Court Opinion

ID: 9425782
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:15:49.738386+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:22:57.536113
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice White,
with whom The Chief Justice, Mr. Justice Blackmun, and Mr. Justice Rehnquist join,
dissenting.
Believing that the majority has improperly substituted its judgment for a fair and reasonable interpretation by *814the Board of § 8 (b) (1) (B) in light of the statutory language and legislative history of that provision and other provisions dealing with supervisors, I must dissent substantially for the reasons expressed by the dissent below.
While it might be unreasonable for the Board to interpret § 8 (b)(1) (B) to permit an employer to require absolute loyalty from a supervisor-member in all circumstances, it is certainly apparent that during an economic strike, the supervisor’s performance of rank-and-file struck work, which represents a classic “use of economic pressure by the parties to a labor dispute ...[,] is part and parcel of the process of collective bargaining.” NLRB v. Insurance Agents’ International Union, 361 U. S. 477, 495 (1960).1 “As management representatives, supervisory personnel may be requested by management to enhance the bargaining position of their employer during a dispute between it and the particular union involved.” 159 U. S. App. D. C. 272, 304, 487 F. 2d 1143, 1175 (1973) (en banc) (dissenting opinion) (footnote omitted). Moreover, these union sanctions would unavoidably decrease a supervisor’s loyalty to his employer and thereby materially interfere with the performance of those responsibilities which the employer quite properly demands of him. Local Union No. 2150, IBEW (Wisconsin Electric Power Co.), 192 N. L. R. B. 77, 78 (1971), enforced, 486 F. 2d 602 (CA7 1973). Nothing in *815the language or legislative history of the statute contradicts the conclusion that
“ [w]hen a union disciplines a supervisor for crossing a picket line to perform rank-and-file work at the request of his employer, that discipline equally interferes with the employer’s control over his representative and equally deprives him of the undivided loyalty of that supervisor as in the case where the discipline was imposed because of the way the supervisor interpreted the collective bargaining agreement or performed his 'normal’ supervisory duties.” 159 U. S. App. D. C., at 305, 487 F. 2d, at 1176 (dissenting opinion).2
In a steady progression of decisions leading up to the instant cases, the Board concluded that §8 (b)(1)(B) interdicted not only direct union pressure on an employer to replace a supervisor with collective-bargaining or grievance-adjustment functions, but also indirect coercion of an employer by means of attempting, through the application of union discipline apparatus against supervisor-members, to dictate the manner in which they would exercise their supervisory responsibilities. Far from seeing the present cases as a radical extension of this principle, I view the Board’s decisions as a reasoned and realistic application of § 8 (b)(1)(B). For my part, the Board’s findings are based upon substantial record evidence and enjoy “a reasonable basis in law.” NLRB v. Hearst Publications, Inc., 322 U. S. 111, 131 (1944). It may be true that special concerns prompted §8 (b)(1)(B), but the provision, as is often the case, was written *816more broadly. Nor do I see anything in the legislative history foreclosing the Board from applying the section to prevent unions from imposing sanctions on supervisors in the circumstances present here. This Court is not a super-Board authorized to overrule an agency’s choice between reasonable constructions of the controlling statute. We should not impose our views on the Board as long as it stays within the outer boundaries of the statute it is charged with administering. Respectfully, I dissent.

 The court below acknowledged the practical realities of the use of supervisors during a strike: “in the highly automated public utility industries involved in these cases a small work force composed of strikebreakers and non-union management personnel can evidently provide sufficient manpower to continue vital services in a strike, thereby cutting into the strike’s effectiveness.” 159 U. S. App. D. C. 272, 290 n. 21, 487 F. 2d 1143, 1161 n. 21 (1973) (en banc).

 I do not read the Court to say that § 8 (b)(1) (B) would allow a union to discipline supervisor-members for performing supervisory or management functions, as opposed to customary rank-and-file work, during a labor dispute.