Pacific Maritime Ass'n v. International Longshoremen's & Warehousemen's Union

304 F. Supp. 1315, 71 L.R.R.M. (BNA) 3117, 1969 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 10603
CourtDistrict Court, N.D. California
DecidedMarch 31, 1969
Docket51002
StatusPublished
Cited by6 cases

This text of 304 F. Supp. 1315 (Pacific Maritime Ass'n v. International Longshoremen's & Warehousemen's Union) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, N.D. California primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Pacific Maritime Ass'n v. International Longshoremen's & Warehousemen's Union, 304 F. Supp. 1315, 71 L.R.R.M. (BNA) 3117, 1969 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 10603 (N.D. Cal. 1969).

Opinion

*1316 MEMORANDUM OF DECISION

PECKHAM, District Judge.

The Threshold Issue of Jurisdiction To Enforce the Arbitration Award

Pacific Maritime Association (PMA), plaintiff, initially * requests this court to confirm and enforce the arbitration award dated March 19, 1969, whereby the Coast Arbitrator ordered the longshoremen and clerks of the International Longshoremen and Warehousemen Union (ILWU) to work on container ships and ships hauling vans as directed by the employer and held that the work stoppage command on March 17, 1969, by the longshoremen and clerks on cargo of these types of vessels was a violation of the Pacific Coast Longshore-Clerks’ Agreement 1966-71.

Objection requiring some comment has been made by the defendants that this court lacks jurisdiction to confirm the arbitration award in this case. The defendants contend that to confirm the award would, in effect, be tantamount to entering an injunction against a work stoppage in violation of § 4 of the Norris-LaGuardia Act of 1932, 47 Stat. 70, 29 U.S.C. § 104 (1965). The plaintiff submits this court has jurisdiction under § 301 of the subsequently enacted Labor Management Relations Act of 1947 (Taft-Hartley Act), 61 Stat. 156, 29 U.S.C. § 185(a) (1965).

Since the enactment of § 301 in 1947, a long series of cases has unfolded which uphold the jurisdiction of federal courts to specifically enforce agreements to arbitrate (Textile Workers Union of America v. Lincoln Mills, 353 U.S. 448, 77 S.Ct. 912, 1 L.Ed.2d 972 (1957)) and to confirm awards resulting from such arbitration (United Steelworkers of America v. America Mfg. Co., 363 U.S. 564, 80 S.Ct. 1343, 4 L.Ed.2d 1403 (1960); United Steelworkers of America v. Warrior and Gulf Navigation Co., 363 U.S. 574, 80 S.Ct. 1347, 4 L.Ed.2d 1409 (1960); United Steelworkers of America v. Enterprise Wheel & Car Corp., 363 U.S. 593, 80 S.Ct. 1358, 4 L.Ed.2d 1424 (1960)). By thus encouraging the process of arbitration, the courts have been carrying out the congressional and national policy which underlied the enactment of § 301.

To date, the United States Supreme Court has never refused to uphold confirmation of an arbitration award directing cessation of a work stoppage on the ground that doing so would conflict with the Norris-LaGuardia Act. Confirmation of such an award, in fact, would seem the logical extension of a specifically enforceable duty to arbitrate. In one case, where a congressional statute imposed a duty to arbitrate under the Railway Labor Act (44 Stat. 577, 45 U.S.C. §§ 151-188 (1954)), the court upheld a mandatory injunction ordering the cessation of a work stoppage. Brotherhood of Railroad Trainmen v. Chicago River & Indiana Railroad Co., 353 U.S. 30, 77 S.Ct. 635, 1 L.Ed.2d 622 (1957). One lower federal court, in a case indistinguishable in any material way from the instant matter, has also held that such an injunction will lie. New Orleans Steamship Assoc. v. General Longshore Workers, I.L.A. Local Union #1418, 389 F.2d 369 (5th Cir. 1968), cert. denied, 393 U.S. 828, 89 S.Ct. 92, 21 L.Ed.2d 99 (1968).

To support their contention concerning the absence of jurisdiction, the defendants place much reliance or Sinclair Refining Co. v. Atkinson, 370 U.S. 195, 82 S.Ct. 1328, 8 L.Ed.2d 440 (1962). There, the Supreme Court held that the Norris-LaGuardia Act deprived the court of jurisdiction to issue an injunction against a strike which violated the “no-strike” clause of a collective bargaining agreement. In Sinclair, however, there had been no arbitration resulting in an award similar to the one made in the instant case. Therefore, no arbitrator had made those fine and complex judgments with respect to the very labor dispute *1317 which the Norris-LaGuardia Act was designed to keep from the federal court forum. See United Steelworkers of America v. Warrior & Gulf Navigation Co., 363 U.S. 574, 581-582, 80 S.Ct. 1347 (1960).

Since no arbitration occurred in the Sinclair case, that case holds only that an injunction against a work stoppage is not a necessary accommodation between the Norris-LaGuardia Act and the Labor Management Relations Act in order to make the policies underlying the latter effective. The ease does not stand for the proposition that where an orderly method of handling disputes through arbitration has been agreed to and followed by the parties, the court is powerless to confirm that award because of the Norris-LaGuardia Act. See International Longshoremen’s Assoc., Local 1291 v. Philadelphia Marine Trade Association, 389 U.S. 64, 77, 88 S.Ct. 201, 19 L.Ed.2d 236 (1967) (Douglas, J., concurring and dissenting opinion).

Any expansive reading of the Sinclair decision would seem inconsistent with the declared Congressional policies underlying the two acts. In 1932 Congress declared in enacting the Norris-LaGuardia Act that

under prevailing economic conditions, developed with the aid of governmental authority for owners of property to organize in the corporate and other forms of ownership association, the individual unorganized worker is commonly helpless to exercise actual liberty of contract and to protect his freedom of labor * * * 47 Stat. 70, 29 U.S.C. § 102 (emphasis added).

Congress’ focus here was upon the individual’s helplessness against the concerted economic power of the employer. In order to aid individual workers to organize, Congress outlawed the “yellow-dog contract” and foreclosed the individual from contracting away rights important to the end of organization.

By the time the Labor Management Relations Act was passed in 1947, the labor union was no longer a fledgling institution, and, accordingly, Congress declared that

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304 F. Supp. 1315, 71 L.R.R.M. (BNA) 3117, 1969 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 10603, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/pacific-maritime-assn-v-international-longshoremens-warehousemens-cand-1969.