United Bro. of Carpenters & Joiners of America v. Brown, 7943

• Decision Date: 23 March 1965
• Docket Number: No. 7943,7974.,7943
• Citation: 343 F.2d 872
• Parties: UNITED BROTHERHOOD OF CARPENTERS AND JOINERS OF AMERICA, and J. O. Mack, individually and as Executive Board Member of the United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners of America, Appellants and Cross-Appellees, v. Malcolm BROWN, Hubert Black, C. E. Klag, and Howard Lane, Appellees and Cross-Appellants.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Tenth Circuit

343 F.2d 872 (1965)

UNITED BROTHERHOOD OF CARPENTERS AND JOINERS OF AMERICA, and J. O. Mack, individually and as Executive Board Member of the United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners of America, Appellants and Cross-Appellees, v. Malcolm BROWN, Hubert Black, C. E. Klag, and Howard Lane, Appellees and Cross-Appellants.

Nos. 7943, 7974.

United States Court of Appeals Tenth Circuit.

March 23, 1965.

COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED

Richard R. Barnes, of Ratner, Mattox & Ratner, Wichita, Kan. (Payne H. Ratner, Wichita, Kan., Francis X. Ward and William A. McGowan, Washington, D. C., on the brief), for appellants and cross-appellees.

Edward F. Arn and Milo M. Unruh, Wichita, Kan. (Richard F. Mullins, H. R. Kuhn and Louis W. Cates, Wichita, Kan., on the brief), for appellees and cross-appellants.

Before PICKETT, HILL and SETH, Circuit Judges.

HILL, Circuit Judge.

This suit was brought in the court below under the provisions, and to obtain relief for alleged violations, of the Labor-Management Reporting and Disclosure Act of 1959, 29 U.S.C.A. §§ 401 et seq. (hereinafter referred to as the Act). The defendants below have appealed in No. 7943 from that portion of the judgment adverse to them and the plaintiffs below have cross-appealed in No. 7974 from the portion of the judgment adverse to them. The plaintiffs-appellees are individual members in good standing of Local Union No. 201 of the United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners of America (hereinafter referred to as Local 201). The defendant-appellant, United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners of America (hereinafter referred to as United Brotherhood), is a national labor union organization with which Local 201 is affiliated. The defendant-appellant, J. O. Mack, is an agent and employee of United Brotherhood and was appointed by it on April 4, 1963, to act as Trustee for Local 201. Local 201 is, of course, the local union organization and it is the only such local union situated in Wichita, Kansas.

The record in this case discloses that in the latter part of 1960 Local 201, by letter application to the General President of United Brotherhood, initiated a movement to form and organize a district council which was to be composed of the local unions in six Kansas cities located in the general area around Wichita, Kansas. The primary reason for the organization of such a district council was to attempt to fully utilize the work force on various missile sites in the area and to supply contractors on those sites with an adequate force of carpenters. One of the benefits accruing to members of the local unions by organizing the district council was that the members of a local union could go anywhere in the territory of the council, even into that of another local union, and work without being required to pay the usual "journeymen's permit" or "service permit" fee that would be charged without a district council. Thus, the members of Local 201 would gain substantial benefits from the formation of a district council since Local 201 was the largest local in the area and only three of the missile sites were in its territory.

Upon receiving the application, the General President assigned Mack to assist the local unions in forming the proposed district council. In addition, some of the members of Local 201 visited other local unions in the area to explain the advantages of having a district council. The minutes of Local 201 reflect that a special call meeting of the local was held on October 18, 1960, for the purpose of having an election on the issue of whether a district council should be organized in the area. The members of Local 201 voted 53 to 9 in favor of the proposal to organize such a council. At a later meeting on December 29, 1960, the members of Local 201 elected nine delegates to represent them and participate in the organization of the council.

Local 201's delegates met with the delegates from the other local unions in the area on January 14, 1961, and organized what is known as the Ark Valley District Council of the United Brotherhood (hereinafter referred to as District Council). At this same meeting, one of the delegates from Local 201 was elected President of the Council and other of the local's delegates were also elected to office. In addition, bylaws for the District Council were drawn up and ultimately approved.¹ Section 3 of those bylaws provides that the District Council "* * * shall be the central governing body and shall have legislative and executive powers on all matters relating to the general interest and welfare of our Local Unions and their members. The Council shall have the power to establish uniform dues * * *." Section 14 provides: "The revenue of this District Council shall be derived from the following sources: Per Capita tax $4.00 for each rank and file member in good standing of each Local Union affiliated with the District Council * * *." Section 31 provides: "The monthly dues in this District Council shall be Eight Dollars ($8.00) * * *." It is not clear from the record but apparently the effect of those provisions was to establish a uniform monthly dues rate for each member of a local union of $8.00 and, out of that amount, a per capita tax of $4.00 per month for each member was to be paid to the District Council. Such a per capita tax is generally paid periodically to the parent labor organization, i. e., the District Council in this case, and is a charge against the local union, not its members, which is in lieu of a dues assessment. It should be noted here that the plaintiffs were not delegates to the January 14 meeting, at which the District Council was organized.

Thereafter, a post-card notice was sent to the members of Local 201 advising them that a meeting would be held on January 26, 1961, to "* * * approve the By-Laws and Working Rules of the Ark Valley District Council, and any other Legal Business that may come before the house." The minutes of that meeting reflect a 58 to 26 vote in favor of raising the members' monthly dues by $2.20 per person, or to a total of $8.00 per person as required by the proposed bylaws of the District Council; but do not clearly show whether or not the Council's bylaws were approved by the membership of Local 201.² In any event, it was stipulated in open court at the trial below that Local 201 approved the bylaws in question. While the record is silent as to the other plaintiffs, it clearly shows that Klag had knowledge of this meeting but did not attend it. And, some of the members of Local 201 did work in the territory of other local unions without being required to pay a fee for doing so.

It is not clear from the record whether increased dues were thereafter collected from the members of Local 201, but it was stipulated that the per capita tax was paid to the District Council. However, before any appreciable time had elapsed a dispute arose over the matter of increasing dues and some of the members of Local 201 questioned the validity of the January 26, 1961, election to raise them. The grievance was submitted to the General President of the United Brotherhood and he determined that it was a valid election. Nevertheless, the same group of members remained unsatisfied and they demanded another election. On July 6, 1961, at a meeting of Local 201 called for that purpose, a motion was made and seconded to raise the dues from $5.80 to $8.00 per month but it was defeated by a secret ballot vote of 91 to 26. The matter of raising the dues again came before a meeting of Local 201 on September 7, 1961, and it was again defeated by a secret ballot vote of 94 to 51. On October 19, 1961, a meeting of Local 201 was called for the purpose of voting to disaffiliate from the District Council. The minutes of that meeting show that the vote was 84 to 29 in favor of withdrawing or disaffiliating from the District Council and, also, that legal proceedings were to be commenced to accomplish that end.

United Brotherhood took the position that the constitutions and bylaws of the respective organizations did not authorize or permit the withdrawal of a local union once the local had become affiliated with a district council and therefore it did not recognize the attempted disaffiliation of Local 201. Consequently, on December 16, 1961, appellants issued a written bulletin to all members of Local 201 stating that the local must commence collecting the $8.00 per month dues, beginning January 1, 1962, in compliance with the various letters and telegrams from the national office directing it to remain affiliated with the District Council. A majority of the members of Local 201, who attended the regular meetings and voted, were not in favor of the raise in dues. The controversy between Local 201 and United Brotherhood over such a raise culminated on May 6, 1962, at which time several members of Local 201³ brought an action against the local's officers in the District Court of Sedgwick County, Kansas, to enjoin the latter from paying any money from increased dues to the District Council. The state court granted the injunction preventing the payment of any money to the District Council for so long as Local 201 remained disaffiliated from it. In so doing, the court found and determined that: There were two provisions for the affiliation of local unions with a district council in the constitution and laws of United Brotherhood; section 26A provided for mandatory affiliation and section 26B, under which Local 201 was affiliated with the District Council, provided for the permissive organization of district councils; Local 201 terminated its affiliation with the District Council on October 19, 1961; and upon such disaffiliation, the dues reverted back to $5.80 but prior to that time, or during the period of affiliation, the dues were governed by the bylaws of the District Council and were $8.00 per month.

Subsequent to that decision and on August 2, 1962, the General President of United Brotherhood,...