Opinion ID: 469365
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Substantial Continuity of Representation

Text: 15 Whether a union's identity has remained essentially the same or whether it has changed so substantially as to require a new representation election depends on a factual determination by the Board after it examines the various changes that affiliation may effect. J. Ray McDermott & Co. v. NLRB, 571 F.2d 850, 857 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, 439 U.S. 893, 99 S.Ct. 250, 58 L.Ed.2d 238 (1978). The Board generally considers a number of factors, including structure, administration, officers, assets, membership, autonomy, by-laws, size, NLRB v. Pearl Bookbinding, 517 F.2d 1108, 1111-12 (1st Cir.1975), and looks for changes in the rights and obligations of the union's leadership and membership, and in the relationships between the putative bargaining agent, its affiliate, and the employer, McDermott, 571 F.2d at 857. See also St. Vincent Hospital v. NLRB, 621 F.2d 1054, 1057 (10th Cir.1980). So long as the Board's conclusion is supported by substantial evidence on the record as a whole, we must affirm. 29 U.S.C. Sec. 160(e) (1982); NLRB v. Commercial Letter, Inc., 496 F.2d 35, 39 (8th Cir.1974). 16 Here, the Board found that affiliating with the IUE does not significantly change the Union's identity. 2 The bargaining unit will remain unchanged, and the officers (as well as those responsible for negotiating and processing employee grievances) will also remain the same. Retaining the same key personnel is important, for [w]hen the same persons participate in communications with the company with respect to grievances, contract negotiations, and the like, continuity is likely to be preserved. St. Vincent Hospital, 621 F.2d at 1057. Compare Retail Store Employees Union, Local 428 v. NLRB, 528 F.2d 1225, 1228 (9th Cir.1975) (per curiam) (affirming a Board finding that there was no substantial continuity because of a leadership change). The Union, moreover, says it will honor any existing contractual commitments to Insulfab, and its activities will continue to be governed for the most part by its own constitution and bylaws. 17 Insulfab contends, nonetheless, that when a small independent union affiliates with a large international union of several hundred thousand members, the changes accompanying affiliation are necessarily so great as to create an essentially new bargaining entity. Once the Union affiliates, Insulfab asserts, the IUE's constitution will significantly affect the autonomy the Union enjoyed as an independent. That document, it is true, places certain obligations on the Union, such as payment of minimum dues, affiliation with district councils, and IUE approval before the membership can change the Union's constitution. The Board supportably found, however, that the Union's local autonomy is not significantly curtailed. The Union continues to retain control over negotiating and administering contracts, processing grievances, and calling strikes, with assistance from the IUE only when requested. The Board also found that the money which currently reposes in the Independent's treasury will remain there, to be spent by the [Union] for its own purposes and at its sole discretion. 18 In urging what would amount to a per se rule that affiliation of a small independent with a much larger union creates a substantially different bargaining entity, Insulfab relies on three Third Circuit decisions: American Bridge Division, U.S. Steel Corp. v. NLRB, 457 F.2d 660, 664 (3d Cir.1972), NLRB v. Bernard Gloekler North East Co., 540 F.2d 197 (3d Cir.1976), and Sun Oil Co. v. NLRB, 576 F.2d 553 (3d Cir.1978). Those cases, however, are distinguishable. 19 In American Bridge, the court concluded that the local was far different after affiliation because, unlike here, the international's constitution substantially limited the union's autonomy by giving the international responsibility over collective bargaining, grievance settlement, and calling strikes. Moreover, the court was apparently influenced in its conclusion that a representation election was necessary by the presence of many procedural irregularities, including the refusal by the union's executive committee to hold a special meeting to discuss affiliation despite the petition of more than 100 (out of some 300) members requesting such a meeting. Here, in sharp contrast, a majority of the Union membership clearly approved the affiliation in a procedurally valid election. 20 Similarly, the court in Bernard Gloekler found that the union, by affiliating with the pre-existing local affiliate of the United Auto Workers (UAW), lost substantial control over its affairs, and that the structure, administration, assets, membership, autonomy, and by-laws all changed as a result. Moreover, before the affiliation vote, the UAW local had tried unsuccessfully to oust the independent by demanding a representation election. Thus the court invalidated the results of the affiliation vote in part because of its concern that the UAW local was using affiliation as a stratagem to avoid the contract bar rule that prohibited any representation election from taking place during the term of a collective bargaining agreement. No such concern is present here. 21 Sun Oil is also different from the instant case. The dispute arose there only after a representation election had been held at the Board's behest. In deciding that the company was not bound by collective bargaining agreements negotiated by the two independent unions before they affiliated with a large international, the court reasoned that the Board's agreement to conduct a representation election showed that, despite its position to the contrary on appeal, the Board [had] determined, in effect, that the employees had a choice between different and distinct bargaining representatives or none. 576 F.2d at 557. Moreover, the Sun Oil court also found that the local independent's constitution and by-laws were largely superseded by the international's, and that the local was abandoning independence for international affiliation. Id. 22 To be sure, in both Gloeckler and Sun Oil the Third Circuit attached considerable weight to the fact that an affiliated union can flex considerably more bargaining muscle than the 30-person local independent. Sun Oil, 576 F.2d at 557. But the notion that a question of representation is created simply by the increase in a union's bargaining power caused by affiliation has no express basis in the Act, and has been rejected by the Board. See New Orleans Publishing Service, Inc., 237 NLRB No. 134 (1978); Newspapers, Inc., 210 NLRB No. 8 (1974), enforced, 515 F.2d 334 (5th Cir.1975). The Supreme Court's recent decision in Financial Institution likewise suggests that an increase in a union's bargaining power is not, standing alone, determinative of whether affiliation raises a question of representation. Observing that there may be a variety of reasons why a local union might seek to affiliate (the larger organization may provide bargaining expertise or financial support, or may compensate for a lack of leadership within the local union), the Court noted that the Board has recognized that a union  'must remain largely unfettered in its organizational quest for financial stability and aid in the negotiating process.'  --- U.S. at ---- n. 5, 106 S.Ct. at 1011-12 n. 5 (quoting The William Co., 244 NLRB 953, 955 (1979) ). 23 Especially where the union membership has expressed its desire to affiliate (at least in part to improve its bargaining posture), and the continuing majority support of the original bargaining representative is not in doubt, we are not inclined to override the Board's judgment that substantial continuity exists and to adopt instead Insulfab's suggested per se rule. Even the Third Circuit has recognized that determining whether substantial continuity exists is a fact-specific determination, to be made by the Board in the first instance after considering the particular effects of an organizational change. This makes sense since not every international exerts the same degree of control over its member locals, and the terms of affiliation will differ from case to case. Moreover, the Supreme Court in Financial Institution explicitly rejected the argument that affiliation by itself necessarily changes the union's identity and results in employees being represented by a different organization; rather, the Court asserted that unless a question of representation is raised, an affiliation vote is a purely internal union affair. --- U.S. at ---- - ----, 106 S.Ct. at 1011-15. 24 Here, there is substantial evidence to support the Board's finding that the affiliation does not raise a question of representation. Moreover, since Congress has entrusted the Board with the authority to interpret and implement the Act, we have generally allowed the Board wide latitude to construe its provisions and to determine how best to effectuate the Act's policies, especially in areas implicating, as here, agency expertise. Thus such a Board decision should be sustained as long as it is not irrational or inconsistent with the Act. See Financial Institution, --- U.S. at ----, 106 S.Ct. at 1013; Beth Israel Hospital v. NLRB, 437 U.S. 483, 501, 98 S.Ct. 2463, 2473, 57 L.Ed.2d 370 (1978). The Board's judgment in this case that a small independent's affiliation with a large international does not raise a question of representation, particularly where the membership freely chose to continue its support of its bargaining agent, is consistent with both the policy against unnecessary outside interference with union decision-making and the policy in favor of maintaining stability in the bargaining representative. See --- U.S. at ---- - ----, 106 S.Ct. at 1013-16. 25 Enforcement of the Board's order is granted.