Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-06-01201/USCOURTS-caDC-06-01201-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
National Labor Relations Board
Petitioner
Service Corporation International
Respondent

Document Text:

United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued April 20, 2007 Decided July 27, 2007

No. 06-1160

SERVICE CORPORATION INTERNATIONAL, D/B/A OAK HILL

FUNERAL HOME AND MEMORIAL PARK,

PETITIONER

v.

NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD,

RESPONDENT

LABORERS’ INTERNATIONAL UNION OF NORTH AMERICA,

AFL-CIO, LOCAL NO. 270,

INTERVENOR

Consolidated with

06-1201

On Petition for Review and Cross-Application for

Enforcement 

of an Order of the National Labor Relations Board

Nick C. Geannacopulos argued the cause and filed the

briefs for petitioner.

Amy H. Ginn, Attorney, National Labor Relations Board,

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argued the cause for respondent. With her on the brief were

Ronald E. Meisburg, General Counsel, John H. Ferguson,

Associate General Counsel, Aileen A. Armstrong, Deputy

Associate General Counsel, and Jill A. Griffin, Attorney. David

A. Rosenfeld, counsel for intervenor Laborer’s International

Union of North America, Local No. 270, joined in the brief of

respondent.

Before: ROGERS, GRIFFITH and KAVANAUGH, Circuit

Judges.

Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge GRIFFITH.

GRIFFITH, Circuit Judge: In its petition for review of a

National Labor Relations Board (“Board”) order, Service

Corporation International (“SCI”) challenges a representation

election narrowly won by the Laborers International Union of

North America, Local Union 270 (“Union”). SCI argues that

the Union campaign used altered sample ballots that had “the

tendency to mislead [its] employees into believing that the

Board favor[ed the Union].” Petitioner’s Br. at 14 (quoting

Sofitel San Francisco Bay, 343 N.L.R.B. 769, 769 (2004)). We

deny the petition and uphold the Board’s order because it is

supported by substantial evidence and is consistent with the

Board’s own precedent.

I.

SCI does business under the name Oak Hill Funeral

Home and Memorial Park in San Jose, California. As part of its

campaign to organize SCI’s maintenance employees, the Union

sent between twenty and thirty pro-union flyers to their homes

in the four months leading up to a July 16, 2004 representation

election. The flyers were mailed in envelopes with a Union logo

printed beside the return address. One flyer in particular, sent

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 The Union later sent a second sample ballot to SCI’s

maintenance employees similar to the first, except that it included

various express exhortations to vote for the Union. SCI raised no

challenge to this sample ballot because there is no dispute that it was

clearly identified as Union propaganda.

2

 The relevant portion of the Notice states, “WARNING:

THIS IS THE ONLY OFFICIAL NOTICE OF THIS ELECTION

AND MUST NOT BE DEFACED BY ANYONE. ANY

MARKINGS THAT YOU MAY SEE ON ANY SAMPLE BALLOT

OR ANYWHERE ON THIS NOTICE HAVE BEEN MADE BY

SOMEONE OTHER THAN THE NATIONAL LABOR

RELATIONS BOARD, AND HAVE NOT BEEN PUT THERE BY

THE NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD. THE

NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD IS AN AGENCY OF

THE UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT, AND DOES NOT

ENDORSE ANY CHOICE IN THE ELECTION.”

several weeks before the election, included a sample ballot

bearing the Board’s seal in a Union envelope that also contained

the business card of a Union organizer. The word “sample” was

printed prominently across the ballot and a handwritten “X” had

been placed in a box showing a vote for the Union. There were

no markings on the face of the sample ballot to indicate its

source.1 During the campaign, SCI posted copies of the Board’s

standard Notice of Election in prominent spaces in and around

its workplace.2 The Notice explained that the Board “does not

endorse any choice in the election” and warned that “any

markings that you may see on any sample ballot . . . have been

made by someone other than the . . . Board.” SCI also held

meetings with its employees to review the Board’s sample ballot

and to answer questions about the election and the materials they

were receiving from the Union. 

The Union carried the election by a vote of 23–20. SCI

filed an objection to the election with the Board, arguing that the

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first sample ballot the Union sent had the “tendency to mislead”

SCI’s employees into believing that the Board supported the

Union. A hearing on SCI’s objections was held in Oakland,

California on September 10, 20, 21, and 22, 2004. In his report

and recommendations to the Board, the hearing officer

concluded that SCI’s employees would know that the sample

ballot was Union propaganda and would not mistake it for Board

endorsement of the Union. The Board rejected SCI’s challenge

to the hearing officer’s conclusions and certified the Union’s

victory. When SCI refused to bargain, the Union filed an unfair

labor practice charge with the Board’s General Counsel, who

filed a complaint with the Board alleging that SCI had violated

§ 8(a)(5) and (1) of the National Labor Relations Act (“NLRA”

or “Act”). In response to a motion for summary judgment, SCI

admitted its refusal to bargain, but challenged the Board’s

certification of the election. The Board granted the motion in

favor of the General Counsel and ordered SCI to bargain with

the Union. Service Corp. Int’l, 346 N.L.R.B. No. 90, 2006 WL

1168862, at *1, 3 (Apr. 28, 2006). SCI now appeals that

decision arguing that the Union’s sample ballot tainted the

election results.

II.

We will uphold the Board’s decision unless “upon

reviewing the record as a whole, we conclude that the Board’s

findings are not supported by ‘substantial evidence,’ 29 U.S.C.

§ 160(e), (f),” Int’l Union of Electronic, Electrical, Salaried,

Mach. & Furniture Workers v. NLRB, 41 F.3d 1532, 1536 (D.C.

Cir. 1994), or that its interpretation of the Act is not “reasonable

and consistent with applicable precedent,” Fashion Valley Mall,

LLC v. NLRB, 451 F.3d 241, 243 (D.C. Cir. 2006). When

making decisions about representation elections, the Board is

entitled to “a wide degree of discretion,” NLRB v. A.J. Tower

Co., 329 U.S. 324, 330 (1946), which we grant so long as “the

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Board has followed appropriate and fair procedures, and . . . has

reached a rational conclusion concerning whether the

atmosphere surrounding the election so attenuated free choice

that a rerun election was necessary,” Amalgamated Clothing &

Textile Workers Union v. NLRB, 736 F.2d 1559, 1564 (D.C. Cir.

1984). 

This deference is based, in part, on our recognition that

Congress has given the Board responsibility to supervise

representation elections, Int’l Bhd. of Elec. Workers v. NLRB,

417 F.2d 1144, 1146 (D.C. Cir. 1969), and authority to

invalidate a result “if the actions of a party to the election

reasonably tended to interfere with the employees’ free and

uncoerced choice in the election,” N. of Mkt. Senior Servs., Inc.

v. NLRB, 204 F.3d 1163, 1169 (D.C. Cir. 2000) (quotation

marks omitted). Although none would dispute that elections

should be held in “laboratory . . . conditions as nearly ideal as

possible, to determine the uninhibited desires of the employees,”

General Shoe Corp., 77 N.L.R.B. 124, 127 (1948), our

deference to the Board in this area acknowledges “that union

elections are often not conducted under ideal conditions, that

there will be minor (and sometimes major, but realistically

harmless) infractions by both sides, and that the Board must be

given some latitude in its effort to balance the right of the

employees to an untrammeled choice, and the right of the parties

to wage a free and vigorous campaign,” NLRB v. Mar Salle,

Inc., 425 F.2d 566, 571 (D.C. Cir. 1970) (quotation marks

omitted); see also Amalgamated Clothing, 736 F.2d at 1562

(“[A]lthough the ‘laboratory conditions’ standard represents a

noble ideal, it must be applied flexibly.”).

When the Board concludes that an altered sample ballot

used in a campaign for a representation election has a tendency

to mislead employees into believing that the Board favors one of

the parties in the election, it has held that the employees’ right

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to an untrammeled choice has been infringed and ordered new

elections. See Sofitel San Francisco Bay, 343 N.L.R.B. at 771;

3-Day Blinds, 299 N.L.R.B. No. 6, 1990 WL 122544, at *3-4

(July 20, 1990). The Board has created a two-part test for

evaluating whether an altered sample ballot has the tendency to

mislead employees into believing that the Board has a favored

outcome. See SDC Investment, Inc., 274 N.L.R.B. 556, 557

(1995). The Board first determines whether “an altered [sample]

ballot . . . on its face clearly identifies the party responsible for

its preparation.” Id. If the source of the altered sample ballot is

not clear from its face, “then the Board will examine the nature

and contents of the document, as well as the circumstances of its

distribution,” Kwik Care Ltd. v. NLRB, 82 F.3d 1122, 1129

(D.C. Cir. 1996) (quotation marks and alterations omitted), to

determine whether the document has “the tendency to mislead

employees into believing that the Board favors one [of the

parties to the election],” SDC Investment, Inc., 274 N.L.R.B. at

557. In addition, the Board has also considered whether

employees had ample opportunity to become familiar with the

Board’s declaration of neutrality. Kwik Care, 82 F.3d at 1129-

30. Because both sides in this dispute agree that the altered

sample ballot did not, on its face, clearly identify who was

responsible for its preparation and distribution, the only question

for us is whether the altered sample ballot had the tendency to

mislead SCI’s employees into believing that the Board had taken

the Union’s side in the election. 

The Board properly considered the nature and contents

of the document, the circumstances of its distribution, and the

employees’ opportunity to become familiar with the Board’s

declaration, and determined that the altered sample ballot did not

have the tendency to mislead SCI’s employees. Looking to the

nature and contents of the document, the Board found that the

fact that the sample ballot was “off-center,” contained “stray

marks” characteristic of a photocopied document, and had only

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a partial reproduction of the Board’s disclaimer from the Notice

of Election would lead a reasonable employee to think that the

flyer was not an official Board publication. Regarding the

extrinsic evidence of the flyer’s source and distribution, the

Board found that because it was mailed in a Union envelope

with the business card of a Union organizer, and the employees

had received twenty to thirty other mailings from the Union in

a similar fashion (one of which was a second sample ballot that

clearly identified the Union as its source), a reasonable

employee would conclude that the flyer came from the Union.

Moreover, the Board determined that SCI’s employees had

ample opportunity to familiarize themselves with the Board’s

declaration of neutrality. The Board’s official Notice of

Election with its neutrality declaration was prominently posted

throughout SCI’s facility, and SCI reviewed the sample ballot

with the employees on several occasions prior to the election.

In light of this substantial evidence, we conclude that the Board

reasonably determined that the sample ballot did not have a

tendency to mislead. 

SCI repeats an argument to us that it made

unsuccessfully to the Board—that the Board, by affirming the

employees’ election of the Union in the face of the altered

sample ballots, has ignored its own precedent in Sofitel San

Francisco Bay, a case SCI maintains is practically

indistinguishable from this one. 343 N.L.R.B. 769. In Sofitel,

the Board overturned a representation election because it

determined that a marked sample ballot distributed by a union

had the tendency to mislead employees into thinking that the

Board supported the union position. SCI asserts that the sample

ballot in Sofitel looked even less official than the ballot in

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 Unlike the Union’s ballot here, the sample ballot in Sofitel

did not include any part of the Board’s neutrality disclaimer. On the

Sofitel ballot the word “MUESTRA” (Spanish for “sample”) was

typed in large letters across the top, at the bottom the phrase “POR

FAVOR–SI SE PUEDE” (Spanish for “Please–Yes it can be done”)

was handwritten in capital letters, and each potential voter’s name was

handwritten on the left side of the document.

dispute before us.3 

SCI is correct to point out that “[t]he Board cannot

ignore its own relevant precedent but must explain why it is not

controlling.” Antelope Valley Bus Co. v. NLRB, 275 F.3d 1089,

1092 (D.C. Cir. 2002) (quotation marks omitted), but the Board

has not ignored Sofitel and has adequately explained why it is

not controlling here. The Board noted three ways in which the

facts of Sofitel differ from the facts here. First, the physical

appearance of the sample ballot in Sofitel contained no “words

or markings” or other indications that it was a photocopy of

another document. Second, there was no evidence in Sofitel that

the “employees had ever seen, much less discussed with the

employer, any sample ballots that contained the Board’s

disclaimer language.” Service Corp. Int’l, 345 N.L.R.B. No. 35,

2005 WL 2102985, at *5 (Aug. 27, 2005). Finally, in contrast

to the twenty to thirty other mailings sent by the Union here, the

Sofitel sample ballot was the only piece of union propaganda

that was sent or distributed to employees before the election. In

light of these significant distinguishing features, we find that it

was not unreasonable for the Board to reach a different

conclusion here than it did in Sofitel.

We conclude that the Board’s decision was supported by

substantial evidence and consistent with precedent, and therefore

we deny SCI’s petition for review and grant the Board’s

cross-motion for enforcement. 

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So ordered.

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