining unit; and that, since plaintiff was not such a member when terminated, he should not be placed under any disability for his failure to pursue this course of action.

Defendant contends, on the other hand, that plaintiff's claim arose at the time of his termination; and at that time his "status automatically became that of an employee with an alleged right to a job within the bargaining unit by virtue of the labor contract." Briefly stated, defendant's argument is that plaintiff cannot assert rights arising under the collective bargaining agreement without claiming status as a member of the bargaining unit; and that, cloaked with such status, he must proceed under the guidelines established in the agreement for members of the bargaining unit.

DUTY TO ARBITRATE

An employee must seek relief through the contract grievance procedure established by the collective bargaining agreement before he can pursue judicial relief under § 301, unless he alleges that his union has breached its duty of fair representation or that his employer has repudiated the arbitration machinery. Vaca v. Sipes, 386 U.S. 185 (1967); Republic Steel Corp. v. Maddox, 379 U.S. 650 (1965); Desrosiers v. American Cyanamid Co., 377 F.2d 864 (2 Cir. 1967), on remand, 299 F.Supp. 162 (D.Conn. 1969). While the two specified exceptions have been expressly discussed in the cases cited above, implicit therein is a third exception: namely, that no one can be compelled to arbitrate a dispute unless he (or his representatives) have agreed to do so. See, e.g., Int'l Longshoremen's Ass'n v. N.Y. Shipping Ass'n, Inc., 403 F.2d 807, 809 (2 Cir. 1968).

The question upon which decision of defendant's motion to dismiss turns is whether or not the parties to the collective bargaining agreement intended that supervisory personnel claiming residual benefits from their former status as members of the bargaining unit must (or even may) utilize the grievance machinery as a prerequisite to judicial relief. Although the Court disagrees with plaintiff's argument that the agreement "clearly" excludes him from coverage, and recognizes the anomaly in permitting him to seek substantive benefits under the agreement without adhering to its procedural formalities, the Court also has difficulty in accepting defendant's theory that upon his termination as a supervisory employee plaintiff reverted to a status within the bargaining unit, since it is defendant that apparently is opposing the substantive benefits incidental to the status it seeks to impose on plaintiff.

The ultimate determination of whether the language of Articles XIV and XV, limiting grievance and arbitration to members of the bargaining unit, was intended by the parties to cover employees promoted out of the bargaining unit who later seek benefits arising out of their former status,...