NLRB v. NASH-FINCH COMPANY

• Decision Date: 26 September 1969
• Docket Number: Civ. No. 1583L.
• Citation: 320 F. Supp. 858
• Parties: NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD, Plaintiff v. NASH-FINCH COMPANY, d/b/a Jack & Jill Stores, a Delaware Corporation, authorized to do business in the State of Nebraska, Defendant.
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Nebraska

320 F. Supp. 858

NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD, Plaintiff v. NASH-FINCH COMPANY, d/b/a Jack & Jill Stores, a Delaware Corporation, authorized to do business in the State of Nebraska, Defendant.

Civ. No. 1583L.

United States District Court, D. Nebraska.

September 26, 1969.

John I. Taylor, NLRB, Washington, D. C., for plaintiff.

David D. Weinberg, Omaha, Neb., and Solomon I. Hirsh, Chicago, Ill., for proposed intervenor-plaintiff.

Thomas F. Dowd, Omaha, Neb., for defendant.

MEMORANDUM and ORDER

VAN PELT, District Judge.

This matter comes before the Court on the motion of the National Labor Relations Board for a preliminary injunction to prevent the Nash-Finch Company (doing business as Jack & Jill Stores) from enforcing a state court injunction issued by the District Court of Hall County, Nebraska. The state court injunction restrains certain actions of individuals engaged in picketing Jack & Jill Stores in Grand Island, Nebraska. The picketing in question occurred during an attempt by Amalgamated Meat Cutter and Butcher Workmen of North America, AFL-CIO, District Union 271 to organize the meat cutters employed by Jack & Jill.

Also before the Court is the motion of Amalgamated to intervene as a party plaintiff in this action. Finally, Nash-Finch has filed a motion to dismiss the complaint. By agreement of counsel, all three motions were argued at a hearing held before this Court on September 12. The Court, at the conclusion of that hearing, took submission of the motions. The matters raised by the motions now stand ready for determination.

It is the opinion of the Court that the jurisdictional question raised by the defendant, Nash-Finch, is dispositive of the case. We turn now to an examination of the power of this Court to grant the relief that the N.L.R.B. requests.

This matter is properly before this court under 28 U.S.C.A. § 1337 giving jurisdiction of questions arising under an Act of Congress to the District Courts. The National Labor Relations Act is such an Act. Capital Service v. N. L. R. B., 347 U.S. 501, 74 S.Ct. 699, 98 L.Ed. 887 (1954).

However, in the instant case, this court is asked to restrain the enforcement of a state court injunction. In such a situation, there is a rigid limitation on the power of this court to act. 28 U.S.C.A. § 2283 provides:

"A court of the United States may not grant an injunction to stay proceedings in a State court except as authorized by an Act of Congress, or where necessary in aid of its jurisdiction, or to protect or effectuate its judgments."

The history of Section 2283 indicates that it is to be strictly construed and a particular case must be within the exceptions that are set out by the statute in order for an injunction to issue. Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America et al. v. Richmond Brothers Co., 348 U.S. 511, 75 S.Ct. 452, 99 L.Ed. 600 (1955). Thus, in order for the relief herein requested to be granted, the N.L.R.B. must bring itself within one of the above noted exceptions to Section 2283 or, in the alternative, show that this section does not apply in the instant case.

The N.L.R.B. offers three arguments to the effect that this Court has the authority to issue the injunction that is asked for. First, the Board argues that under the rationale of Leiter Minerals, Inc. v. U. S., 352 U.S. 220, 77 S.Ct. 287, 1 L.Ed.2d 267 (1957), when the United States is the party applying for an injunction restraining state court proceedings, Section 2283 does not apply. Thus, the Board as an agency of the United States Government would also be excluded from the prohibition of Section 2283.

Secondly, it is argued that Section 2283 does not apply here as the state court is wholly without jurisdiction over the subject matter in that it has invaded a field preempted by congressional legislation. See, e. g., San Diego Building Trades Council v. Garmon, 359 U.S. 236, 79 S.Ct. 773, 3 L.Ed.2d 775 (1959).

Finally, it is the Board's contention that the picketing in question is involved with the organizational activities which have been continuing over a period of time. In connection with these activities, an unfair labor practice charge has been filed with the Board by the Union. 29 U.S.C.A. § 160(j) and (l) authorize the Board to seek injunctive relief in specific circumstances concerning unfair labor charges. Thus, the Board argues, if this Court finds Section 2283 applicable to the instant case, the questioned activities are within the ambit of sections (j) and (l) and therefore within the "as authorized by an Act of Congress" or the "in aid of its jurisdiction" exceptions to Section 2283. Capital Service v. N. L. R. B., 347 U.S. 501, 74 S.Ct. 699, 98 L.Ed. 887 (1954).

In examining the first contention of the Board, it is noted that the Court of Appeals for this Circuit has held that the Board did not stand in the position of the United States for the purposes of determining the applicability of Section 2283 in a suit for injunctive relief. N. L. R. B. v. Swift & Company, 233 F.2d 226 (8th Cir. 1956). It is the position of the Board, however, that the United States Supreme Court's decision in Leiter Minerals, Inc., supra, has undermined the Court of Appeals' holding on this point. We believe that a careful examination of Leiter and other relevant cases in this area does not bear out this contention.

We begin with the proposition that the intention of Congress to bestow the privileges and immunities of the Government upon agencies created by the Government must be clearly demonstrated. Reconstruction Finance Corporation v. J. G. Menihan Corp., 312 U.S. 81, 61 S.Ct. 485, 85 L.Ed. 595 (1941). The Court of Appeals in Swift & Company, supra, found that

"The Board has not demonstrated that it was the intention of Congress to exempt actions brought by it from the limitations imposed by section 2283." Id. 233 F.2d at 232.

We are of the opinion that in the instant case the Board has not established that it was the intention of Congress to bring it within the immunity of the United States insofar as concerns section 2283. While the Leiter case does establish the inapplicability of section 2283 to the United States, we find no justification in extending this doctrine to the National Labor Relations Board as an agency of the Government. To be considered is Mr. Justice Frankfurter's statement in Amalgamated Clothing Workers, supra, 348 U.S. at 514, 75 S.Ct. 452, at 454 where he considers the import of the 1948 amendment to the predecessor of section 2283 which represents the section as it appears today.

"By that enactment, Congress made it clear beyond cavil that the prohibition is not to be whittled away by judicial improvisation."

We also are of the opinion that the Supreme Court's decision in Amalgamated, while bearing more directly on the second contention of the Board, also supplies compelling support for the position that the Board is not to be excluded from the prohibition of section 2283. This will be noted in the discussion of the preemption issue raised by the Board.

The Board next argues that the area covered by the state court injunction is within the exclusive jurisdiction of the N.L.R.B. and thus section 2283 does not apply. We feel that this argument is met squarely by the Supreme Court's findings in Amalgamated Clothing Workers, supra.

"In the face of this carefully considered enactment § 2283, we cannot accept the argument of the petitioner and the Board, as amicus curiae, that § 2283 does not apply whenever the moving party in the District Court alleges that the state court is `wholly without jurisdiction over the subject matter, having invaded a field preempted by Congress.' No such exception had been established by judicial decision under former § 265. In any event, Congress has left no justification for its recognition now. This is not a statute conveying a broad general policy for appropriate ad hoc application. Legislative policy is here expressed in a clear-cut prohibition qualified only by specifically defined exceptions.

"We are further admonished against taking the liberty of interpolation when Congress clearly left no room for it, by the inadmissibility of the assumption that ascertainment of preemption under the Taft-Hartley Act is self-determining or even easy. As we have noted in the Weber case, Weber v. Anheuser-Busch, Inc., 348 U.S. 468, 75 S.Ct. 480, 99 L.Ed. 546 `the areas that have been pre-empted by federal authority and thereby withdrawn from state power are not susceptible of delimitation by fixed metes and bounds.' 348 U.S. at 480, 75 S.Ct. at page 487. What is within exclusive federal authority may first have to be determined by this Court to be so." Amalgamated Clothing Workers, supra, 348 U.S. at 515-516, 75 S.Ct. at 455.

Thus, while we note, although not deciding, that the complained of picketing in the instant case may be within the exclusive jurisdiction of the N.L.R.B. by virtue of the San Diego Building Trades Council case, this without more does not remove the limitation on this Court's power to grant the injunctive relief requested.

This would also reenforce our determination that the Board should not be considered as having the Government's immunity to section 2283. If this Court may not exercise its equity power to ban state courts from federally preempted areas, then there is no logic to the argument that the Board, as administrator of the preempted areas and being vested with exclusive jurisdiction therein, should enjoy the exclusion from the operation of section 2283 when it seeks to protect this jurisdiction. Section 2283 provides that the Board will be exempt when the Court is "authorized by an act of Congress" to issue injunctive relief. The National Labor Relations Act in 29 U.S.C.A. § 160(j) and (l) provides a remedy to the Board to protect this jurisdiction.

Thus, it is our conclusion that unless the Board can bring itself within one of the exceptions to section 2283, this Court is powerless to...