Labor Law - Stephen W. Mooney and Leigh Lawson Reeves

• Publication year: 1996

Labor Lawby Stephen W. Mooney^* and Leigh Lawson Reeves^**

I. Introduction

This Article surveys the 1995 decisions of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit that addressed issues in the areas of traditional labor law. This Article specifically discusses decisions by the Eleventh Circuit under the National Labor Relations Act ("NLRA"),¹ the Labor Management Relations Act ("LMRA"),² the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 ("FLSA"),³ and the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 ("ERISA").⁴

Unlike the past few years, this survey year the Eleventh Circuit did not decide many cases which involved labor law issues. There were numerous unpublished opinions by the Eleventh Circuit dealing with the activities of various labor unions, their elections, and the interpretation of certain collective bargaining agreements. These unpublished opinions, however, are not considered binding precedent. This year, the Eleventh Circuit's published opinions appear to have focused more on the interpretation of certain guidelines in the FLSA, as well as the ERISA statute. This Article does not attempt to address all the cases decided by the Eleventh Circuit that touched upon these traditional areas of labor law. Instead, the Article addresses some of the more noteworthy decisions by the Eleventh Circuit in 1995 and attempts to provide practical guidance to the practitioner for these types of claims.

II. The National Labor Relations Act and the Labor Management Relations Act

In the case of Lightning v. Roadway Express, Inc.,⁵ the Eleventh Circuit addressed the issue of whether the Georgia state law claim for intentional infliction of emotional distress was pre-empted by section 301 of the LMRA. Interestingly enough, the court made the determination that the LMRA did not pre-empt the Georgia state law claim, and therefore, the plaintiff was allowed to proceed with his state law claim against his employer.⁶

Specifically, the plaintiff, Lightning, worked as a janitor for Roadway Trucking Company from February 1988 until his discharge in August 1990.⁷ Lightning initially served as an on-call employee but eventually received regular employee status. As a regular employee, the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Local Union No. 728 ("Union") represented his interests at the Roadway terminal in which he worked. The collective bargaining agreement between Roadway and the Union allowed for "progressive discipline," but it also granted employees the right to file a grievance against the employer regarding any discipline imposed upon them.⁸

It was undisputed that Lightning's job performance had been less than marginal during the years he had worked for Roadway. Specifically, Roadway management had discussed with him several times about violating certain collective bargaining agreement company rules, such as wasting time, failing to follow instructions, and failing to wear steel-toed shoes. Due to these numerous work rule violations, Roadway dismissed Lightning several times during his work history with them. Roadway always reinstated Lightning, however, until his final discharge in August 1990.⁹

The record showed that Roadway supervisors had verbally abused Lightning on numerous occasions. The verbal abuse usually included profanity and encouragement by Roadway supervisors for Lightning to leave the company. Moreover, Lightning received several telephone calls at home telling him to resign his position.¹⁰

The court found two particular encounters between Roadway supervisors and Lightning to be especially egregious. The first incident commenced when a supervisor complained about how Lightning was sweeping his area and actually spit in Lightning's face and told him, "Who do you think you are?" and "You ain't no better than a janitor." The second incident occurred when Lightning commented that a certain supervisor, Mark Keahon, was the only individual who treated him with decency. When Keahon heard of this comment, he called Lightning into his office and criticized him about his work performance. The conversation became very hostile, and Lightning requested the presence of a union steward. Keahon responded, "Fuck the union steward" and "Get your sorry ass out of here." Lightning returned with the union steward, and during the heated conversation that ensued, Keahon actually tried to hit Lightning.¹¹

Eventually, Lightning began to suffer from psychotic episodes, which included manifestations of paranoid delusions. He was later admitted into Georgia Mental Health Institute, where the physicians diagnosed his problems as being "work related." Shortly thereafter, Lightning resigned his position in August 1990.¹²

A few months thereafter, Lightning brought suit against Roadway in state court alleging that Roadway had breached his contract by committing violations of the collective bargaining agreement, engaging in intentional infliction of emotional distress, as well as assault. Roadway removed the case to the United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia and moved for summary judgment on the following grounds: (1) federal law pre-empted Lightning's breach of contract claim; (2) federal law pre-empted Lightning's intentional infliction of emotional distress claim; (3) Roadway's alleged conduct did not constitute intentional infliction of emotional distress as a matter of law; and (4) the Georgia Workers' Compensation Act provided the exclusive remedy for Lightning's assault claim. The district court granted Roadway's motion in part, finding that the federal labor law did pre-empt Lightning's contract claim, but otherwise, the district court denied Roadway's motions. After conducting a nonjury trial, the court entered judgment for Lightning and awarded him approximately

$150,000 in damages. Shortly thereafter, Roadway filed their appeal to the court of appeals.¹³

Among other arguments, Roadway contended that the resolution of Lightning's intentional infliction of emotional distress claim depended upon the interpretation of the collective bargaining agreement, and therefore, section 301 of the Labor Management Relations Act would preempt his claim. The Eleventh Circuit noted that whether section 301 of the Labor Management Relations Act pre-empted a state law claim was necessarily a question of law and, therefore, subject to de novo review.¹⁴

Section 301(a) of the LMRA provides:

Suits for violation of a contract between an employer and a labor organization representing employees in an industry affecting commerce . . . may be brought in any district court of the United States having jurisdiction of the parties, without respect to the amount in controversy or without regard to the citizenship of the parties.¹⁵

Consequently, section 301 not only grants federal courts jurisdiction over employment disputes involving collective bargaining agreements, it also expresses a federal policy that federal substantive law should apply under section 301(a), rather than any type of state substantive law.¹⁶

The Eleventh Circuit then cited the case of Lingle v. Norge, Inc.,¹⁷ in which the Supreme Court of the United States outlined the principles behind section 301 and the pre-emption doctrine:

[If] the resolution of a state law claim depends upon the meaning of a collective bargaining agreement, the application of state law (which might lead to inconsistent results since there could be as many state law principles as there are states) is pre-empted and federal labor law principles—necessarily uniform throughout the nation—must be employed to resolve the dispute.¹⁸

In other words, if the only way Lightning's state law claim could be resolved, was if there was some type of interpretation of the collective bargaining agreement, then that particular state law would be preempted. The Eleventh Circuit, however, found that Lightning's intentional infliction of emotional distress claim did not require interpretation of the collective bargaining agreement and, therefore, he was free to go forward with the claim.¹⁹

Specifically, the Eleventh Circuit noted that Lightning's intentional infliction of emotional distress claim required scrutiny of the actual treatment he received by his employers while working at Roadway. There was no dispute concerning the terms and conditions of his employment; rather, it was simply "severe abuse [that] he endured from Roadway supervisors."²⁰ The fact that Roadway management verbally abused Lightning on several occasions and actually spat on him on one occasion, demonstrated that the facts in his claim were not in any way "arguably sanctioned by the labor contract."²¹ Accordingly, section 301 was found not to pre-empt Lightning's intentional infliction of emotional distress claim.²²

A careful review of Lightning demonstrates that even if an employee is part of a labor union and is governed by a collective bargaining agreement, a lawsuit he wishes to bring against his employer will not always be scrutinized under the federal labor laws. Instead, the Eleventh Circuit has now specifically given an example of certain actions, on the part of an employer, that would be found to be well outside of the terms and/or understandings of any collective bargaining agreement. Thus, if an employer engages in such egregious conduct as noted above, they may well not only be liable under the National Labor Relations Act or the Labor Management Relations Act, but also under state law tort claims as well.

III. The Fair Labor Standards Act

This past survey year, the Eleventh Circuit decided several Fair Labor Standards Act cases. This survey year is unique, however, in that they specifically address a somewhat obscure exception to the FLSA requirements involving amusement or recreational establishments. In addition, the court specifically discussed a retaliation provision under the FLSA and the burden of proof that the moving party must be able to carry when alleging their termination was in direct response...