Lehnert v. Ferris Faculty Ass'n-MEA-NEA

• Decision Date: 11 August 1982
• Docket Number: No. G78-346 CA1.,G78-346 CA1.
• Citation: 556 F. Supp. 309
• Parties: James P. LEHNERT, Elmer S. Junker, James E. Lindsey, Sam C. Peticolas, John R. Schauble, Theodore D. Speerman, Plaintiffs, v. The FERRIS FACULTY ASSOCIATION —MEA-NEA, Michigan Education Association, National Education of the United States, and the Board of Control of Ferris State College, Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Western District of Michigan

556 F. Supp. 309

James P. LEHNERT, Elmer S. Junker, James E. Lindsey, Sam C. Peticolas, John R. Schauble, Theodore D. Speerman, Plaintiffs, v. The FERRIS FACULTY ASSOCIATION —MEA-NEA, Michigan Education Association, National Education of the United States, and the Board of Control of Ferris State College, Defendants.

No. G78-346 CA1.

United States District Court, W.D. Michigan, S.D.

August 11, 1982.

COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED

Allaben, Massie, Vander Weyden & Timmer by Sam F. Massie, Jr., Grand Rapids, Mich., Law Office of John C. Kruchko by Garry M. Ewing, Vienna, Va., Nat. Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation by Raymond J. LaJeunesse, Springfield, Va., for plaintiffs.

Foster, Swift, Collins & Coey, P.C. by Michael J. Schmedlen, Lansing, Mich., Mika, Meyers, Beckett & Jones by Steven L. Dykema, Grand Rapids, Mich., for defendants.

OPINION

HILLMAN, District Judge.

Plaintiffs, faculty members of Ferris State College, have brought this action challenging the constitutionality of an agency shop clause contained in the collective bargaining agreement between defendants Ferris State College Faculty Association (FFA) and the Board of Control of Ferris State College. Named defendants include the FFA, the Michigan Education Association (MEA), the National Education Association (NEA), and the Board of Control of Ferris State College.¹ Defendant FFA is a local labor organization which is the exclusive bargaining agent for faculty members of Ferris State College. Defendants MEA and NEA are state and national labor organizations affiliated with the FFA.

This case is currently before the court pursuant to renewed cross motions for summary judgment.² Defendant unions have also moved to dismiss plaintiffs' claims as moot, and have moved for this court to abstain from reaching the merits.

Plaintiffs include active and retired faculty members at Ferris State College. Plaintiffs are not members of any labor organization, but are required to pay a service fee to FFA for representing plaintiffs in contract negotiations.

Plaintiffs' suit is allegedly authorized by 42 U.S.C. §§ 1982, 1985, 1986. Plaintiffs seek injunctive and compensatory relief for defendants' alleged violations of Article I, Section 10, Clause 1 of the United States Constitution and the First and Fourteenth Amendments of the United States Constitution. Plaintiffs have premised this court's jurisdiction on 28 U.S.C. §§ 1331, 1343.

Plaintiffs' specific claims are as follows:

First, plaintiffs claim that since 1974, successive collective bargaining agreements between the Board of Control and FFA have contained an agency shop clause requiring plaintiffs to pay to the FFA, as a condition of employment, a service fee for the benefits plaintiffs receive from FFA's efforts in negotiating collective bargaining agreements. Plaintiffs allege that defendant unions have collected service fees in excess of the amount expended on collective bargaining and administering bargaining agreements. Specifically, plaintiffs allege that defendant unions have used plaintiffs' service fees for political purposes, over plaintiffs objections, in violation of plaintiffs' First Amendment rights.

Second, plaintiffs claim that under the collective bargaining agreements, the college, pursuant to M.C.L.A. § 408.477, has automatically deducted service fees from plaintiffs' salaries. Plaintiffs contend that the Michigan statute, on its face and as applied in the collective bargaining agreement, violates plaintiffs' due process rights by not providing for a pre-seizure hearing to validate the compelled deduction.

Third, plaintiffs contend that prior to June 30, 1978, defendants' agency shop agreements obliged Ferris State to terminate faculty members who refused to pay service fees. Plaintiffs allege that these agreements impaired plaintiffs' contract rights, acquired under the Board of Controls' tenure police, in violation of Article I, Section 10, Clause 1 of the Constitution of the United States.

Defendants' renewed motions are as follows:

First, that the court dismiss plaintiffs' claims regarding prior collective bargaining agreements as moot.

Second, defendant unions have moved the court to abstain from deciding plaintiffs' claims with the exception of plaintiffs' claim that M.C.L.A. § 408.477 is unconstitutional. Defendant Ferris State College has not joined defendants' unions' abstention motion, and has urged the court not to abstain in the interest of avoiding piecemeal and protracted litigation.

Third, defendants have moved for summary judgment on plaintiffs' claims regarding the constitutionality of the expenditures of service fees by defendant unions.

Plaintiffs have moved for summary judgment on their claim that the automatic deduction of service fees acts as a prior restraint of their First Amendment rights. For the following reasons, the motions of the respective parties are denied.

MOOTNESS

A party alleging mootness has the burden of conclusively showing that a case no longer presents issues that are "live" or presents parties with a legally cognizable interest in the outcome of the case. Powell v. McCormack, 395 U.S. 486, 89 S.Ct. 1944, 23 L.Ed.2d 491 (1969). Defendants' motion to dismiss plaintiffs' impairment of contract claims is based upon defendants' position that prior collective bargaining agreements providing for discharge of faculty members for nonpayment of service fees has been replaced with a clause providing for the automatic deduction of service fees. Defendants also contend that plaintiffs' claims against the NEA are moot because plaintiffs have failed to exhaust available union procedures to challenge union conduct. Furthermore, the unions claim that plaintiffs' claims against defendant NEA are moot because the NEA has withdrawn its claim for plaintiffs' agency shop fees.

The fact that defendants have replaced the discharge clause of the collective bargaining agreement with an automatic deduction provision does not render plaintiffs' claims moot. There is no dispute that plaintiffs paid service fees under prior collective bargaining agreements (Stip. 15). Therefore, plaintiffs have an ongoing claim for damages against defendants FFA, NEA and MEA.³ Consequently, plaintiffs retain a legally-cognizable interest in the outcome of the case, within the meaning of Powell v. McCormack, supra.

Plaintiffs' claims for injunctive relief also present a live controversy. Although a suit for injunctive relief may become moot if past challenged practices cannot recur, voluntary cessation does not render a claim moot. County of Los Angeles v. Davis, 440 U.S. 625, 99 S.Ct. 1379, 59 L.Ed.2d 642 (1979). A party alleging mootness must clearly establish that the challenged conduct could not recur. Rubbermaid, Inc. v. FTC, 575 F.2d 1169 (6th Cir.1978); see, Seay v. McDonnell Douglas Corp., 533 F.2d 1126, 1132 (9th Cir.1976). In the present case, defendants have not established that the challenged contract provisions could not be reinstated. In fact, defendant Board of Control, in answering plaintiffs' interrogatories, has stated that defendant unions have demanded a change in the collective bargaining agreement reinstating a discharge provision for the nonpayment of service fees. (Defendant Board of Control Amended Answers to Set I of Plaintiffs' Interrogatory # 3.) Therefore, plaintiffs clearly present a live controversy.

Defendants' assertion that plaintiffs' claims are moot because plaintiffs have failed to exhaust available union procedures is equally misplaced. Although resorting to available grievance procedures may be preferred, and in some cases mandatory, see, Beck v. Communications Workers, 468 F.Supp. 87, 90 (D.Md.1979), questions of exhaustion are fundamentally distinct from questions of mootness. While exhaustion is concerned with the proper forum in which to bring an action, mootness is concerned with the justifiability of a particular claim. See, County of Los Angeles v. Davis, supra. In the present case, the fact that defendants concede that plaintiffs have claims to exhaust establishes that plaintiffs have alleged a live controversy between the parties. Consequently, defendants' motion to dismiss plaintiffs' claims as moot is denied.

ABSTENTION

Defendants have moved for this court to abstain on the grounds that this case presents unclear issues of state law which, if conclusively determined by state courts, would obviate the need to address plaintiffs' constitutional issues. Defendants also urge the court to abstain due to the pendency of litigation in Michigan courts which defendants allege will make unnecessary the resolution of plaintiffs' constitutional claims. For the reasons that follow, defendants' motion for abstention is denied.

Where federal jurisdiction is properly invoked and the constitutionality of a state statute is challenged, a federal court may stay proceedings in the federal forum if the construction of pertinent, but unclear, state law by the state courts would obviate the necessity of a decision of federal constitutional issues. Railroad Commission of Texas v. Pullman, 312 U.S. 496, 61 S.Ct. 643, 85 L.Ed. 971 (1941). However, the abstention doctrine has never been invoked to simply give state courts the first opportunity to vindicate First Amendment rights. Zuickler v. Koota, 389 U.S. 241, 252, 88 S.Ct. 391, 397-398, 19 L.Ed.2d 444 (1967). In the present case, plaintiffs allege that the defendants' agency shop agreements, authorized by M.C.L.A. § 423.210(1), have impermissibly forced plaintiffs to support ideological causes which plaintiffs oppose. Since the Supreme Court has specifically stated that such allegations establish a cause of action under the First and Fourteenth Amendments, Abood v. Detroit Board of Education, 431 U.S. 209, 237, 97 S.Ct. 1782, 1800-1801, 52 L.Ed.2d 261 (1977), this court must determine whether to postpone the exercise of jurisdiction in the present proceedings would obviate the need to...