Yellow Forwarding Co. v. Atlantic Container Line
| Citation | 668 F.2d 350 |
| Decision Date | 21 December 1981 |
| Docket Number | No. 80-1945,80-1945 |
| Parties | 109 L.R.R.M. (BNA) 2356, 92 Lab.Cas. P 13,165, 1981-2 Trade Cases 64,419 YELLOW FORWARDING CO. d/b/a Yellow Freight International, Appellant, v. ATLANTIC CONTAINER LINE; Dart Containerline Company Limited; Hapag-Lloyd Aktiengesellschaft; Sea-Land Service, Inc.; and United States Lines, Inc., Appellees. |
| Court | United States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (8th Circuit) |
Thomas J. Guilfoil, Jim J. Shoemake, John W. O'Neil, Jr., Guilfoil, Symington, Petzall & Shoemake, St. Louis, Mo., for appellant; Lester M. Bridgeman, argued, Robert L. Wright, Washington, D. C., Philip B. Green, Shawnee Mission, Kan., of counsel.
John H. Stroh, Thompson & Mitchell, St. Louis, Mo., Rodney O. Thorson, John C. Fricano, Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom, Washington, D. C., for Sea-Land Service, Inc.; Robert S. Zuckerman, Oliver J. Trytell, of counsel.
John H. Stroh, Thompson & Mitchell, St. Louis, Mo., for appellees.
Jacob P. Billig, argued, John R. Attanasio, Billig, Sher & Jones, P. C., Washington, D. C., for appellee Hapag-Lloyd Aktiengesellschaft.
Before STEPHENSON and McMILLIAN, Circuit Judges, and HANSON, * Senior District Judge.
Yellow Forwarding Company appeals from a summary judgment entered in the District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri 1 pursuant to Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b), dismissing its complaint seeking monetary and injunctive relief against appellee ocean carriers on the basis of alleged violations of the Sherman Act, 15 U.S.C. § 1, and the Labor Management Relations Act, 29 U.S.C. §§ 158(b) and (e).
For reversal appellant argues that the district court erred (1) in finding that the Federal Maritime Commission's (Commission) approval of appellees' conference agreement required the dismissal of its complaint, and (2) in finding that the Commission has the authority to immunize the conspiracy and secondary boycott alleged in appellant's complaint. For the reasons discussed below, we affirm.
Appellant is a surface freight forwarder and a non-vessel operating common carrier (NVO). It consolidates, for midwestern shippers, less-than-container loads into single containers for shipment to ocean ports and beyond. Appellant employs the services of ocean carriers to carry container shipments across the Atlantic. 2
Appellees operate ocean vessels for trans-Atlantic shipments of containerized freight and employ members of the International Longshoremen's Association (Union) to load their ships. Appellees are subject to the jurisdiction of the Commission pursuant to the Shipping Act, 46 U.S.C. § 801 et seq. Under § 15 of the Shipping Act, 3 46 U.S.C § 814, ocean carriers may organize ratemaking conferences through which the conference members may jointly establish the rates to be observed by the member carriers in the particular trade covered by the agreement. Conference agreements must be filed with and approved by the Commission. 4 Agreements approved by the Commission and activities conducted pursuant to approved agreements are exempt from the antitrust laws. 5
Appellees are members of the North Atlantic Shipping Conference. Several years ago appellees agreed to establish and maintain uniform consolidation allowances. 6 The conference agreements were filed with the Commission as part of appellees' ocean tariffs.
Subsequently, appellees attempted to eliminate the allowances by filing tariff revisions to that effect with the Commission. In December, 1975, in response to complaints from NVOs, freight forwarders, and consolidators, the Commission issued an Order to Show Cause directing appellees to show:
(W)hy the Commission should not find that any concerted action of Respondents (appellees) with regard to consolidation allowances are actions which implement unfiled, unapproved agreements in violation of section 15.
....
(W)hy, even if the concerted actions are pursuant to agreements approved by the Commission under section 15 of the Shipping Act, 1916, the Commission should not find such agreements contrary to the public interest which should be disapproved or modified.
Docket No. 76-35, Cancellation of Consolidation Allowance Rule (1978) (Appendix A at 3-4). 7 In that proceeding appellant and other NVOs participated as intervenors and all five of the instant appellees were respondents.
The Commission found that, although the consolidation allowances did not constitute routine ratemaking, appellees' "agreement as approved by this Commission permits them the authority to initiate and maintain a system of consolidation allowances." Appendix A at 17. However, the Commission found that such authority did not extend to cancellation or elimination of the allowances and that any attempt at cancellation would require separate approval under § 15. 8 Id. at 18. The Commission further determined that the implementation and maintenance of the consolidation allowance system was in the public interest because it fostered the growth of the consolidation business. Id. at 19-20. No party to Docket No. 76-35 sought judicial review of the Commission's decision, although such review was available pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2342.
Subsequently, appellant filed the present action in district court. Specifically, appellant alleged that appellees had conspired with each other and with the Union to violate § 1 of the Sherman Act by depriving appellant of its right to deal competitively with appellees. Appellant alleged that appellees carried out the conspiracy by both establishing and attempting to eliminate the consolidation allowance system without informing the Commission that the intended purpose of the uniform allowance rule was to transfer the consolidation business from the Midwest to the East Coast and that the effect of the rule was a secondary boycott of appellant which employed no members of the Union, in violation of the Labor Management Relations Act, 29 U.S.C. § 158(b), (e). 9
Appellees filed motions to dismiss the complaint for failure to state a claim upon which relief could be granted. The district court granted the motions holding that the Commission's decision in Docket No. 76-35 conferred antitrust immunity on the consolidation allowances under § 15 of the Shipping Act because the Commission had found the allowances to be within the scope of appellees' approved conference agreements and in the public interest. Yellow Forwarding Co. v. Atlantic Container Line, 498 F.Supp. 105, at 108 (E.D.Mo.1980). The district court also ruled that appellant, as a party to Docket No. 76-35, could not challenge that immunity by collaterally attacking the Commission decision in district court. Id., citing Port of Boston Marine Terminal Ass'n v. Rederiaktiebolaget Transatlantic, 400 U.S. 62, 91 S.Ct. 203, 27 L.Ed.2d 203 (1970). The district court further held that the complaint failed to state a cause of action insofar as it alleged an agreement with the Union to obtain Commission approval to eliminate the allowance because that conduct was protected under the Noerr-Pennington doctrine. At 109.
On appeal appellant argues that the Commission's decision in Docket No. 76-35 did not immunize the conspiracy and secondary boycott alleged in its complaint because the nature, purpose and intended effect of the conspiracy were not revealed to the Commission. Therefore, appellant argues, the district court erred in relying on Port of Boston Marine Terminal Ass'n v. Rederiaktiebolaget Transatlantic, supra, 400 U.S. 62, 91 S.Ct. 203, 27 L.Ed.2d 203. Appellant does not challenge the Commission's approval of the fixing of consolidation allowances pursuant to a conference agreement. Alternatively, appellant argues that the Commission lacks jurisdiction under Allen Bradley Co. v. Electrical Workers Union, 325 U.S. 797, 65 S.Ct. 1533, 89 L.Ed. 1939 (1945), to immunize a conspiracy among appellees and the Union to injure the business of midwestern consolidators by a secondary boycott.
In response appellees argue that the uniform allowances are immunized from the antitrust laws by reason of the Commission's approval and that appellant is estopped from collaterally attacking the issues decided by the Commission in Docket No. 76-35.
We find appellant's arguments unpersuasive and affirm the district court's dismissal of appellant's complaint for lack of subject matter jurisdiction. Appellees' conference agreements are exempt from the federal antitrust laws by virtue of Commission approval pursuant to § 15 of the Shipping Act, 46 U.S.C. § 814, and appellant may not seek judicial review of the final orders of the Commission by filing an antitrust action in the district court.
First, appellant argues that the only issue litigated before the Commission in Docket No. 76-35 was whether appellees' "elimination (of the allowances) had been impliedly approved by the (Commission's) prior approval of their earlier ratemaking agreement." 10 However, the issues set forth for investigation in that proceeding included whether "any concerted action of Respondents (appellees) with regard to consolidation allowances are actions which implement ... unapproved agreements ... in violation of section 15." Appendix A at 3. Therefore, the scope of the issue decided by the Commission included the legality of the establishment and maintenance, as well as the attempted elimination, of the uniform allowances.
Moreover, the Commission in Docket No. 76-35 specifically found that the establishment and maintenance of the allowances was in the "public interest." Appendix A at 19. In making such a finding, the Commission must consider the antitrust implications of the agreements submitted for approval. E.g., FMC v. Pacific Maritime Ass'n, 435 U.S. 40, 53, 98 S.Ct. 927, 935, 55 L.Ed.2d 96 (1978); FMC v. Seatrain Lines, Inc., 411 U.S. 726, 739, 93 S.Ct. 1773, 1781, 36 L.Ed.2d 620 (1973); FMC v. Aktiebolaget Svenska Amerika Linien, 390 U.S. 238, 242-44 (1968). Further, when...
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