Opinion ID: 512568
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Was the Conduct Inherently Destructive of Employee Rights?

Text: 30
31 Our first task, then, is to tread the uneasy path between 'inherently destructive' and 'comparatively slight' discrimination. See Allied Industrial Workers, Local No. 289 v. NLRB, 476 F.2d 868, 878 (D.C.Cir.1973). That path is dimly lit, but the Supreme Court has shed this much light on the way: inherently destructive conduct carries with it 'unavoidable consequences which the employer not only foresaw but which he must have intended' and thus bears 'its own indicia of intent.'  Great Dane, 388 U.S. at 33, 87 S.Ct. at 1797 (quoting Erie Resistor, 373 U.S. at 228, 231, 83 S.Ct. at 1147). Additional illumination comes from a review of the cases in which an employer's action has been found to be on the wrong side of the inherently destructive foul line. As the Ninth Circuit has observed, however, such cases are relatively rare, Loomis Courier Service, Inc. v. NLRB, 595 F.2d 491, 495 (9th Cir.1979), which is itself enlightening. 32 In Radio Officers' Union v. NLRB, 347 U.S. 17, 45, 74 S.Ct. 323, 338, 98 L.Ed. 455 (1954), the Court viewed as inherently destructive discharges and suspensions of employees under company 'no solicitation' rules for soliciting union membership; in a dictum in American Ship Building, 380 U.S. at 309, 85 S.Ct. at 962, it suggested that permanently discharg[ing] unionized staff and replac[ing] them with employees known to be possessed of a violent antiunion animus would also fall into that category; and in Erie Resistor, the Court held that the grant of 20 years' super-seniority to strike replacements and to strikers who returned to work was also inher ently destructive of protected employee rights. 33 In Erie Resistor, the Court emphasized that super-seniority, by its very terms operates to discriminate between strikers and non-strikers, both during and after a strike, and its destructive impact upon the strike and union activity cannot be doubted. 373 U.S. at 231, 83 S.Ct. at 1147. Indeed, the Board had found that 34 Super-seniority renders future bargaining difficult, if not impossible, for the collective bargaining representative. Unlike the [right of an employer to hire permanent replacements for striking workers, which the Supreme Court upheld in NLRB v. Mackay Radio & Telegraph Co., 304 U.S. 333, 58 S.Ct. 904, 82 L.Ed. 1381 (1938), and] which ceases to be an issue once the strike is over, the plan here creates a cleavage in the plant continuing long after the strike is ended. Employees are henceforth divided into two camps: those who stayed with the union and those who returned before the end of the strike and thereby gained extra seniority. This breach is re-emphasized with each subsequent layoff and stands as an ever-present reminder of the dangers connected with striking and with union activities in general. 35 Id. 36 While the Court's reference to the impact of super-seniority on the particular strike against which it was directed could be read to give a broad sweep to the concept of activity that is inherently destructive of employee rights, the Court has not so understood its meaning. Rather, as one widely-quoted comment has suggested, whether employer conduct is inherently destructive hinges on the distinction between conduct which merely influences the outcome of a particular dispute and that which is potentially disruptive of the opportunity for future employee organization and concerted activity. Note, Lockouts--Employer's Lockout with Temporary Replacements is an Unfair Labor Practice, 85 Harv.L.Rev. 680, 686 (1972). The Court made the point itself in American Ship Building, when it said: 37 Proper analysis of the problem demands that the simple intention to support the employer's bargaining position as to compensation and the like be distinguished from a hostility to the process of collective bargaining which could suffice to render a lockout unlawful. 38 380 U.S. at 309, 85 S.Ct. at 962-963. As restated by the Eighth Circuit, inherently destructive conduct is that which creates visible and continuing obstacles to the future exercise of employee rights, Inter-Collegiate Press, 486 F.2d at 845 (citing Note, supra, at 686); or as the Ninth Circuit has put it, such conduct has far reaching effects which would hinder future bargaining. Portland Willamette Co. v. NLRB, 534 F.2d 1331, 1334 (9th Cir.1976). 39 Essential to understanding the Supreme Court's analysis, we believe, is its distinction between substance and process in collective bargaining. The Labor Act is process-oriented. It establishes and protects the employees' right to bargain, not their right to a bargain. Thus, the employer must negotiate, but it need not agree. Employer hostility to the process of collective bargaining is intolerable in this regime, and constitutes a rejection of all that the law requires an employer to accept. Employer hostility to the terms sought by the employees, on the other hand, is to be expected, and is, in any event, the employer's right. Contention, combativeness, and conflict are inconsistent neither with good faith collective bargaining, nor with the employer's other obligations under the Labor Act. 40 The first question raised by the present case, therefore, is whether an employer's hiring temporary replacements for the employees it has locked out is inherently destructive of the process of collective bargaining or, rather, has only some lesser, or perhaps no, effect on that process. It is clear to us that such employer conduct has little if any impact on the process of collective bargaining, and thus does not bear the heavy (if not impossible, see supra note 2) burden of justification required of conduct that is inherently destructive of employee rights. 41 First, there is no reason in principle to expect that hiring temporary replacements for locked out employees will create within the latter group any cleavage that would endure after they return to work, and by dividing the employees, undermine their ability to act in concert to exercise their Section 7 rights. All employees are treated alike both during and after the conflict. Certainly, on the record before us, there is no indication that the Company's conduct in this case left any sort of division at the Portsmouth plant, or any other visible and continuing obstacles that will make collective bargaining or any other concerted activity difficult, much less impossible, for the employees in the future; and tellingly, the Union has suggested none. That the employer may have used an effective economic weapon in collective bargaining does not mean that the bargaining process is impaired. Indeed, the Union, which has shown itself to be a capable and willing economic warrior in the past, maintained the support of the workers throughout the lockout, and has apparently continued to represent them. 42 Second, there is nothing about hiring temporary replacements for locked out employees that discourages collective bargaining in the sense of making it seem a futile exercise in the eyes of employees. Cf. National Metalcrafters v. McNeil, 784 F.2d 817, 827 (7th Cir.1986); Robbins Door & Sash Co., 260 N.L.R.B. 659, 662 (1982). Of course, to the extent that this tactic, or any other, strengthens the employer's bargaining position, and correspondingly weakens the union's, the employees' return on their investment in concerted activity is diminished. But they are not guaranteed by law that collective bargaining will avail them; the only guarantee is that when they go to the bargaining table, with such strength as they can bring to it, the employer, with such strengths as it has, will be obliged to meet them there, and to bargain with them in good faith. 43
44 The conclusion that the Company's conduct in this case was not inherently destructive of employee rights also appears to be compelled by the Supreme Court's reasoning in American Ship Building and Brown. Under American Ship Building, it is clear beyond cavil that the bargaining lockout in this case, standing alone, is not inherently destructive of employee rights. Under Brown, we do not believe that by continuing to operate with temporary employees, the Company transformed a lawful form of economic pressure into a tactic that was inherently destructive of protected employee rights. 45 As we discussed above, prior to Brown the Court had held in Truck Drivers Union that a nonstruck employer that was a member of a multiemployer bargaining unit could lawfully lock out its employees in response to a whipsaw strike against another member. The issue in Brown was whether it was a violation of sections 8(a)(1) and (3) for an employer in that same position to continue to operate with temporary replacements during the lockout. The Court rejected the proposition that hiring temporaries was inherently destructive of employee rights. 380 U.S. at 284, 85 S.Ct. at 984 ([W]e do not see how the continued operations of respondents and their use of temporary replacements imply hostile motivation any more than the lockout itself; nor do we see how they are inherently more destructive of employee rights.). Although it acknowledged that, by continuing to operate during the lockout, the employer increased the economic pressures on its locked-out employees, the Court observed that these pressures are no different from those that result from the legitimate use of any economic weapon by an employer. Id. at 286, 85 S.Ct. at 985. Therefore, the court reasoned, the use of temporary replacement workers during the lockout was not inherently destructive of the employees' right to strike, even though it meant the failure of the whipsaw strike strategy. We see no feature of the employer's conduct in this case that distinguishes it, with regard to the right to strike, from the conduct at issue in Brown. 46 The Court in Brown also rejected the claim that the employer's conduct was inherently destructive of other employee rights. Inasmuch as the lockout itself was bound to create some discontent among the members of the locked-out union, the Court concluded that the added dissatisfaction, with its resultant pressure on membership, attributable to the fact that the nonstruck employers remain in business with temporary replacements is comparatively insubstantial. Id. at 288, 85 S.Ct. at 986. It discussed three factors that supported this conclusion, each of which is equally applicable in this case. First, because the replacements were to be kept only for the duration of the labor dispute, the locked-out employees were not faced with the threat of losing their jobs. That is also true in this case. Second, by accepting the employers' terms, the employees could put an end to the lockout and return to work at any time. Again, equally true in this case. And third, because the employer did not seek to alter the union shop provision in the previous collective bargaining agreement, the union members would have nothing to gain, and much to lose, by quitting the union. Id. at 289, 85 S.Ct. at 987. Also true in this case. Under these circumstances, the Court in Brown held, the employers' conduct had a comparatively slight, rather than an inherently destructive, adverse impact on employee rights; and under the same circumstances in our case, we must reach the same conclusion. 47 The Union contends that Brown is inapplicable because the employers in Brown acted defensively to preserve the integrity of the multiemployer bargaining unit in the face of a whipsaw strike, whereas in this case the Company used the tactic offensively to increase its bargaining power. In Brown, however, the Court's conclusion that the employers had acted to maintain the multiemployer bargaining group was independent of its analysis of whether their actions had been inherently destructive of their employees' rights. Rather, preserving the bargaining unit was, in the language of Great Dane, the legitimate and substantial business justification that the Court sought and found quite apart from its determination that the employers' actions were not inherently destructive of protected employee rights. The Brown court clearly stated first that here, the tendency to discourage union membership is comparatively slight, id at 287, 85 S.Ct. at 986, and separately that the respondents' attempt to remain open for business with the help of temporary replacements was a measure reasonably adapted to the achievement of a legitimate end--preserving the integrity of the multiemployer bargaining unit. Id. at 289, 85 S.Ct. at 987. As we discuss below, moreover, the purported distinction between offensive and defensive tactics simply cannot withstand scrutiny. 48 Therefore, on the question whether the lockout and hiring of temporary replacements was inherently destructive of employee rights, this case is indistinguishable from Brown; it is irrelevant that here there was no whipsaw strike. In this case, then, we simply repeat what the Supreme Court said in Brown: [W]e do not see how the continued operations of [employers] and their use of temporary replacements imply hostile motivation any more than the lockout itself; nor do we see how they are inherently more destructive of employee rights. Id. at 284, 85 S.Ct. at 984. 49 We also note that the use of temporary replacements, unlike the initial lockout, does not itself deprive employees of work or otherwise impose a cost upon them. Rather, if it works, it only strengthens the employer's bargaining power by decreasing the cost to it of resisting the employees' demands or of insisting upon its own. It is clear, however, that any effect on the parties' relative bargaining power--so long as it does not substantially impair the employees' ability to organize and to engage in concerted activity--is simply outside the scope of proper inquiry under sections 8(a)(1) and (3). The Supreme Court, in a long line of cases, has repeatedly emphasized that it is not the role of the NLRB, and certainly not that of the courts, to regulate the bargaining power of the parties to a labor dispute. Thus, in American Ship Building, the Court acknowledged that a lockout may well dissuade employees from adhering to the position which they initially adopted in the bargaining, but stated that the right to bargain collectively does not entail any 'right' to insist on one's position free from economic disadvantage. 380 U.S. at 309, 85 S.Ct. at 962. The employees might suffer an economic disadvantage because of the lockout, it noted, but the existence of an arguable possibility that someone may feel himself discouraged in his union membership as a result of an action that his employer may take during a bargaining dispute does not by itself make that action inherently destructive of employee rights. Id. at 312-13, 85 S.Ct. at 964-65. 50 Indeed, the Court criticized the NLRB for having, in essence, denied the use of the bargaining lockout to the employer because of its conviction that use of this device would give the employer 'too much power.'  Id. at 317, 85 S.Ct. at 967. This approach, the Court chided, is fundamentally inconsistent with the structure of the [Labor] Act, id. at 318, 85 S.Ct. at 967, reaffirming that Sections 8(a)(1) and (3) do not give the Board a general authority to assess the relative economic power of the adversaries in the bargaining process and to deny weapons to one party or the other because of its assessment of that party's bargaining power. Id at 317, 85 S.Ct. at 966-967. Thus, even if an employer's bargaining power is greater because it can temporarily replace locked-out employees--and at least in cases where doing so would be practical, it most probably is--that consequence can have no bearing on the lawfulness of the employer's doing so. 51 Despite the reasoning of Brown and American Ship Building, the Union relies on the decision of the Seventh Circuit in Inland Trucking, 440 F.2d at 562, to support its contention that the lockout and hiring of temporary replacements is an unfair labor practice. In that case, the court held that a bargaining lockout, although not in itself inherently destructive of employee rights, does become so if the employer does not shut down, but continues operation with temporary replacements. Id. at 564. The court explained that 52 [such a tactic] would not merely pit the employer's ability to withstand a shut down of its business against the employees' ability to endure cessation of their jobs, but would permit the employer to impose on his employees the pressure of being out of work while obtaining for himself the returns of continued operation.... Permitting an employer to impose this additional price on the protected right to collective bargaining would, in our opinion, conflict with the intended scope and content of that right, as protected in 29 U.S.C. Sec. 157. 53 Id. In the Seventh Circuit's view, then, it is a proper contest of economic strength if the employer is required to shut down its business during the lockout; but if the employer tries to obtain[ ] for himself the returns of continued operation during the lockout, thereby placing additional economic pressure on the employees, then the contest becomes impermissible under the Labor Act. Although that court expressly disavowed any intention of regulating the parties' relative bargaining power, id., its approach appears to us to do just that; and that seems fundamentally inconsistent with the Supreme Court's repeated insistence that neither the Board nor the courts may introduce some standard of properly 'balanced' bargaining power, or some new distinction of justifiable and unjustifiable, proper and 'abusive' economic weapons into [the Labor Act]. American Ship Building, 380 U.S. at 317, 85 S.Ct. at 967 (quoting NLRB v. Insurance Agents' International Union, 361 U.S. 477, 497, 80 S.Ct. 419, 431, 4 L.Ed.2d 454 (1960)). Therefore, we are constrained to reject both the reasoning and the conclusion of Inland Trucking. 54 The Union also argues that it is inherently destructive of employee rights for an employer to lockout and temporarily to replace its employees, because, as a practical matter, the odious result is capitulation rather than bargaining. This contention is plainly incorrect, however. First, there is no general reason to believe that allowing employers to hire temporary replacements for locked-out workers will inevitably lead to employee capitulation in bargaining.. Locked-out employees may find temporary (or even permanent) employment elsewhere, and may receive strike benefits (and, in some states, unemployment insurance), thereby enhancing their ability to hold out for a better bargain. On the other side of the conflict, although it is possible, it is quite unlikely that an employer will fare well using temporary replacements during a lockout. Any business that requires skilled, or just experienced, workers will operate less efficiently when even some of them, much less all, are suddenly replaced. Nor is there any guarantee that there will be a supply of workers willing to accept temporary jobs at the wages an employer will be willing to pay for replacements. And, of course, locked-out employees can picket to dissuade such available workers as there may be. Therefore, we simply cannot agree that employees, who have available to them a full arsenal of economic weapons, will inevitably be forced to capitulate to any employer that has temporarily replaced them. 55 Second, the record in this case demonstrates the opposite of the Union's claim: hiring temporary replacements did not enable the employer to demand an unconditional surrender by its locked-out employees. 3 Even if the Union had been forced to capitulate, moreover, we would not be free to disregard the Supreme Court's persistent admonition that the Labor Act does not prohibit use of an economic weapon simply because it appears to be too powerful. Unless the weapon is inherently destructive of the process rights secured to employees by law, and is not justified by compelling business interests, the Board is not free to order the employer unilaterally to disarm.