Quinn v. DiGiulian, 83-2065
| Decision Date | 13 July 1984 |
| Docket Number | No. 83-2065,83-2065 |
| Citation | 238 U.S.App.D.C. 247,739 F.2d 637 |
| Parties | 116 L.R.R.M. (BNA) 3321, 238 U.S.App.D.C. 247, 39 Fed.R.Serv.2d 850, 101 Lab.Cas. P 11,109 Daniel P. QUINN v. Joseph L. DIGIULIAN, Jr., et al., Appellants. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — District of Columbia Circuit |
Appeals from the United States District Court for the District of Columbia (Civil Action No. 81-01921).
William B. Peer, Washington, D.C., for appellants.
Stewart S. Manela, Washington, D.C., with whom Stanley J. Brown, Washington, D.C., was on the brief, for appellee.
Before ROBINSON, Chief Judge, WALD, Circuit Judge, and McGOWAN, Senior Circuit Judge.
Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge WALD.
In August, 1981, Daniel Quinn sued his union, Local 31 of the Tile, Marble, Terrazzo Finishers and Shopmen, AFL-CIO ("Local 31" or "the Local") and two of its officers, Joseph DiGiulian and Dennis Baugh, alleging that when he announced his decision to run as a candidate for business agent of Local 31 against the incumbent DiGiulian, he became the target of a relentless campaign of harassment--including trumped-up disciplinary charges, fines and suspension from the Local--culminating finally in his discharge from his job. A jury found that the Local and the individual defendants had violated the Bill of Rights provisions of section 101 of the Labor Management Reporting and Disclosure Act (LMRDA), 29 U.S.C. Sec. 411, 1 and section 609 of the LMRDA, 29 U.S.C. Sec. 529. 2 The jury also found that the Local had violated the duty of fair representation implicit in the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), 29 U.S.C. Sec. 151-169. The trial judge found further that the defendant officers had violated their fiduciary obligations to Local 31 members under the LMRDA, 29 U.S.C. Sec. 501. 3 The court upheld the jury award of compensatory and punitive damages and granted equitable relief.
The defendants appeal from several aspects of the district court judgment. They claim (1) that Count III of the jury verdict charged conduct for which Quinn had already obtained relief from the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), and that the district court's jurisdiction was thus either preempted by the primary and exclusive jurisdiction of the NLRB or precluded by the "election of remedies" doctrine; (2) that the court improperly let certain of Quinn's "equitable" claims go to the jury; (3) that the court erred in permitting the jury to award punitive damages for violation of the duty of fair representation and of the LMRDA; and (4) that the court had no authority to waive certain jurisdictional prerequisites under section 501, and in any event improperly ruled that the protection of members' political rights fell within the scope of that section.
We conclude that the district court erred in permitting the assessment of punitive damages under the duty of fair representation claim. Although we also have doubts as to whether Congress intended a union's fiduciary obligation under section 501 to encompass the protection of individual political rights of members, we find it unnecessary to decide that question because in this case the district court could have ordered the same relief for the same unlawful conduct under its undisputed authority in the Bill of Rights provisions of the LMRDA. In all other respects, we uphold the judgment of the district court.
Daniel Quinn, a construction worker and member of Local 31, was nominated for the office of business manager in November, 1978. Within one week his opponent, incumbent business manager DiGiulian, returned Quinn's dues payment and suspended him for failure to pay his dues. At the December, 1978, election meeting, DiGiulian challenged Quinn's status as a union member in good standing and thus disputed his eligibility for union office. Although Quinn was ultimately permitted to stay at the meeting and run for office, he lost the election. He objected that the election was unfair because the names of some candidates had been scratched off the ballot.
Quinn wrote to Pascal DiJames, the president of the International Union, to protest the election procedures, his suspension, and the continuing rejection of his dues. DiJames arranged for the acceptance of Quinn's dues and his reinstatement as a member, and ordered a new election to be held May 18, 1979. On the day of the second election, DiGiulian wrote to the president of Local 31, Baugh, charging Quinn with slander against DiGiulian and "disgraceful conduct" in violation of the Local 31 constitution and by-laws. On the same day, Baugh charged Quinn with violating the Local's constitution and by-laws by complaining directly to the International about the election and his suspension.
The Local 31 Executive Board held a hearing at which it found Quinn guilty and fined him $263.80. Quinn refused to pay the fine, and the Local consequently refused to accept his dues, thus putting him in arrears. In January, 1980, Quinn again wrote to DiJames to describe and protest the actions that had been taken against him; he requested that DiJames "see that this matter is straightened out." 4 DiJames responded that it was a Local Union matter, and forwarded Quinn's letter to Baugh. 5 In February, Quinn was suspended from Local 31 for his failure to pay the fine. At a meeting in March, Baugh notified the members that Quinn was no longer a member in good standing, and that any member caught working with him would be fined. As a result of this threat, at least one Local 31 member refused to work with Quinn on a construction project and Quinn was laid off.
Quinn brought an unfair labor practice charge against Local 31 in April, 1980. The NLRB, in a decision issued on September 30, 1981, 6 concluded that Local 31 had restrained Quinn in the exercise of his section 7 rights in violation of section 8(b)(1)(A) of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), 7 and had caused an employer to discriminate against him on grounds other than nonpayment of dues in violation of section 8(b)(2) of the NLRA. 8
In August, 1981, shortly before the NLRB's final decision, Quinn initiated this suit in federal district court. The defendants moved to dismiss several counts and to strike Quinn's demand for a jury trial. The court issued a memorandum opinion in which it reviewed the undisputed facts and decided several issues now before us on appeal. Quinn v. DiGiulian, Civil No. 81-1921 (D.D.C. Mar. 29, 1983) (hereinafter cited as "Opinion "). The court denied the defendants' motion to dismiss certain claims under the LMRDA on the ground that the NLRB had primary and exclusive jurisdiction over, and indeed had already ruled on, analogous claims under the NLRA. Id. at 5-6. The court also rejected the defendants' motion to dismiss claims that they had violated their fiduciary duty under section 501 on the grounds that Quinn had failed to meet certain formal jurisdictional prerequisites to suit. Id. at 6-9. Finally, the court denied the defendants' motion to strike plaintiff's demand for a jury trial of his claims under the NLRA and the LMRDA. Id. at 11-13. 9
After a ten-day trial in April, 1983, a jury found for Quinn on most counts and awarded him damages. Specifically, it found that DiGiulian had violated the LMRDA Bill of Rights for union members by "intimidating, harassing, coercing, threatening and discriminating" against Quinn because of his candidacy in the election (Count I); it found further that Baugh, DiGiulian and Local 31 had violated the Bill of Rights by bringing unfounded disciplinary charges against Quinn, trying him on the charges without due process, enforcing the resulting fine against him, and making false and malicious statements about him to the members (Count II), and by refusing Quinn's dues, suspending him for allegedly failing to pay his dues, and instructing members of the Local not to work on any jobs with him (Count III), all because he had run for union office. The jury found in addition that the Local had violated its duty of fair representation under the LMRA "by its course of harassment and illegal conduct" and by "procuring plaintiff's discharge from his employment," action the jury found to be "arbitrary, capricious, unfounded, unlawful, malicious, and intentionally against the plaintiff's interests" (Count V). 10
In its judgment and order of June 16, 1983, the trial court upheld the verdict over the defendants' motion and ordered DiGiulian to pay a total of $7500 in compensatory and $3500 in punitive damages, Baugh to pay $5500 in compensatory and $2500 in punitive damages, and Local 31 to pay $14,500 in compensatory and $10,500 in punitive damages plus Quinn's costs. 11 The court found further that DiGiulian and Baugh, in violating Quinn's political rights, had breached the fiduciary obligations of union officers toward members mandated by 29 U.S.C. Sec. 501; The court thus ordered them to "refrain from violating or chilling the exercise of LMRDA rights of Local 31 members." Finally, the court ordered all three defendants to "cancel and expunge the decisions ... to fine, suspend, and refuse to accept and record dues payments tendered by Daniel P. Quinn," to accept the dues payments of Quinn and any other members who exercised their federally protected rights, to publish a retraction and apology stating that Quinn had at all times been a member in good standing, and that the actions taken against him were illegal and unwarranted, and to refrain from interfering with Quinn's rights as a union member. This appeal followed.
The defendants no longer dispute the facts on which all of the violations were predicated. They concede for the purpose of this appeal that the actions of Local 31, Baugh and DiGiulian were malicious and motivated by Quinn's electoral challenge to the incumbent union leadership. Nevertheless, they argue, the district court made several errors of...
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