Wegscheid v. Local Union 2911, Intern. Union, United Auto., Aerospace and Agr. Implement Workers of America

• Decision Date: 26 June 1997
• Docket Number: No. 95-3385,95-3385
• Citation: 117 F.3d 986
• Parties: 155 L.R.R.M. (BNA) 2728, 155 L.R.R.M. (BNA) 2911, 134 Lab.Cas. P 10,024 Michelle M. WEGSCHEID, et al., Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. LOCAL UNION 2911, INTERNATIONAL UNION, UNITED AUTOMOBILE, AEROSPACE AND AGRICULTURAL IMPLEMENT WORKERS OF AMERICA, et al., Defendants-Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Seventh Circuit

Page 986

117 F.3d 986

155 L.R.R.M. (BNA) 2728, 155 L.R.R.M. (BNA) 2911,

134 Lab.Cas. P 10,024

Michelle M. WEGSCHEID, et al., Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. LOCAL UNION 2911, INTERNATIONAL UNION, UNITED AUTOMOBILE AEROSPACE AND AGRICULTURAL IMPLEMENT WORKERS OF AMERICA, et al., Defendants-Appellees.

No. 95-3385.

United States Court of Appeals Seventh Circuit.

Argued April 25, 1997.

Decided June 26, 1997.

William T. Hopkins, Eric H.J. Stahlhut, Gallucci, Hopkins & Theisen, Fort Wayne, IN, John C. Scully (argued), National Right To Work Legal Defense Foundation, Springfield, VA, for Plaintiffs-Appellants.

Barry A. Macey, Macey, Macey & Swanson, Indianapolis, IN, Michael Nicholson (argued), International Union, UAW, Detroit, MI, for Defendants-Appellees International Union, United Auto, Aerospace and Agricultural Implement Workers of America, Local 2911.

Michael A. Warner, Jr., David P. Radelet, Franczek, Sullivan, Mann, Crement, Hein & Relias, Chicago, IL, for Defendant-Appellee Navistar International Transportation Corporation.

Before POSNER, Chief Judge, and CUMMINGS and FLAUM, Circuit Judges.

POSNER, Chief Judge.

Section 8(a)(3) of the National Labor Relations Act, 29 U.S.C. § 158(a)(3), forbids an employer to discriminate in terms and conditions of employment in order to encourage or discourage union membership. But the employer may agree in a collective bargaining agreement to make it a condition of continued employment that all the employees in the bargaining unit join the union (that is, may include in the agreement a "union shop" clause), provided that membership is not denied for any reason other than the employee's failure "to tender the ... dues ... uniformly required as a condition of acquiring or retaining membership." The courts have interpreted this proviso as entitling an employee to retain his employment, notwithstanding his refusal to join the union or pay the full dues that members are required to pay, as long as he pays so much of the dues as represent the cost to the union of carrying out its responsibilities with respect to negotiating the collective bargaining agreement and enforcing its terms. Communications Workers v. Beck, 487 U.S. 735, 108 S.Ct. 2641, 101 L.Ed.2d 634 (1988); Nielsen v. International Ass'n of Machinists & Aerospace Workers, 94 F.3d 1107, 1111 (7th Cir.1996); Miller v. Air Line Pilots Ass'n, 108 F.3d 1415, 1420 (D.C.Cir.1997). This is the "agency fee," the part of the dues that compensates the union for its services as the exclusive bargaining representative of the employees in the bargaining unit. Were they not required to pay this fee, workers could take a free ride on the union's statutorily required efforts on behalf of all the workers in the unit, including the refusers, to press for higher wages or fringe benefits or better working conditions and to represent workers having grievances against the employer. Communications Workers v. Beck, supra, 487 U.S at 753-54, 108 S.Ct. at 2653. In the limit, no workers would join the union, which would therefore have no income out of which to defray the expense of performing its duties as bargaining representative.

The interpretation of section 8(a)(3) that allows the substitution of the agency fee for union membership and full dues does considerable violence to the "plain meaning" of the section, and this violence is at the heart of this appeal. The usual justification offered for this result is that the union would violate its implied duty of fair representation of all members of the bargaining unit (implied in section 9(a) of the National Labor Relations Act, 29 U.S.C. § 159(a), which permits a collective bargaining agreement to make the union the exclusive representative of the workers in the unit, see Breininger v. Sheet Metal Workers, 493 U.S. 67, 86-87, 110 S.Ct. 424, 436-37, 107 L.Ed.2d 388 (1989)) if it forced some of them to support activities unrelated to that representation. E.g., Communications Workers v. Beck, supra, 487 U.S. at 743-44, 108 S.Ct. at 2647-48. But lurking underneath may be a concern with a potential violation of the First Amendment if the union-shop provision is interpreted to allow a union to use the power over nonunion workers that the statute gives it to force them to identify with and support an organization whose political activities may be abhorrent to them. It is true that a union is not a state actor and that the National Labor Relations Act allows states to forbid union-shop clauses in collective bargaining agreements, 29 U.S.C. § 164(b) ("right to work" provision), but when a state does not forbid the union shop the Act empowers the union to coerce the members of the bargaining unit.

However all this may be (we left open the question whether union-shop clauses in collective bargaining agreements with private employers are governmental action in Nielsen v. International Ass'n of Machinists & Aerospace Workers, supra, 94 F.3d at 1113, as had the Supreme Court in Beck, 487 U.S. at 761-62, 108 S.Ct. at 2656-57), unions are not happy about having to discount the regular union dues for those workers who prefer not to be union members. The discounts are substantial, because political and other activities not directly related to collective bargaining agency consume a substantial fraction of unions' resources--in this case, where the agency fee is only 76.4 percent of the full dues, almost a quarter. The suit, by four employees of Navistar International Transportation Corporation in Fort Wayne, Indiana who are covered by a collective bargaining agreement between Navistar and a local of the auto workers' union but do not want to belong to the union, charges the company and the union with violating the plaintiffs' right to pay no more than the agency fee. The complaint is based on section 301 of the Taft-Hartley Act, 29 U.S.C. § 185(a), insofar as it names the company as a defendant, and on section 9(a) of the National Labor Relations Act, the source of the implied right to sue a union in federal district court for breach of the duty of fair representation, insofar as it names the union (and its parent, but we can ignore that detail) as a defendant.

One count of the complaint challenges the "union security" (that is, union-shop) clause of the collective bargaining agreement. This clause is a close paraphrase of the language that we quoted earlier from section 8(a)(3) of the National Labor Relations Act. Hence it does not advise the employees of their right (announced in Beck) not to join the union and instead to pay only an agency fee, since that right is a judicial gloss on section 8(a)(3) rather than a part of the actual language of the statute. The other count of the complaint challenges statements to the plaintiffs by officers of the local to the effect that the plaintiffs would have to join the union and pay the full union dues in order to keep their jobs. That count was dismissed with prejudice by agreement of the parties after the union agreed to refund the union dues that the plaintiffs had paid and to notify all the employees in the bargaining unit of their right to pay the agency fee in lieu of joining the union and paying the full dues. That left only the challenge to the language in the collective bargaining agreement. The district judge dismissed Navistar because the complaint alleged no breach of the collective bargaining agreement and hence stated no claim under section 301, and then granted the union's motion to dismiss what was left of the suit on the ground that the collective bargaining agreement did not violate section 8(a)(3). Although it is not important to the ultimate disposition of the appeal, we note that Navistar should not have been dismissed from the case, since the plaintiffs were asking the court to order a change in a contract to which Navistar is a party. Fed.R.Civ.P. 19(a)(1); United States ex rel. Hall v. Tribal Development Corp., 100 F.3d 476, 479 (7th Cir.1996); Kulawy v. United States, 917 F.2d 729, 736 (2d Cir.1990).

The parties agree, though perhaps mistakenly or unnecessarily, as we shall see, that the issue presented by the appeal is the "facial validity" of the union-shop clause. The union argues that the National Labor Relations Board has exclusive jurisdiction over such a challenge, and so urges us to dismiss the case without reaching the merits. Invoking the general rule that the Board has exclusive jurisdiction over claims involving conduct subject (or even just arguably subject) to section 8 of the Act, e.g., Amalgamated Ass'n of Street, Electric Railway & Motor Coach Employees v. Lockridge, 403 U.S. 274, 284, 91 S.Ct. 1909, 1916-17, 29 L.Ed.2d 473 (1971), the union argues that the only ways in which a federal district court rather than the Board can consider a violation of section 8 are if a suit is brought under section 301 of the Taft-Hartley Act claiming a violation of the collective bargaining agreement and the union is joined as a defendant because it has failed in its duty of fair representation of all the members of the bargaining unit, or if, though there is no claim that the company violated the agreement, the union has failed in its duty of fair representation by not administering the agreement fairly. Either way, if the union defends by invoking section 8(a)(3), the court can interpret that section. Communications Workers v. Beck, supra, 487 U.S. at 743, 108 S.Ct. at 2647-48; Nielsen v. International Ass'n of Machinists & Aerospace Workers, supra, 94 F.3d at 1111.

But there is no basis for limiting federal judicial jurisdiction, in cases in which the company is not culpable, to union violations of the duty of fair representation committed in the course of administering the agreement. The district court can adjudicate a claimed violation of section 8(a)(3) whenever a case over which it has jurisdiction is before it, and it is now settled that any suit to enforce a union's duty of fair representation is within the...