Jones v. Commercial Federal Sav. and Loan Ass'n, 44061

• Decision Date: 07 May 1982
• Docket Number: No. 44061,44061
• Citation: 211 Neb. 487,319 N.W.2d 88
• Parties: , 94 Lab.Cas. P 13,522 Arthur E. JONES, Bradley D. Miller, and Steve F. Sommers, for themselves and for all other persons similarly situated, Appellees, v. COMMERCIAL FEDERAL SAVINGS AND LOAN ASSOCIATION, Appellee, Omaha Building Contractors Employers Association et al., Intervenors-Appellants.
• Court: Nebraska Supreme Court

Page 88

319 N.W.2d 88

211 Neb. 487, 94 Lab.Cas. P 13,522

Arthur E. JONES, Bradley D. Miller, and Steve F. Sommers, for themselves and for all other persons similarly situated, Appellees, v. COMMERCIAL FEDERAL SAVINGS AND LOAN ASSOCIATION, Appellee Omaha Building Contractors Employers Association et al., Intervenors-Appellants.

No. 44061.

Supreme Court of Nebraska.

May 7, 1982.

Syllabus by the Court

1. Labor and Labor Relations: Constitutional Law. The preemption doctrine, generally, seeks to insure the accommodation of a uniform national labor policy. Additionally, in cases where the state is seeking to regulate activities impacting commerce under federal law, preemption is constitutionally based on the supremacy clause.

2. Labor and Labor Relations. Congress, by enacting comprehensive legislation which governs labor relations affecting commerce and creating a centralized administrative body charged with administering that legislation, intended to exclude the various states from enforcing conflicting regulations or procedures.

3. Labor and Labor Relations: Courts. Under § 301 of the Labor Management Relations Act, 29 U.S.C. § 185 (1976), suit may be brought in either state or federal court for breach of a collective bargaining agreement.

4. Labor and Labor Relations: Trust Funds. Employer contributions to employee benefit trust funds must accrue to the benefit of employees and their families and dependents to the exclusion of all others.

5. Labor and Labor Relations: Courts. State courts must follow the federal law, as fashioned by the federal courts, to effectuate the statutory policy of enforcement of collective bargaining agreements.

Dean G. Kratz of McGrath, North, O'Malley & Kratz, P. C., Omaha, for intervenor-appellant Omaha Building Contractors Employers Assn.

David D. Weinberg of Weinberg & Weinberg, P. C., Omaha, for appellees Jones et al.

Heard before KRIVOSHA, C. J., and BOSLAUGH, McCOWN, CLINTON, WHITE, HASTINGS, and CAPORALE, JJ.

CAPORALE, Justice.

This is an appeal from an action to determine the validity of assignments directing a depositary to distribute portions of a Holiday Trust Fund allocated to the assignors' individual passbook accounts for the payment of assignors' dues and assessments to a labor union.

The appellants, impleaded defendants and employer trustees Cal Solem and George Gilmore, together with intervenor and impleaded defendant Omaha Building Contractors Employers Association (OBCEA), assert, through the brief of OBCEA, that the District Court of Nebraska for Douglas County erred in decreeing the assignments valid and ordering Commercial Federal Savings and Loan Association (Commercial Federal) to honor them. Specifically, appellants urge that the assignments are invalid because they violate § 302 of the Labor Management Relations Act, 29 U.S.C. § 186 (1976). We agree with appellants and reverse the decree of the trial court.

This class action was commenced on September 12, 1979, by the plaintiffs-appellees, Arthur E. Jones, Bradley D. Miller, and Steve F. Sommers, for themselves and for all other persons similarly situated, requesting a declaratory judgment to determine whether the defendant herein, Commercial Federal, should honor certain assignments executed by the named plaintiffs in favor of the International Laborers' Union of North America, Local No. 1140, for the payment of union dues and assessments. Commercial Federal filed a motion for interpleader requesting a court order directing the Holiday Trust Fund to appear and maintain or relinquish any claim it might have against the defendant with respect to the trust which was established by collective bargaining. In response to defendant's motion, the trial court ordered the trust fund to appear. Solem and Gilmore, employer trustees to the trust fund, responded to the order and requested that the petition be dismissed on the ground that, under the trust agreement, the money can only be used for the purpose of providing vacation benefits for laborer employees of Local 1140, and not for the payment of union dues or assessments.

The appellees thereafter filed a motion to bar the trust fund from asserting any claim and a motion to strike the answer and response of trustees Solem and Gilmore. On November 30, 1979, OBCEA filed a petition in intervention, requesting the court to allow it to intervene in the action for the reason that it was the multiemployer bargaining association which had negotiated the collective bargaining agreement with Local 1140, under which the Holiday Trust Fund had been established pursuant to § 302 of the Labor Management Relations Act, supra. An objection to Commercial Federal's motion for interpleader was next filed by the appellees on February 15, 1980.

On March 12, 1980, the trial court sustained the motion for interpleader and ordered that the employer trustees, Solem and Gilmore, and employee trustees, Donald Lewis and Leonard Schaefer, be made parties to this action. In addition, the court ordered that the motions of the appellees to strike the answer and response to the order of interpleader and to bar the Holiday Trust Fund from asserting any claim be denied. Having been made parties to this action, Local 1140, OBCEA, and the employee trustees all filed answers to the petition.

This matter was heard by the trial court on October 10, 1980. The evidence submitted was based on four stipulations entered into among the parties. On December 10, 1980, the court entered its decree ordering Commercial Federal to comply with the assignments. A motion for new trial was filed by OBCEA and the employer trustees. The motion was overruled, from which order OBCEA and the employer trustees appealed to this court. OBCEA is the only appellant who filed a brief in this court.

The issue before the court presents a preliminary question as to whether the doctrine of preemption applies to the type of dispute involved in this appeal. The preemption doctrine, generally, seeks to insure the accommodation of a uniform national labor policy. Additionally, in cases where the state is seeking to regulate activities impacting commerce under federal law, preemption is constitutionally based on the supremacy clause. U.S.Const. art. VI, cl. 2. See, also, Sears, Roebuck & Co. v. Carpenters, 436 U.S. 180, 199-200, 98 S.Ct. 1745, 1758-1759, 56 L.Ed.2d 209 (1978). The U. S. Supreme Court has clearly stated that Congress, by enacting comprehensive legislation which governs labor relations affecting commerce and creating a centralized administrative body charged with administering that legislation, intended to exclude the various states from enforcing conflicting regulations or procedures. San Diego Unions v. Garmon, 359 U.S. 236, 79 S.Ct. 773, 3 L.Ed.2d 775 (1959). See, also, Gorman, Basic Text on Labor Law Unionization and Collective Bargaining at 766-86 (1976).

In Garmon, supra at 244, 79 S.Ct. at 779, the Court established the broad rule of preemption applicable to this case: "When it is clear or may fairly be assumed that the activities which a State purports to regulate are protected by § 7 of the National Labor Relations Act, or constitute an unfair labor practice under § 8, due regard for the federal enactment requires that state jurisdiction must yield. To leave the States free to regulate conduct so plainly within the central aim of federal regulation involves too great a danger of conflict between power asserted by Congress and requirements imposed by state law."

The rule of federal preemption is not without its exceptions. Primarily, the judicially created exceptions are based on the Court's inability to discern a congressional intent to preempt local jurisdiction over the activity involved. "[T]he Labor Management Relations Act 'leaves much to the states, though Congress has refrained from telling us how much.' " Weber v. Anheuser-Busch, Inc., 348 U.S. 468, 480, 75 S.Ct. 480, 488, 99 L.Ed. 546 (1955). Most of the cases which have resulted in exceptions to the preemption doctrine have fallen within one of two areas left open in Garmon. "[D]ue regard for the presuppositions of our embracing federal system, including the principle of diffusion of power not as a matter of doctrinaire localism but as a promoter of democracy, has required us not to find withdrawal from the States of power to regulate where the activity regulated was a merely peripheral concern of the Labor Management Relations Act. See International Ass'n of Machinists v. Gonzales, 356 U.S. 617, 78 S.Ct. 923, 2 L.Ed.2d 1018. Or where the regulated conduct touched interests so deeply rooted in local feeling and responsibility that, in the absence of compelling congressional direction, we could not infer Congress had deprived the States of the power to act." Garmon, supra, 359 U.S. at 243-44, 79 S.Ct. at 779. Violence and threats of violence have often been cited as the examples of such conduct.

Other exceptions to the rule have been specifically created by Congress. Under § 301 of the Labor Management Relations Act, 29 U.S.C. § 185 (1976), suit may be brought in either state or federal court for breach of a collective bargaining agreement. "When ... the activity in question also constitutes a breach of a collective-bargaining agreement, the Board's authority 'is not exclusive and does not destroy the jurisdiction of the courts in suits under § 301.' Smith v. Evening News Ass'n, 371 U.S. 195 at 197 [83 S.Ct. 267, at 268, 9 L.Ed.2d 246 (1962) ].... [A]ctions within the purview of § 301 ... may be brought in either state or federal courts, Dowd Box Co. v. Courtney, supra, [368 U.S. 502, 82 S.Ct. 519, 7 L.Ed.2d 483 (1962) ] ...." William E. Arnold Co. v. Carpenters, 417 U.S. 12, 16, 94 S.Ct. 2069, 2072, 40 L.Ed.2d 620 (1974).

We determine that the present case does not present an unfair labor practice. Rather, we conclude that this appeal is to enforce the terms of the collective bargaining agreement entered into among the...