United Steelworkers of America, Local 6218 v. Paula Shoe Co.
United Steelworkers of America, Local 6218 v. Paula Shoe Co.
Opinion of the Court
delivered the opinion of the Court.
■Two questions are raised in the present appeal, namely, (a) whether the trial court had jurisdiction to enforce an arbitration award construing a bargaining agreement clause and, (b) whether said construction is applicable to subsequent agreements.
Let us consider the facts of the case. Section 10 of the agreement signed by Paula Shoe Co. Inc., Gentry Shoe Co. Inc., (hereinafter designated as respondents) with the Unión de Trabajadores de Muelles y Ramas Anexas de Ponce, Puerto Rico, Local 1903, (AFL-CIO), known as UTM, on August 12, 1959, retroactive to April 27, 1959 and in effect until December 31 of said year, provided that “The Company agrees that effective April 27, 1959, it will grant a 5% increase on all the piece rates in effect on April 24, 1959, and that an increase of 5 % will be granted to all employees within the bargaining unit which are paid by the hour.” Later, the parties signed another agreement for the years 1960-62, which provided that: “The Company agrees that effective January 1, 1960, it will grant a 5% increase on all the piece rates in effect on January 1, 1960, and that an increase of 5% will be granted to all the employees within the bargaining unit who are paid by the hour.” On December 18, 1962, the respondents and the United Steelworkers of America (AFL-CIO) signed another collective bargaining agreement retroactive to July 9, 1962 and effective until
On September 15, 1960 the parties submitted the following question to arbitration:
“To determine whether the Company is bound to pay the workers engaged in piecework but who do not produce sufficient piecework in the forty hours to cover the federal minimum, the 5% increase established in § 10 of the collective bargaining agreement in relation to the federal minimum wage of 59 cents per hour and $23.60 for 40 hours of work per week.”
On October 7, 1960 the arbitrator rendered the following award:
“It is determined that the Company is bound to pay the laborers engaged in piecework, but who do not produce sufficient piecework in the 40 hours to cover the federal minimum, the increase of 5% established in § 10 of the collective bargaining agreement in relation to the federal minimum wage of 59 cents per hour and $23.60 for 40 hours of work per week.”
On April 20, 1965, United Steelworkers of America (AFL-CIO), Local 6218, petitioner in this case, hereinafter designated as the petitioner, filed a complaint in the Superior Court, San Juan Part, alleging, in synthesis, that respondents have failed to comply with said award and have not paid to the pieceworkers the progressive increases provided in the aforesaid collective bargaining agreements. They prayed for judgment in the amount resulting from the study of respondents’ payrolls and records, and like amount for liquidation of damages, costs, and a reasonable amount for attorney’s fees. Respondents requested summary judgment on July 8, 1965, alleging that the court lacked jurisdiction to enforce the aforesaid arbitration award, since what appears from the face of the complaint is an alleged unfair labor practice, the Labor Relations Board being the forearm provided by law to take cognizance of this matter; furthermore, that the petitioner is not the UTM because it is not and never was a party in the collective bargaining agreement which gave rise to the right to arbitrate and, therefore, could not request the enforcement of the award in question. On its part, petitioner requested interlocutory summary judgment on July 21, 1965.
In its amended summary judgment rendered on October 20, 1965, the trial court concluded that:
*649 “As to the period comprised between April 27, 1959, and July 9, 1964, respondent’s motion for summary judgment to dismiss the complaint is hereby denied. That part of the claim which refers to services rendered subsequent to July 9, 1964, must be submitted to arbitration and therefore, as to that part judgment is rendered dismissing the complaint. Petitioner’s motion requesting interlocutory summary judgment is denied.”
Feeling aggrieved and in support of its petition for review, petitioner alleges that: '
“(a) The court erred in denying the motion for interlocutory summary judgment on the ground that it lacked jurisdiction to order the enforcement of the award of October 7, 1960 in conclüding that the power to do so was exclusively reserved to the Labor Relations Board and the Supreme Court pursuant to the provisions of Section 9(2) (c) of the Labor Relations Act of Puerto Rico. The judgment is contrary to the local statutory law and the case law established by the Supreme Court of Puerto Rico in the cases of Labor Relations Board v. New York & P. R. S. S. Co., 69 P.R.R. 730, 737 (1949); Asociación de Guardianes v. Bull Lines, 78 P.R.R. 680, 684-685 (1955).
“(b) The court erred in failing to decide that in actions for the enforcement of arbitration awards issued by virtue of a collective bargaining agreement signed by an enterprise in interstate commerce,- like respondents herein, the jurisdiction of the local court is concurrent with that of the federal court under section 301 of the Taft-Hartley Act, pursuant to the rulings established by the Supreme Court of Puerto Rico in the case of Puerto Rico Telephone Co. v. Labor Relations Board, 86 P.R.R. 362, 373 (1962), and by the Supreme Court of the United States in the cases of Charles Dowd Box Co. v. Courtney, 368 U.S. 502, and Smith v. Evening News Assn., 371 U.S. 195 (1962). Under said doctrine the local forum has been concurrently available for actions for the enforcement of collective bargaining agreements including enforcement of arbitration awards.
“(c) The court erred in denying the motion for interlocutory summary judgment presented by petitioners refusing to enforce the arbitration award, and in granting respondent’s motion for summary judgment to dismiss that part of the complaint subsequent to July 9, 1964, and ordering instead, the arbitration thereof.”
3. — Is it proper that the increase in wages agreed upon in agreements subsequent to the first one, on which the arbitration award in question was based, shall be determined in the manner provided in said award which specifically covers the increase agreed upon in the first agreement? In other words, is said arbitral determination binding as to the form and manner of computing the wage increases agreed upon in the subsequent agreements? We do not believe so. When the second agreement was signed, the manner for computing the 5% increase on wages under the first agreement, according to the arbitration award rendered in the light of the provisions in the first agreement, was to apply that 5% to the federal minimum weekly wage, irrespective of whether the worker earned that minimum on the basis of piecework produced by him during the week. The fact that the employer (1) was not agreeable with the
As it does not appear from the record that the agreement covering the period from January 9, 1964, to July 9, 1966, contains an arbitration clause, we conclude that the trial judge erred in determining that the claim for unpaid wages during this agreement must be submitted to arbitration because he affirmed that: “This agreement was bargained while the ruling in Ceferino Pérez v. Water Resources Authority was in force,” since “In this case petitioner himself accepted that according to the agreement his claim must be arbitrated.” Such acceptance does not appear from the record.
By virtue thereof, the judgment rendered in this case by the Superior Court, San Juan Part, is modified to order the following:
1. — Judgment is rendered in favor of petitioner and ordering respondents to pay to the pieceworkers who worked during the period comprised between April 27, 1959 and December 81 of said year, the unpaid wages according to the formula which should be paid in conformance with the arbitration award, consisting in not less than the federal weekly wage of 59 cents per hour and $23.60 for 40 working hours per week, plus 5% over said wage or over the highest wage that might result from the application of the wage rate prevailing at the time for piecework produced by the worker as his weekly task.
2. — The wages to be paid to pieceworkers under the agreements subsequent to the first one will be computed under the following formulas, but will never be less than the prevailing federal minimum wage:
(b) Agreement No. 3 for the period covering from July 9, 1962 to July 9, 1964, the base rate plus 19% during the first year and plus 23% during the second year of said agreement.
(c) Agreement No. 4 for the period covering from July 9, 1964 to July 9, 1966 the base rate plus 27 1/2 % during the first year and plus 31 1/2 % during the second year of said agreement.
3. — Respondents are ordered to pay to said workers as additional compensation (29 L.P.R.A. § 246b) an amount equal to the amount he failed to pay according to this decision.
The case is remanded to the trial court for further proceedings consistent with the terms of this opinion.
Case-law data current through December 31, 2025. Source: CourtListener bulk data.