Thomas v. Consolidation Coal Company
| Decision Date | 15 May 1967 |
| Docket Number | No. 10788.,10788. |
| Citation | 380 F.2d 69 |
| Parties | John THOMAS, William McCoy, John Salters, Isaac Sizemore, Ray Trantham, Ellis Coleman, Jr., Lee Looney, John Yates, and Charles Taylor, Appellants, v. CONSOLIDATION COAL COMPANY, a Corporation, (POCAHONTAS FUEL COMPANY DIVISION) and the International Union, United Mine Workers of America, an Unincorporated Association, (District 29) and Local Union No. 9690, United Mine Workers of America, an Unincorporated Association, Appellees. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Fourth Circuit |
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D. Grove Moler, Mullens, W. Va., for appellants.
Harry G. Camper, Jr., Welch, W. Va. (John W. Gillespie, Tazewell, Va., Robert D. Bailey and Bailey, Worrell, Camper & Viers, Pineville, W. Va., on brief), for Consolidation Coal Co.
M. E. Boiarsky, Charleston, W. Va. (Harrison Combs, Washington, D. C., and James K. Edmundson, Beckley, W. Va., on brief), for Unions.
Before HAYNSWORTH, Chief Judge, BRYAN, Circuit Judge, and KAUFMAN, District Judge.
Plaintiffs, nine former employees of Consolidation Coal Company (the Company) and members of Local 9690, United Mine Workers of America (the Union) brought this action in the United States District Court for the Southern District of West Virginia. Plaintiffs seek to recover damages for their alleged wrongful discharge by the Company in violation of the latter's collective bargaining agreement with the Union, and for the Union's alleged conspiracy with the Company in procuring by fraud a decision of the umpire under the grievance procedures of the union contract sustaining discharges of plaintiffs. The jurisdiction of the District Court was asserted under section 301(a) of the Taft-Hartley Act, 29 U.S. C.A. § 185(a).1 Each of the defendants filed motions to dismiss.2 The District Court in a Memorandum Opinion dismissed the action as against all defendants on the ground that where a collective bargaining contract provides that a decision of the umpire in the arbitration of grievances shall be final, such a decision will be reviewed by the courts only where there is an allegation that the decision was procured by fraud and that plaintiffs' complaint did not state the circumstances constituting fraud with the particularity required by Rule 9(b) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.3
Subsequent to the filing by the District Court of its Memorandum Opinion on April 4, 1966, plaintiffs filed a motion requesting leave to file an amended complaint. In their proposed amended complaint plaintiffs included certain amplifications with regard to the allegations of fraud. All defendants opposed plaintiffs' motion. The District Court found the factual allegations of the amended complaint were not materially different from those in the original complaint, denied plaintiffs' motion to amend, and ordered plaintiffs' original complaint dismissed with prejudice in accordance with its previously filed Memorandum Opinion.
Plaintiffs' suit is one for wrongful discharge and is grounded upon an alleged breach by the Company and the Union of the collective bargaining agreement. That agreement includes detailed grievance provisions for the handling of disputes relating to discharges and provides that a decision rendered by an umpire in the course of arbitration proceedings "shall be final." Plaintiffs allege that they submitted their claims pursuant to the grievance procedure, and that those claims were considered at the appropriate stage in this procedure by an umpire mutually agreed upon by the Company and the Union. Plaintiffs further aver that the Company and the Union conspired fraudulently to obtain and induce a decision of the umpire affirming their discharges. Plaintiffs allege that the Company threatened Union representatives with reprisals against the Local and that because of such threats the Union withheld information from the umpire pertinent to the disposition of plaintiffs' grievances.
The District Court dismissed solely on the ground that plaintiffs failed to allege fraud with sufficient particularity. That Court did not consider any of the other grounds advanced by defendants in support of their motions to dismiss. The questions arise as to whether plaintiffs were entitled to file their proposed amended complaint as a matter of right and also whether the original or amended complaint failed sufficiently to particularize fraud. The view which we take of this case does not require us to reach either of those issues. Suffice it to say that the amended complaint alleges basically the same facts and raises essentially the same issues as the original complaint. Both defendants raised the defense of res judicata in their motions to dismiss, alleging that plaintiffs had previously instituted this same action in the Circuit Court of Wyoming County, West Virginia, and that that Court had dismissed the action. Plaintiffs contend that res judicata cannot properly be raised in the context of a motion to dismiss, an argument which we reject as against the weight of authority. Jenson v. Olson, 353 F.2d 825 (8th Cir. 1965); Scholla v. Scholla, 201 F.2d 211, 213 (D. C.Cir. 1953); Larter & Sons, Inc. v. Dinkler Hotels Co., 199 F.2d 854, 855 (5th Cir. 1952); W. E. Hedger Transp. Corp. v. Ira S. Bushey & Sons, Inc., 186 F.2d 236, 237 (2d Cir. 1951); Hartmann v. Time, Inc., 166 F.2d 127, 131, 137-138 (3d Cir. 1947).
There is no dispute concerning the facts in this case which are relevant to the claim of res judicata. For the reasons stated herein we affirm the dismissal of plaintiffs' complaint and apply the doctrine of res judicata.
On February 21, 1964, the same nine plaintiffs herein instituted an action in the Circuit Court of Wyoming County, West Virginia,4 against the same defendants herein. As in this case, both the complaint and the amended complaint later filed in the State Court allege that plaintiffs were wrongfully discharged from their jobs by the Company and that the decision of the umpire in arbitrating the dispute in connection with their discharges was fraudulently obtained by a conspiracy of the Company and the Union. Both complaints filed in the State Court, as well as the complaint filed by the plaintiffs in the District Court below and the proposed amended complaint in that Court, contain substantially the same factual allegations. And in the State Court, as here, plaintiffs sought to set aside and vacate the decision of the umpire and sought judgment for compensatory and punitive damages against defendants.
In the State Court the Company filed an answer to the complaint and a motion to dismiss and motion for summary judgment. The Union moved to dismiss the original complaint on the ground that as unincorporated associations neither the Local nor the International could be sued by name under West Virginia law. Plaintiffs voluntarily entered an order dismissing the unincorporated associations as such and, with leave of court, filed an amended complaint substituting as defendants named individual district and local officers and committeemen.5
To the amended complaint the Company filed an amended answer and also a motion to dismiss. The record before us does not reveal whether the Company filed any supporting legal memorandum. Two of the individually named union official defendants, Titler and Gibson, appeared specially and filed a motion to dismiss. Two other individually named union representative defendants, Lambert and Cordell, also appeared specially filing a joint and several motion to dismiss. The fifth individual defendant, Smith, made no appearance or motion in the State Court. Lambert and Cordell filed a legal memorandum in the State Court in support of their motion to dismiss. In addition to that memorandum, at least two legal memoranda were filed by plaintiffs in the State Court in opposition to the motions to dismiss.
On March 8, 1965, the State Court entered an order sustaining the motions to dismiss filed on behalf of the Company and the individual defendants and dismissing plaintiffs' action "as to all defendants. * * *" In its order the State Court assigned no reasons for the action it took, made no findings or conclusions, and filed no opinion.
On May 11, 1965, the nine plaintiffs petitioned to appeal to the Supreme Court of Appeals of West Virginia6 and filed a lengthy supporting brief. On May 24, 1965, the State Supreme Court refused plaintiffs' petition for appeal without assignment of any reason. No review was sought by plaintiffs in the Supreme Court of the United States, although plaintiffs had urged throughout the State Court proceedings that their cause of action was grounded upon a federal statute — section 301(a) of the Labor Management Relations Act of 1947 — and that state and federal courts had concurrent jurisdiction under that Act.7 Plaintiffs instead instituted the instant action in the District Court on July 14, 1965.
Res judicata is a broad, judicially-developed doctrine under which the courts have sought to deal with the problems posed by the effects, if any, of a prior judgment on subsequent litigation. "The principle of res judicata fosters reliance on judicial action, and tends to eliminate vexation and expense to the parties, wasted use of judicial machinery and the possibility of inconsistent results."8 The general rule in regard to cases where, as here, a defendant has prevailed in a former action is stated in the Restatement of Judgments9 as follows:
Where a valid and final personal judgment is rendered on the merits in favor of the defendant, the plaintiff cannot thereafter maintain an action on the original cause of action. Restatement § 48.
The rationale behind this rule is embodied in the determination and desire to put an end to litigation once it has reached a terminal point. As expressed in the Restatement (§ 1 Comment a):
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