Opinion ID: 2994613
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Union Authorization Cards

Text: On March 13, 1995, ACE/CO distributed a memorandum in which it requested employees to inform their supervisors when they were approached by someone and asked to sign a union authorization card. Specifically, the memorandum said If anyone puts you under pressure to sign a union card, tell your supervisor and we’ll take every legal step to see that the union stops. This was, of course, after the contested election and during the time when the possibility of a new election was recognized by everyone. ACE/CO witnesses testified that the company had received reports that certain employees had been threatened and pressured, and that this was a protective measure. Requests from an employer to report threats to employees are not unlawful, as the ALJ acknowledged. See Liberty House Nursing Homes, 245 NLRB 1194, 1197 (1979). But threats (which had been addressed by an earlier February 2 memorandum) and pressure are two different things, in spite of ACE/CO’s efforts to conflate them here. A management witness testified that one employee complained that he felt pressured because the Union had visited his home 13 times, but the witness admitted that the employee never said that he felt threatened. The ALJ and the Board found that the March 13 statement violated section 8(a)(1), because it encouraged employees to report union activity that is protected by the Act. Such reporting, or the risk of it, has the effect of discouraging the employees from engaging in protected activity. C.O.W. Indus., Inc., 276 NLRB 960, 961 (1985). ACE/CO’s only response to this claim is to urge that its intention in distributing the leaflet was to impress upon its employees the significance of the authorization card and to address possible coercion of its employees. But its intent or purpose is irrelevant under section 8(a)(1) of the Act. See Carry Companies of Illinois, Inc. v. NLRB, 30 F.3d 922, 934 (7th Cir. 1994). Because the Board’s finding that the memorandum was used to learn the identity of union adherents in violation of the Act is supported by substantial evidence, it too is entitled to enforcement.