U.S. Dept. of Air Force, Scott Air Force Base, Illinois v. Federal Labor Relations Authority, s. 87-1143

Decision Date29 March 1988
Docket NumberNos. 87-1143,87-1272,s. 87-1143
Citation838 F.2d 229
Parties127 L.R.R.M. (BNA) 2710, 56 USLW 2496 UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF the AIR FORCE, SCOTT AIR FORCE BASE, ILLINOIS, Petitioner, Cross-Respondent, v. FEDERAL LABOR RELATIONS AUTHORITY, Respondent, Cross-Petitioner.
CourtU.S. Court of Appeals — Seventh Circuit

Al J. Daniel, Jr., Civil Div., Dept. of Justice, Washington, D.C., for petitioner, cross-respondent.

William E. Persina, Federal Labor Relations Authority, Joseph Henderson, Washington, D.C., for respondent, cross-petitioner.

Before FLAUM and EASTERBROOK, Circuit Judges, and GRANT, Senior District Judge. *

EASTERBROOK, Circuit Judge.

The American Federation of Government Employees (the Union), representing some civilian employees at Scott Air Force Base, wants the home addresses of non-members so it can communicate with them--to induce them to join or to learn their desires so it can better represent them whether they join or not. The Air Force offered to distribute the Union's messages to each employee's desk in sealed envelopes, and an administrative law judge concluded that this would afford satisfactory access. The Federal Labor Relations Authority disagreed, applying a rule it announced in Farmers Home Administration Finance Office, St. Louis, Missouri, 23 F.L.R.A. 788 (1986) (FHAFO ). The FLRA concluded that withholding the home addresses is an unfair labor practice under 5 U.S.C. Sec. 7114(b)(4), which it ordered the Air Force to cease. We must decide whether FHAFO correctly applies exemption 6 to the Freedom of Information Act, 5 U.S.C. Sec. 552(b)(6).

Section 7114(b)(4) requires a federal employer to furnish a union with "data" that are "reasonably available and necessary for full and proper discussion, understanding, and negotiation of subjects within the scope of collective bargaining ... to the extent not prohibited by law". The Authority concluded that knowing and being able to reach employees facilitates the "discussion, understanding, and negotiation" of matters subject to collective bargaining, a determination within its discretion. Department of Health and Human Services v. FLRA, 833 F.2d 1129, 1131-32 (4th Cir.1987) (relying on cases decided under the National Labor Relations Act). The principal disputes concern whether home addresses are "necessary" to this purpose, in light of alternative channels of communication, and whether the release of such information without the consent of each employee is "prohibited by law". The pertinent "law" is the Privacy Act, 5 U.S.C. Sec. 552a, which forbids the unconsented disclosure of personal information found in a governmental system of records, unless an exception applies. One exception is that documents covered by a "routine use" notice may be revealed routinely. 5 U.S.C. Sec. 552a(b)(3). Another is that documents may be revealed when the Freedom of Information Act so requires, see Sec. 552a(b)(2). The FOIA requires agencies to release home addresses unless they come within exemption 6, which covers records the public availability of which "would constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy".

The FLRA concluded that access to home addresses is "necessary" because the delivery of union materials to employees at work may expose them to pressure. If they read the information on the spot, they may be accused of neglect of duty or subject to inquiry by supervisors; if they take it home unopened or throw it away, this may raise the eyebrows of fellow employees who fear they possess insufficient sympathy for the common cause. Although delivery at work might be sufficient at some times and places--as the ALJ found it would be at Scott Air Force Base--the Authority feared that the task of drawing lines case by case would be time consuming and imprecise. The employer could drag out the decision for years, and in the end the decision would not necessarily be accurate. Only a presumptive rule, the Authority thought, had reasonable prospect of effective, expeditious administration. The Authority relied both on the "routine use" exemption to the Privacy Act and on its interpretation of exemption 6 to the FOIA in concluding that disclosure was not prohibited by law. It allowed that "[d]isclosure need not be made in situations where, for example, the evidence discloses that a union has acted in a manner which leads to the conclusion that the employees whose addresses would be disclosed would be in imminent danger if the union knew where they lived" (23 F.L.R.A. at 798), a problem the Authority did not detect in FHAFO or at Scott Air Force Base.

The Department of Justice, representing the Air Force and governmental employers in approximately 100 similar cases pending throughout the country, attacks FHAFO at every point. Disclosure is not necessary because of alternative means of communication; at the least there should be case by case decisions on the "necessity" question; if disclosure is necessary to something, that something is not the "collective bargaining" defined by 5 U.S.C. Sec. 7103(a)(12); the routine use notice on which the FLRA relies refers the agency to FOIA principles and so is not really "routine"; and exemption 6 to the FOIA itself, the Department submits, treats the release of home addresses as unwarranted invasions of personal privacy.

Two courts have addressed one or more of these issues. AFGE, Local 1760 v. FLRA, 786 F.2d 554 (2d Cir.1986), holds that the FOIA requires governmental employers to release home addresses to unions; because the union could enforce the FOIA by independent suit, the Second Circuit did not consider the "necessity" issue peculiar to labor law. Department of Health and Human Services v. FLRA, supra, concluded that the Authority is entitled to find release of the information "necessary" and avoided deciding whether the FOIA would compel release independently of Sec. 7114(b)(4). The Fourth Circuit earlier had held that the FOIA does not require the government to release home addresses to unions in independent litigation. AFGE, Local 1923 v. Department of Health and Human Services, 712 F.2d 931 (4th Cir.1983). Invoking the discretion of the FLRA enabled the Fourth Circuit to finesse its earlier decision. We may put on the other side, at least in spirit, decisions such as Wine Hobby USA, Inc. v. IRS, 502 F.2d 133 (3d Cir.1974), holding that exemption 6 permits the IRS to withhold a list of home addresses of persons who had paid the tax to make wine at home; the Third Circuit thought that home addresses were too private to be exposed for the sake of one (a publisher of a winemaking magazine) who wanted to propose a "mere" commercial transaction.

We agree with the Second Circuit and therefore enforce the FLRA's order without reaching the issues under Sec. 7103(a)(12), Sec. 7114(b)(4), and the routine use exemption to the Privacy Act. Because most arguments pro and con have been ventilated in published opinions and scholarly writings--e.g., Anthony T. Kronman, The Privacy Exemption to the Freedom of Information Act, 9 J. Legal Studies 727, 741-48 (1980) (criticizing Wine Hobby )--we set out an outline of our reasons.

Exemption 6 permits the government to withhold information that would create a "clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy". The FOIA's status as a disclosure law has led the Supreme Court to read this with strong emphasis on "clearly unwarranted". Department of the Air Force v. Rose, 425 U.S. 352, 360-62, 372-73, 378-79 & n. 16, 96 S.Ct. 1592, 1598-1600, 1604-05, 1607 & n. 16, 48 L.Ed.2d 11 (1976). It is hard to see how the disclosure of home addresses could be "clearly unwarranted" as a rule. Most home addresses are in the telephone book, freely available to anyone interested. They are widely disseminated on mailing lists. And the mail that comes in response does not substantially impinge on seclusion; the addressee may send it to the circular file. Both the secrecy and the seclusion components of privacy therefore are minuscule here. The willingness of most persons to make their home addresses accessible to strangers is a telling datum in any effort to discern whether release of the same information by the government "clearly" produces an "unwarranted" invasion of privacy. See Department of State v. Washington Post Co., 456 U.S. 595, 602-03 n. 5, 102 S.Ct. 1957,...

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