Hawaiian Airlines, Inc. v. Norris, 512 U.S. 246 (1994)

Hawaiian Airlines, Inc. v. Norris

Argued April 28, 1994
Decided June 20, 1994 *
512 U.S. 246

CERTIORARI TO THE SUPREME COURT OF HAWAII

Syllabus

Respondent Norris was terminated from his job as an aircraft mechanic by petitioner Hawaiian Airlines, Inc. (HAL), after refusing to sign a maintenance record, as required by his collective bargaining agreement (CBA), for a plane he considered unsafe, and reporting his concerns to the Federal Aviation Administration. In separate state court suits against HAL and its officers, also petitioners, he alleged, inter alia, that he had been wrongfully discharged in violation of the public policy expressed in the Federal Aviation Act and implementing regulations and in violation of Hawaii’s Whistleblower Protection Act. The court dismissed these tort claims as preempted by the Railway Labor Act’s (RLA’s) mandatory arbitral mechanism for so-called "minor" disputes, which grow "out of grievances or out of the interpretation and application of agreements concerning [pay rates], rules, or working conditions," 45 U.S.C. § 153 First (i). The State Supreme Court reversed, concluding that § 153 First (i)’s plain language does not support preemption of disputes independent of a labor agreement, and interpreting the opinion in Consolidated Rail Corp. v. Railway Labor Executives’ Assn., 491 U.S. 299, to limit RLA preemption to disputes involving contractually defined rights. The court rejected petitioners’ argument that the claims were preempted because resort to the CBA was necessary to determine whether Norris was discharged for insubordination, pointing to Lingle v. Norge Division of Magic Chef, Inc., 486 U.S. 399, in which this Court held that the Labor Management Relations Act, 1947 (LMRA), preempts state law only if a state law claim is dependent on the interpretation of a CBA, and that purely factual questions about an employee’s conduct and the employer’s conduct and motives do not require interpreting such an agreement’s terms.

Held: The RLA does not preempt Norris’ state law causes of action. Pp. 252-266.

(a) The minor disputes contemplated by the RLA are those that are grounded in a CBA. See, e.g., Consolidated Rail Corp., 491 U.S. at 305. The RLA preemption standard for resolving such disputes that has emerged from the relevant cases, see e.g., Atchison, T. & S. F. R. Co. v. Buell, 480 U.S. 557, is that a state law cause of action is not preempted if it involves rights and obligations that exist independent of the CBA. This standard is virtually identical to the preemption standard employed in cases involving § 301 of the LMRA. Given the convergence of the two standards, Lingle provides an appropriate framework for addressing RLA preemption, and its standard -- that the existence of a potential CBA-based remedy does not deprive an employee of independent remedies available under state law -- is adopted to resolve such claims. Elgin, J. & E. R. Co. v. Burley, 325 U.S. 711; Consolidated Rail Corp., 491 U.S. at 302, distinguished. Pp. 252-266.

(b) Under Lingle, Norris’ state law claims are independent of the CBA. Petitioners’ argument that resort to the CBA is necessary to determine whether Norris was discharged for cause is foreclosed by Lingle’s teaching that the issue whether an employer’s actions make out the element of discharge under state law is a purely factual question. Similarly, Norris’ failure to sign the maintenance record is not relevant to the determination of his state law tort claims. Pp. 266.

74 Haw. 648, 847 P.2d 263 (first case), and 74 Haw. 235, 842 P.2d 634 (second case), affirmed.

BLACKMUN, J., delivered the opinion for a unanimous Court.