After negotiations had failed, a railroad which had a collective
bargaining agreement with a labor union of its employees submitted
several "minor disputes" arising under the agreement to the
National Railroad Adjustment Board created by the Railway Labor
Act. The union promptly issued a strike call. The railroad sought
relief from the Federal District Court, which entered a permanent
injunction against the strike.
Held: a railway labor union cannot lawfully resort to a
strike over such "minor disputes" pending before the National
Railroad Adjustment Board; the District Court had jurisdiction to
enjoin such a strike; and its judgment is sustained. Pp.
353 U. S.
31-42.
(a) Section 3, First, of the Railway Labor Act authorizes either
side to submit a "minor dispute" to the National Railroad
Adjustment Board, whose decision shall be final and binding on both
sides, and the Section should be literally applied in the absence
of a clear showing of a contrary or qualified intention of
Congress. Pp.
353 U. S.
34-35.
(b) The legislative history of the provisions of the Railway
Labor Act creating the National Railroad Adjustment Board shows
that they were intended to provide for compulsory arbitration of
such "minor disputes." Pp.
353 U. S. 35-39.
(c) The federal courts can compel compliance with the provisions
of the Act to the extent of enjoining a union from striking to
defeat the jurisdiction of the National Railroad Adjustment Board,
and such injunctions are not barred by the Norris-LaGuardia Act.
Pp.
353 U. S.
39-42.
(d) The Norris-LaGuardia Act and the Railway Labor Act must be
read together so that the obvious purpose in the enactment of each
is preserved. Pp.
353 U. S.
39-42.
Page 353 U. S. 31
(e) Cases in which it has been held that the Norris-LaGuardia
Act's ban on federal injunctions is not lifted because the conduct
of the union is unlawful under some other statute are inapposite to
this case. P.
353 U. S.
42.
Affirmed.
MR. CHIEF JUSTICE WARREN delivered the opinion of the Court.
We are asked to interpret that provision of the Railway Labor
Act [
Footnote 1] which created
the National Railroad Adjustment Board for the resolution of minor
grievances in the event that the parties were unable to settle them
by negotiation. The ultimate question is whether a railway labor
organization can resort to a strike over matters pending before the
Adjustment Board. [
Footnote
2]
Page 353 U. S. 32
The Chicago River and Indiana Railroad Company operates the
switching and yard facilities at the Chicago stockyards. A segment
of the employees of the River Road were represented by the
Brotherhood of Railroad Trainmen. A collective bargaining agreement
between the Brotherhood and the River Road was in existence
throughout the period covered by this case. The present
disagreement arises from an accumulation of twenty-one grievances
of members of the Brotherhood against the carrier. Nineteen of
these were claims for additional compensation, one was a claim for
reinstatement to a higher position, and one was for reinstatement
in the employ of the carrier. When negotiations failed, the
Brotherhood called a strike. Because of the serious nature of the
impending work stoppage, the National Mediation Board proffered its
services. The mediator was unsuccessful, and upon his withdrawal,
the River Road submitted the controversy to the Adjustment Board.
The Brotherhood promptly issued a strike call for four days
later.
The River Road then sought relief from a District Court. Because
of the threatened irreparable injury to the carrier, its employees
and the 600 industries and 27 railroads served by it, the complaint
prayed for a preliminary injunction, and ultimately a permanent
injunction, against a strike by the Brotherhood over the grievances
pending before the Adjustment Board. A temporary restraining order
was issued, but that order was vacated and the complaint dismissed
upon the finding by the district judge that the Norris-LaGuardia
Act was applicable and that the court lacked jurisdiction to grant
the relief requested. The Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit
reversed. 229 F.2d 926. A permanent injunction
Page 353 U. S. 33
was accordingly entered by the District Court and affirmed by
the Seventh Circuit. We granted certiorari in order to resolve an
important question concerning interpretation and application of the
Railway Labor Act. [
Footnote 3]
352 U.S. 865.
The grievances for which redress is sought by the Brotherhood
are admittedly "minor disputes" as that phrase is known in the
parlance of the Railway Labor Act. These are controversies over the
meaning of an existing collective bargaining agreement in a
particular fact situation, generally involving only one employee. §
2, Sixth. [
Footnote 4] They may
be contrasted with "major disputes" which result when there is
disagreement in the bargaining process for a new contract. § 2,
Seventh. [
Footnote 5]
See
Elgin, J. & E. R. Co. v. Burley, 325 U.
S. 711,
325 U. S.
722-724.
The first step toward settlement of either kind of dispute is
negotiation and conference between the parties. Section 3, First
(i), [
Footnote 6] provides that
--
"The disputes between an employee or group of employees and a
carrier or carriers growing out of grievances or out of the
interpretation or application of agreements concerning rates of
pay, rules, or working conditions . . . shall be handled in the
usual manner up to and including the chief operating officer of the
carrier designated to handle such disputes. . . . "
Page 353 U. S. 34
If the parties are unable to reach an agreement, the section
continues --
". . . but, failing to reach an adjustment in this manner, the
disputes may be referred by petition of the parties or by either
party to the appropriate division of the [National Railroad]
Adjustment Board with a full statement of the facts and all
supporting data bearing upon the disputes."
Section 3, First(m) [
Footnote
7] declares that --
"The awards of the several divisions of the Adjustment Board . .
. shall be final and binding upon both parties to the dispute. . .
."
This language is unequivocal. Congress has set up a tribunal to
handle minor disputes which have not been resolved by the parties
themselves. Awards of this Board are "final and binding upon both
parties." And either side may submit the dispute to the Board. The
Brotherhood suggests that we read the act to mean only that an
Adjustment Board has been organized and that the parties are free
to make use of its procedures of they wish to, but that there is no
compulsion on either side to allow the Board to settle a dispute if
an alternative remedy, such as resort to economic duress, seems
more desirable. [
Footnote 8]
Such an interpretation would render meaningless those provisions in
the Act which allow
one side to submit a dispute to the
Board, whose decision shall be find and binding on
both
sides. If the Brotherhood is
Page 353 U. S. 35
correct, the Adjustment Board could act only if the union and
the carrier were amenable to its doing so. The language of § 3,
First, reads otherwise and should be literally applied in the
absence of a clear showing of a contrary or qualified intention of
Congress.
Legislative history of the provisions creating the National
Railroad Adjustment Board reinforces the literal interpretation of
the Act. The present law is a composite of two major pieces of
legislation. Most of the basic framework was adopted in 1926.
[
Footnote 9] In 1934, after
eight years of experience, the statute was amended, and, in that
amendment, the Adjustment Board was born. [
Footnote 10]
The distinction between "major disputes" and "minor disputes"
was found in the 1926 statute. Above the level of negotiation and
conference, each was to follow a separate procedure. Section 3,
First, [
Footnote 11] of that
Act called upon carriers or groups of carriers and their employees
to agree to the formation of boards of adjustment, composed equally
of representatives of labor and management, to resolve the "minor
disputes." If this step were unsuccessful, these disputes along
with the "major disputes" became a function of the Board of
Mediation, predecessor of the National Mediation Board.
The obvious lack of any compulsion toward a settlement of
disputes was a basic characteristic of the Act, and proved to be a
major weakness in the procedures for handling "minor disputes." As
stated in the Report of the House of Representatives Committee on
Interstate and Foreign Commerce, after hearings on the 1934
amendment:
"In many instances . . . , the carriers and the employees have
been unable to reach agreements to establish such boards [of
adjustment]."
H.R.Rep. No. 1944, 73d Cong., 2d Sess. 3. This was not the only
weakness,
Page 353 U. S. 36
however.
"Many thousands of these [minor] disputes have been considered
by boards established under the Railway Labor Act, but the boards
have been unable to reach a majority decision, and so the
proceedings have been deadlocked."
Ibid.
This condition was in market contrast to the declared purpose of
the 1926 Act
". . . to settle all disputes, whether arising out of the
application of . . . agreements or otherwise, in order to avoid any
interruption to commerce or to the operation of any carrier growing
out of any dispute between the carrier and the employee
thereof."
§ 2, First. [
Footnote 12]
The Report continued:
"These unadjusted disputes have become so numerous that, on
several occasions, the employees have resorted to the issuance of
strike ballots and threatened to interrupt interstate commerce in
order to secure an adjustment. This has made it necessary for the
President of the United States to intervene and establish an
emergency board to investigate the controversies. This condition
should be corrected in the interest of industrial peace, and of
uninterrupted transportation service."
Ibid.
The means chosen to correct this situation are the present
provisions of § 3, First, concerning the National Railroad
Adjustment Board. The Board was set up by Congress, making it
unnecessary for the parties to agree to establish their own boards.
[
Footnote 13] In case of a
deadlock on the Adjustment Board, which continued the policy of
equal representation of labor and management, the appropriate
Page 353 U. S. 37
division is allowed to select a neutral referee to sit with them
and break the tie. If the division cannot agree even on a referee,
the Act provides that one shall be appointed by the National
Mediation Board. [
Footnote
14] Thus was the machinery built for the disposition of minor
grievances.
The change was made with the full concurrence of the national
railway labor organizations. Commissioner Joseph B. Eastman,
Federal Coordinator of Transportation and principal draftsman of
the 1934 bill, complimented the unions on conceding the right to
strike over "minor disputes" in favor of the procedures of the
Adjustment Board:
"The willingness of the employees to agree to such a provision
is, in my judgment, a very important concession, and one of which
full advantage should be taken in the public interest. I regard it
as perhaps the most important part of the bill. [
Footnote 15]"
Asked if the Act made it a matter of discretion whether disputes
would be submitted to the Adjustment Board, he replied in the
negative. It was, he said, a matter of duty --
". . . and it is my understanding that the employees, in the
case of these minor grievances -- and that is all
Page 353 U. S. 38
that can be dealt with by the adjustment board -- are entirely
agreeable to those provisions of the law."
"I think that is a very important concession on their part. . .
. [T]his law is in effect an agreement on the part of the parties
to arbitrate all of these minor disputes. [
Footnote 16]"
The chief spokesman for the railway labor organizations was
George M. Harrison. He appeared as chairman of the legislative
committee of the Railway Labor Executives' Association before both
the House of Representatives and the Senate Committee. This
Association comprised the twenty-one standard railway labor groups,
including the Brotherhood of Railroad Trainmen. He testified before
the House Committee:
"So, out of all that experience and recognizing the character of
the services given to the people of this country by our industry
and how essential it is to the welfare of the country, these
organizations have come to the conclusion that in respect to these
minor grievance cases that grow out of the interpretation and/or
application of the contracts already made that they can very well
permit those disputes to be decided . . . by an adjustment board.
[
Footnote 17]"
Later, before the Senate Committee, he declared:
"Grievances are instituted against railroad officers' actions,
and we are willing to take our chances with this national board,
because we believe, out of our experience, that the national board
is the best and most efficient method of getting a determination of
these many controversies that arise on these railroads between the
officers and the employees."
"
* * * *
Page 353 U. S.
39
"
"These railway labor organizations have always opposed
compulsory determination of their controversies. . . . [W]e are now
ready to concede that we can risk having our grievances go to a
board had get them determined, and that is a contribution that
these organizations are willing to make. [
Footnote 18]"
The voice of labor was not unanimous in this concession. The
representative of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters
vehemently objected to the adoption of § 3, First.
"We are unalterably opposed to paragraph M, . . . [which] brings
about compulsory arbitration and prevents the use of the only
weapon in the hands of organized labor. We believe that a very
dangerous precedent would be established with the passage of this
paragraph, and, to the best of our knowledge, it is the first time
that any such measure has been enacted by the Congress of the
United States. [
Footnote
19]"
This record is convincing that there was general understanding
between both the supporters and the opponents of the 1934 amendment
that the provisions dealing with the Adjustment Board were to be
considered as compulsory arbitration in this limited field. Our
reading of the Act is therefore confirmed, not rebutted, by the
legislative history.
The only question which remains is whether the federal courts
can compel compliance with the provisions of the Act to the extent
of enjoining a union from striking to defeat the jurisdiction of
the Adjustment Board. The Brotherhood contends that the
Norris-LaGuardia Act [
Footnote
20]
Page 353 U. S. 40
has withdrawn the power of federal courts to issue injunctions
in labor disputes. That limitation, it is urged, applies with full
force to all railway labor disputes, as well as labor controversies
in other industries.
We hold that the Norris-LaGuardia Act cannot be read alone in
matters dealing with railway labor disputes. There must be an
accommodation of that statute and the Railway Labor Act, so that
the obvious purpose in the enactment of each is preserved. We think
that the purposes of these Acts are reconcilable.
In adopting the Railway Labor Act, Congress endeavored to bring
about stable relationships between labor and management in this
most important national industry. It found from the experience
between 1926 and 1934 that the failure of voluntary machinery to
resolve a large number of minor disputes called for a strengthening
of the Act to provide an effective agency, in which both sides
participated, for the final adjustment of such controversies.
Accumulation of these disputes had resulted in the aggregate's
being serious enough to threaten disruption of transportation.
Hence, with the full consent of the brotherhoods, the 1934
amendment became law.
The Norris-LaGuardia Act, on the other hand, was designed
primarily to protect working men in the exercise of organized
economic power, which is vital to collective bargaining. The Act
aimed to correct existing abuses of the injunctive remedy in labor
disputes. Federal courts had been drawn into the field under the
guise either of enforcing federal statutes, principally the Sherman
Act, or through diversity of citizenship jurisdiction. In the
latter cases, the courts employed principles of federal law
frequently at variance with the concepts of labor law in the States
where they sat. Congress acted to prevent the injunctions of the
federal courts from upsetting the natural interplay of the
competing economic forces of labor and capital. Rep. LaGuardia,
during the
Page 353 U. S. 41
floor debates on the 1932 Act, recognized that the machinery of
the Railway Labor Act channeled these economic forces, in matters
dealing with railway labor, into special processes intended to
compromise them. [
Footnote
21] Such controversies, therefore, are not the same as those in
which the injunction strips labor of its primary weapon without
substituting any reasonable alternative. [
Footnote 22]
In prior cases involving railway labor disputes, this Court has
authorized the use of injunctive relief to vindicate the processes
of the Railway Labor Act.
Virginia R. Co. v. System Federation
No. 40, 300 U. S. 515, was
an action by the union to enjoin compliance with the Act's
provisions for certification of a bargaining representative. The
question raised was whether a federal court could issue an
injunction in a labor dispute. The Court held:
"It suffices to say that the Norris-LaGuardia Act can affect the
present decree only so far as its provisions are found not to
conflict with those of § 2, Ninth, of the Railway Labor Act,
authorizing the relief which has been granted. Such provisions
cannot be rendered nugatory by the earlier and more general
provisions of the Norris-LaGuardia Act."
Id. at
300 U. S. 563.
In
Brotherhood of Railroad Trainmen v. Howard,
343 U. S. 768, and
other similar cases, [
Footnote
23] the Court held that
Page 353 U. S. 42
the specific provisions of the Railway Labor Act take precedence
over the more general provisions of the Norris-LaGuardia Act.
"Our conclusion is that the District Court has jurisdiction and
power to issue necessary injunctive orders [to enforce compliance
with the requirements of the Railway Labor Act] notwithstanding the
provisions of the Norris-LaGuardia Act."
Id. at
343 U.S.
774. This is a clear situation for the application of that
principle. [
Footnote 24]
The Brotherhood has cited several cases in which it has been
held that the Norris-LaGuardia Act's ban on federal injunctions is
not lifted because the conduct of the union in unlawful under some
other statute. [
Footnote 25]
We believe that these are inapposite to this case. None involved
the need to accommodate two statutes, when both were adopted as a
part of a pattern of labor legislation.
The judgment of the Court of Appeals must be affirmed.
It is so ordered.
MR. JUSTICE WHITTAKER took no part in the consideration or
decision of this case.
[
Footnote 1]
44 Stat. 577, as amended, 45 U.S.C. §§ 151-188.
[
Footnote 2]
The relationship of labor and management in the railroad
industry has developed on a pattern different from other
industries. The fundamental premises and principles of the Railway
Labor Act are not the same as those which form the basis of the
National Labor Relations Act, 49 Stat. 449, as amended 29 U.S.C. §
151
et seq. It is one of those differences which underlies
the controversy in this case.
[
Footnote 3]
In addition to the importance of the question, there was a
conflict in the decisions of the Courts of Appeals.
Brotherhood
of Railroad Trainmen v. Central of Georgia R. Co., 229 F.2d
901, decided by the Fifth Circuit, came to a conclusion contrary to
that of the Seventh Circuit in this case. Certiorari had been
granted in both cases, 352 U.S. 865, but we dismissed the writ in
the
Central of Georgia controversy upon a suggestion of
mootness.
352 U. S. 995.
[
Footnote 4]
45 U.S.C. § 152, Sixth.
[
Footnote 5]
45 U.S.C. § 152, Seventh.
[
Footnote 6]
45 U.S.C. § 153, First (i).
[
Footnote 7]
45 U.S.C. § 153, First (m).
[
Footnote 8]
The Brotherhood does not discuss this interpretation in the
event that the union had referred the dispute to the Adjustment
Board, as is normally the case in grievance disputes, and the
carrier was recalcitrant. It is to be doubted that the Brotherhood
would support allowing carriers the same right to defeat the
jurisdiction of the Adjustment Board that it claims for itself. The
statutory language, however, would support no distinction.
[
Footnote 9]
44 Stat. 577.
[
Footnote 10]
48 Stat. 1185.
[
Footnote 11]
44 Stat. 578-579.
[
Footnote 12]
44 Stat. 577-578.
[
Footnote 13]
Section 2, Second, authorizes carriers or groups of carriers and
their employees to agree to the establishment of system, group or
regional boards of adjustment similar to those in the 1926 Act.
These boards can have jurisdiction coextensive with that of the
National Board, but the existence of the latter insures against
accumulation of disputes through ineffectiveness of the local
boards.
[
Footnote 14]
"Minor disputes" were eliminated from the functions of the
Mediation Board by the 1934 amendment. However, that Board can
still become involved in a "minor dispute" case if "any labor
emergency is found by it to exist at any time." § 5, First, 45
U.S.C. § 155, First. Such was the fact in this case when the
threatened strike presented an emergency situation. The Mediation
Board enters these cases solely on its own motion, however. It
cannot be called into the dispute by either or both of the parties
or by an employee or group of employees, as is true for disputes
not within the jurisdiction of the Adjustment Board.
[
Footnote 15]
Hearings before House of Representatives Committee on Interstate
and Foreign Commerce on H.R. 7650, 73d Cong., 2d Sess. 47.
[
Footnote 16]
Id. at 58, 60.
[
Footnote 17]
Id. at 81-82.
[
Footnote 18]
Hearings before Senate Committee on Interstate Commerce on S.
3266, 73d Cong., 2d Sess. 33, 35.
[
Footnote 19]
Hearings before House of Representatives Committee,
supra, note 15 at
118.
[
Footnote 20]
47 Stat. 70, as amended, 29 U.S.C. §§ 101-115.
[
Footnote 21]
75 Cong.Rec. 5499, 5503-5504.
[
Footnote 22]
The Adjustment Board cannot entertain a case on its own motion.
Its processes must be invoked by one or both of the parties. In
this case, the River Road filed the grievances with the Board
before seeking an injunction.
Cf. the exhaustion of
remedies provisions in § 8 of the Norris-LaGuardia Act. 29 U.S.C. §
108.
[
Footnote 23]
Graham v. Brotherhood of L.F. & E., 338 U.
S. 232;
Tunstall v. Brotherhood of L.F. &
E., 323 U. S. 210;
Steele v. Louisville & N. R. Co., 323 U.
S. 192.
See also Rolfes v. Dwellingham, 198
F.2d 591.
[
Footnote 24]
The Norris-LaGuardia Act has been held to prevent the issuance
of an injunction in a railway labor case involving a "major
dispute."
Brotherhood of Railroad Trainmen v. Toledo, P. &
W. R. Co., 321 U. S. 50. In
such a case, of course, the Railway Labor Act does not provide a
process for a final decision like that of the Adjustment Board in a
"minor dispute" case.
[
Footnote 25]
Milk Wagon Drivers' Union v. Lake Valley Farm Products,
Inc., 311 U. S. 91;
East Texas Motor Freight Lines v. International Brotherhood of
Teamsters, 163 F.2d 10;
cf. Mead, Inc. v. International
Brotherhood of Teamsters, 217 F.2d 6;
In re Third Avenue
Transit Corp., 192 F.2d 971;
Carter v. Herrin Motor
Freight Lines, Inc., 131 F.2d 557;
Wilson & Co. v.
Birl, 105 F.2d 948.