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SCOFIELD V. NLRB, 394 U. S. 423 (1969)
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1. Petition for certiorari in this case, filed within 90 days of the decree but not of the opinion, where no notice of entry of any judgment at time of the opinion had been given petitioners, was timely. P. 394 U. S. 427.
2. Section 8(b)(1) of the NLRA permits a union to enforce a properly adopted rule which reflects a legitimate union interest, impairs no statutory labor policy, and is reasonably enforced against union members who are free to leave the union and escape the rule, while maintaining job security under the union shop clause by paying dues. NLRB v. Allis-Chalmers Mfg. Co., 388 U. S. 175. Pp. 394 U. S. 428-430.
3. Arguments that the union rule in this case contravened a statutory labor policy were inadequate here. That rule did not demonstrably impede the collective bargaining process, cause a breach of the collective bargaining agreement, establish featherbedding within the meaning of the statute, induce discrimination by the employer against any class of employees, or represent any dereliction by the union of its duty of fair representation, and, in view of the acceptable manner of its enforcement by reasonable chanrobles.com-red
fines to vindicate a proper union concern it does not constitute the restraint or coercion prohibited by § 8(b)(1)(A). Pp. 394 U. S. 430-436.
Half the production employees of the Wisconsin Motor Corporation are paid on a piecework or incentive basis. They and the other employees are represented by respondent union, which has had contractual relations with the company since 1937. [Footnote 1] In 1938, the union initiated a ceiling on the production for which its members would accept immediate piecework pay. This was done at first by gentlemen's agreement among the members, but, since 1944, by union rule enforceable by fines and expulsion. As the rule functions now, members may produce as much as they like each day, but may only draw pay up to the ceiling rate. The additional production is "banked" by the company; that is, wages due for it are retained by the company and paid out to the employee for days on which the production ceiling has not been chanrobles.com-red
"the average competent operator working at a reasonable pace [as determined by a time study] shall earn not less than the machine rate of his assigned task. [Footnote 2]"
Allowances are made in the time study for setting up machinery, cleaning tools, fatigue, and personal needs. By ignoring these allowances or by speed and efficiency it is possible for an industrious employee to produce faster than the machine rate. If he does so, he is entitled to additional pay. Union members, however, are subject to the banking procedures imposed by the union rule. chanrobles.com-red
The margin between the "machine" rate set by the contract and the ceiling rate set by the union was 10¢ per hour in 1944. As a result of collective bargaining between company and union over both the machine and ceiling rates, the margin has been increased to between 45¢ and 50¢, depending on the skill level of the job. The company has regularly urged the union to abandon the ceiling, and has never agreed to refuse employees immediate pay for work done over the ceiling. However, the parties have bargained over the ceiling, rate and the company has extracted from the union promises to increase the ceiling rate. The company opens its work records to the union to permit it to check compliance with the ceiling; pays union stewards for time spent in this checking activity as legitimate union business, and banks money for union members complying with the rule. The ceiling rate is also used in computing piece rate increases and in settling grievances.
This case arose in 1961, when a random card check by the union showed that petitioners, among other union members, had exceeded the ceiling. The union membership imposed fines of $50 to $100, and a year's suspension from the union. Petitioners refused to pay the fines, and the union brought suit in state court to collect the fines as a matter of local contract law. [Footnote 3] Petitioners then initiated charges before the National Labor Relations Board, arguing that union enforcement of its rule through the collection of fines was an unfair labor practice. Petitioners asserted that their right to refrain chanrobles.com-red
In our view, the petition for certiorari was timely filed. Petitioners here received a copy of the March 5 opinion, but were given no notice of any entry of judgment on that date, as would be required by Rule 36 of the new Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure, effective July 1, 1968. Since no notice was given and it could not have been clear to petitioners whether there was a March 5 judgment or not, we hold, without abandoning the standard that a "judgment for our purposes is final when the issues are adjudged" and settled with finality, Market Street R. Co. v. Railroad Commission, 324 U. S. 548, 324 U. S. 551-552 (1945); FTC v. Minneapolis-Honeywell Regulator Co., 344 U. S. 206, 344 U. S. 212 (1952), that, in this case, the relevant date is that of the entry of the decree. @Cf. 73 U. S. 156 (1868). chanrobles.com-red
Based on the legislative history of the section, including its proviso, the Court in NLRB v. Allis-Chalmers Mfg. Co., 388 U. S. 175, 388 U. S. 195 (1967), distinguished between internal and external enforcement of union rules and held that
A union rule, duly adopted and not the arbitrary fiat of a union officer, forbidding the crossing of a picket line during a strike was therefore enforceable against voluntary union members by expulsion or a reasonable fine. The Court thus essentially accepted the position of the National Labor Relations Board dating from Minneapolis Star & Tribune Co., 109 N.L.R.B. 727 (1954), where the Board also distinguished internal from external enforcement [Footnote 4] in holding that a union could fine a member for his failure to take part in picketing during a strike but that the same rule could not be enforced by causing the employer to exclude him from the workforce or by affecting his seniority without triggering violations of §§ 8(b)(1), 8(b)(2), 8(a)(1), 8(a)(2), and 8(a)(3). These sections chanrobles.com-red
form a web, of which § 8(b)(1)(A) is only a strand, preventing the union from inducing the employer to use the emoluments of the job to enforce the union's rules. [Footnote 5]
This interpretation of § 8(b)(1), as the Court explained in Allis-Chalmers, 388 U.S. at 388 U. S. 193-195, was reinforced by the Landrum-Griffin Act of 1959 which, although it dealt with the internal affairs of unions, including the procedures for imposing fines or expulsion, did not purport to overturn or modify the Board's interpretation of § 8(b)(1). [Footnote 6] And it was this interpretation which the Board followed in Allis-Chalmers and in the case now before us.
Although the Board's construction of the section emphasizes the sanction imposed, rather than the rule itself, and does not involve the Board in judging the fairness or wisdom of particular union rules, it has become clear that, if the rule invades or frustrates an overriding policy of the labor laws, the rule may not be enforced, even by fine or expulsion, without violating § 8(b)(1). In both chanrobles.com-red
Skura [Footnote 7] and Marine Workers, [Footnote 8] the Board was concerned with union rules requiring a member to exhaust union remedies before filing an unfair labor practice charge with the Board. That rule, in the Board's view, frustrated the enforcement scheme established by the statute and the union would commit an unfair labor practice by fining or expelling members who violated the rule.
The Marine Workers case came here [Footnote 9] and the result reached by the Board was sustained, the Court agreeing that the rule in question was contrary to the plain policy of the Act to keep employees completely free from coercion against making complaints to the Board. Frustrating this policy was beyond the legitimate interest of the labor organization, at least where the member's complaint concerned conduct of the employer as well as the union.
In the case at hand, there is no showing in the record that the fines were unreasonable or the mere fiat of a union leader, or that the membership of petitioners in the union was involuntary. Moreover, the enforcement of the rule was not carried out through means unacceptable in themselves, such as violence or employer discrimination. chanrobles.com-red
It is doubtless true that the union rule in question here affects the interests of all three participants in the labor-management relation: employer, employee, and union. [Footnote 10] chanrobles.com-red
The principal contention of the petitioners is that the rule impedes collective bargaining, a process nurtured in many ways by the Act. But surely this is not the case here. The union has never denied that the ceiling is a bargainable issue. It has never refused to bargain about it as far as this record shows. Indeed, the union has at various times agreed to raise its ceiling in return for an increase in the piece rate, and the ceiling has been regularly used to compute the new piece rate. In light of this bargaining history, it can hardly be said that the union rule has removed this issue from the bargaining table. The company has repeatedly sought an agreement eliminating the piecework ceiling, an agreement which, had it been obtained, unquestionably would have been violated by the union rule. But the company could not attain this. Although, like the union, it could have pressed the point to impasse, Fibreboard Paper Products Corp. v. National Labor Relations Board, 379 U. S. 203, 379 U. S. 209-215 (1964), followed by strike or lockout, it has never done so. Instead, it has signed contracts recognizing the chanrobles.com-red
ceiling, has tolerated it, and has cooperated in its administration by honoring requests by employees to bank their pay for over-ceiling work. We discern no basis in the statutory policy encouraging collective bargaining for giving the employer a better bargain than he has been able to strike at the bargaining table. [Footnote 11]
Nor does the union ceiling itself or compliance with it by union members violate the collective contract. The company and the union have agreed to an incentive pay scale, but they have also established a guaranteed minimum or machine rate considerably below the union ceiling and defined in the contract as the rate of production of an average, efficient worker. The contract therefore leaves in the hands of the employee the option of taking full advantage of his allowances, performing only as an average employee and not reaching even the ceiling rate. At least there is nothing before us to indicate that the company disciplines individuals who work at only the machine rate or individuals who produce more but who choose not to exceed the union ceiling. The same decision can be made collectively by the union. Although it has agreed in the contract to a pay scale for production in excess of ceiling, that fact, in the context of this case, does not support an inference that the union has agreed not to impose the ceiling or that its action in announcing one is somehow contrary to the contract. And if neither union nor member is in breach of contract for establishing and adhering to the ceiling, it is equally clear that the rule neither causes nor invites a contract violation by the employer who stands ready to pay an employee for his over-ceiling production or to bank it at his request. chanrobles.com-red
61 Stat. 142, 29 U.S.C. § 158(b)(6). This narrow prohibition was enacted partly because the Congress found it difficult to define with more particularity just where the area between shiftlessness and overwork should lie. [Footnote 12] Since Congress has addressed itself to the problem specifically and left a broad area for private negotiation, there is no present occasion for the courts to interfere with private decision. Indeed, there is no claim before us that the rule violates § 8(b)(6). If the company wants to require more work of its employees, let it strike a better bargain. The labor laws as presently drawn will not do so for it.
This leaves the possible argument that, because the union has not successfully bargained for a contractual ceiling, it may not impose one on its own members, for doing so will discriminate between members and those chanrobles.com-red
That the choice to remain a member results in differences between union members and other employees raises no serious issue under § 8(b)(2) and § 8(a)(3) of the Act, because the union has not induced the employer to discriminate against the member, but has merely forbidden the member to take advantage of benefits which the employer stands willing to confer. Those sections are not aimed at completely internal union discipline of union members, even though the discipline chanrobles.com-red
The Court has held that the "policy of the Act is to insulate employees' jobs from their organizational rights." Radio Officers' Union v.National Labor Relations Board, 347 U. S. 17, 347 U. S. 40 (1954). As an employee, he may be a "good, bad, or indifferent" member so long as he meets the financial obligations of the union security contract. Thus, the Board has found an unfair labor practice by union and employer where an employee was discharged for violation of a union rule limiting production. Printz Leather Co., 94 N.L.R.B. 1312 (1951). But as a union member, so long as he chooses to remain one, he is subject to union discipline.
"Provided, That nothing herein shall be construed to impair the right of a labor organization to adopt and enforce reasonable rules as to the responsibility of every member toward the organization as an institution and to his refraining from conduct that would interfere with its performance of its legal or contractual obligations."
Because the union members collected from their employer extra pay for piecework production in excess of that agreed upon by the union and the company, the union has tried the members, fined them, and suspended them from the union for one year. Section 8(b)(1) of the National Labor Relations Act makes it an unfair labor practice for a union to "restrain or coerce" employees in the exercise of their right under § 7 to refrain from any or all concerted activities. In this case, the National Labor Relations Board held that the union did not commit an unfair labor practice in coercing employees through fines and suspensions into refusing to engage in this concerted activity. I dissent from affirming this order of the Board for the reasons set out at length in my dissenting opinion in NLRB v. Allis-Chalmers Mfg. Co., 388 U. S. 175, 388 U. S. 199 (1967).