ASSOCIATED LABOR UNION, PETITIONER, VS. JUDGE AMADOR E. GOMEZ, JUDGE JOSE C. BORROMEO, AND SUPERIOR GAS AND EQUIPMENT CO. OF CEBU, INC., RESPONDENTS.

Associated Labor Union versus Gomez

The Case

This is a petition for certiorari and prohibition filed by the Associated Labor Union against Judge Amador E. Gomez, Judge Jose C. Borromeo, and the Superior Gas and Equipment Company of Cebu, Incorporated. The Union asks the Supreme Court to declare that the Court of First Instance of Cebu had no jurisdiction over the company's complaint for injunction against the Union's picketing, to annul the writ of preliminary injunction issued in that case, and to order the dismissal of the complaint. The case matters because it fixes, with unusual clarity, where jurisdiction lies when the acts complained of amount to unfair labor practice: exclusively in the Court of Industrial Relations, and not in the regular courts.

Procedural History

The company, Superior Gas and Equipment Company of Cebu, Incorporated, which the decision calls Sugeco, filed a complaint for injunction in the Court of First Instance of Cebu, praying that the Union be restrained from its picketing activities at the Basak plant and from picketing its offices in Cebu City and elsewhere in the Philippines. On the very day the complaint was filed, Judge Amador E. Gomez issued the writ of preliminary injunction ex parte, upon a bond of 5,000 pesos. The Union moved for reconsideration, arguing among other things that the court of first instance had no jurisdiction over the subject matter, which was unfair labor practice. Judge Jose C. Borromeo refused reconsideration. The Union then came to the Supreme Court on certiorari and prohibition, and the Court issued a cease-and-desist order while the case was pending.

Facts

On the first day of January 1965, the Associated Labor Union and Sugeco entered into a collective bargaining contract, which was to expire on the first day of January 1966. Before the contract expired, the Union and the employer began negotiating for its renewal. Late in February 1966, while bargaining was in progress, twelve of Sugeco's employees resigned from the Union, and the negotiations were broken.

On the first day of March 1966, the Union wrote Sugeco requesting that, unless the twelve resigned employees could produce a clearance from the Union, they should not in the meantime be allowed to report for work. Sugeco's attorney rejected the request the same day, citing irreparable injury, the lapse of the bargaining contract, and the company's inability to demand the clearance. Sugeco made it understood that once the twelve men returned to the Union fold, the company would be in a position to negotiate again for the renewal of the collective bargaining contract. Also on that day, the Union charged Sugeco with bargaining in bad faith and its supervisors with campaigning for the resignation of Union members, and served notice that unless the unfair labor practice acts were stopped and a collective bargaining agreement signed, the Union would declare a strike and establish picket lines. On the third of March, Sugeco's counsel wrote the Union that, with the resignations, the Union was no longer the representative of the majority of the employees for purposes of negotiation and recognition.

On the fourth of March, the Union struck and picketed Sugeco's Basak plant. The next day, Sugeco filed its injunction complaint in the Court of First Instance of Cebu, and the writ was issued ex parte. On that same fifth of March, the Union lodged with the Court of Industrial Relations a charge for unfair labor practice against Sugeco, its general manager, and two supervisors, averring that they had coerced and pressured Union members to resign and that the resignations were seized upon to refuse further negotiations. A formal complaint for unfair labor practice was later filed in the Court of Industrial Relations by its Acting Prosecutor.

Issues

• Whether or not the Court of First Instance of Cebu had jurisdiction over the subject matter of Sugeco's complaint for injunction against the Union's picketing.
• Whether or not the alleged coercion of employees to resign from the Union, and the alleged coercion of resigned employees to rejoin it, constitute unfair labor practice within the exclusive jurisdiction of the Court of Industrial Relations.
• Whether or not Sugeco's claim of damages arising from the strike defeats the jurisdiction of the Court of Industrial Relations.
• Whether or not the unfair labor practice case filed by the Union in the Court of Industrial Relations was a mere afterthought designed to divest the Court of First Instance of jurisdiction.

Applicable Provisions

Section 4(a) of the Industrial Peace Act provides:

It shall be unfair labor practice for an employer: (1) To interfere with, restrain or coerce employees in the exercise of their rights guaranteed in section three.

This provision brings Sugeco's alleged coercion of its employees to resign from the Union within the definition of unfair labor practice.

Section 4(b) of the Industrial Peace Act provides:

It shall be unfair labor practice for a labor organization or its Agents: (1) To restrain or coerce employees in the exercise of their rights under section three.

This provision covers Sugeco's countercharge that the Union was coercing the resigned employees to rejoin it.

Section 3 of the Industrial Peace Act provides:

Employees shall have the right to self-organization and to form, join or assist labor organizations of their own choosing for the purpose of collective bargaining through representatives of their own choosing and to engage in concerted activities for the purpose of collective bargaining and other mutual aid or protection.

This is the right that both the employer and the Union are prohibited from restraining or coercing.

Section 5(a) of the Industrial Peace Act provides:

The Court shall have jurisdiction over the prevention of unfair labor practices and is empowered to prevent any person from engaging in any unfair labor practice. This power shall be exclusive and shall not be affected by any other means of adjustment or prevention that has been or may be established by an agreement, code, law or otherwise.

This is the decisive provision: it vests exclusive jurisdiction over unfair labor practice in the Court of Industrial Relations and excludes the regular courts.

Ruling

On the first issue, the Court held that the Court of First Instance of Cebu was without jurisdiction over the subject matter of the complaint. The charge and countercharge between Sugeco and the Union both fall under the Industrial Peace Act. The alleged act of coercing or instigating Union members to resign is clearly within the coverage of the proscription; it is aimed at crippling the Union, throwing it off balance, and destroying its bargaining authority, and is an attack against the Magna Carta of Labor. By the same token, Sugeco's charge that the Union was coercing the resigned employees to rejoin is no less an unfair labor practice. Jurisdiction is therefore exclusively vested in the Court of Industrial Relations under Section 5(a). Because the court below had no authority to provide an ancillary remedy, the injunction was issued coram non judice, meaning by a court without jurisdiction, and is void.

On the second issue, the Court read the broad sweep of the law as suggesting that coercion or cajolery of employees, whether by management or by union, is unfair labor practice, and held that both the resignation charge and the rejoin charge fall within the exclusive jurisdiction of the Court of Industrial Relations.

On the third issue, the Court held that Sugeco's averment of damages by reason of the strike will not defeat the jurisdiction of the Court of Industrial Relations, because the right to damages would still have to depend on the evidence in the unfair labor practice case. To hold otherwise would sanction split jurisdiction, which is obnoxious to the orderly administration of justice.

On the fourth issue, the Court rejected the afterthought argument. The unfair labor practice case was filed on the very same day Sugeco went to the Court of First Instance, which was anyway without jurisdiction over the subject matter. The Union struck precisely because of the unfair labor practice allegedly indulged in by Sugeco, so the case was not calculated merely to divest the Cebu court of a jurisdiction it did not possess. The Court noted that the rule that labor cases involving unfair labor practice are within the exclusive jurisdiction of the Court of Industrial Relations has ripened into dogma and commands adherence, not breach, and that the policy of social justice demands that courts take care in the exercise of their prerogatives and discretion when cases appear to involve labor disputes.

Doctrine

Unfair labor practice cases are within the exclusive jurisdiction of the Court of Industrial Relations, and the regular courts may not take cognizance of them, whether the unfair labor practice is charged against the employer under Section 4(a) or against the labor organization under Section 4(b) of the Industrial Peace Act. A claim for damages arising from a strike does not split that jurisdiction, because the right to damages depends on the evidence in the unfair labor practice case; split jurisdiction is obnoxious to the orderly administration of justice. An injunction issued by a court without jurisdiction over the subject matter is void, having been issued coram non judice, and the filing of an unfair labor practice case on the same day as the regular court action is not an afterthought where the regular court never had jurisdiction in the first place.

Disposition

The Union won. The Supreme Court granted the petition for certiorari and prohibition, declared the writ of preliminary injunction issued by the Court of First Instance of Cebu null and void, made permanent its own cease-and-desist order, directed the respondent judges to dismiss the injunction case, and taxed the costs against Sugeco.

Remember This

Memorize the line that unfair labor practice jurisdiction is exclusive in the Court of Industrial Relations and that this rule has ripened into dogma. Examiners use this case to test jurisdiction over unfair labor practice, the voidness of an injunction issued coram non judice, and the rule against split jurisdiction when damages are claimed alongside a labor dispute.