Opinion ID: 405327
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Appropriateness of the Bargaining Order Remedy

Text: 42 The final prerequisite to the issuance of a bargaining order-i.e., the finding that, due to the employer's serious and pervasive unfair labor practices, the possibility of ensuring a fair election is slight and employee sentiment would, on balance, be better protected by a bargaining order-is a determination largely within the special competence of the Board. The Supreme Court noted in Gissel that: 43 It is for the Board and not the courts ... to make that determination, based on its expert estimate as to the effects on the election process of unfair labor practices of varying intensity. In fashioning its remedies ..., the Board draws on a fund of knowledge and expertise all its own, and its choice of remedy must therefore be given special respect by reviewing courts. 44 NLRB v. Gissel Packing Co., 395 U.S. 575, 612 n.32, 89 S.Ct. 1918, 1939 n.32, 23 L.Ed.2d 547 (1969). See also Pedro's, Inc. v. NLRB, 652 F.2d 1005, 1011-12 (D.C.Cir.1981) (remanding case for determination of appropriate remedy after rejecting one unfair labor practice finding). 45 In the present case we cannot say that the Board abused its remedial discretion. First, the litany of unfair labor practices supports the Board's conclusion that almost from the moment it learned of its employees' support for the Union, (the Company) embarked on an unlawful course of conduct designed to stifle further union activity. John Cuneo, Inc., 253 N.L.R.B. at 1027; see Part II supra. Second, the Board properly considered the relatively small size of the bargaining unit. While the effect of the Company's conduct arguably might have been diluted if it had involved only a small number of employees in a large bargaining unit, the anti-union conduct in this case was highly magnified in a unit limited to fourteen persons. See, e.g., Ann Lee Sportswear, Inc. v. NLRB, 543 F.2d 739, 744 (10th Cir. 1976) (twenty-employee bargaining unit); NLRB v. Scoler's Inc., 466 F.2d 1289, 1291 (2d Cir. 1972) (interrogation of six employees out of nineteen in bargaining unit). Moreover, a majority of the Company's employees was subject to one or more serious unfair labor practices. Cf. NLRB v. Kostel Corp., 440 F.2d 347, 352 (7th Cir. 1971) (threats and interrogations involving three employees in a bargaining unit of five). 46 We therefore uphold the Board's bargaining order. As this court has previously noted: Gissel does not require a finding that no other remedy could suffice, only that the bargaining order better protects employees' expressed union preference. Amalgamated Clothing Workers v. NLRB, 527 F.2d 803, 807 (D.C.Cir.1975), cert. denied, 426 U.S. 907, 96 S.Ct. 2229, 48 L.Ed.2d 832 (1976). That standard is met here, given the Union's valid card majority in an appropriate bargaining unit and the Company's serious and pervasive unfair labor practices.