Court Orders Labor Board to Reconsider

Academe, May/Jun 2004

In February, a federal appeals court ruled that the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) must explain more clearly why it decided in favor of faculty seeking to unionize at LeMoyne-Owen College, a historically black college in Tennessee. The LeMoyne-Owen College Faculty Organization, a local AAUP chapter, petitioned the labor board in 2002 to be recognized as a union. The college administration argued that the faculty should not be allowed to unionize because they were essentially managers. In making that argument, the administration relied on the so-called Yeshiva defense widely used by private institutions since the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1980 that faculty at Yeshiva University were ineligible to unionize for this reason. The AAUP's Legal Defense Fund provided support for the chapter in meeting its expenses in this post-Yeshiva litigation.

After a regional director of the NLRB ruled in favor of the faculty, the administration appealed to the full board, which declined to hear the appeal because it found that the administration had not raised any substantial issues for review. In the end, rather than negotiate with the faculty, the administration sought court review. The appellate court found that the regional NLRB director had not adequately explained why he rejected the precedents cited by LeMoyne-Owen's administration, and it sent the case back for further review by the board.

The faculty intends to continue pursuing collective bargaining, says Cheryl Golden, a psychology professor and president of the LeMoyneOwen AAUP chapter. "The Court could have found that faculty at LeMoyne-Owen were managerial employees, but it did not do so. Instead, it simply required that the NLRB substantiate its decision with case law, a requirement that does not close the door on collective bargaining."