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Parties Involved:
Anheuser-Busch, Inc.
Intervenor
Brewers and Maltsters, Local Union No. 6
Petitioner
National Labor Relations Board
Respondent

Document Text:

Notice: This opinion is subject to formalrevision before publication in the

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bound volumes go to press.

United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued May 9, 2005 Decided July 5, 2005

No. 04-1278

BREWERS AND MALTSTERS, LOCAL UNION NO. 6, AFFILIATED

WITH THE INTERNATIONAL BROTHERHOOD OF TEAMSTERS,

PETITIONER

v.

NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD,

RESPONDENT

ANHEUSER-BUSCH, INC.,

INTERVENOR

Consolidated with

Nos. 04-1297 & 04-1316

On Petitions for Review and Cross-Application

 for Enforcement of an Order of the

National Labor Relations Board

Arthur G. Telegen argued the cause for petitioner AnheuserUSCA Case #04-1278 Document #903640 Filed: 07/05/2005 Page 1 of 23
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Busch, Inc. With him on the briefs was Robert A. Fisher. John

H. Henn entered an appearance.

Arthur J. Martin argued the cause for petitioner Brewers

and Maltsters, Local Union No. 6. With him on the briefs was

Stacey A. Aschemann.

Philip A. Hostak, Attorney, National Labor Relations

Board, argued the cause for respondent. With him on the brief

were Arthur F. Rosenfeld, General Counsel, John H. Ferguson,

Associate General Counsel, Aileen A. Armstrong, Deputy

Associate General Counsel, and Robert J. Englehart,

Supervisory Attorney.

Arthur G. Telegen and Robert A. Fisher were on the brief

for intervenor Anheuser-Busch, Inc.

Arthur J. Martin and Stacey A. Aschemann were on the brief

for intervenor Brewers and Maltsters, Local Union No. 6.

Before: GINSBURG, Chief Judge, and SENTELLE and

ROGERS, Circuit Judges.

Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge ROGERS.

Opinion dissenting in part filed by Circuit Judge SENTELLE.

 

ROGERS, Circuit Judge: Anheuser-Busch, Inc. installed

hidden surveillance cameras to monitor an area where its

employees occasionally work and take breaks. As a result of

misconduct that Anheuser-Busch discovered on footage from

the cameras, five employees were discharged and lesser

discipline was imposed on eleven others. The National Labor

Relations Board, with one member dissenting, ruled that

Anheuser-Busch violated section 8(a)(5) and (1) of the National

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Labor Relations Act, as amended (“the Act”), 29 U.S.C. §

158(a)(5), (1) (2000), by failing to bargain with Brewers and

Maltsters, Local Union No. 6 over the installation and use of the

hidden surveillance cameras and by failing to provide the Union

with information it requested about the use of such cameras.

Anheuser-Busch, Inc., 342 N.L.R.B. No. 49 (July 22, 2004).

The Board, with a different member dissenting, refused to order

Anheuser-Busch to rescind the discipline and to make the

disciplined employees whole. Id. Anheuser-Busch petitions for

review of the Board’s determination that it violated the Act, the

Union petitions for review of the Board’s remedy, and the Board

cross-applies for enforcement of its Order. We deny AnheuserBusch’s petition, grant the Union’s petition, and remand the case

to the Board to determine the appropriate remedy. 

I.

In response to concern that an elevator motors room on the

roof of one of its buildings was being used for activities

inconsistent with its employees’ work assignments and possibly

for drug use, Anheuser-Busch installed two hidden surveillance

cameras to monitor that room and the rooftop stairs leading to it.

The elevator motors room is on the eighth-floor roof of

Stockhouse 16, one of Anheuser-Busch’s brewing facilities in

St. Louis, Missouri, and, as its name suggests, it contains the

electrical motors and systems that operate the building’s

elevators. It is accessible using a short staircase located on the

roof. Although employees do not work frequently in that room,

on at least a monthly basis bargaining-unit employees enter the

room to perform a lock-out and tag-out procedure that

immobilizes the elevators for cleaning. There are no signs

restricting access to the roof, and Anheuser-Busch never

instructed its employees that they could not use the elevator

motors room as a break room, although the door to that room is

marked with a sign indicating that only authorized personnel are

permitted inside. Anheuser-Busch is aware that employees use

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the roof as a break area to escape the extreme temperatures in

the Stockhouse, and the Board concluded that “the elevator

motors room became an extension of the roof break area.”

Anheuser-Busch, Inc., 342 N.L.R.B. No. 49, slip op. at 1. 

During an inspection of the premises in late April or early

May 1998, an Anheuser-Busch supervisor informed Assistant

Brewmaster Mel Harris that he had discovered a table, four

chairs, a number of mattress-sized foam pads, and pieces of

cardboard in the elevator motors room. Harris notified

Anheuser-Busch’s Captain of Security William Dougherty, and

they, along with the Manager of Human Resources, inspected

the room. According to the Administrative Law Judge (“ALJ”),

these articles led Dougherty to conclude that “persons were

using the room for reasons inconsistent with any work

assignment and possibly illegal drug activity might be ongoing.”

Id. at 7. In response, on May 17, 1998, Anheuser-Busch

installed a non-oscillating hidden surveillance camera in a gang

box with a pinhole; it was directed toward the stairs that led

from the roof to the elevator motors room. A few weeks passed

before Dougherty reviewed the video footage. Although the

footage revealed that individuals were using flashlights to enter

the elevator motors room at night, it was too dark to determine

the individuals’ identities or what they were doing. To remedy

this problem, in early June 1998 Anheuser-Busch placed a

special lens on that camera so that it could be used in low-light

conditions, and it installed a second hidden surveillance camera

inside the elevator motors room that was trained on the room’s

entrance. Both cameras operated continuously from the moment

they were installed until Anheuser-Busch removed them on June

30, 1998. 

The complete video footage revealed sixteen identifiable

employees engaging in misconduct by smoking marijuana,

urinating on company property, and/or being away from their

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assigned work areas for extended periods. It also showed four

employees not engaged in misconduct – two employees were

performing the lock-out and tag-out procedure, one employee

was removing a ladder, and one employee was engaging in no

obvious work activity. Anheuser-Busch informed the Union of

the hidden surveillance cameras on July 1, 1998 – the day after

they were removed. The Union objected to not being informed

prior to the use of the cameras, but Anheuser-Busch maintained,

as it does in this court, that it had no obligation to notify or to

bargain with the Union over their installation and use. Over the

next two months, Anheuser-Busch conducted sixteen

investigatory meetings at which each employee admitted

engaging in misconduct. At the first such meeting, the Union

again asked why it had not been notified prior to the cameras’

installation. Anheuser-Busch responded that it was a matter of

“corporate security” over which it had no obligation to bargain.

Following the investigatory meetings, Anheuser-Busch

disciplined the sixteen employees: five were discharged for

violating the company’s drug use policy; seven received lastchance agreements for leaving assigned work areas for extended

periods, sleeping, and urinating on the roof; and four were

suspended for leaving assigned work areas for extended periods.

The Union filed grievances on behalf of each employee,

and, on October 5, 1998, before the initial arbitration hearing, it

wrote to Anheuser-Busch requesting information relating to the

installation and use of hidden surveillance cameras or other

monitoring devices “[i]n order to carry out its responsibility

under the Collective Bargaining Agreement and to properly

investigate the grievance and prepare for the arbitration.”

Anheuser-Busch responded on October 22, 1998, by providing

information about the installation of the two hidden surveillance

cameras, but it stated that it was “still in the process of

determining whether there is any additional information

responsive to” the Union’s request. On November 2, 1998, the

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Union’s counsel repeated the request, and Anheuser-Busch’s

counsel responded the next day by stating that the information

was not relevant to the arbitration but that he was willing to

discuss the matter at the upcoming hearing. The parties

proceeded to arbitrate three of the employee discharges –

deferring the remaining two until the resolution of this

proceeding – and three arbitrators independently sustained the

discharges but did not rule on the refusal-to-bargain issue.

Anheuser-Busch, however, did not provide the Union with the

requested information until May 25, 1999 – the first day of the

unfair labor practice hearing before the ALJ. 

On September 29, 1998, the Union filed an unfair labor

practice charge that, as amended on November 13, 1998, alleged

that Anheuser-Busch committed two violations of section

8(a)(5) and (1) of the Act: first, by unilaterally installing hidden

surveillance cameras and disciplining sixteen employees as a

result of information obtained from those cameras; and second,

by failing to provide information about the use, installation, and

extent of the cameras. On November 23, 1998, the Board’s

General Counsel issued a complaint alleging violations of

section 8(a)(5) and (1), which was amended on May 18, 1999,

to allege more specifically that Anheuser-Busch failed and

refused to provide information that the Union requested orally

and in writing. 

After a two-day hearing, the ALJ issued his decision on

October 1, 1999. Relying on Colgate-Palmolive Co., 323

N.L.R.B. 515 (1997), the ALJ concluded that an employer’s

installation and use of hidden surveillance cameras in the

workplace is a mandatory subject of bargaining. The ALJ

therefore ruled that Anheuser-Busch violated the Act when it

placed such cameras in what the ALJ determined to be a work

and break area, but the ALJ refused to order make whole relief

for the disciplined employees because “it is not consistent with

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the policies of the Act or public policy generally to reward

[employees] who engage in unprotected conduct.” AnheuserBusch, 342 N.L.R.B. No. 49, slip op. at 9. The ALJ also ruled

that the company did not violate the Act by refusing to furnish

information in response to the Union’s oral request on or about

July 2, 1998, but that it did violate the Act when it failed to

furnish information in response to the Union’s request by letter

of October 5, 1998. Anheuser-Busch, the Union, and the

General Counsel filed exceptions to the ALJ’s decision.

Nearly five years later, a divided three-member panel of the

Board issued its Decision and Order. Anheuser-Busch, Inc., 342

N.L.R.B. No. 49 (July 22, 2004). One two-member majority

(Chairman Battista and Member Walsh; Member Schaumber,

dissenting) affirmed the ALJ’s ruling that Anheuser-Busch

violated section 8(a)(5) and (1) by failing to notify and to

bargain with the Union before installing and using hidden

surveillance cameras in the workplace. That majority relied on

National Steel Corp. v. NLRB, 324 F.3d 928 (7th Cir. 2003),

enforcing 335 N.L.R.B. 747 (2001), to reinforce that the use of

such cameras is a mandatory subject of bargaining. Another

two-member majority (Chairman Battista and Member

Schaumber; Member Walsh, dissenting) affirmed the ALJ’s

decision not to revoke the discipline. Relying on Taracorp

Industries, 273 N.L.R.B. 221 (1984), this majority ruled that

section 10(c) of the Act, 29 U.S.C. § 160(c), precludes makewhole relief even when misconduct is discovered through

unlawful means. It distinguished Great Western Produce, 299

N.L.R.B. 1004 (1990), and Tocco, Inc., 323 N.L.R.B. 480

(1997) – two cases where the Board ordered the revocation of

discipline that was based on misconduct – because it said those

cases involved a unilateral change in a rule regulating employee

conduct and the discipline came directly from the unilateral

change. In contrast, that majority found “an insufficient nexus

in the instant case between [Anheuser-Busch’s] unlawful

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installation and use of the cameras and the employees’

misconduct to warrant a make-whole remedy.” AnheuserBusch, 342 N.L.R.B. No. 49, at slip op. 2. The Board

unanimously affirmed, without discussion, the ALJ’s rulings

regarding Anheuser-Busch’s responses to the Union’s requests

for information. The Board’s Order directed Anheuser-Busch

to cease and to desist, to bargain, upon request, respecting the

installation and use of surveillance cameras and any other

mandatory subject of bargaining, to respond in a timely manner

to the Union’s information requests respecting matters relevant

to bargaining-unit employees, and to post appropriate remedial

notices. Anheuser-Busch petitions for review of the Board’s

ruling that it violated the Act, the Union petitions for review of

the Board’s remedial Order, and each has intervened to oppose

the other’s petition. The Board seeks enforcement of its Order.

 

II.

Under section 8(a)(5) of the Act, it is an unfair labor

practice for an employer to refuse to bargain with the exclusive

bargaining representative of its employees, 29 U.S.C. §

158(a)(5), and a violation of section 8(a)(5) constitutes a

derivative violation of section 8(a)(1), Exxon Chem. Co. v.

NLRB, 386 F.3d 1160, 1164 (D.C. Cir. 2004). The duty to

bargain is mandatory with respect to the subjects listed in

section 8(d) of the Act, 29 U.S.C. § 158(d), i.e., wages, hours,

and terms and conditions of employment. See Litton Fin.

Printing Div. v.NLRB, 501 U.S. 190, 198 (1991). Subjects that

are “plainly germane to the ‘working environment’” and are

“not among those ‘managerial decisions, which lie at the core of

entrepreneurial control’” are deemed “terms and conditions of

employment” and therefore are mandatory subjects of

bargaining. Ford Motor Co. v. NLRB, 441 U.S. 488, 498 (1979)

(quoting Fibreboard Paper Prods. Corp. v. NLRB, 379 U.S.

203, 222, 223 (1964) (Stewart, J., concurring)). Thus, an

employer’s unilateral change in a term or condition of

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employment without first bargaining to impasse violates section

8(a)(5) and (1). See Litton, 501 U.S. at 198; Beverly Health &

Rehab.Servs., Inc. v. NLRB, 317 F.3d 316, 322 (D.C. Cir. 2003).

The court’s review of the Board’s determinations in an

unfair labor practice proceeding is limited, DaimlerChrysler

Corp. v. NLRB, 288 F.3d 434, 442 (D.C. Cir. 2002), and it may

not “displace the Board’s choice between two fairly conflicting

views, even though the court would justifiably have made a

different choice had the matter been before it de novo,”

Universal Camera Corp. v. NLRB, 340 U.S. 474, 488 (1951).

The Board’s classification of bargaining subjects as “terms or

conditions of employment” is entitled to “considerable

deference,” Ford Motor, 441 U.S. at 495, and the court will

uphold the Board’s determination so long as it is “reasonably

defensible,” id. at 497; see also Regal Cinemas, Inc. v. NLRB,

317 F.3d 300, 307 (D.C. Cir. 2003). The Board’s factual

findings are conclusive if supported by substantial evidence in

the record as a whole, 29 U.S.C. § 160(e); Universal Camera,

340 U.S. at 488. The court, however, will not enforce an order

of the Board that is irrational or otherwise inconsistent with the

Act. See, e.g., NLRB v. Fin. Inst.Employees, 475 U.S. 192, 202

(1986); Titanium Metals Corp. v. NLRB, 392 F.3d 439, 445-46

(D.C. Cir. 2004). 

A.

Anheuser-Busch contends that the Board erred in ruling that

it violated section 8(a)(5) and (1), and it first relies on section

9(b)(3), 29 U.S.C. § 159(b)(3), to support the proposition that its

use of hidden surveillance cameras is not a mandatory subject of

bargaining because the Act exempts matters of internal security

from bargaining. That reliance is misplaced. Section 9(b)(3)

prohibits the Board from including both rank-and-file employees

and guards in a single bargaining unit and from certifying a

union as the representative of a guard bargaining unit if the

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union also represents non-guards or is affiliated with a union

that does so. This provision does not express a broad policy

disfavoring bargaining over security-related matters. In fact, it

has nothing to do with bargaining, and the Act does not prevent

an employer from bargaining with a properly-constituted unit of

security employees. See, e.g., Swanson Group, Inc., 312

N.L.R.B. 184 (1993); J.W. Mays, Inc., 253 N.L.R.B. 717 (1980);

cf. Gen. Serv. Employees Union v. NLRB, 230 F.3d 909, 913

(7th Cir. 2000). Instead, as the court has noted, “Congress

drafted this provision ‘to minimize the danger of divided loyalty

that arises when a guard is called upon to the enforce the rules

of his employer against a fellow union member.’” Wackenhut

Corp. v. NLRB, 178 F.3d 543, 546 (D.C. Cir. 1999) (quoting

Drivers, Chauffeurs, Warehousemen, & Helpers v. NLRB, 553

F.2d 1368, 1373 (D.C. Cir. 1977)). Similarly, the cases

Anheuser-Busch cites do not suggest that matters of internal

security cannot be mandatory subjects of bargaining. 

Contrary to Anheuser-Busch’s assertion, the Board’s rulings

in section 8(a)(1) unlawful-surveillance cases easily are

reconcilable with its rulings that the use of hidden surveillance

cameras constitutes a mandatory subject of bargaining.

Although the Board has recognized that an employer may use

overt surveillance of its employees’ protected, concerted

activities where necessary to further its legitimate security

concerns, section 8(a)(1) prohibits the employer from using that

surveillance in a manner having a tendency “to interfere with,

restrain, or coerce employees in the exercise of” such activity,

29 U.S.C. § 158(a)(1). See, e.g., Nat’l Steel & Shipbuilding Co.,

324 N.L.R.B. 499 (1997), enforced, 156 F.3d 1268 (D.C. Cir.

1998). At most, Anheuser-Busch’s contention indicates that the

Board’s section 8(a)(1) unlawful surveillance cases do not

address whether overt surveillance of protected, concerted

activities is a mandatory subject of bargaining – a logical

omission as section 8(a)(1) does not directly address bargaining.

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Here, the Board also accommodated employers’ legitimate

security concerns, as its ruling does not prevent an employer

from using hidden surveillance cameras after bargaining over

the issue. 

Anheuser-Busch further contends that Colgate-Palmolive

Co., 323 N.L.R.B. 515 (1997), where the Board first ruled that

the installation and use of hidden surveillance cameras was a

mandatory subject of bargaining, is inapposite because that case

involved employees’ privacy concerns about being videotaped

in a restroom and a fitness room. However, as noted, the wellestablished test for determining whether a subject is a term or

condition of employment is not whether it affects employees’

privacy interests, but whether it is “plainly germane to the

‘working environment’” and “not among those ‘managerial

decisions, which lie at the core of entrepreneurial control.’”

Ford Motor, 441 U.S. at 498 (quoting Fibreboard, 379 U.S. at

222, 223 (Stewart, J., concurring)). As to the first criterion, after

analogizing surveillance cameras to other mandatory subjects of

bargaining – physical examinations, drug/alcohol testing

requirements, and polygraph testing – because of their shared

purpose as “investigatory tools,” the Board in ColgatePalmolive concluded that the use of hidden surveillance cameras

“has the potential to affect the continued employment of

employees whose actions are being monitored.” 323 N.L.R.B.

at 515. Although the Board also considered the privacy

implications of the employer’s particular use of hidden

surveillance, that issue was secondary to whether the

surveillance occurred in “the working environment.” Id. In any

event, although Anheuser-Busch placed the cameras at issue in

less sensitive places than the employee restroom and fitness

room, the potential for constant monitoring in “the working

environment,” id., cannot be said to be free of privacy concerns.

As to the second criterion, the Board in Colgate-Palmolive ruled

that the installation and use of hidden surveillance cameras in

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the workplace do not constitute managerial decisions that lie at

the core of entrepreneurial control because “the use of

surveillance cameras is not entrepreneurial in character, is not

fundamental to the basic direction of the enterprise, and

impinges directly on employment security.” Id. 

The Board reaffirmed its characterization of the use of

hidden surveillance cameras as a mandatory subject of

bargaining in National Steel Corp., 335 N.L.R.B. 747 (2001),

where the employer had installed a hidden surveillance camera

in a manager’s office to determine who was accessing it when

the manager was not present. That the Board found the case

“not distinguishable in any material respect” from ColgatePalmolive, id. at 747, even though the area surveilled was an

office, as opposed to a restroom and a fitness room,

demonstrates that the extent of possible privacy concerns is not

necessarily dispositive in determining whether an employer

must bargain over the installation and use of a particular camera.

The Seventh Circuit enforced the Board’s order in National

Steel Corp. v. NLRB, 324 F.3d 928, 932 (7th Cir. 2003),

concluding that the Board’s determination was “objectively

reasonable and wholly supported.” We agree that the Board’s

legal conclusion that the installation and use of hidden

surveillance cameras in the workplace constitutes a mandatory

subject of bargaining is eminently reasonable, especially in light

of the cameras’ effects on the employees’ job security here. 

Anheuser-Busch further faults the Board for not explaining

what aspects of the use of hidden surveillance cameras should

be bargained. In its Decision, however, the Board recognized

that while an employer must bargain over a proposal for the use

of hidden surveillance cameras and the general reasons for such

a proposal, it need not “apprise the union of the location of the

cameras or the time in which they will be in use.” AnheuserBusch, 342 N.L.R.B. No. 49, slip op. at 2 n.7. Anheuser-Busch

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responds that, even with this caveat, the Board has created an

unworkable situation because “instance-by-instance bargaining

. . . is impractical and undercuts an employer’s legitimate need

for promptness and secrecy.” Br. of Pet’r Anheuser-Busch, Inc.

at 39. We do not read the Board’s Decision to require instanceby-instance bargaining. Instead, the Board has left open what

seems to be the far more practical option of a union and an

employer bargaining over the general requirements for an

employer’s use of hidden surveillance cameras as part of their

collective bargaining agreement, including, for example,

whether the cameras may ever be used, in what general areas the

cameras may be used, whether the employer would have to

demonstrate some level of suspicion before using the cameras,

and whether the cameras may be used to discipline employees.

Addressing these and other issues as part of the collective

bargaining agreement preserves the benefit of hidden

surveillance, while also involving a union in the development of

the terms and conditions of their members’ employment. 

Even if the installation and use of hidden surveillance

cameras generally is a mandatory subject of bargaining,

Anheuser-Busch contends that it still did not violate section

8(a)(5) and (1) under the circumstances presented here. It first

maintains that the Board’s determination that the cameras were

trained on an employee work area and break area is not

supported by substantial evidence in the record. The record,

however, belies Anheuser-Busch’s assertion. Although, as the

Board noted, “the area surveilled was not a part of the physical

plant in which employees worked frequently,” Anheuser-Busch,

342 N.L.R.B. No. 49, at slip op. 1, it is undisputed that two

employees had work assignments in the elevator motors room at

least once a month. In fact, the hidden surveillance cameras,

which were trained on the stairs leading to the elevator motors

room and inside the room itself, recorded those employees

performing their routine tasks. Furthermore, the record contains

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ample evidence that the roof generally was a de facto break area

and that the camera trained on the steps filmed a portion of the

roof itself. This evidence is sufficient to support the Board’s

determination that the hidden surveillance cameras were located

within the working environment and therefore that their

installation and use was a mandatory subject of bargaining. 

Anheuser-Busch next contends that the Union made no

demand to bargain. However, a union is obligated to demand

bargaining only “[i]f an employer gives a union advance notice

of its intention to make a change to a term or condition of

employment.” Regal Cinemas, 317 F.3d at 314. The Union did

not know about the hidden surveillance cameras until July 1,

1998 – the day after Anheuser-Busch removed them – and

therefore it would have been futile for it to demand bargaining.

See, e.g., id.; Teamsters Local Union No. 171 v.NLRB, 863 F.2d

946, 954 (D.C. Cir. 1988). Anheuser-Busch also contends the

Union cannot now claim a violation of the obligation to bargain

because it long has been aware of the company’s use of

surveillance cameras and never has sought bargaining. To the

extent that this is a waiver argument, it is contrary to the wellestablished principle that “a union’s acquiescence in previous

unilateral changes does not operate as a waiver of its right to

bargain over such changes for all time.” Verizon N.Y. Inc. v.

NLRB, 360 F.3d 206, 209 (D.C. Cir. 2004) (quoting OwensCorning Fiberglas Corp., 282 N.L.R.B. 609, 609 (1987))

(internal quotation marks omitted); see also Nat’l Steel, 324

F.3d at 934. And, to the extent Anheuser-Busch is arguing that

there has been no change in the status quo because it has used

hidden surveillance cameras before, this argument is nothing

more than a re-characterization of the waiver argument and

suffers from the same flaws because the Union’s purported past

acquiescence does not have any present effect. In any event, the

two isolated and dated usages of hidden surveillance cameras

cited by Anheuser-Busch are insufficient to constitute a practice

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that is incorporated implicitly into the terms and conditions of

employment.

Therefore, because the Board reasonably concluded that the

use of hidden surveillance cameras in the workplace is a

mandatory subject of bargaining, substantial evidence in the

record supports the Board’s finding that Anheuser-Busch used

these cameras in the workplace without bargaining over them,

and the Union did not waive its right to object to the unilateral

change in terms or conditions of employment, we defer to the

Board’s determination that Anheuser-Busch violated section

8(a)(5) and (1).

B.

Anheuser-Busch also challenges the Board’s determination

that it violated section 8(a)(5) and (1) by failing timely to

respond to the Union’s October 5, 1998, request for information.

It is well-settled that “[t]he duty to bargain in good faith also

includes the obligation to provide the union with information

relevant to the collective bargaining process in certain

circumstances.” ConAgra, Inc. v. NLRB, 117 F.3d 1435, 1439

(D.C. Cir. 1997) (citing Detroit Edison Co. v. NLRB, 440 U.S.

301, 303 (1979)). An employer violates the Act not only by

refusing to provide such relevant information but also by not

providing it in a timely manner. Providence Hosp. v. NLRB, 93

F.3d 1012, 1021-22 (1st Cir. 1996); Woodland Clinic, 331

N.L.R.B. 735, 736 (2000); Leland Stanford Junior Univ., 307

N.L.R.B. 75, 80 (1992). Although “[a] union’s bare assertion

that it needs information to process a grievance does not

automatically oblige the employer to supply all the information

in the manner requested,” Detroit Edison, 440 U.S. at 314, the

court has held that the “the threshold for relevance is low,”

DaimlerChrysler, 288 F.3d at 443 (quoting Country Ford

Trucks, Inc. v. NLRB, 229 F.3d 1184, 1191 (D.C. Cir. 2000))

(internal quotation marks omitted), such that “[t]he fact that the

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information is of probable or potential relevance is sufficient to

give rise to an obligation . . . to provide it,” Crowley Marine

Servs., Inc. v. NLRB, 234 F.3d 1295, 1297 (D.C. Cir. 2000)

(quoting Oil, Chem. & Atomic Workers Local Union v. NLRB,

711 F.2d 348, 359 (D.C. Cir. 1983)) (alteration and omission in

original). It therefore is sufficient that the information sought is

relevant to the investigation and processing of grievances,

DaimlerChrysler, 288 F.3d at 443, and the court has recognized

that “‘[i]nformation related to the wages, benefits, hours, [and]

working conditions’ of unit employees is presumptively

relevant.” Id. (quoting Country Ford, 229 F.3d at 1191)

(alteration in original).

Substantial evidence in the record supports the Board’s

finding that on October 5, 1998, in advance of the first

arbitration over the employee discharges, the Union made a

written request to Anheuser-Busch for information related to the

use of hidden surveillance cameras, which is a term or condition

of employment. After not receiving a complete response, the

Union followed up with another letter on November 2, 1998.

Although Anheuser-Busch provided the Union with information

about the use of such cameras in Stockhouse 16, the record

indicates that it failed to provide the requested information about

surveillance in other areas of the workplace until over six

months later. Because the Union had put Anheuser-Busch on

notice that it desired information relevant to a mandatory subject

of bargaining, it was under no obligation to make continued

requests, and thus cannot be said to have abandoned its request

in the face of Anheuser-Busch’s resistance. Anheuser-Busch’s

suggestion that the Board’s determination is inconsistent with

the reality of information exchanges that occur prior to

arbitration proceedings ignores that this information relates to a

term or condition of employment and therefore is presumptively

relevant regardless of the context in which the request arose.

See DaimlerChrysler, 288 F.3d at 443. The Board therefore did

USCA Case #04-1278 Document #903640 Filed: 07/05/2005 Page 16 of 23
17

not need to determine whether the information request was

relevant to the particular arbitration. Furthermore, the

employer’s obligation is to provide relevant information upon

request, and thus, contrary to Anheuser-Busch’s contention, it is

not something over which the employer may opt to bargain

during an arbitration, see, e.g., Crowley Marine, 234 F.3d at

1297; Country Ford, 229 F.3d at 1191-92. Because AnheuserBusch’s resistance to providing the Union with information

related to a term or condition of employment, the Board

properly determined that its actions were contrary to its duty to

bargain in good faith and therefore violated the Act. 

 

III.

Although in agreement with the Board’s determination that

Anheuser-Busch violated section 8(a)(5) and (1), the Union

challenges the Board’s failure to order a make-whole remedy for

the disciplined employees. In evaluating the Board’s chosen

remedy, the court “give[s] great deference to [its] selection.”

CaterairInt’l v. NLRB, 22 F.3d 1114, 1120 (D.C. Cir. 1994);see

also Phelps Dodge Corp. v. NLRB, 313 U.S. 177, 194 (1941).

As the court has stated, “The Act does not require the Board to

‘order that which a complaining party may regard as “complete

relief” for every unfair labor practice.’” Teamsters Local Union

No. 639 v. NLRB, 924 F.2d 1078, 1085 (D.C. Cir. 1991)

(quoting Shepard v. NLRB, 459 U.S. 344, 352 (1983)). Rather,

“[a] party challenging the Board’s choice of remedy must show

that the remedy is ‘clearly inadequate in light of the findings of

the Board.’” Id. (quoting Int’l Union of Elec. Workers v. NLRB,

434 F.2d 473, 478 (D.C. Cir. 1970). The court will not enforce

the Board’s remedial order, however, when it fails to distinguish

adequately its applicable precedent. See, e.g., Gen. Elec. Co. v.

NLRB, 117 F.3d 627, 636 (D.C. Cir. 1997); Avecor, Inc. v.

NLRB, 931 F.2d 924, 933 (D.C. Cir. 1991); cf. DaimlerChrysler,

288 F.3d at 445. 

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18

In an effort to remedy Anheuser-Busch’s unfair labor

practices, the Board entered a cease-and-desist order, ordered it

to bargain over hidden surveillance upon request, and required

it to post remedial notices. However, relying on section 10(c) of

the Act, a majority of the Board refused to order make-whole

relief for the sixteen disciplined employees because there was

“an insufficient nexus in the instant case between [AnheuserBusch’s] unlawful installation and use of the cameras and the

employees’ misconduct.” Anheuser-Busch, 342 N.L.R.B. No.

49, slip op. at 2. Section 10(c) “delegate[s] to the Board the

primary responsibility for making remedial decisions that best

effectuate the policies of the Act.” ABF Freight Sys., Inc. v.

NLRB, 510 U.S. 317, 323-24 (1994). However, that section also

provides, as relevant, “No order of the Board shall require the

reinstatement of any individual as an employee who has been

suspended or discharged, or the payment to him of any back

pay, if such individual was suspended or discharged for cause.”

29 U.S.C. § 160(c). 

Section 10(c) does not expressly address whether the Board

shall or shall not deny make-whole relief where an employer

would not have discovered its employees’ misconduct but-for its

own unlawful action. As the Seventh Circuit has observed,

“[T]he proviso [in § 10(c)] does not prevent the Board from

insisting that the employer [prove ‘cause’] without using the

‘fruit’ of the violation. . . . Section 10(c) does not speak to

burdens of persuasion, fruits of violations, exclusionary rules,

and the other paraphernalia of trials and inferences.”

Communication Workers v. NLRB, 784 F.2d 847, 851 (7th Cir.

1986); cf. NLRB v. Transp. Mgmt.Corp., 462 U.S. 393, 401 n.6

(1983). The Board, of course, “may fill interstices with a

reasoned approach.” Communication Workers, 784 F.2d at 851;

see also Beth Israel Hosp. v. NLRB, 437 U.S. 483, 501 (1978);

BPH & Co., Inc. v. NLRB, 333 F.3d 213, 222 (D.C. Cir. 2003).

Here, however, the Board has not adopted a reasoned approach

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because it has failed to distinguish adequately its prior decisions.

In Tocco, Inc., 323 N.L.R.B. 480 (1997), the Board ordered

make-whole relief for employees who were discharged for drug

use after the employer unilaterally changed its drug testing

policy. The Board majority has attempted to distinguish Tocco

by maintaining that it involved a unilateral change “to the very

policy under which the employees were discharged,” AnheuserBusch, 342 N.L.R.B. No. 49, at slip op. 2, whereas here “the

rules that the employees violated were unaltered and

preexisting,” id. As the dissenting Board member correctly

concluded, this purported distinction ignores that the employer

in Tocco did not alter its underlying drug use policy. Instead,

the employer unilaterally changed from testing employees only

for cause as determined by evidence of possession or use of

drugs by a specific employee to a policy of determining cause

based on overall safety, efficiency, and production records.

Tocco, 323 N.L.R.B. at 489. This unilateral change resulted in

the testing of all employees. Id. Similarly, in the instant case,

the employer did not alter its underlying conduct rules, but

instead unilaterally instituted a new means for detecting

violations of a preexisting standard of conduct. In both cases,

the employer would not have discovered the employees’

misconduct but-for its unlawful unilateral change.

Consequently, the Board’s purported distinction between the

cases fails, and the Board has treated like situations differently.

Furthermore, in Great Western Produce, Inc., 299 N.L.R.B.

1004 (1990), the Board ruled that the unilateral implementation

of certain work rules, including a record-keeping system that

tracked employees’ shortcomings, violated section 8(a)(5). The

Board, after noting that it traditionally orders make-whole relief

“where an employee’s loss stems directly from the [employer’s]

unfair labor practice,” stated that an “employer may avoid

having to reinstate and pay backpay to an employee discharged

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20

pursuant to an unlawfully instituted rule or policy if the

employer demonstrates that it would have discharged the

employee even absent that rule or policy.” Id. at 1006.

Contrary to the view of the Board majority, Great Western

applied this remedial rule not just where the employer

discharged employees for violating substantive rules that were

unlawfully changed but also where the employer’s unlawful

work rule allowed it to discover grounds for an employee’s

discharge. For example, in Great Western, one of the unlawful

unilateral changes was the employer’s establishment of

employee warning reports that chronicled performance and

conduct and that served as a basis for discipline over time. The

Board ordered reinstatement with backpay where the employer’s

“unilaterally instituted recordkeeping system contributed to his

supervisor’s knowledge of his excessive tardiness and

absenteeism,” id., which were the substantive violations that led

to discharge, because the employer “[did] not assert any basis

independent of the unlawfully imposed employee warning

reports for [the employee’s] termination,” id. at 1007 n.13.

Where the employer “had a source of knowledge about [another

employee’s unsatisfactory performance] independent of the

unlawful employee warning reports,” the Board refused to order

reinstatement and backpay. Id. at 1007. 

Here, as in Great Western, and unlike Taracorp Industries,

Inc., 273 N.L.R.B. 221 (1984), upon which the Board

principally relied, Anheuser-Busch does not assert a source of

knowledge of the employee’s misconduct independent of the

unlawful change in the manner that it monitors and tracks its

employees’ activities. That the employees confessed during the

investigatory interview is irrelevant because there is no record

evidence that Anheuser-Busch relied on those statements to

discipline the employees or that they would have been subject

to investigatory interviews absent the misconduct discovered on

the videotape footage. Thus, the refusal of the Board majority

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21

to order reinstatement here cannot be enforced because it also is

inconsistent with its approach in Great Western.

Despite the shortcomings of the remedial aspect of the

Board’s Decision, it remains for the Board to determine, based

on policies consistent with the Act, whether reinstatement is not

appropriate here because an exclusionary rule would improperly

“reward [employees] who engage[] in unprotected conduct.”

Anheuser-Busch, 342 N.L.R.B. No. 49, slip op. at 2. The

Supreme Court stated when the Act was in its infancy that “[i]n

the exercise of its informed discretion the Board may find that

effectuation of the Act’s policies may or may not require

reinstatement. We have no warrant for speculating on matters

of fact the determination of which Congress has entrusted to the

Board.” Phelps Dodge, 313 U.S. at 195-96. Because the Board

failed to distinguish adequately its prior decisions that support

ordering make-whole relief, a remand is necessary so the Board

can apply, distinguish adequately, or overrule those precedents.

Accordingly, we deny Anheuser-Busch’s petition, grant the

Union’s petition, and remand the case for the Board to address

the appropriate remedial order for the disciplined employees.

We note that while the Board’s Order refers twice to

“surveillance cameras,” Anheuser-Busch, 342 N.L.R.B. No. 49,

slip op. at 10, its Decision is plainly limited to “hidden

surveillance cameras,” id. at 1, and, on remand, the Order should

be corrected to reflect that fact.

USCA Case #04-1278 Document #903640 Filed: 07/05/2005 Page 21 of 23
SENTELLE, Circuit Judge, dissenting in part: I am

completely in concurrence with the Court’s opinion denying

Anheuser-Busch’s petition. I cannot concur in that portion of

the opinion which grants the petition of the union.

To recap briefly what is well set forth in the opinion in the

majority, Anheuser-Busch disciplined sixteen employees. It

discharged five for violating the company’s drug use policy (and

by all appearances, the drug laws of the state of Missouri and

possibly the United States). It entered last-chance agreements

with seven employees for leaving assigned work areas for

extended periods, sleeping on the job, and urinating on the roof

of the brewhouse. It suspended four for leaving assigned work

areas for extended periods. The Board, quite expectedly,

approved this course of discipline. It did so acting under the

authority of section 10(c) of the National Labor Relations Act

(“the Act”), 29 U.S.C. § 160(c). That section provides, in

pertinent part, “no order of the Board shall require the

reinstatement of any individual as an employee who has been

suspended or discharged, or the payment to him of any backpay,

if such individual was suspended or discharged for cause.” The

employees whose status is at issue in the union’s petition were

discharged or suspended for cause. The Board’s order, in

perfect compliance with the statute, did not require

reinstatement. The Court holds this error.

My understanding of the role of the court in the application

of a statute, and specifically in the review of statutory

application by federal agencies, is that: “If the intent of

Congress is clear, that is the end of the matter; for the court, as

well as the agency, must give effect to the unambiguously

expressed intent of Congress.” Chevron U.S.A. Inc. v. Natural

Resources Defense Council, Inc., 467 U.S. 837, 842-43 (1984).

That should be the end of the matter. We have no need for

legislative history, Chevron step 2, or any other tools. The plain

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2

language of the statute is unambiguous. The Board followed

that plain and unambiguous language. I would deny the petition.

The majority quotes from a Seventh Circuit decision,

Communication Workers of Am. v. NLRB, 784 F.2d 847, 851

(7th Cir. 1986), to the effect that “[s]ection 10(c) does not speak

to burdens of persuasion, fruits of violations, exclusionary rules,

and the other paraphernalia of trials and inferences.” This is

correct. It does not. It says, absolutely and unqualifiedly, that

“[n]o order of the Board shall require the reinstatement of any

individual as an employee who has been suspended or

discharged, or the payment to him of any back pay if such

individual was suspended or discharged for cause.” 29 U.S.C.

§ 160(c). The employees in the order at issue before us were

reinstated with backpay by reason of their having been

discharged for cause. The statute plainly covers the

circumstance. The statute does not say that this statute shall not

apply where a court can think of a methodology that derails the

truth-seeking function of the hearing in such a fashion as to

require everyone involved to pretend that the employees did not

commit the misconduct in order to keep these sections from

applying.

I would perhaps be able to better accept the majority’s

reasoning if it were offered in support of a Chevron analysis

upholding a decision the Board had made. Here, where it is

used solely for the purpose of reversing a decision that the

Board has made, it seems to me wholly inappropriate.

In short, the language of the statute is clear. There is

nothing in legislative history or in Supreme Court decisions

compelling or even counseling a departure from that plain

language. The Board was correct. I would deny the union’s

petition.

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