Opinion ID: 758565
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: standard of review

Text: 19 We uphold the NLRB's findings of fact if they are supported by substantial evidence on the record considered as a whole. 29 U.S.C. § 160(e); see also Universal Camera Corp. v. NLRB, 340 U.S. 474, 491, 71 S.Ct. 456, 95 L.Ed. 456 (1951). The Supreme Court has defined substantial evidence as more than a mere scintilla. It means such relevant evidence as a reasonable mind might accept as adequate to support a conclusion. Consolidated Edison Co. v. NLRB, 305 U.S. 197, 229, 59 S.Ct. 206, 83 L.Ed. 126 (1938). While a deferential standard, Congress has ... made it clear that a reviewing court is not barred from setting aside a Board decision when it cannot conscientiously find that the evidence supporting that decision is substantial, when viewed in the light that the record in its entirety furnishes, including the body of evidence opposed to the Board's view. Universal Camera Corp., 340 U.S. at 488, 71 S.Ct. 456. 20 While we follow the general standard of review outlined above, we also recognize that [a]n administrative agency, like any other first-line tribunal, earns--or forfeits--deferential judicial review by its performance. Children's Habilitation Ctr., 887 F.2d at 132. In determining supervisory status, the Board's well-attested manipulativeness, see id., has earned it little deference. See Winnebago Television Corp., 75 F.3d at 1214; Children's Habilitation Ctr., 887 F.2d at 132. 21 Reduced deference is particularly appropriate in this case because the Board, in its first decision, all but found that the LPNs at issue were supervisors absent the patient care analysis. The Board stated, [a]ssignment of work and direction of the CNAs is done in the LPNs' technical capacity. Thus, while at times it may constitute the utilization of independent judgment, it is judgment utilized in the Nurses' treatment of patients and does not constitute the exercise of supervisory authority in the interests of the employer. Since the nurses did not exercise their authority in the interests of the employer, the Board concluded that the LPNs were not supervisors under the Act. However, in Health Care & Retirement Corp., the Supreme Court rejected the Board's patient care analysis. Thus, in its Supplemental Decision after remand, the Board was precluded from relying on its previous analysis. 22 Although the testimony at the second hearing established that the LPNs had at least the same, if not more, supervisory duties than they had at the time of the first hearing, the Supplemental Decision found that the LPNs are not supervisors because they do not dispatch their duties utilizing independent judgment. Thus the Board reached the same result but relied on a different statutory factor, independent judgment, notwithstanding the fact that it had previously conceded that the LPNs' activities at times may constitute the utilization of independent judgment. Given this history, we see little reason to accord significant deference to the Board determination in this case. Accord Providence Alaska Med. Ctr. v. NLRB, 121 F.3d 548, 556 (9th Cir.1997) (Noonan, J., dissenting) (Only after the Supreme Court rejected its patient care analysis did the Board's new interpretation of independent judgment see the light of day. Deference should not be accorded an interpretation that it has taken 50 years to reach and ... has been brought forward as an end run around [Health Care & Retirement Corp.] as decided by the Supreme Court.).