Tyree v. Edwards
| Decision Date | 01 August 1968 |
| Docket Number | No. J-18-67,J-19-67.,J-18-67 |
| Citation | 287 F. Supp. 589 |
| Parties | William TYREE, Clark Ingram, James O. Green, Kenneth E. Wright, Donald E. Conner, Arlin A. DeChaney and International Union of Operating Engineers, Local 302, AFL-CIO, a labor union, Plaintiffs, and National Labor Relations Board, Plaintiff-intervenor, v. G. Kent EDWARDS, Attorney General of the State of Alaska; Thomas J. Moore, Commissioner of Labor of the State of Alaska; and Walter J. Hickel, Governor of the State of Alaska, Defendants. INTERNATIONAL UNION OF OPERATING ENGINEERS, LOCAL 302, AFL-CIO, a labor union, Plaintiff, v. The ALASKA CHAPTER OF ASSOCIATED GENERAL CONTRACTORS OF AMERICA, INC., an employer, Defendant, and State of Alaska, Defendant-intervenor. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — District of Alaska |
R. Bocchever, Faulkner, Banfield, Boochever & Doogan, Juneau, Alaska, and J. Duane Vance (of Vance, Davies, Roberts & Bettis), Seattle, Wash., for plaintiffs.
Laurence H. Silberman, N. L. R. B., Washington, D. C., for plaintiff-intervenor.
G. Kent Edwards, Atty. Gen., for the State of Alaska, Juneau, Alaska, and Edgar Paul Boyko, Anchorage, Alaska, Special Counsel for State of Alaska, Boyko & Richey, Anchorage, Alaska, for defendants.
Before ELY, Circuit Judge, and PLUMMER and VON DER HEYDT, District Judges.
Plaintiffs seek a declaratory judgment decreeing Alaska's "Local Union Autonomy Act", as amended, to be unconstitutional, and a permanent injunction restraining enforcement thereof.
The causes have been consolidated by order of the Court for all proceedings subsequent to March 27, 1968. Prior to consolidation, an identical three judge district court, as provided by Title 28, U.S.C., Sec. 2284, had been designated by the Chief Judge of the Circuit to hear and determine the appropriate issues presented in each case.
The three judge court so designated convened to hear arguments on the merits at Juneau, Alaska, June 24, 1968, following which the Court took the cause under advisement.
The facts, briefly, are these. Plaintiffs are an international labor organization, Local 302, which is a member thereof, and individual members of the local union. The National Labor Relations Board has appeared as an Intervenor-Plaintiff. Defendants are the State of Alaska, its Governor, Attorney General, Commissioner of Labor, and the Alaska Chapter of Associated Contractors of America, Inc., the latter designated as "an employer".
Local 302 is headquartered at Seattle, Washington, and does business in Alaska and Washington. A majority of its members reside outside the State of Alaska.
It appears that Alaska's Commissioner of Labor, over a period of time, has received numerous complaints that Local 302 discriminates against its Alaska resident members in job referrals, in favor of those members residing outside the State of Alaska. After legislative passage of the original Act in early 1967, a State Senate committee was established further to investigate the problem. By its report, dated July 17, 1967, the committee concluded that Local 302 in fact did discriminate against resident Alaska workers, and particularly against those who favored a local autonomous union, by dispatching nonresidents from Seattle to jobs in Alaska. Subsequent to this report, the 1968 Legislature enacted amendments to the local autonomy statute. The entire Act, as amended, is challenged here.
The Attorney General of Alaska brought both civil and criminal proceedings in the State Courts to enforce the Act. The civil proceeding resulted in an injunction entered by the Superior Court. The Attorney General of Alaska has stipulated to withhold prosecution of all state proceedings, pending this Court's decision on the issues before it.
We confine ourselves to a determination of two questions:
The Local Autonomy Act, as amended, is as follows:
Plaintiffs assert that the statute is unconstitutional because it:
Defendants contend that the Local Autonomy Act is a constitutional exercise of the State's police power, that it does not conflict with the National Labor Relations Act, and that the injunction of the Superior Court is valid and proper.
With this background in mind, we turn to the issues before us. We limit ourselves to plaintiffs' first asserted point, and decide whether the Act in question operates in an area pre-empted by Congress, and is therefore unconstitutional under the Supremacy Clause of the Constitution of the United States. We do so find.
We quote first the "ground rules for preemption" noted by the United States Supreme Court:
The ground rules for preemption in labor law, emerging from our Garmon decision (359 U.S. 236, 79 S.Ct. 773, 3 L.Ed.2d 775), should first be briefly summarized: in general, a State may not regulate conduct arguably "protected by § 7, or prohibited by § 8" of the National Labor Relations Act * * *. The greatest threat against which the Garmon doctrine guards * * * is a State's prohibition of activity that the Act indicates must remain unhampered.4
Local regulation is invalid if it does or may conflict with federal legislation or policy.5
Plaintiffs assert that the statutes in question conflict with the National Labor Relations Act,6 and cite Hill v. State of Florida.7 In Hill a Florida statute which precluded a convicted felon from serving as a union business agent was declared unconstitutional. The Supreme Court held that the statute interfered with the employees' freedom of choice in selecting a collective bargaining agent, and that such a provision "stands as an obstacle to the accomplishment and execution of the full purposes and objectives of Congress."8 Moreover, since an employer could not bargain with a duly selected representative of the workers unless the union had complied with the Florida statute, it impermissibly interfered in the...
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