SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
Syllabus
UNITED MINE WORKERS OF AMERICA v. PENNINGTON ET AL.
381 U.S. 657
CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT
No. 240. Argued January 27, 1965 -- Decided June 7, 1965
The trustees of the United Mine Workers of America Welfare and Retirement Fund sued respondents, partners in a coal mining company, for royalty payments under the National Bituminous Coal Wage Agreement of 1950, as amended. Respondents filed a cross claim for damages, alleging that the trustees, the UMW and certain large coal operators had conspired to restrain and monopolize commerce in violation of §§ 1 and 2 of the Sherman Act. It was alleged that, to eradicate overproduction in the coal industry, the UMW and large operators agreed to eliminate the smaller companies, by imposing the terms of the 1950 Agreement on all companies regardless of ability to pay, by increasing royalties due the welfare fund, by excluding the marketing, production and sale of nonunion coal, by refusing to lease coal lands to nonunion operators and refusing to buy or sell coal mined by such operators, by obtaining from the Secretary of Labor the establishment of a minimum wage under the Walsh-Healey Act higher than that in other industries, by urging TVA to curtail spot market purchases which were exempt from the Walsh-Healey order, and by waging a price-cutting campaign to drive small companies out of the spot market. Petitioner's motions to dismiss were denied and the jury returned a verdict against the trustees and the UMW. The trial court set aside the verdict against the trustees but overruled the union's motion for judgment notwithstanding the verdict or for a new trial. The Court of Appeals affirmed, ruling that the union was not exempt from liability under the Sherman Act under the facts of the case.
Held:
1. An agreement between the union and large operators to secure uniform labor
standards throughout the industry would not be exempt from the antitrust laws.
Pp. 661-669.
(a) An agreement resulting from union-employer bargaining is not automatically
exempt from Sherman Act scrutiny merely because the negotiations covered wage
standards, or any other compulsory subject of bargaining. Pp. 664-665.
(b) A union may make wage agreements with a multi-employer bargaining unit and
may, in pursuance of its own self-interests, seek to obtain the same terms from
other employers, but it forfeits its antitrust exemption when it agrees with a
group of employers to impose a certain wage scale on other bargaining units and
thus joins a conspiracy to curtail competition. Pp. 665-666.
(c) Nothing in the national labor policy indicates that a union and employers in
one bargaining unit are free to bargain about wages or working conditions of
other bargaining units or to settle these matters for the whole industry, nor
does it allow an employer to condition the signing of an agreement on the
union's imposition of a similar contract on his competitors. Pp. 666-667.
(d) Antitrust policy clearly restricts employer-union agreements seeking to set
labor standards outside the bargaining unit, in view of the anticompetitive
potential and the surrender by the union of its freedom of action with respect
to bargaining policy. P. 668.
2. Concerted efforts to influence public officials do not violate the antitrust
laws even though intended to eliminate competition. Eastern
R. Conf. v. Noerr Motors, 365 U.S. 127,
followed. Pp. 669-672.
(a) Instructions to the jury that anticompetitive purpose could support an
illegal conspiracy based solely on the Walsh-Healey and TVA episodes did not
constitute merely harmless error. P. 670.
(b) Respondents were not entitled to damages under the Sherman Act for any
injury suffered from the actions of the Secretary of Labor, and the jury should
have been so instructed. Pp. 671-672.
325 F.2d 804, reversed and remanded.
MR. JUSTICE WHITE delivered the opinion of the Court.