Court Opinion

ID: 9474766
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 05:08:17.078024+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:44:19.432205
License: Public Domain

ROSENN, Circuit Judge,
concurring and dissenting.
I disagree with the majority’s reading of Burns International Security Services, Inc., 256 N.L.R.B. 959 (1981), as announcing a new policy of strict compliance with the Board’s five-day rule for the filing of objections. In my opinion, the Regional Director was required by the Board’s past precedents to consider the allegations Rhone-Poulenc tendered after the initial five-day period but before he began his investigation. I am therefore compelled to dissent from parts III and IV of the majority’s opinion. I join, however, in parts I and II.
I.
The NLRB has a longstanding policy, recognized in American Safety Equipment Corp., 234 N.L.R.B. 501 (1978), enf. denied on other grounds, 643 F.2d 693 *193(10th Cir.1981), that no matter what scope a Regional Director gives his investigation,
if he receives or discovers evidence during his investigation that shows that the election has been tainted, he has no discretion to ignore such evidence and it is reversible error if he fails to set aside the election____ Were we to close our eyes to objectionable conduct merely because a party has failed to frame its objections properly to include such conduct, we would make a mockery of our pledge to preserve employee rights to a fair election.
234 N.L.R.B. at 501-02.
This court in NLRB v. Campbell Products Department, 623 F.2d 876 (3d Cir. 1980), held that under the Board’s settled policy, as reflected in American Safety, a Regional Director must investigate evidence of objectionable conduct brought to its attention after the initial five-day period for objections had passed. The court recognized “that the Board plainly has the power to compel strict compliance with its five day objection rule,” id. at 880 (emphasis in original), but held that the Board was bound by its adopted policy until it “change[s] its mind expressly and substitute[s] a strict compliance policy.” Id. at 882 n. 4.
Within the five-day period following initial objections provided for by Board practice and regulations, Rhone-Poulenc submitted evidence, in the form of affidavits, to support its initial objections to the union’s campaign propaganda. See 29 C.F.R. § 102.69(a) (1985). Two of these affidavits, sworn to by a supervisor and an employee, also reported threats of violence by union supporters that if confirmed might require the election be set aside. Although he had not yet commenced his investigation, the Regional Director declined to consider the evidence of threats tendered in these affidavits, despite his obligation under American Safety to investigate all evidence of objectionable behavior that he receives. He relied on Burns and two other cases in holding that the evidence of threats constituted an untimely objection which he was not bound to consider.1 The Board in affirming his decision cited no authority and summarily concluded, “we are not persuaded by the facts of this case that any special circumstance exists that would justify permitting the Employer to file untimely objections.”
In a well-reasoned dissent, Board Member Hunter discussed the authority relied on by the Regional Director, including Bums, and found it all distinguishable. Despite the assertion of the majority of this panel that “[t]he employer does not contest the applicability of the Bums rule to the facts of this case,” Rhone-Poulenc argues at length in its brief, as Member Hunter did in his dissent, that “Bums is clearly inapplicable” to the present case. I agree.
II.
This court in Campbell Products imposed no unusual requirement on the Board by requiring it to obey its past precedents unless it expressly rejects them. 623 F.2d at 882 n. 4. As we previously stated, all administrative agencies “have an obligation to render consistent opinions and either follow, distinguish, or overrule their own precedent.” Chisholm v. Defense Logistics Agency, 656 F.2d 42, 47 (3d Cir. 1981). The Board, as an administrative agency, may overrule its prior precedents, “so long as the Board’s new position is fully reasoned and explained, and ... the position does not exceed the bounds of the Act.” Latrobe Steel Co. v. NLRB, 630 *194F.2d 171, 177 (3d Cir.1980), cert. denied, 454 U.S. 821, 102 S.Ct. 104, 70 L.Ed.2d 92 (1981). This requirement that the Board, as an administrative agency, expressly state its reasoning and intent to change its established policies, is fully consistent with the Supreme Court’s decisions.2
As the Court recently stated, “an agency changing its course by rescinding a rule is obligated to supply a reasoned analysis beyond that which may be required when an agency does not act in the first instance.” Motor Vehicle Manufacturer’s Association v. State Farm Mutual Auto Ins. Co., 463 U.S. 29, 42, 103 S.Ct. 2856, 2866, 77 L.Ed.2d 443 (1983). In addition to the need of the public to be informed of a change in policy, effective judicial review requires that an administrative agency changing settled procedures explicate the change in a way that allows a reviewing court to discern the policy served by the new procedure. Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railway Co. v. Wichita Board of Trade, 412 U.S. 800, 805-06, 93 S.Ct. 2367, 2373-74, 37 L.Ed.2d 350 (1973) (Marshall, J.) (plurality opinion). An agency’s factual distinction between past and present cases without an explanation of the underlying policy served by their different treatments may give the reviewing court too little guidance in evaluating the propriety of a newly altered rule. See id. at 807-08, 93 S.Ct. at 2374-75.
The Board’s decision to depart from prior norms in carrying out the policies committed to it by Congress should as a rule be entitled to deference by the courts. A reviewing court, however, cannot determine whether the new course pursued by the Board adopts a policy “consistent with its mandate from Congress,” id. at 806, 93 S.Ct. at 2374, unless it expressly articulates its reasons for the change. A change in policy announced by the Board will be respected if “the Board has reached a fair and reasoned balance upon a question within its special competence, ... and the Board has adequately explicated the basis of its interpretation.” NLRB v. Weingarten, Inc., 420 U.S. 251, 267, 95 S.Ct. 959, 968, 43 L.Ed.2d 171 (1975). My concern is whether the Board has met this burden in Bums and announced a new policy of strict compliance with its five-day rule.
III.
In Bums, the Board held that a Regional Director had erred in reading American Safety as requiring him to consider an employer’s “Supplementary Objections” filed 47 and 77 days after an election and during his investigation. Although noting that “[t]he line between evidence discovered during the investigation and new, untimely objections will not always be glaringly clear,” the Board held that parties should not be allowed to file new objections during a Regional Director’s investigation. 256 N.L.R.B. at 959.
Entertainment of a whole new set of objections ... would vitiate our requirement that parties file timely objections. Being inundated with successive sets of objections, the Regional Director, if he had to investigate each new allegation, could be prevented from or unduly delayed in concluding his investigation.
Id. The Board held that new and untimely objections presented during a Regional Director’s investigation normally should be considered only if the presenting party gives clear and convincing proof that they were newly discovered and previously unavailable. Id. at 960. The Board gave two reasons for this rule: to “discourage ... the piecemeal submission of evidence,” id; and to prevent “the potential mischief inherent in permitting an objecting party to take control over the investigation away from the Regional Director.” Id. at 959.
I do not think that Bums can fairly be read as announcing a new Board policy that henceforth no evidence of objectionable behavior would be considered after the *195initial five-day period for filing objections, even if the Regional Director had not and could not have begun an investigation of the timely filed objections. By my reading, all the Bums decision established is that an objecting party may not file supplemental objections during a Regional Director’s investigation without a convincing showing that the objections could not have been made previously. The Board stated that some limitation of American Safety was necessary to prevent objecting parties from wrongly delaying the resolution of election disputes and interfering with the Regional Director’s investigation with a flurry of untimely objections. The Board did not purport, as the majority contends, to announce a new policy of strict enforcement of the five-day rule.
The circumstances of Burns are distinguishable from those of the present case on two crucial grounds: (1) Rhone-Poulenc submitted the affidavits supporting further objections during the period the Board specifically provides objecting parties for the submission of supporting evidence, and before the Regional Director had begun any investigation. (2) Rhone-Poulenc’s allegation of unlawful threats came in the form of evidence, not conclusory or unsubstantiated objections.
It is difficult to see how Rhone-Poulenc’s action implicates the Board’s concern in Bums that late objections would cause delay and interfere with the Regional Director’s control over, an investigation. Rhone-Poulenc submitted its affidavits “[wjithin 5 days after the filing of objections,” the period provided by Board regulations for an objecting party to “furnish to the regional director the evidence available to it to support the objections.” 29 C.F.R. § 102.69(a) (1985). The Board’s longstanding regulatory scheme clearly expects an objecting party to continue its own investigation during this five-day period, with a Regional Director’s investigation to follow only if the objecting party’s submission of evidence is sufficient to support prima fa-cie the setting aside of the election. The majority’s concern that Rhone-Poulenc’s affidavits may have been the result of its continued investigation is misplaced. It was Rhone-Poulenc’s obligation to investigate the election during this five-day period, and it was the Regional Director’s obligation to pursue Rhone-Poulenc’s evidence of objectionable conduct with its own investigation subsequent to the five-day period. Rhone-Poulenc’s timely submission of evidence, whether unsolicited or obtained through its investigation, did not and could not interfere with any investigation the Regional Director might subsequently make.
Further, it is incongruous and inconsistent with the policy concerns of American Safety for the Regional Director to read and consider that portion of Rhone-Pou-lenc’s affidavits that support the timely objections to campaign propaganda but ignore the rest. Under American Safety, which the Board has not repudiated, a Regional Director may limit the scope of its investigation but must consider evidence of election taint brought to its attention during its investigation. By ignoring the evidence of possibly unlawful threats brought to his attention before he commenced any investigation, the Regional Director here utterly abdicated the “Board’s obligation to provide voters with the ‘laboratory conditions’ under which they may exercise their franchise in a free and informal manner,” 234 N.L.R.B. at 501, even though it meant no delay in the proceedings or challenge to the Director’s control over the investigation. I cannot believe that the Board would have intended such an anomalous and stultifying result without a thorough explication of its change in policy in response to judicial mandate.
IV.
I would therefore grant Rhone-Poulenc’s petition for review in part and remand the case to the Board for investigation of the threats reported in Rhone-Poulenc’s affidavits.

. The other Board opinions cited as authority by the Regional Director are Parks Food Service, 235 N.L.R.B. 1410 (1978), and Tuf-Flex Glass, 262 N.L.R.B. 445 (1982), aff’d 715 F.2d 291 (7th Cir.1983). Both are consistent with American Safety and clearly distinguishable from the present case. In Parks Food, the union filed exceptions after the Regional Director had corn-pleted his investigation and report. 235 N.L. R.B. at 1410 n. 1. In Tuf-Flex also, the objections were made after the hearing officer completed his investigation and report. 262 N.L. R.B. at 445 n. 3. Such objections are untimely under American Safety, as this court noted in Campbell Products. 623 F.2d at 882 n. 4.

. Other circuits also require that the Board explicate the policy grounds for changing its established practices. See, e.g., IATSE v. NLRB, 779 F.2d 552, 555 (9th Cir.1985); Consolidated Papers, Inc. v. NLRB, 670 F.2d 754, 757 (7th Cir. 1982); NLRB v. West Sand and Gravel Co., 612 F.2d 1326, 1333 n. 5 (1st Cir.1979).