International Brotherhood v. United Parcel

447 F.3d 491

INTERNATIONAL BROTHERHOOD OF TEAMSTERS, AFL-CIO, and Teamsters Local Union No. 2727, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. UNITED PARCEL SERVICE CO., Defendant-Appellee.

No. 05-5478.

United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit.

Argued: January 24, 2006.

Decided and Filed: April 26, 2006.

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ARGUED:

Roland Wilder, Jr., Baptiste & Wilder, Washington, D.C., for Appellants. Tony C. Coleman, Frost Brown Todd LLC, Louisville, Kentucky, for Appellee.

ON BRIEF:

Roland Wilder, Jr., Katherine A. McDonough, Baptiste & Wilder, Washington, D.C., for Appellants. Tony C. Coleman, David L. Hoskins, Frost Brown Todd LLC, Louisville, Kentucky, for Appellee.

Before: SILER, SUTTON, and COOK, Circuit Judges.

OPINION

SUTTON, Circuit Judge.

Section 3 of the Railway Labor Act (RLA), Pub.L. No. 442, 48 Stat. 1185 (1934) (codified as amended at 45 U.S.C. § 151 et seq.), grants adjustment boards exclusive jurisdiction to resolve disputes over the "interpretation or application of [collective bargaining] agreements" affecting the railroad and airline industries. At issue in this case is a claim by the International Brotherhood of Teamsters (the union) that it has a right to designate a representative on a safety committee established by its collective bargaining agreement with United Parcel Service (UPS). The district court dismissed the suit, concluding that it fell within the exclusive jurisdiction of the adjustment board. The union responds that the dispute lies outside of the board's exclusive jurisdiction because it involves a dispute between labor and management about the "[d]esignation of representatives." § 2, Third. Concluding that the union has construed the board's exclusive jurisdiction in § 3 too narrowly and the term "representatives" in § 2, Third too broadly, we affirm.

I.

The union represents maintenance technicians and other workers employed by UPS at 88 "gateways" across the country (hubs for the company's airborne shipping business). UPS and the union entered into a collective bargaining agreement that established, among other things, a safety committee at each of the larger gateways. Representatives of both parties sit on these safety committees, where they work together to address the safety concerns of employees at the gateways. At gateways with fewer than 20 employees, the Local 2727 Safety Committee chairman works with UPS's safety manager to resolve employee safety concerns.

In April 2003, Local 2727 hired John J. Tulipana, Jr. to be (1) its Safety Committee Chair and (2) the Union Chair of the Louisville Gateway Safety Committee. UPS, however, refused to acknowledge Tulipana as chair of the Louisville Committee, arguing that the collective bargaining agreement mandated that a UPS employee hold the position. On November 3, 2003, the union filed this lawsuit in the United States District Court for the Western District of Kentucky, seeking a declaratory judgment and injunctive relief under § 3 of the Railway Labor Act. Claiming that UPS had refused "to `treat' with Mr. Tulipana on health and safety issues," the union complained that "UPS has interfered with its employees' choice of representative and has violated § 2, Third and Fourth of the Act." JA 9. UPS filed a motion to dismiss for lack of jurisdiction, which the district court granted. Even if UPS had failed to "treat with" Tulipana in this safety committee position, the district court held that "the dispute . . . qualified as `minor' under the Railway Labor Act [and] was committed to the exclusive jurisdiction of the system adjustment board." D. Ct. Op. at 24, 26.

II.

The union appealed. We give fresh review to a district court's decision to dismiss a suit for lack of statutory jurisdiction. Airline Prof'ls Ass'n of the Int'l Bhd. of Teamsters v. ABX Air, Inc., 274 F.3d 1023, 1027 (6th Cir.2001).

A.

Enacted in 1926, the Railway Labor Act was designed to "avoid any interruption to commerce or to the operation of any [railroad] engaged therein" caused by labor-management disputes. 45 U.S.C. § 151a(1); see also H.R.Rep. No. 328, at 1 (1926) (noting that the Act would ensure "continuity and efficiency of interstate transportation service, and [] protect the public from the injuries and losses consequent upon any impairment or interruption of interstate commerce through failures of managers and employees to settle peaceably their controversies"). In 1936, Congress extended the Act to "every common carrier by air engaged in interstate or foreign commerce." Act of April 10, 1936, Pub.L. No. 487, 49 Stat. 1189 (codified at 45 U.S.C. § 181).

In attempting to prevent labor disputes from crippling freight and passenger delivery in the railway and airline industries, the Act divides labor disputes into four categories: representation disputes, major disputes, minor disputes and collateral disputes governed by independent state or federal laws. Representation disputes are governed by § 2, Ninth of the Act and address conflicts that arise before certification of a union and that concern who will represent employees in future labor negotiations. See Virginian Ry. Co. v. System Federation No. 40, Ry. Employees, 300 U.S. 515, 543, 57 S.Ct. 592, 81 L.Ed. 789 (1937) ("[The] employees' free[dom] to organize and to make choice of their representatives without the `coercive interference' and `pressure' of a company union . . . [and the statutory protection of] the freedom of choice of representatives. . . . was continued and made more explicit by [§ 2, Third and Fourth]."); see also W. Airlines, Inc. v. Int'l Bhd. of Teamsters, 480 U.S. 1301, 1302-03, 107 S.Ct. 1515, 94 L.Ed.2d 744 (1987) (O'Connor, Circuit Justice) ("Representation disputes involve defining the bargaining unit and determining the employee representative for collective bargaining. Under § 2, Ninth, of the Act, the National Mediation Board has exclusive jurisdiction over representation disputes.") (internal quotation marks omitted).

"Major disputes" occur after certification "over the formation of collective agreements or efforts to secure them" and "arise where there is no such agreement or where it is sought to change the terms of one, and therefore the issue is not whether an existing agreement controls the controversy. They look to the acquisition of rights for the future, not to assertion of rights claimed to have vested in the past." Elgin, Joliet & E. Ry. Co. v. Burley, 325 U.S. 711, 723, 65 S.Ct. 1282, 89 L.Ed. 1886 (1945); see also Pittsburgh & Lake Erie R.R. Co. v. Ry. Labor Executives' Ass'n, 491 U.S. 490, 496 n. 4, 109 S.Ct. 2584, 105 L.Ed.2d 415 (1989) ("Disputes about proposals to change rates of pay, rules, or working conditions are known as major disputes."); Burlington N. R.R. Co. v. Bhd. of Maint. of Way Employees, 481 U.S. 429, 432, 107 S.Ct. 1841, 95 L.Ed.2d 381 (1987) ("A dispute over the formation of collective agreements or efforts to secure them is a `major dispute' in the parlance of railway labor law and is governed by the Railway Labor Act.") (citation and quotation marks omitted); Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe R.R. Co. v. Ruell, 480 U.S. 557, 562-63, 107 S.Ct. 1410, 94 L.Ed.2d 563 (1987) (labeling "`major disputes' [as] those arising out of the formation or change of collective bargaining agreements covering rates of pay, rules, or working conditions") (internal quotation marks and brackets omitted).

A minor dispute "contemplates the existence of a collective agreement . . . . The dispute relates either to the meaning or proper application of a particular provision with reference to a specific situation or to an omitted case. . . . In either case the claim is to rights accrued, not merely to have new ones created for the future." Burley, 325 U.S. at 723, 65 S.Ct. 1282; see also Hawaiian Airlines v. Norris, 512 U.S. 246, 252-54, 114 S.Ct. 2239, 129 L.Ed.2d 203 (1994) ("[M]inor disputes[] grow out of grievances or out of the interpretation or application of agreements covering rates of pay, rules, or working conditions. Minor disputes involve controversies over the meaning of an existing collective bargaining agreement in a particular fact situation[,] . . . . develop from the interpretation and/or application of the contracts between the labor unions and the carriers . . . . [and] pertain[] only to disputes invoking contract-based rights.") (internal quotation marks and citation omitted); Pittsburgh & Lake Erie R.R. Co., 491 U.S. at 496, 109 S.Ct. 2584 ("Minor disputes are those involving the interpretation or application of existing contracts."); Buell, 480 U.S. at 563, 107 S.Ct. 1410 ("[A] minor dispute . . . grow[s] out of grievances or out of the interpretation or application of agreements concerning rates of pay, rules, or working conditions.") (internal quotation marks omitted); cf. Conrail v. Ry. Labor Executives' Ass'n, 491 U.S. 299, 302, 109 S.Ct. 2477, 105 L.Ed.2d 250 (1989) ("This Court . . . . adopted the major/minor terminology, drawn from the vocabulary of rail management and rail labor, as a shorthand method of describing two classes of controversy Congress had distinguished in the RLA: major disputes seek to create contractual rights, minor disputes to enforce them."); id. at 307, 109 S.Ct. 2477 ("Where an employer asserts a contractual right to take the contested action, the ensuing dispute is minor if the action is arguably justified by the terms of the parties' collective-bargaining agreement. Where, in contrast, the employer's claims are frivolous or obviously insubstantial, the dispute is major.").

Finally, disputes over rights granted by other provisions of federal and state law, which are not otherwise covered by any of the previous dispute categories, are largely unaffected by the Act. Hawaiian Airlines, 512 U.S. at 260, 114 S.Ct. 2239 ("[A] state-law cause of action is not pre-empted by the RLA if it involves rights and obligations that exist independent of the CBA."); id. at 265-66, 114...