Marchers Protest NLRB's Busy Sept.

Unions Say Politics Governed Ruling Rush

Hundreds of labor protesters marched down waterlogged D.C. streets yesterday, decrying a blitz of recent National Labor Relations Board decisions they dubbed the "September Steamroll."

In the final weeks of the month, the board issued 61 decisions that unions contend will make it harder for them to organize and easier for employees who do not support unions to protest and disband them. One of the decisions also makes it more difficult for union workers who have been fired to collect back pay, they said. On a half-dozen of the most controversial decisions, the Republican-dominated board was split along partisan lines, with the majority supporting pro-business measures.

The rush of decisions, the unions allege, was a push by Bush appointees on the NLRB "churning out pro-business decisions in a 'beat the clock' strategy to do as much damage as possible before the 2008 elections," said Tom Buffenbarger, president of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, based in Upper Marlboro. "We cannot afford to wait until then. This board is clearly operating as an agent for businesses and against the workers and the law they are charged with protecting."

In a prepared statement, Robert J. Battista, chairman of the NLRB, dismissed the protest as "shrill political rhetoric over reasoned debate" and noted that in the majority of the unfair labor practice cases issued in September, the board found one or more violations of the act against the employer involved.

"If these groups truly believe that our recent decisions are not consistent with the National Labor Relations Act, they are free to challenge those decisions in court -- either directly in those cases in which they are a party, or they can assist in such a challenge in those cases where they are not a party," Battista said in the statement. "I am confident that our decisions will be upheld on review."

Wilma B. Liebman, a Democrat who was first appointed to the NLRB by President Clinton, said the board's decisions represent "some rather dramatic shifts in [labor] policy . . . what this board is doing is giving much more focus to the right to refrain [from union organizing] than the underlying policy goal of encouraging collective bargaining."

One of the board's decisions, issued Sept. 29, limits a key membership-building technique, in which a company agrees to recognize a union when a majority of workers have signed union cards. Business has long supported the traditional "secret-ballot" election process, contending that makes it less likely that unions will be able to pressure employees into joining. Another NLRB decision expanded the definition of a supervisor to include workers who provide instruction to co-workers in the course of their job, thereby making them ineligible to join unions.

Former Republican NLRB appointee Charles I. Cohen, a partner in the District office of Morgan Lewis & Bockius law firm, did not attend the protest. But he suggested that the surge of decisions in September is more a result of the board's efforts to close cases before the end of the fiscal year, a point Liebman also made.

"It is a more conservative board, and that's what one ends up with," Cohen said. "It's not a case of the administration saying, 'Hey, let's be tough on unions.' "

Workers representing machinists, school employees, Merchant Marine, pipe fitters and other trades wound their way from the AFL-CIO headquarters in Northwest Washington to the NLRB's office on 14th Street NW. Some carried signs that read "Employee Free Choice Act Now!" recalling labor's earlier battle to strengthen organizing practices.

Union forces were set back this summer when Congress failed to enact that measure, which would have required employers to recognize unions after being presented union cards signed by a majority of eligible workers on their payrolls. Under current labor law, a company can demand a secret-ballot election supervised by the federal government after being presented the union cards.

Union leaders yesterday declared the fight would continue.

"This is about galvanizing, it's not about changing these turkeys' minds," said Joslyn N. Williams, president of the AFL-CIO's Metropolitan Washington Council. "It's about the Bush administration and our mission between now and election day to pull together our 15 million workers."