Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-12-01143/USCOURTS-caDC-12-01143-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
DHL Express, Inc.
Respondent
National Labor Relations Board
Petitioner

Document Text:

United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued September 10, 2015 Decided January 21, 2016

No. 12-1072

DHL EXPRESS, INC.,

PETITIONER

v.

NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD,

RESPONDENT

Consolidated with 12-1143

On Petition for Review and Cross-Application 

for Enforcement of an 

Order of the National Labor Relations Board

David A. Kadela argued the cause and filed the briefs for 

petitioner.

Barbara Sheehy, Attorney, National Labor Relations 

Board, argued the cause for respondent. On the brief were 

John H. Ferguson, Associate General Counsel, Linda 

Dreeben, Deputy Associate General Counsel, Usha Dheenan, 

Supervisory Attorney, and Nicole Lancia, Attorney.

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Anton G. Hajjar and James B. Coppess were on the brief 

for movant-intervenor American Postal Workers Union, AFLCIO in support of respondent.

Before: ROGERS, BROWN and GRIFFITH, Circuit Judges.

Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge BROWN.

BROWN, Circuit Judge: DHL Express, Inc. (the 

Company) petitions for review of the December 22, 2011, 

decision and order by the National Labor Relations Board 

(NLRB or Board) finding the Company violated Section 

8(a)(1) of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) by

prohibiting nonworking employees from distributing union 

literature in the hallway of its facility. The Board seeks this 

court’s enforcement of its order requiring the Company to 

cease and desist. We deny the Company’s petition and grant 

the Board’s cross-application for enforcement.

I.

This case is governed by Section 7 of the NLRA, 29 

U.S.C. § 157, which dictates that “[e]mployees shall have the 

right to self-organization, to form, join, or assist labor 

organizations . . . and to engage in other concerted activities 

for the purpose of collective bargaining or other mutual aid or 

protection . . . .” It is a violation of the Act for an employer to 

“interfere with, restrain, or coerce employees in the exercise 

of the rights guaranteed in section 157 . . . .” Id. §158(a)(1).

 Background

DHL Express, Inc. is an express delivery service that 

moves mail and freight throughout the United States and in 

many foreign countries. DHL’s only U.S. hub is located on 

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the grounds of the Cincinnati Airport in Erlanger, Kentucky 

(CVG). Jetliners arriving from domestic and international 

destinations taxi directly to the sort facility where a 

sophisticated system for unloading and reloading freight and 

package containers ensures items reach their final 

destinations. Over 1,200 workers are employed at the CVG 

facility which handles between 560,000 and 630,000 

packages each week. Most of this loading and unloading 

activity occurs on the first floor and mezzanine level of the 

main sort building. The facility operates 24 hours a day with 

a part-time morning shift, part-time night shift, and a full-time 

day shift. In 2011, fourteen of DHL’s employees were 

represented by the International Brotherhood of Teamsters. 

The American Postal Workers Union, AFL-CIO (APWU) had 

been attempting to organize the Company’s remaining 

employees.

Because the facility is on the grounds of the Cincinnati 

airport, DHL must comply with the safety and security 

regulations of the U.S. Customs Service, the Federal Aviation 

Administration, and the Transportation Security 

Administration. To comply with these security requirements,

ingress and egress to the hallway are controlled, with a 

security checkpoint located at the far end. The vast majority 

of DHL employees enter and exit through this main hallway 

of the administration building. The hallway is used by the 

company for a variety of purposes. It contains bulletin boards 

and wall-mounted television screens which display upcoming 

company events, weather reports, and production statistics. 

And there are computer stations employees can use during 

non-work time to view benefit and payroll information and to 

check personal email. 

The Company has also used the hallway for companysponsored events, scheduled and supervised by management. 

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DHL organized and hosted a Wellness Fair, Financial Fair, 

Education Fair, Autism Speaks fundraiser, and a promotion of 

the DHL-sponsored IndyCar, complete with free t-shirts and 

hats. These events were scheduled in advance with notice 

provided to employees, and they were held at the end of the 

overnight shift. Similarly, the collective bargaining 

agreement with the Teamsters provided for union access. Per 

that agreement, the Company permitted distribution of union 

literature provided the union gave advance notice and allowed 

DHL to specify the location and timing of the distribution. 

And the ALJ credited testimony that a fitness company was 

permitted to offer gym memberships, some employees sold 

Super Bowl Raffle tickets in the hallway, and off-duty 

employees talked on cell phones and had other social 

interactions while transiting the hallway.

However, certain work-related activities do occur in the 

hallway. Members of DHL’s quality control team 

occasionally use the hallway to move damaged or misdirected 

packages to the front entrance. And company representatives 

frequently conduct tours for new employees and visitors, 

which stop in the hallway. 

DHL’s Employee Handbook includes a Solicitation and 

Distribution policy which prohibits “interference from

persons who are pursuing a purpose not related to DHL’s 

normal business” and forbids any solicitation by nonemployees at any time unless “specifically authorized or 

sponsored by DHL.” JA 56. Solicitation between employees 

is prohibited during work time or in work areas. See id. DHL 

also purports to have an “unwritten” policy which requires 

security staff to prevent employees from loitering or 

congregating in the hallway, except during companysponsored or approved events. DHL admits its employees 

have never been officially notified of this security policy. 

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In December 2010 and February 2011, four different 

employees handed out union literature in the hallway. In 

December when Vida Manuel distributed flyers she was told 

by security staff that she could not handbill in the hallway. 

Manuel responded that “she had seen the Teamsters in the 

hallway doing it before at the tables and she thought she was 

able to do it also.” JA 89, 353. Later that month, Manuel and 

fellow employees Bob Woodyard and James Hamilton 

handed out APWU’s holiday newsletter, standing by the 

televisions. They were informed by Jennifer Miller, Captain 

of Security, that they could not loiter in the hallway but could 

handbill in the cafeteria or break room. When the employees 

complained that the Teamsters had been allowed to distribute 

literature, Miller reiterated that no employees were permitted 

to loiter in the hallway. Miller notified the Human Resources 

Manager who repeated the admonition. On February 25, 

2011, Manuel, Woodyard, and Charles Teeters stood in the 

hallway handing out literature and displaying posters. They 

were again told it was against company policy to loiter and 

asked to move to the cafeteria, a break room, or an outside 

area. Each time the off-duty employees distributed literature 

for about 20 minutes. They left — sometimes reluctantly —

when instructed to do so.

Procedural History

The APWU brought two unfair labor practice charges 

against DHL, alleging that the Company violated Section 

8(a)(1) by prohibiting employees from distributing union 

literature during non-work time in a non-work area of its 

facility on two occasions in December 2010 and once in

February 2011. The Regional Director issued a Complaint on 

the charges on March 25, 2011.

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On May 16 and 17, 2011, during a hearing before an 

Administrative Law Judge, the parties stipulated that, on three 

occasions, off-duty DHL employees who were distributing 

APWU literature in the hallway were told they could not 

loiter there, informed they could distribute the literature 

outside or in the cafeteria or breakroom, and were asked to 

leave the hallway. 

The General Counsel claimed the hallway is a non-work 

area and thus DHL could not prohibit the distribution of union 

literature there. DHL countered that the hallway is a work 

area and that it had the right under its distribution policy, the 

legality of which is not at issue, to prohibit employees from 

leafletting there and to limit their leafletting to the facility’s 

parking lot, cafeteria, and other non-work areas. The General 

Counsel also argued that even if the hallway was a work area, 

union distribution could not be prohibited because DHL had 

permitted other types of distribution in that area. DHL 

contended the other distributions were distinguishable and did 

not compromise the Company’s right to enforce its 

distribution policy, especially because security-related 

considerations justified the prohibition.

On July 21, 2011, the ALJ found DHL violated Section 

8(a)(1) by preventing off-duty employees from distributing 

union literature in the hallway — which he described as a 

“mixed-use” area of the facility. Specifically, the ALJ found 

DHL “compromised the hallway area by permitting non-work

use of it.” JA 26-29. DHL raised several exceptions to the 

decision and the Board issued its own decision and order on 

December 21, 2011. Two Board members agreed with the 

ALJ that the hallway constituted a “mixed-use” area in which 

DHL could not prohibit distribution during non-work time. 

The third, Member Hayes, concluded the hallway was a work 

area but would have found a violation because, in his view, 

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the Company’s policy discriminated against the union. The 

Board ordered DHL to cease and desist from enforcing its nodistribution rule and to notify employees that the rule will not 

be enforced in the hallway.

On January 31, 2012, DHL petitioned for review in this 

court; the Board filed a cross-application for enforcement. 

 

II.

This court’s “role in reviewing an NLRB decision is 

limited.” Wayneview Care Ctr. v. NLRB, 664 F.3d 341, 348 

(D.C. Cir. 2011). “[A] decision of the NLRB will be 

overturned only if the Board’s factual findings are not 

supported by substantial evidence, or the Board acted 

arbitrarily or otherwise erred in applying established law to 

the facts of the case.” Pirlott v. NLRB, 522 F.3d 423, 432 

(D.C. Cir. 2008). Substantial evidence is defined as “such 

relevant evidence as a reasonable mind might accept as 

adequate to support a conclusion.” Consol. Edison Co. v. 

NLRB, 305 U.S. 197, 229 (1938). Judicial review of 

the Board’s credibility determinations is especially 

deferential: such determinations must be sustained unless they 

are “hopelessly incredible or self-contradictory,” Teamsters 

Local 171 v. NLRB, 863 F.2d 946, 953 (D.C. Cir. 1988), or 

“patently insupportable,” Exxel/Atmos, Inc. v. NLRB, 28 F.3d 

1243, 1246 (D.C. Cir. 1994). 

However, deference is not warranted where the Board 

“fails to adequately explain its reasoning,” where the Board 

leaves “critical gaps” in its reasoning, Point Park Univ. v. 

NLRB, 457 F.3d 42, 49-50 (D.C. Cir. 2006), or where the 

Board erred in applying law to facts, Perdue Farms, Inc., 

Cookin’ Good Div. v. NLRB, 144 F.3d 830, 834 (D.C. Cir. 

1998). But the court may not overturn a Board’s order merely 

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because the court “might have reached a different conclusion 

had the court considered the issue de novo.” Reno Hilton 

Resorts v. NLRB, 196 F.3d 1275, 1282 (D.C. Cir. 1999).

 

A. Jurisdiction

In its brief, DHL emphatically urges that the Board’s 

“mixed-use” presumption is “unreasonable, irrational, and 

arbitrary.” But the Board argues this rationality argument was 

not presented below and so is not properly before the court. 

We are, of course, precluded from considering any issue 

raised by a party for the first time on appeal. See Pirlott v. 

NLRB, 522 F.3d 423, 433 (D.C. Cir. 2008) (“It is . . . well 

understood that a reviewing court must confine itself to the 

grounds upon which the record discloses that the agency’s 

action was based.”); see also 29 U.S.C. § 160(e) (“No 

objection that has not been urged before the Board . . . shall 

be considered by the court, unless the failure or neglect to 

urge such objection shall be excused because of extraordinary 

circumstances.”). The question then is whether DHL 

challenged the rationality of the “mixed-use” presumption 

below in a manner sufficient to put the Board on notice. 

The ALJ’s opinion explicitly characterized the hallway as 

a “mixed-use” area. The ALJ therefore applied the Board’s 

longstanding “mixed-use” presumption: that an employer 

cannot prohibit non-worktime distribution of union literature 

in a mixed-use area, absent a showing of special 

circumstances. In its exceptions to the ALJ’s findings, DHL 

seemed to accept this mixed-use presumption. See, e.g., JA

53-54 (citing, without question, Board precedents holding that 

a mixed-use area is “usually properly treated as a non-work 

area for purposes of application of these principles”). Indeed, 

DHL appeared to be challenging the application of this 

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presumption here — not its validity. See, e.g., JA 55 (“The 

ALJ’s decision that the hallway is not a work area is flawed 

because it fails to recognize the substantial evidence of workrelated activity that regularly occurs in the hallway.”). Only a 

single exception and a single sentence in its appeal before the 

Board arguably go to the validity of the presumption. See JA

35 (“Respondent excepts to the ALJ’s finding that a mixeduse area must be treated the same as a non-work area for 

purposes of application of a no distribution rule.”); JA 56 

(“To conclude as a matter of law, as the ALJ did, that a nonwork area and a mixed-use area are equivalent would be to 

abandon the Board’s responsibility to balance employees’

Section 7 rights against an employer’s property and 

management rights and to accommodate each with as little 

destruction of one as is consistent with the maintenance of the 

other.”).

Our precedent indicates a “vague exception” to an ALJ’s 

finding may be sufficient “to preserve an issue for appeal 

when petitioner’s ‘brief in support of its exceptions’ 

adequately put[s] the Board on notice” of the grounds on 

which the petitioner is objecting. Parsippany Hotel Mgmt. 

Co. v. NLRB, 99 F.3d 413, 417-18 (D.C. Cir. 1996) 

(discussing NLRB v. Blake Constr., 663 F.2d 272, 283-84

(D.C. Cir. 1981)). Alternatively, when a petitioner 

“specifically object[s] in its exceptions to the ALJ’s findings,” 

then the issue may still be preserved for appeal even though 

the petitioner “did not brief and argue the issue to the Board.”

Id. (discussing Davis Supermarkets, Inc. v. NLRB, 2 F.3d 

1162 (D.C. Cir. 1993)). Here, we have neither a clear 

statement in DHL’s exceptions nor a less-than-clear statement 

that is fully explained in the brief. This case is most similar to 

Highlands Hospital Corp. v. NLRB, in which we held the 

company’s “single reference to the ‘excessive breadth’ of a 

remedy with multiple parts [was] insufficient to satisfy 

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section 10(e) because it failed to give the Board ‘adequate 

notice’ of the argument it [sought] to advance on review.” 

508 F.3d 28, 32-33 (D.C. Cir. 2007). We are therefore 

precluded from considering any direct challenge to the 

Board’s mixed-use presumption.

But a close reading of the Company’s arguments below 

indicates that, while DHL seemed to accept the Board’s 

general mixed-use presumption, the Company did challenge 

the ALJ’s application of that presumption — claiming the 

ALJ’s purported classification of any area not exclusively

devoted to work as “non-work” or “mixed-use” was a novel 

misapplication of Board precedent to which the Board 

acquiesced. For reasons explained more fully below, we 

conclude the ALJ’s decision relating to mixed-use areas also 

was controlled by long-settled precedent. 

B. The Balancing of Rights

The Board and the employers are often not on the same 

page. In this case, they might not even be reading from the 

same book. For example, the Board, affirming the ALJ, 

concludes the hallway is a “mixed use” area in which union 

solicitation may not be prohibited. DHL, however, sees the 

operative principle quite differently. DHL contends that the 

working area of a business includes more than its production, 

inventory, and active processing space. Every sizeable 

business also requires administrative space where the 

business’s payroll, human resources, accounting, security and 

other support services are housed. Thus, DHL argues work 

necessary to the operation of the business is being performed

in such spaces. And these areas remain as much under the

control of the employer as the active manufacturing or 

processing facilities. In this case, the hallway is part of the 

administrative portion of the facility, and — being integral to 

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the Company’s commitment to maintain a secure facility — is 

made available to both outsiders and employees for limited 

purposes on a schedule established by management. These 

purposes, DHL maintains, must be congruent with the 

Company’s need to inform and provide benefits and 

assistance to employees and to promote Company objectives. 

Thus, APWU’s insistence that off-duty, pro-union employees

may use this space for organizing activity without the 

company’s permission and without being relegated to a 

particular time and place is viewed by the Company as an 

unwarranted disruption of the discipline DHL attempts to 

maintain in this administrative space and a violation of the 

Company’s property rights.

DHL correctly identifies Republic Aviation Corp. v. 

NLRB, 324 U.S. 793 (1945), as the seminal case articulating 

the Board’s responsibility to balance employees’ right to selforganize against employers’ right to maintain discipline in 

their establishments. See id. at 803 n.10 (upholding the 

Board’s presumption that it is “not within the province of an 

employer to promulgate and enforce a rule prohibiting union 

solicitation by an employee outside of working hours, 

although on company property” absent special 

circumstances). The Court in Republic Aviation recognized 

neither right was unlimited, a principle that was refined in 

NLRB v. Babcock & Wilcox Co.: “Accommodation between 

[employee-organizational rights and employer-property 

rights] must be obtained with as little destruction of one as is 

consistent with the maintenance of the other.” 351 U.S. 105, 

112 (1956). 

Still, Congress entrusted the task of balancing between 

these conflicting legitimate interests to the Board, not the 

judiciary. See Beth Israel Hosp. v. NLRB, 437 U.S. 483, 501 

(1978). If the Board’s resolution is rational, consistent with 

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the Act, and supported by substantial evidence, it must be 

enforced. Id.

Unfortunately for DHL, there is less to the protection of 

employer property rights and managerial prerogatives than the 

language of accommodation seems to suggest. The locus of 

the accommodation between Section 7 rights and private 

property rights “may fall at different points along the 

spectrum depending on the nature and strength of the 

respective § 7 rights and private property rights asserted in 

any given context.” Hudgens v. NLRB, 424 U.S. 507, 522

(1976). In practice, the locus of accommodation shifts on a 

sliding scale. When property rights are ascendant, labor 

organizers must show their need for access trumps the 

employers’ right to exclude. When employee rights are at 

their zenith, employers need to make an affirmative showing 

that organizational activity cannot be accommodated without 

negatively impacting productivity, discipline, security, or 

similarly important interests. Employer rights are at their 

strongest when dealing with non-employees. Employers can 

generally prohibit solicitation and other labor organizing 

activities by nonemployee union representatives. An 

employer cannot be compelled to allow nonemployee 

organizers onto his property. See Lechmere, Inc. v. NLRB, 

502 U.S. 527, 534 (1992). “Nonemployee organizers cannot 

claim even a limited right of access to a nonconsenting 

employer’s property until ‘[a]fter the requisite need for access 

to the employer’s property has been shown.’” Id. (quoting

Centr. Hardware Co. v. NLRB, 407 U.S. 539, 545 (1972)). 

 In contrast, the employer’s ability to restrict pro-union 

activity by an off-duty employee legally on the premises — in 

a non-work area — is quite limited. See ITT Indus. v. NLRB,

251 F.3d 995, 1001 (D.C. Cir. 2001). When organizing 

activity is undertaken by employees lawfully on the 

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employer’s property, the proper balance is between their right 

to organize and an employer’s managerial rights. See, e.g.,

Hudgens, 424 U.S. at 521 n.10 (1976) (“A wholly different 

balance was struck when the organizational activity was 

carried on by employees already rightfully on the employer’s 

property, since the employer’s management interests rather 

than his property interests were there involved.”); Babcock, 

351 U.S. at 112-13 (“Here the Board failed to make a 

distinction between rules of law applicable to employees and 

those applicable to nonemployees. The distinction is one of 

substance. No restriction may be placed on the employees’ 

right to discuss self-organization among themselves, unless 

the employer can demonstrate that a restriction is necessary to 

maintain production or discipline.”). Indeed, the Court has 

specifically held that “the Board is entitled to view the 

intrusion by employees on the property rights of their 

employer as quite limited in this context as long as the 

employer’s management interests are adequately protected.” 

Eastex, Inc. v. NLRB, 437 U.S. 556, 574 (1978). 

DHL argues that “[d]rawing such a presumption with 

respect to mixed-use and incidental-work areas conflicts . . . 

with the very distinction that the Supreme Court endorsed in 

Republic Aviation — the one between working and nonworking areas.” Pet. Br. 29. However, as Babcock makes 

clear, distinctions between employees and non-employees and 

between property rights and managerial rights may 

dramatically shift the balance. An employer may lawfully 

prohibit employees from distributing union literature in work 

areas during work time; however, a rule that extends the 

prohibition to nonworking areas during nonwork time is 

presumptively invalid. See NLRB v. Transcon Lines, 599 

F.2d 719, 722 (5th Cir. 1979). The Board still adequately 

protects the employer’s management interests by maintaining 

the special circumstance exception available to employers for 

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non-work areas.1 DHL’s argument that the Board was 

required to conduct a balancing of its property interests 

against its employees’ organizational interests is inapt. See 

Hudgens, 424 U.S. at 521 n.10. The company ignores the 

differences between employees and strangers and fails to 

distinguish property rights from managerial rights. DHL thus 

misapprehends the critical point: while the Company may be 

able to dictate the terms of access to strangers, contractors, 

and other business invitees, “no restriction may be placed on 

the employees’ right to discuss self-organization among 

themselves, unless the employer can demonstrate that a 

restriction is necessary to maintain production or discipline.” 

Lechmere, Inc., 502 U.S. at 533. 

C. Deference

In an attempt to escape the high level of deference 

accorded to agency action, DHL also claims the Board’s 

mixed-use presumption is “arbitrary” and “conflicts with 

Supreme Court precedent.” As discussed above, these 

arguments are likely precluded because DHL failed to 

squarely raise them before the Board. But to the extent DHL 

 1 For example, in Beth Israel Hospital v. NLRB, the Supreme Court 

considered whether two industry-specific presumptions put forth by the 

Board were rational. The Board found that rules prohibiting solicitation in 

the dining areas of public restaurants were presumptively lawful “because 

solicitation has the tendency to upset patrons,” while also holding that 

prohibiting solicitation in the cafeteria of a hospital was unlawful “absent 

evidence that nonemployee patrons would be upset.” Beth Israel, 437 

U.S. at 505-06. The Court approvingly noted that “the Board [had] 

concluded that these rules struck the appropriate balance between 

organizational and employer rights in the particular industry to which each 

is applicable.” Id. at 506. Similarly, in this context, the Board has 

concluded that mixed-use areas should not be subject to prohibitions on 

distribution unless the employer offers evidence of special circumstances. 

This conclusion does not conflict with Republic Aviation or any other 

Supreme Court precedent. 

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is challenging the “heightened” presumption purportedly 

employed by the ALJ — that any area not “exclusively”

devoted to work must be considered a mixed-use area — we 

consider and reject that challenge below.

Because Congress has given the Board such broad 

discretion, the Court must “uphold [the] Board rule as long as 

it is rational and consistent with the Act, even if we would 

have formulated a different rule had we sat on the Board.” 

NLRB v. Curtin Matheson Scientific, Inc., 494 U.S. 775, 787 

(1990) (citation omitted). The Board has for decades — with 

court approval — found areas in which minimal or solely 

incidental work is conducted are to be considered “mixeduse” areas in which a prohibition on distribution during nonwork time has to be justified by special circumstances. See, 

e.g., United Parcel Serv., 327 N.L.R.B. 317 (1998), aff’d, 228 

F.3d 772 (6th Cir. 2000); Transcon Lines, 235 N.L.R.B. 1163, 

1165 (1978), aff’d, 599 F.2d 719 (5th Cir. 1979); Rockingham 

Sleepwear, 188 N.L.R.B. 698, 701 (1971). Moreover, the 

Board has adequately explained the (rather obvious) reasons 

for applying the same presumption to mixed-use areas as to 

non-work areas: “[i]t is the main production area of an 

employer’s facility where the hazards of littering and 

maintaining order are paramount over employee distribution 

of literature” such that employee distribution in these mixeduse areas “does not infringe” on the employer’s interests in 

“conducting an orderly nonhazardous workplace.” Found.

Coal West, Inc., 352 N.L.R.B. 147, 150 (2008); cf. Patio 

Foods v. NLRB, 415 F.2d 1001, 1003 (5th Cir. 1969) (“[T]he 

implicit holding of these cases is that an employer’s 

legitimate interest in keeping his employees’ work stations 

free of the disruptive influence of handbilling justifies the 

prohibition of union literature distribution in work areas 

where employees are, in fact, working.”). 

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This presumption necessarily incorporates a balancing of 

employer and employee interests, and no court precedent 

prevented the Board from reasonably concluding the balance 

should be the same for non-work and mixed-use areas. Here, 

the ALJ and the Board applied this longstanding presumption 

to DHL’s hallway, without modification. Although DHL 

fixates on the ALJ’s finding that “the hallway is not 

exclusively a work area,” JA 96, neither the ALJ nor the 

Board has heightened the standard for employers — a 

miniscule amount of nonwork will not now convert a work 

area into a “mixed use” area. An examination of the ALJ 

opinion, adopted by the Board, shows the ALJ carefully 

considered the type, duration, and frequency of work and 

nonwork occurring in the hallway prior to concluding that it 

should be considered a “mixed-use” area. See JA 96-98. 

Although DHL is alarmed by the “exclusivity” language 

employed by the ALJ, the record demonstrates that he was 

simply responding to the Company’s argument that the 

hallway was a work area by stating all the reasons he could 

not find it to be exclusively so. See id. This analysis 

ultimately amounts to a run-of-the-mill application of the

Board’s traditional mixed-use framework.

While DHL may not agree with the underlying 

presumption, “it is to the Board that Congress entrusted the 

task of applying the Act’s general prohibitory language in 

light of the infinite combinations of events which might be 

charged as violative of its terms.” Beth Israel, 437 U.S. at 

500-01. Moreover, the Board’s mixed-use presumption is 

quite reasonable: it provides predictability for employers and 

employees, it includes a “special circumstances” exception for 

employers, and DHL’s only proffered alternative is treating 

mixed-use areas, where very little work occurs, as equivalent 

to work areas — an outcome that “overcompensate[s] its 

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goals and give[s] too little weight to employee organizational 

interests.” Id. at 501. 

D. Substantial Evidence

Having failed on its broader challenge to the mixed-use 

presumption, DHL still contends that the Board’s finding that 

the hallway constituted a “mixed-use” area was not supported 

by substantial evidence. This court “must uphold the ALJ’s 

findings of fact if substantial evidence exists in the record 

when viewed as a whole, to support them.” United Parcel 

Serv., 228 F.3d at 776; see also Universal Camera Corp., 340 

U.S. 474, 477 (1951). “Evidence is considered substantial if 

it is adequate, in a reasonable mind, to uphold the decision.” 

Roadway Express, Inc. v. NLRB, 831 F.2d 1285, 1289 (6th 

Cir. 1987). Here, both the ALJ’s findings and the Board’s 

decision were supported by substantial evidence. 

The Board has “long held that merely because a work 

function or functions occur in a given space does not render 

that space a ‘work area’ within the meaning of the Board’s 

rules regarding distribution. Rather, the Board has looked at 

the quality and quantity of work, which occurs in the area at 

issue, and examine[d] whether the work is more than de 

minimus and whether it involves production.” Brockton 

Hospital, 333 N.L.R.B 1367, 1375 (2001). To constitute a 

work area, “the area must be integral, not merely incidental, 

to the employer’s main function.” Meijer, Inc., 344 N.L.R.B.

916, 923 (2005) (emphasis added); see also U.S. Steel Corp., 

223 N.L.R.B. 1246, 1247-48 (1976) (“Respondent’s 

contention that all its property is a work area is a contention 

that can be asserted by every company, thus effectively 

destroying the right of employees to distribute literature. 

Some work tasks, whether it be cleaning up, maintenance, or 

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other incidental work, are performed at some time in almost 

every area of every company.”). 

Board precedent on this issue is instructive: for example, 

in Santa Fe Hotel, the Board identified “the main function of 

the Respondent’s hotel-casino [as] to lodge people and permit 

them to gamble.” Santa Fe Hotel, 331 N.L.R.B. 723, 723 

(2000). Thus, the work activity — “security, maintenance, 

and gardening” — asserted by Respondent to occur at the 

facility entrance was merely incidental to its main function. 

See id. Other cases have followed the same line of analysis.

In Saisa Motor Freight, the Board designated a break room as 

a “mixed-use area” because it was an area “where employees 

may take breaks and eat” but also “where line haul and city 

drivers receive[d] papers from dispatchers and turn[ed] in 

documents at the end of a trip.” 333 N.L.R.B. 929 (2001); see 

also Transcon Lines, 599 F.2d at 721 (holding the Board’s 

mixed-use designation to be supported by substantial 

evidence because the drivers’ room was an area where 

employees could relax, drink coffee or eat snacks, and 

converse freely even though some work was occasionally 

conducted there); United Parcel Serv., 228 F.3d at 777 

(upholding designation of check-in area as “mixed-use” 

because that area “transformed into a congregation point for 

the drivers to drink coffee, read magazines and newspapers, 

and converse before their morning shift”). 

The Board’s analysis of another hallway in Foundation 

Coal is particularly illuminating.

2

 As in this case, the hallway 

there served as a place for employees to congregate, to view 

the bulletin boards, and to use communal goods like the 

 2 Only two Board members decided Foundation Coal; the Board therefore 

found it unnecessary to rely on that precedent when deciding this case. 

DHL Express, Inc., 357 N.L.R.B. No. 145 at 1 n.1 (2011). Regardless, the 

logic of Foundation Coal is instructive here. 

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company microwave and coffeemaker. See 352 N.L.R.B. at 

148 (“There is no dispute that employees use the hallway to 

socialize with coworkers before, during, and after work.”). 

Some work also took place in the hallway, namely dispatchers 

relaying new assignments to employees and human resource 

employees discussing safety and other issues with employees. 

Id. at 148-49. But the Board identified the employer’s main 

function as “the digging, removal, sorting, and distribution of 

coal” and noted that “[t]his work is done primarily in the Pit 

and loading areas of Respondent’s . . . mine.” Id. at 150. 

Because of this, the Board concluded that “[a]t best the 

hallway is a mixed use area where both socializing and 

nonproduction work, incidental to Respondent’s main 

function, the production of coal, take place. Employee 

distribution of written materials in the hallway does not 

infringe on Respondent’s interests in conducting an orderly 

nonhazardous workplace for the mining of coal.” Id. 

So too with DHL’s hallway: there is no question 

employees often congregate and socialize in the hallway. The 

hallway features televisions, where employees can watch for 

weather and company updates, computer stations for checking 

benefits information and personal email, and areas for 

employees to use their personal cellphones. Moreover, DHL 

has allowed the hallway to be used for various fairs, charity 

drives, raffles, and the sale of merchandise. The main 

function of DHL is the sorting and transfer of packages; this 

activity takes place in the sorting facility — not the hallway. 

Even though incidental work (like the carrying of packages 

and company tours) occasionally occurs in the hallway, the 

ALJ and the Board were justified in designating it as a “mixed 

use” area. 

None of the cases relied on by DHL undercut this 

determination; “[t]he facts in those cases differ substantially 

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from the facts at issue here . . . . Those cases dealt with areas 

still retaining the characteristics of a work area but where 

non-working employees happened to be found . . . .” United 

Parcel Serv., 228 F.3d at 777 (discussing the same cases DHL 

relies on in its briefing). DHL’s contention that it provides 

alternative areas for organizational activities is also irrelevant. 

See id. at 778 (“[T]he NLRB has expressly found that a 

company may not prohibit the distribution of union literature 

in a mixed-use area, even though other non-work areas 

existed in the building”); Beth Israel Hosp., 437 U.S. at 505 

(“[O]utside of the health-care context, the availability of 

alternative means of communication is not, with respect to 

employee organizational activity, a necessary inquiry . . . .”). 

The Board’s mixed-use determination is therefore supported 

by substantial evidence on the record as a whole. 

E. Special Circumstances

Even when the Board finds an employer’s prohibition is 

invalid, it is still “necessary to examine whether there are 

‘special circumstances’ present which rebut the presumption 

of invalidity.” U.S. Steel Corp., 223 N.L.R.B. 1246, 1248 

(1976). “Special circumstances” in this context means 

“problems associated with distribution which go beyond the 

normal problems of litter and production efficiency which the 

Board took into account in that case when it granted 

employers the additional limitation of banning distributions 

from work areas.” Id. 

DHL’s facility is located on the grounds of an airport, 

and so the company must comply with several sets of federal 

safety and security regulations. Its security checkpoint for 

employees entering and exiting the building is located at one 

end of the hallway. DHL thus asserts that its security and 

safety concerns constitute “special circumstances” sufficient 

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to support a prohibition on the distribution of union literature 

in the hallway. 

DHL need “show only a likelihood of, not actual, 

disruption or disturbance.” Brockton Hosp. v. NLRB, 294 

F.3d 100, 104 (D.C. Cir. 2002). And at least one court has 

previously admonished the Board for failing to give due 

consideration to an employer’s safety and security concerns. 

In McDonnell Douglas Corp., the Eighth Circuit held that 

“when . . . an employer makes a credible showing of special 

justifying circumstances, . . . the Board in weighing that 

evidence must responsibly and in a meaningful way consider 

the importance of the proffered justification.” 472 F.2d 539, 

545 (8th Cir. 1973). The employer in that case was “engaged 

in highly sophisticated operations in manufacturing aircraft, 

missiles, space vehicles, and military airplanes,” and the court 

found that the Board gave too little weight to the employer’s 

“security problems.” Id. at 545-47. 

The special circumstances question is a closer call here 

than whether the hallway is a mixed-use area. But the ALJ 

evaluated the specific argument put forward by DHL and 

concluded that, “[w]ith respect to security concerns, [a 

company director] testified that the employees did not break 

any Transportation Security Administration (TSA) policies or 

guidelines when distributing union literature in the hallway 

area, and [the human resource manager] testified that 

employees were not hindered in there [sic] ingress or egress 

from the facility.” JA 27. The security concerns at DHL, 

while arguably above the norm, do not rise to the level of 

those in McDonnell Douglas where the employer was 

engaged in classified military work. Moreover, DHL was 

unable to point to any instance in which the distribution of 

union literature had in fact clogged the hallways, endangered 

other employees, or violated any security regulations. At oral 

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argument, DHL’s counsel seemed somewhat ambivalent on 

this point. The Company could offer no specific evidence of 

disruption, instead arguing that its description of the security 

challenges should have been sufficient. But the Board has 

consistently held that the employer must point to “some 

specific evidence of unusual circumstances.” Meijer, 436 

F.3d at 545. Also, DHL’s own contention that “[p]ermitting 

activities in the hallway that require employees to stop, even 

for a moment, [will] impede the progress of the throng of 

employees coming down the hallway, causing the hallway to 

become congested and creating the potential for a back-up,” 

JA 40, is undermined by its allowance of so many other 

activities in the hallway — such as the use of cellphones and 

computers, socialization of employees, and even solicitation 

by a different union — none of which appear to have caused 

any safety or security problems. 

Given the absence of evidence that discipline, production,

or security had been adversely affected, the Board’s

determination was supported by substantial evidence on the 

record as a whole. 

F. Burden of Proof

Finally, DHL contends the Board improperly saddled it 

with the burden of proving that one or more on-duty 

employees received union literature, when the General 

Counsel bears the burden of proof with respect to employees 

being off-duty. As the Board held in Stoddard-Quirk, an 

unfair labor practice occurs when an employer prevents 

employees from distributing union literature in non-work (or 

mixed-use) areas during non-work time. See Stoddard-Quirk

Mfg. Co., 138 N.L.R.B. 615 (1962). And it is, of course, the 

General Counsel who “carries the burden of proving the 

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elements of an unfair labor practice.” NLRB v. Transp. Mgmt.

Corp., 462 U.S. 393, 401 (1983). 

Here, both sides agree the employees distributing the 

literature were off-duty. JA 80-81, 101. And no evidence 

was adduced that these employees distributed literature to 

anyone who was on duty. See id. Board precedent, including 

court-approved precedent, does not seem to require the 

General Counsel to prove each and every employee who 

received the literature was off-duty. See Transcon Lines, 599 

F.2d at 722 (“The employer urges that the Board’s proof 

failed because it was not shown that at the moment Brown 

handed out literature to other drivers . . . he was on non-work 

time, and that the precise moment each other driver was 

handed a piece of literature . . . he was in non-work status as 

well. The employer’s argument is specious with respect to 

Brown . . . [and] with respect to drivers who were handed 

pieces of literature, the precise nicety of proof hypothesized 

by the employer was not required.”). 

Obviously the employer is in a much better position to 

demonstrate that on-duty employees received the literature, 

and the Board has consistently looked to see whether any such 

evidence was adduced. See, e.g., Oak Apparel, Inc., 218 

N.L.R.B. 701, 702 n.7 (1975) (“In any event, there is no 

evidence that leaflets were distributed to any employees who 

were working . . . .”). Moreover, even if some on-duty 

employees received the distribution, some off-duty employees 

undoubtedly were prevented from receiving this literature 

because DHL repeatedly curtailed the distribution. Board 

precedent and common sense dictate that the General Counsel 

was not required to prove that every single employee who 

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received APWU’s literature was off-duty.3 Rather, DHL had 

the option to demonstrate the contrary and failed to do so. 

Under the circumstances, we are satisfied that the General 

Counsel proved the unfair labor practice, regardless of 

whether some employees who received the distribution were 

on the clock. 

Conclusion

Substantial evidence exists on this record to support the 

Board’s findings of fact and because we find no errors of law 

in the Board’s decision, we deny the petition for review and 

grant the Board’s application for enforcement. 

 3 While not on precisely this point, the Sixth Circuit’s discussion in United 

Parcel Service is instructive: “UPS contends that the NLRB impermissibly 

shifted the burden of proof to UPS on this issue, since no UPS supervisor 

admitted to seeing the drivers pass around newspapers or other reading 

materials. And, several managers testified that they threw away any 

reading materials if they happened to see them in the check-in area after 

the drivers had left. The ALJ pointed out, though, that there was also no 

evidence that UPS ‘posted any warning notices, gave verbal warnings, or 

otherwise informed employees that the newspapers and magazines were 

being discarded pursuant to the no-distribution rule.’ The ALJ inferred 

that the supervisors knew about the sharing of reading materials in the area 

since there was evidence that the supervisors routinely mingled with 

drivers while such distributions took place. Thus, this is not a matter of 

shifting the burden of proof. It is merely a matter of whether the Court 

finds the ALJ’s inference to be reasonable.” 228 F.3d at 778 (emphasis 

added). 

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