holding that failure to grant a wage increase could be lawfully motivated by a good-faith effort “to comply with the requirements of law”
How later courts described this case
- holding that failure to grant a wage increase could be lawfully motivated by a good-faith effort “to comply with the requirements of law”
- no due process violation when cross-examination would not have been any different if evidence had been directed toward additional violation
- “In the absence of evidence demonstrating that the timing of the announcement of changes in benefits was governed by factors other than the pendency of the election, the Board will regard interference with employee freedom of choice as the motivating factor.”
- no due process violation when cross-examination and rebuttal testimony would not have been any different if evidence had been directed to prove additional violation
Written by the judges who cited it.
The opinion
GOODWIN, Circuit Judge,
concurring and dissenting.
I concur in the majority’s disposition of all the issues except that dealing with the denial of the 1973 wage increase. Here, I would grant enforcement. The hearing officer had an ample evidentiary basis for the *1132 finding that the denial of the wage increase was motivated in part by a management expectation that the union would get the blame.
I am not persuaded by the “advice of counsel” defense. This is not a case of an employer who was faced with a true dilemma. The hearing officer had the right to believe the evidence that the plant manager had told at least one employee, after two years of successive matching pay increases, that, by joining the union, the employees had “blown it” for the next increase.