40 A.2d 413 | Pa. | 1944
The Sun Ship Employees Association filed a bill in equity against the Industrial Union of Marine and Shipbuilding Workers of America, Local No. 2 Cow. I. O., and the Sun Shipbuilding and Drydock Company, in which it was averred that both labor groups had members employed by the company; that on March 22, 1937, following a consent election by the employees of the company, the Sun Ship Employees Association was designated exclusive bargaining agent by the National Labor Relations Board; that they continued to act in that capacity until a complaint was filed against them which eventually led to the parties to this action entering into a private written agreement designated "Agreement for Consent Election." The purpose of this was to determine *86
the appropriate bargaining agent of the employees of the Sun Shipbuilding and Drydock Company with their employer. Under this agreement an election was held, resulting in the choice by the employees of the Industrial Union of Marine and Shipbuilding Workers of America, Local No. 2 Cow. I. O., as the bargaining agent. Alleged irregularities in that election led to the filing of this bill in equity. The bill, among other prayers, asks that the report on the consent election by the Regional Director, as well as the election itself, be declared illegal, null and void. To this bill the Industrial Union of Marine and Shipbuilding Workers of America, Local No. 2 Cow. I. O., has filed a petition under the Act of March 5, 1925, P. L. 23 (12 Pa.C.S.A. § 672, 673), questioning the jurisdiction of the Pennsylvania court and asking that question to be preliminarily passed upon. The issue before us does not deal with the sufficiency of the facts alleged in the bill of complaint, but solely with the question of jurisdiction. It is agreed there is no diversity of citizenship of the parties and the litigation arises solely out of the conduct of the election pursuant to the agreement referred to. The contract, providing for an election, was an ordinary private agreement wherein the parties consented among themselves that the issues as to representation should be settled in the way which the agreement prescribed. The complaint relates the manner in which the arbiter permitted the election to be conducted and of numerous irregular, improper and fraudulent acts. The complainant had first thought the jurisdiction of the cause of action was in the Federal courts, but in Sun Ship Employees Association v. National LaborRelations Board et al.,
The question of jurisdiction relates solely to the competency of the court to determine controversies of the general class to which the case presented for its consideration belongs:Skelton v. Lower Merion Township,
The contract involved in this action, now being the subject of dispute and it being averred that the arbiter appointed under it acted fraudulently and illegally in violation of its terms, depriving the plaintiff of valuable contractual and property rights, a court of equity will have jurisdiction to hear the complaint and grant such relief as, when the case is tried on its merits, is determined to be just and equitable.
Decree affirmed and the record remitted to the court below with a procedendo. *89