Section 23 Ally Doctrine

• Library: Employer-Employee Law 2008

Application of NLRA § 8(b)(4), 29 U.S.C. § 158(b)(4), turns not only on the location of the picketing and the types of concerns that are present but also on the nature of the relationship between the primary and neutrals. Under the NLRB’s “ally doctrine,” entities that are allied with one another in some manner may not be insulated from each other’s labor disputes, and picketing may lawfully be conducted at all allied facilities during the course of a labor dispute. Typically, the ally doctrine applies to two situations:

1. When a second employer is performing struck work—i.e., work that would normally be done by striking employees but for a strike

2. When two or more entities have such common ownership, overlapping corporate control, or integration of operations that none can be said to be disinterested in the labor disputes of others

In the first instance, the employer who performs struck work stands to benefit from a labor dispute and thus is no longer a disinterested bystander. NLRB v. Bus. Mach. & Office Appliance Mechs. Conference Bd., Local 459, 228 F.2d 553 (2^nd Cir. 1955). In the second instance, entities, though nominally separate, may be so inextricably bound together that they are, in effect, a single enterprise. See Teamsters, Chauffeurs, Warehousemen & Helpers, Local Union No. 560, 248 N.L.R.B. 1212 (1980); Los Angeles Newspaper Guild, Local No. 69, 185 N.L.R.B. 303 (1970).

In Local No. P-9, United Food & Commercial Workers Union,
281 N.L.R.B. 986 (1986), the NLRB held that a bank having some common directors with a meat processing business and performing banking services for the business was not an ally that would permit a union to picket at the bank in support of a primary dispute with the business.

In Carpenters Local 316, 283 N.L.R.B. 81...