Opinion ID: 448863
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Meyers Test

Text: 29 The Board announced in this case that, [i]n general, to find an employee's activity to be 'concerted,' we shall require that it be engaged in with or on the authority of other employees, and not solely by and on behalf of the employee himself. 47 As counsel for the Board confirmed at oral argument, this test in effect requires that two or more employees join in or authorize conduct before activity can be concerted under section 7. 30 The Board's decisions since Meyers indicate that the new definition will be strictly construed to include only activity clearly joined in or endorsed by other employees. Thus, to find that a complaint by an individual employee was made on behalf of others, the Board in effect will require that the complaint have been specifically authorized by other employees. 48 Further, a single employee who files a complaint with a state agency will not be held to have engaged in concerted activities, regardless of how clearly his concern is shared by other employees. 49 31 The Board's opinion reveals that it believed its present construction of concerted activities both to be required by the NLRA and to be a return to standards used by the courts as well as by the Board itself before Alleluia. Although it conceded that the legislative history of Section 7 does not specifically define 'concerted activity,'  the Board maintained that it does reveal that Congress considered the concept in terms of individuals united in pursuit of a common goal. 50 The Board argued that a similar interpretation emerged from an analysis of the language of section 7. 51 The Board then reviewed its pre-Alleluia decisions to show that, [c]onsistent with this interpretation, they had required some sort of group action to be present in order to find conduct to be concerted under section 7. 52 The opinion criticized Alleluia for deviating from this norm, and observed that the Board's post-Alleluia decisions had been rejected by the courts of appeals. 53 The Board concluded: 32 For all the foregoing reasons, we are persuaded that the [Alleluia ] per se standard of concerted activity ... is at odds with the Act. The Board and courts always considered, first, whether the activity is [actually] concerted, and only then, whether it is protected. This approach is mandated by the statute itself, which requires that an activity be both concerted and protected. A Board finding that a particular form of individual activity warrants group support is not a sufficient basis for labeling that activity concerted within the meaning of Section 7. 33