Author Question: Did the Dissent concede that the Board Majority could legally overrule the Epilepsy Foundation ... (Read 54 times)

joesmith1212 · **on:** Jun 24, 2018

Did the Dissent concede that the Board Majority could legally overrule the Epilepsy Foundation precedent?

Question 2

Section 7 of the NLRA states in part, employees shall have the rightto engage in concerted activities for the purposes ofmutual aid or protection.. The Board's construction of this language in Weingarten was that it created a statutory right in an employee to refuse to submit to an interview which the employee reasonably feared may result in discipline without union representation. Does this same language provide the same rights to unrepresented employees?

rachel · **Reply #1 on:** Jun 24, 2018

Answer to Question 1

Yes. It stated that they overruled a sound decisionbecause they can.. The administrative process allows the Board to alter precedents to address changing circumstances according to the cumulative experience of the Board and the constant process of trial and error. Moreover, through the presidential appointment powers there can be an ever-changing composition of the Board. While a Board majority cannot create under the guise of interpretation a meaning for the Act that is unsustainable in order to achieve a desired result, the Board has the primary responsibility for applying the provisions of the Act to the complexities of industrial life, and as long as its interpretation is permissible, courts will defer to the expertise of the Board.
The IBM Corp. Board's interpretation of the Act is permissible, but not right according to the dissent. The dissent states that the majority overruled the Epilepsy decision not because they must or should, but simply because they can.. The IBM Corp. decision is well within the norms of the administrative process. The Board could legally do what it did do.

Answer to Question 2

For policy reasons, the Board majority decided that the above quoted language did not provide a right to unrepresented employees to have a coworker present during the investigatory interviews.