Opinion ID: 527007
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Bargaining Directly with Employees.

Text: 17 Section 8(a)(5) of the NLRA requires employers to bargain in good faith with employee representatives. We have read that section to preclude employers from circumventing those representatives by bargaining directly with employees. See Standard Fittings Co. v. NLRB, 845 F.2d 1311, 1317 (5th Cir.1988). GM asserts that in making its representations to the group of employees who attended the VTEP meetings, it engaged in conduct arguably prohibited by the NLRA. Thus, GM maintains that the NLRB is the appropriate forum to hear even the claims of those whose conduct the Act arguably prohibits; in even more basic terms, the implication of GM's argument is that if its conduct indeed was wrong, it is the Board that should declare it so. We hold, however, that Davis defeats GM's attempt to invoke the NLRB's exclusive jurisdiction in this fashion. 18 In Davis, the Court gave the following construction to the phrase arguably protected or prohibited: 19 If the word 'arguably' is to mean anything, it must mean that the party claiming pre-emption is required to demonstrate that his case is one that the Board could legally decide in his favor. That is, a party asserting pre-emption must advance an interpretation of the Act that is not plainly contrary to its language and that has not been 'authoritatively rejected' by the courts or the Board. The party must then put forth enough evidence to enable the court to find that the Board reasonably could uphold a claim based on such an interpretation. 20 476 U.S. at 395, 106 S.Ct. at 1914 (citations omitted). GM contends throughout its brief that its positions on the status of future employment eligibility as a bargaining subject and on the propriety (or impropriety) of its representations to the employees were not ones which the Board or courts have rejected authoritatively. But that contention, even if accepted, does not bring us to a resolution, for as the Court explains in the passage quoted above, the party attempting to invoke the Board's jurisdiction must then demonstrate that the Board could reasonably uphold that party's claim. The reason for this requirement is simple and instructive here: The exclusivity of the Board's administrative province, made necessary by the need for uniform treatment in labor disputes, may not serve as a shelter for those whose claims have no realistic chance of acceptance and no import for national labor policy. Cf. Gray v. Local 714, Int'l Union of Operating Eng'rs, 778 F.2d 1087, 1090 (5th Cir.1985) (employee's claim for fraudulent inducement not preempted by NLRA because alleged conduct was of only peripheral concern regarding federal law). 21 By its own cast, GM's argument concerning its circumvention of union representatives goes only to show that its conduct was arguably prohibited by the Board; hence, its claim could not reasonably be upheld by the Board. 7 Nor does GM convincingly demonstrate the import of its claim for national labor policy: As plaintiffs observe, the challenged conduct here was not an attempt on the part of GM to interfere with the collective bargaining process or to diminish the union's representative role; instead, it was a post-bargaining effort to induce individual employees to accept VTEP benefits. While not dispositive, 8 it is relevant that the parties had completed collective bargaining over the VTEP; GM's alleged inducements had no direct bearing upon the collective bargaining process in that they were not offered in order to obtain ratification of an agreement. 9 For better or worse, the bargaining process had served its function, and the union representatives had fulfilled their role. It was then left to the individual employees to choose whether they would opt for the plan, and it is upon that choice that GM's alleged inducements operated. 22