by WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court ruled Thursday in favor of a Washington state concrete company seeking to revive a lawsuit against the International Brotherhood of Teamsters alleging a strike damaged its product.
The 8-1 decision written by Judge Amy Coney Barrett means the company, Glacier Northwest Inc., can sue the union in state court over an August 2017 strike in which drivers walked off the job and they left wet concrete in their trucks.
Barrett, one of six conservatives on the court, wrote that a state court erred in dismissing the claims so early in the process out of concern that the claims would conflict with the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA). , a federal law that protects union activity.
“Because the union took affirmative action to endanger Glacier property instead of reasonable precautions to mitigate that risk, the NLRA may not protect its conduct,” Barrett wrote.
Organized labor advocates expressed concern that a ruling in favor of the company could stifle strike action by putting unions on the hook for a wide range of potential losses employers may face as a result of such activities.
Liberal Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson dissented, saying the ruling “risks eroding the right to strike.”
Jackson pointed to the fact that the National Labor Relations Board issued a complaint after the state court ruling, accusing the company of unfair labor practices and saying the drivers’ actions were “possibly protected.”
By ruling in favor of the company, the court “is inserted into this conflict, proceeding to give an opinion on the origin of the union’s strike activity” despite not being the best place to ponder the facts, he wrote.
“This case is Exhibit A as to why the board, and not the courts, should normally take the first step in resolving contentious, fact-based employment disputes of this nature,” he added.
Jackson noted, however, that the state court could still stay the case while the labor board concludes its proceedings.
Business interests that are often in conflict with organized labor have been highly critical of the labor board in the past. The Supreme Court’s conservative majority ruled against unions several times in recent years, including a 2018 case in which the court said public sector workers who choose not to join a union cannot be forced to pay a portion of union dues to cover the cost of negotiating contracts.
The failure occurs when the number of strikes has increased in the middle of a renewed interest in some sectors on the protections that unionized jobs can offer. It centers on an incident in which members of Teamsters Local 174 went on strike after negotiations on a new collective bargaining agreement broke down.
When truck drivers walked off the job, the company says some of the concrete already in the delivery process became useless. The drivers returned the trucks to company facilities, some of which had partial or full loads on board. As a result of the strike, concrete was left in the trucks and had to be removed to harden and then break up before it could be disposed of, the company says.
The union says that when the workers returned the trucks, the cement was wet and they left the drums on the trucks spinning, meaning it would not freeze immediately. It was the company’s decision to remove the concrete and then break it up once it hardened, the union says.
Glacier says it lost $100,000 as a result of breaking a contract on the day of the strike and is also seeking additional damages. The company says it was able to do the previously scheduled work the following week.
The Washington Supreme Court ruled in favor of the union in December 2021, saying that any loss of concrete was “incidental to a strike possibly protected by federal law.”
The company was backed by business and anti-union groups, including the US Chamber of Commerce, which said in a report that the state court’s decision that willful destruction of property could be considered a protected activity was in conflict. with the precedent of the US Supreme Court.
Various labor groups and unions endorsed the Teamsters.
