Amalgamated Association of Street Electric Railway and Motor Coach Employees, Division 1225 v. Las Vegas-Tonopah-Reno Stage Line, Inc.

The union and the employer company made an “agency shop” agreement. That kind of an agreement provides that employees who do not join the union will pay the regular initiation fee and dues to the union, and that if they do not make these payments, the employer will discharge them. The employer, having made this agreement, refused to carry it out by discharging employees who did not join the union and did not make the payments to the union required by the contract.

The union brought this suit in the United States District Court for the District of Nevada, asking for a declaratory judgment that the agency shop agreement was valid, and an order requiring the employer to comply with the agreement.

The National Labor Relations Act, § 8(a) (1) and (3), 29 U.S.C. § 158 (a) (1) and (3), makes illegal a closed shop, i. e., an agreement under which an employer can neither hire nor work persons not members of the union, but, by proviso, it expressly permits an agreement requiring employees, after the thirtieth day following their employment, to become members of the union, but by further proviso the employer is forbidden to discharge an employee for nonmember-ship in the union if the union…