Opinion ID: 105187
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: a.necessity for proving employer's motive.

Text: The language of § 8 (a) (3) is not ambiguous. The unfair labor practice is for an employer to encourage or discourage membership by means of discrimination. Thus this section does not outlaw all encouragement or discouragement of membership in labor organizations; only such as is accomplished by discrimination is prohibited. Nor does this section outlaw discrimination in employment as such; only such discrimination as encourages or discourages membership in a labor organization is proscribed. The relevance of the motivation of the employer in such discrimination has been consistently recognized under both § 8 (a) (3) and its predecessor. In the first case to reach the Court under the National Labor Relations Act, Labor Board v. Jones & Laughlin Steel Corp., 301 U. S. 1, in which we upheld the constitutionality of § 8 (3), we said with respect to limitations placed upon employers' right to discharge by that section that the [employer's] true purpose is the subject of investigation with full opportunity to show the facts. Id., at 46. In another case the same day we found the employer's real motive to be decisive and stated that the act permits a discharge for any reason other than union activity or agitation for collective bargaining with employees. [45] Courts of Appeals have uniformly applied this criteria, [46] and writers in the field of labor law emphasize the importance of the employer's motivation to a finding of violation of this section. [47] Moreover, the National Labor Relations Board in its annual reports regularly reiterates this requirement in its discussion of § 8 (a) (3). For example, a recent report states that upon scrutiny of all the facts in a particular case, the Board must determine whether or not the employer's treatment of the employee was motivated by a desire to encourage or discourage union membership or other activities protected by the statute. [48] That Congress intended the employer's purpose in discriminating to be controlling is clear. The Senate Report on the Wagner Act said: Of course nothing in the bill prevents an employer from discharging a man for incompetence; from advancing him for special aptitude; or from demoting him for failure to perform. [49] Senator Wagner spoke of § 8 (3) as reaching those very cases where the employer is strong enough to impress his will without the aid of the law. [50] With this consistent interpretation of that section before it, Congress, as noted above, chose to retain the identical language in its 1947 amendments. No suggestion is found in either the reports or hearings on those amendments that the section had been too narrowly construed, and the House Conference Report states that § 8 (a) (3) prohibits an employer from discriminating against an employee by reason of his membership or nonmembership in a labor organization, except to the extent that he obligates himself to do so under the terms of a permitted union shop or maintenance of membership contract. [51] B.PROOF OF MOTIVE. But it is also clear that specific evidence of intent to encourage or discourage is not an indispensable element of proof of violation of § 8 (a) (3). This fact was recognized in the House Report on the Wagner Act when it was stated that under § 8 (3) agreements more favorable to the majority than to the minority are impossible . . . . [52] Both the Board and the courts have recognized that proof of certain types of discrimination satisfies the intent requirement. [53] This recognition that specific proof of intent is unnecessary where employer conduct inherently encourages or discourages union membership is but an application of the common-law rule that a man is held to intend the foreseeable consequences of his conduct. Cramer v. United States, 325 U. S. 1, 31; Nash v. United States, 229 U. S. 373, 376; United States v. Patten, 226 U. S. 525, 539; Agnew v. United States, 165 U. S. 36, 50. Thus an employer's protestation that he did not intend to encourage or discourage must be unavailing where a natural consequence of his action was such encouragement or discouragement. Concluding that encouragement or discouragement will result, it is presumed that he intended such consequence. In such circumstances intent to encourage is sufficiently established. Our decision in Republic Aviation Corp. v. Labor Board, 324 U. S. 793, relied upon by the Board to support its contention that employers' motives are irrelevant under § 8 (a) (3), applied this principle. That decision dealt primarily with the right of the Board to infer discouragement from facts proven for purposes of proof of violation of § 8 (3). In holding that discharges and suspensions of employees under company no solicitation rules for soliciting union membership, in the circumstances disclosed, violated § 8 (3), we noted that such employer action was not motivated by opposition to the particular union or, we deduce, to unionism and that there was no union bias or discrimination by the company in enforcing the rule. But we affirmed the Board's holding that the rules involved were invalid when applied to union solicitation since they interfered with the employees' right to organize. Since the rules were no defense and the employers intended to discriminate solely on the ground of such protected union activity, it did not matter that they did not intend to discourage membership since such was a foreseeable result. In Gaynor, the Second Circuit also properly applied this principle. The court there held that disparate wage treatment of employees based solely on union membership status is inherently conducive to increased union membership. In holding that a natural consequence of discrimination, based solely on union membership or lack thereof, is discouragement or encouragement of membership in such union, the court merely recognized a fact of common experiencethat the desire of employees to unionize is directly proportional to the advantages thought to be obtained from such action. No more striking example of discrimination so foreseeably causing employee response as to obviate the need for any other proof of intent is apparent than the payment of different wages to union employees doing a job than to nonunion employees doing the same job. As noted above, the House Report on § 8 (3) of the Wagner Act emphasized that such disparate treatment was impossible under the Act. In Gaynor it was conceded that the sole criterion for extra payments was union membership, and the vacation payments were admittedly gratuitous. The wage differential payments, on the other hand, were based upon the 1947 supplementary agreement which the company below contended was negotiated solely in behalf of union members. However, the court below held that the union was exclusive bargaining agent for both union and nonunion employees. The company has not challenged this holding, asserting only that, even though the union represented all employees, the company's only liability to the nonunion employees can be for breach of contract. The union's representative status obviously does not effect the legality of the gratuitous payment. According to the reasoning of the Second Circuit, however, disparate payments based on contract are illegal only when the union, as bargaining agent for both union and nonunion employees, betrays its trust and obtains special benefits for the union members. That court considered such action unfair because such employees are not in a position to protect their own interests. Thus, it reasoned, if a union bargains only for its own members, it is legal for such union to cause an employer to give, and for such employer to give, special benefits to the members of the union for if nonmembers are aggrieved they are free to bargain for similar benefits for themselves. We express no opinion as to the legality of disparate payments where the union is not exclusive bargaining agent, since that case is not before us. We do hold that in the circumstances of this case, the union being exclusive bargaining agent for both member and nonmember employees, the employer could not, without violating § 8 (a) (3), discriminate in wages solely on the basis of such membership even though it had executed a contract with the union prescribing such action. Statements throughout the legislative history of the National Labor Relations Act emphasize that exclusive bargaining agents are powerless to make agreements more favorable to the majority than to the minority. [54] Such discriminatory contracts are illegal and provide no defense to an action under § 8 (a) (3). See Steele v. Louisville & Nashville R. Co., 323 U. S. 192; Wallace Corp. v. Labor Board, 323 U. S. 248; J. I. Case Co. v. Labor Board, 321 U. S. 332; Order of Railroad Telegraphers v. Railway Express Agency, 321 U. S. 342. Cf. Ford Motor Co. v. Huffman, 345 U. S. 330.