National Labor Relations Board v. International Longshoremen Association

• Decision Date: 27 June 1985
• Docket Number: AFL-CIO,No. 84-861,84-861
• Citation: 473 U.S. 61,105 S.Ct. 3045,87 L.Ed.2d 47
• Parties: NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD, Petitioner, v. INTERNATIONAL LONGSHOREMEN'S ASSOCIATION,, et al
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

473 U.S. 61

105 S.Ct. 3045

87 L.Ed.2d 47

NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD, Petitioner,

v INTERNATIONAL LONGSHOREMEN'S ASSOCIATION, AFL-CIO, et al.

No. 84-861.

Argued April 23, 1985.

Decided June 27, 1985.

Syllabus

The Rules on Containers (Rules) require that some cargo containers owned or leased by marine shipping companies that otherwise would be loaded or unloaded within the local port area (defined as anywhere within a 50-mile radius of the port) instead must be loaded or unloaded by longshoremen at the pier. These Rules were collectively bargained for by respondent union after the advent of "containerization" had drastically reduced the amount of longshoremen's on-pier work involved in cargo handling. In this case, the National Labor Relations Board (Board) held that the Rules constituted unlawful secondary activity under §§ 8(b)(4)(B) and 8(e) of the National Labor Relations Act when applied to containers destined for "shortstopping" truckers (truckers who stop in the vicinity of a pier to load and unload cargo for reasons related to trucking requirements) and "traditional" warehousers (warehousers who perform loading and unloading of cargo at the warehouse for reasons unrelated to marine transportation). The Board reasoned that because the Rules, as so applied, sought to preserve longshoremen's work that had been "eliminated" by containerization, the Rules had "an illegal work acquisition objective." The Court of Appeals refused to enforce the Board's decision, holding that the Board had failed to make any factual finding that the Rules actually operated to deprive "shortstopping" truckers or "traditional" warehousers of any work, and that, as a matter of law, an agreement that preserves duplicative or technologically "eliminated" work does not constitute unlawful "work acquisition."

Held: The Board's partial invalidation of the Rules as applied in the contexts in question is inconsistent with National Woodwork Manufacturers Assn. v. NLRB, 386 U.S. 612, 87 S.Ct. 1250, 18 L.Ed.2d 357, and NLRB v. Longshoremen, 447 U.S. 490, 100 S.Ct. 2305, 65 L.Ed.2d 289 (ILA I ). Pp. 73-84.

(a) National Woodwork, supra, concluded that §§ 8(b)(4)(B) and 8(e) were intended by Congress to "reach only secondary pressures," and that agreements negotiated with the objective of preserving work in the face of a threat to union members' jobs are lawful primary activity. These conclusions were reaffirmed in NLRB v. Pipefitters, 429 U.S. 507, 97 S.Ct. 891, 51 L.Ed.2d 1, and ILA I, supra. Pp. 74-78.

(b) By focusing on the effect that the Rules might have on "shortstopping" truckers and "traditional" warehousers, the Board contravened this Court's direction in ILA I, supra, at 507, n. 22, 100 S.Ct., at 2315, n. 22, that such extra-unit effects, "no matter how severe," are "irrelevant" to the analysis. Given the Rules' primary objective to preserve longshoremen's work in the face of a threat to jobs, extra-unit effects of a work preservation agreement alone provide an insufficient basis for concluding that the agreement has an unlawful secondary objective. Pp. 78-79.

(c) The Board misconstrued this Court's cases in suggesting that "eliminated work" can never be the object of a work preservation agreement. "Elimination" of work in the sense that it is made unnecessary by innovation is not of itself a reason to condemn work preservation agreements under §§ 8(b)(4)(B) and 8(e); to the contrary, such elimination provides the very premise for such agreements. The relevant inquiry is whether a union's activity is primary or secondary, and no talismanic tests may substitute for analysis. When the objective of an agreement and its enforcement is so clearly one of work preservation as is the one involved here, the lawfulness of the agreement under §§ 8(b)(4)(B) and 8(e) is secure, absent some other evidence of secondary purpose. Pp. 80-82.

(c) The Rules are a lawful work preservation agreement, and nothing in the record of this case suggests a conclusion that their enforcement has had a secondary, rather than a primary, objective. P. 84.

734 F.2d 966 (CA4 1984), affirmed.

Norton Jay Come, Washington, D.C., for petitioner.

James Alan Lips, Cincinnati, Ohio, for respondents, American Trucking Associations, et al., in support of petitioner.

Donato Caruso, New York City, for respondents, New York Shipping Ass'n, et al.

Ernest L. Mathews, Jr., New York City, for respondents, Intern. Longshoremen's Ass'n, et al.

Justice BRENNAN delivered the opinion of the Court.

The Rules on Containers are collectively bargained-for guidelines requiring marine shipping companies to allow some of the large cargo containers that they own or lease to be loaded or unloaded by longshoremen at the pier. In NLRB v. Longshoremen, 447 U.S. 490, 100 S.Ct. 2305, 65 L.Ed.2d 289 (1980) (ILA I ), we reviewed the National Labor Relations Board's conclusion that the Rules and their enforcement constituted unlawful secondary activity under §§ 8(b)(4)(B) and 8(e) of the National Labor Relations Act, as amended, 29 U.S.C. §§ 158(b)(4)(B) and 158(e). Respondent union, the International Longshoremen's Association (ILA), defended the Rules as lawful under the "work preservation" doctrine of National Woodwork Manufacturers Assn. v. NLRB, 386 U.S. 612, 87 S.Ct. 1250, 18 L.Ed.2d 357 (1967). We ruled, however, that the Board's preliminary definition of the work in dispute had been legally erroneous, because it focused on the off-pier work of nonlongshoremen rather than on the work of longshoremen sought to be preserved. 447 U.S., at 507-508, 100 S.Ct., at 2315-2316. We therefore affirmed the Court of Appeals' remand of the Rules to the Board, directing it to "focus on the work of the bargaining unit employees, not on the work of other employees who may be doing the same or similar work." Id., at 507, 100 S.Ct., at 2315. The Board then sustained the Rules, but held that their enforcement against "shortstopping" truckers and "traditional" warehousers is unlawful. 266 N.L.R.B. 230 (1983). The question now presented is whether the Board's partial invalidation of the Rules as applied in these two contexts is consistent with ILA I.

I

At issue is the response of unionized dockworkers to a technological innovation known as "containerization." Traditionally, longshoremen employed by steamship or stevedoring companies loaded and unloaded cargo into and out of oceangoing vessels at the pier. Cargo arriving at the pier by truck was "transferred piece by piece from the truck's tailgate to the ship by longshoremen. . . . The longshoremen checked the cargo, sorted it, placed it on pallets and moved it by forklift to the side of the ship, and lifted it by means of a sling or hook into the ship's hold. The process was reversed for cargo taken off incoming ships." 447 U.S., at 495, 100 S.Ct., at 2309. As we explained in some detail in ILA I, the advent of containerization some 25 years ago profoundly transformed this traditional pattern, by reducing the cost of ocean cargo transport and "largely eliminat[ing] the need for cargo handling at intermediate stages." Id., at 509, 100 S.Ct., at 2316.¹

It is thus unsurprising that "the amount of on-pier work involved in cargo handling has been drastically reduced" and that containerization has been since its inception a "hotly disputed topic of collective bargaining" between the ILA and the marine shipping companies. Id., at 495-496, 100 S.Ct., at 2309. The Rules are the evolutionary product of the ILA's bargaining efforts that began with the introduction of the first oceangoing container ship in the Port of New York in 1957.²

The Rules do not require that all containers be loaded or unloaded by longshoremen at the pier. Instead, they apply only to containers that would otherwise be loaded or unloaded within the local port area, defined for convenience as anywhere within a 50-mile radius of the port. Rule 1(a).³ Containers directly coming from or going to points beyond the 50-mile radius are not affected by the Rules. Rule 2. Even within the 50-mile area, containers that go directly to the owner of the cargo or to "bona fide" warehouses are exempted from the Rules. Rules 1(a)(2) and (3), 2(B)(4).⁴ To ensure compliance, a fine of $1,000 is levied against a marine shipping company for each of its containers that it allows to be handled in violation of the Rules. Rule 7(c). As we noted in ILA I: "The practical effect of the Rules is that some 80% of containers pass over the piers intact. The remaining 20% are [loaded and unloaded] by longshoremen, regardless of whether that work duplicates work done by non-ILA employees off-pier." 447 U.S., at 499, 100 S.Ct., at 2311.

Although the marine shipping companies and longshoremen have accepted the various compromises that the Rules represent, three groups of non-ILA employers are unhappy with the Rules. Freight consolidators, truckers, and warehousers all also load and unload containers. Freight consolidators are in the business of arranging for small loads of cargo to be delivered to their off-pier facilities, where consolidator employees combine the cargo with cargo from other parties to pack full containers, which are then delivered to the pier. Consolidators also receive from incoming vessels containers packed with several parties' cargo, which they unload and disperse to the respective owners.

Unlike consolidators, many of whose businesses have been founded on containerization, some truckers and warehousers have always performed some off-pier cargo handling work. For example, prior to containerization, some interstate truckers would pick up cargo at the pier, drive a short distance to a central facility, and then unload and reload the cargo to meet weight, safety, or delivery requirements. Such unloading and reloading near the pier still sometimes occurs, even if the cargo is picked up in containers. The trucking practice of stopping in the vicinity of the pier to unload and reload cargo for...