American Newspaper Publishers Ass'n v. National Labor Relations Board
Headline: Newspaper union wins as Court limits anti-featherbedding law, allowing publishers to be required to pay printers for duplicate ad types when the printers actually perform the work.
Holding: The Court held that a printers' union's insistence that publishers pay workers to set duplicate advertising type does not violate the anti-featherbedding law because the printers actually performed the disputed work.
- Allows unions and publishers to keep pay agreements for 'made work' when work is done.
- Narrows the anti-featherbedding law to payments for services not performed.
- Leaves disputes over wasteful make-work to bargaining or Congress.
Summary
Background
A national association of newspaper publishers sued after a printers' union insisted that publishers pay compositors to set duplicate advertising type, a practice called 'setting bogus,' even though the duplicates were usually thrown away. The publishers filed unfair-labor-practice charges with the National Labor Relations Board under the Taft-Hartley Act's anti-featherbedding section, § 8(b)(6). The Board dismissed those charges, the Seventh Circuit upheld the dismissal, and the Supreme Court agreed to decide whether the union's insistence violated the statute.
Reasoning
The core question was whether demanding pay for reproducing ads that the publisher ordinarily does not use counts as pay "for services which are not performed or not to be performed." The Court held it does not. Because the printers actually performed the reproduction work with the employer's consent, the Court read § 8(b)(6) to reach only payments for services that are not performed or will not be performed by anyone. The opinion relied on the statute's text and Congress's legislative history and concluded that collective bargaining should decide what work is compensable.
Real world impact
The decision lets unions and publishers keep agreements that pay workers for 'made work' when the work is actually done, preserving long-standing printing practices. It narrows the legal reach of § 8(b)(6), leaving debate over wasteful practices to bargaining or to Congress if it chooses to act. The ruling affects large newspaper employers, local printing unions, and other industries with similar 'made work' customs.
Dissents or concurrances
Two Justices dissented, arguing that setting bogus type is useless work and that the statute should forbid pay for such contrived tasks because they add no value to the employer.
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