Opinion ID: 783630
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Legal Standards Regarding Solicitation and/or Distribution Rights Under Section 7 of the Act

Text: 17 Section 7 of the Act guarantees employees the right to self-organization, to form, join, or assist labor organizations. 29 U.S.C. § 157. Section 8(a)(1) makes it an unfair labor practice for any employer to interfere with, restrain, or coerce employees in the exercise of the rights guaranteed in [Section 7]. 29 U.S.C. § 158(a)(1). 18 The organizational solicitation and/or distribution rights under Section 7 of off-duty offsite employees — that is, employees of a single company who engage in organizational activity at a company facility other than that to which they have been assigned to work — is an issue upon which the NLRB has spoken but not one upon which the Supreme Court has spoken. In addition, while the District of Columbia Circuit not long ago had the issue of what, if any, Section 7 rights off-site employees enjoy, the D.C. Circuit declined to speak affirmatively on the matter, but instead remanded the matter back to the Board for further determination. In other words, an issue of first impression is before this Court upon which there is little said directly on point in the relevant jurisprudence. As a result, we shall paint the legal landscape surrounding the matter with a broad brush so as to allow for proper consideration of the issue. 19 To begin, it has been black-letter law for nearly fifty years that the Board cannot order employers to grant non-employee union organizers access to company property absent a showing that onsite employees are otherwise inaccessible through reasonable efforts. NLRB v. Babcock & Wilcox Co., 351 U.S. 105, 112, 76 S.Ct. 679, 100 L.Ed. 975 (1956); see also Lechmere, Inc. v. NLRB, 502 U.S. 527, 534, 112 S.Ct. 841, 117 L.Ed.2d 79 (1992). 20 In Tri-County Medical Center, Inc. v. District 1199, 222 N.L.R.B. 1089, 1976 WL 7839 (1976), the Board considered the issue of whether it could prevent employers from denying off-duty employees access to outside non-working areas of the facility at which they were employed for purposes of exercising Section 7 rights. The Board found that it had authority under Section 8(a)(1) of the Act to prevent employers from denying off-duty onsite employees access to parking lots, gates, and other outside non-working areas for purposes of exercising Section 7 rights, unless the employer had justified business reasons for doing so. Id. This Court affirmed the Board's application of the Tri-County test to invalidate a no-access policy applied to off-duty onsite employees in NLRB v. Ohio Masonic Home, 892 F.2d 449, 453 (6th Cir.1989). 21 In Southern California Gas Co., 321 N.L.R.B. 551, 1996 WL 345762 (1996), and U.S. Postal Service, 318 N.L.R.B. 466, 1995 WL 506875 (1995), the Board applied the rule of Tri-County in finding that it had authority under Section 8(a)(1) to prevent an employer from denying visiting off-site employees access to outside non-working areas of the employer's property for the purpose of exercising Section 7 rights. The Board followed Southern California Gas Co. and Postal Service in deciding ITT Industries, Inc., 331 N.L.R.B. 7, 2000 WL 617063 (2000), thus preventing the employer in that case from denying off-duty offsite employees who were seeking to exercise their organizational rights access to outside non-working areas. 22 The employer in ITT Industries, Inc., ITT Automotive (ITT), petitioned the District of Columbia Court of Appeals for review, and the Board cross-petitioned for enforcement of the Board's decision. See ITT Indus., Inc. v. NLRB, 251 F.3d 995, 996 (D.C.Cir.2001). The D.C. Circuit denied ITT's petition for review of an issue not relevant here, but vacated the Board's determination that ITT committed an unfair labor practice by applying its no-access policy to offsite employees seeking to distribute pro-union handbills and solicit signatures for the union organizing petition, and remanded the matter to the Board for further proceedings consistent with the court's opinion. Id. at 1006-007. In doing so, the court began by noting that under Chevron U.S.A. Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 467 U.S. 837, 842-43, 104 S.Ct. 2778, 81 L.Ed.2d 694 (1984), the NLRB is entitled to judicial deference when it interprets an ambiguous provision of a statute that it administers, and that because Section 7 does not itself speak of access rights, much less access rights of offsite employees, such statutory silence would counsel Chevron deference unless courts have settled on the statute's clear meaning. ITT Indus., Inc., 251 F.3d at 1000 (citing Lechmere, 502 U.S. at 536-37, 112 S.Ct. 841). 23 With this principle in mind, the D.C. Circuit then surveyed the landscape of relevant Supreme Court decisions so as to determine whether Chevron deference was in order — i.e., whether the judicial pronouncements have settled on Section 7's meaning. Id. The court began by examining the Court's decision in Babcock, 351 U.S. at 112, 76 S.Ct. 679, wherein it was held that the access rights of non-employees are derivative of the access rights of onsite employees; that is, non-employees enjoy no independent, free-standing Section 7 right of access. 251 F.3d at 1000. 24 The D.C. Circuit then looked to the Court's decision in Hudgens v. NLRB, 424 U.S. 507, 96 S.Ct. 1029, 47 L.Ed.2d 196 (1976), rendered some twenty years after Babcock was handed down. See 251 F.3d at 1001. In Hudgens the Court ultimately remanded the matter back to the Board to decide the Section 7 question in the first instance; however, in doing so, the Court acknowledged that the facts in Hudgens differed from those of Babcock because the alleged trespass onto the employer's property was carried on by [the employer's] employees (albeit not employees of its shopping center store), not by outsiders. 424 U.S. at 522, 96 S.Ct. 1029. The Hudgens Court also distinguished Babcock from Republic Aviation Corp. v. NLRB, 324 U.S. 793, 65 S.Ct. 982, 89 L.Ed. 1372 (1945), an earlier decision wherein the Court affirmed a Board ruling that an employer may not prohibit distribution of organizational materials by employees in non-working areas during non-work hours absent a showing that the ban was necessary to maintain plant discipline or production. Hudgens, 424 U.S. at 521-22 n. 10, 96 S.Ct. 1029. The Hudgens Court noted that [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. Id. 25 Next, the D.C. Circuit recognized that in Eastex, Inc. v. NLRB, 437 U.S. 556, 98 S.Ct. 2505, 57 L.Ed.2d 428 (1978), the Court explained the underlying concerns driving the different outcomes in Babcock and Republic Aviation. ITT Indus., Inc., 251 F.3d at 1001. Specifically, the Eastex Court had observed that 26 [i]n Babcock & Wilcox, ... nonemployees sought to enter an employer's property to distribute union organizational literature. The Board applied the rule of Republic Aviation in this situation, but the court held that there is a distinction of substance between rules of law applicable to employees and those applicable to nonemployees. The difference was that the nonemployees in Babcock & Wilcox sought to trespass on the employer's property, whereas the employees in Republic Aviation did not. Striking a balance between § 7 organizational rights and an employer's right to keep strangers from entering on its property, the Court held that the employer in Babcock & Wilcox was entitled to prevent nonemployee distribution of union literature [on its property] if reasonable efforts by the union through other available channels of communication will enable it to reach the employees with its message. 27 Eastex, 437 U.S. at 571, 98 S.Ct. 2505 (quoting Babcock, 351 U.S. at 112-13, 76 S.Ct. 679) (citations omitted). 28 Finally, the D.C. Circuit recognized that in Lechmere, Inc. v. NLRB, 502 U.S. 527, 532, 112 S.Ct. 841, 117 L.Ed.2d 79 (1992), the Supreme Court sharpened the distinction between employee/non-employee Section 7 rights. 251 F.3d at 1002. In Lechmere, the Court stated that by its plain terms, ... the NLRA confers rights only on employees, not on unions or their non-employee organizers.... Lechmere, 502 U.S. at 532, 112 S.Ct. 841 (emphasis is original). 29 With this background into the controlling jurisprudence in mind, the D.C. Circuit found that neither Lechmere nor the Court's cases leading up to it answered the question of whether off-duty offsite employees enjoyed nonderivative Section 7 organizational rights, or whether the offsite employees' organizational rights were merely derivative. 251 F.3d at 1003. As a result, the D.C. Circuit concluded that [b]ecause the [Supreme] Court's cases do not bespeak a clear answer, and because the statute is silent on the point, we must defer to the Board's interpretation if reasonable.  Id. (emphasis in original). 30 The D.C. Circuit went on to address the reasonableness of the Board's decision in ITT Industries, and found that the Board's decision was conclusory and lacked sufficient consideration or analysis of the interests involved. Id. at 1004. Specifically, the D.C. Circuit opined in relevant part regarding the deficiencies it found with the Board's decision: 31 First, the Board failed even to acknowledge that the question of off-site employee access rights was an open one, i.e., that, in Chevron terms, § 7 and the Court's cases are silent on the issue. Rather, the Board decided sub silento that § 7 guarantees all off-site employees, whether members of the same bargaining unit or not, some measure of free-standing, nonderivative rights. See Board Decision at 4 ([E]mployees of the employer who work at one plant are still considered employees of the employer if they handbill at another of the employer's plants.). Indeed, by applying the Tri-County balancing test, the Board decided without analysis that trespassing off-site employees possess access rights equivalent to those enjoyed by on-site employee invitees. Because it is by no means obvious that § 7 extends nonderivative access rights to off-site employees, particularly given the considerations set forth in the Court's access cases, the Board was obliged to engage in considered analysis and explain its chosen interpretation. 32