## Facts

- Carroll College, Inc. is a private, nonprofit liberal-arts college in Waukesha, Wisconsin, affiliated with the Synod of Lakes and Prairies of the United Presbyterian Church of the U.S.A.
- Carroll’s organizational documents and public materials describe it as a Christian liberal-arts college with an educational mission rooted in the Christian tradition.
- The UAW petitioned the NLRB to represent Carroll’s full-time faculty for collective bargaining.
- The NLRB’s Regional Director asserted jurisdiction and the Board certified the union.
- After Carroll refused to bargain, the NLRB ordered Carroll to bargain with the faculty union.
- Carroll sought judicial review; on appeal it relied on the First Amendment Religion Clauses and the constitutional-avoidance approach of *NLRB v. Catholic Bishop of Chicago*, as applied by the D.C. Circuit’s *University of Great Falls* test.

## Issues

1. Whether the NLRB may exercise NLRA jurisdiction over a nonprofit, religiously affiliated college that publicly holds itself out as providing a religious educational environment.
2. Whether the Board may limit *Catholic Bishop* to narrowly “church-operated” schools rather than applying an objective test keyed to nonprofit status, religious affiliation, and public religious identity.

## Decision

- The D.C. Circuit granted Carroll’s petition for review and denied enforcement of the Board’s bargaining order.
- The court vacated the NLRB’s order for lack of jurisdiction.
- Applying *Catholic Bishop* and the *Great Falls* test, the court held Carroll qualified as a religious educational institution beyond the Board’s authority under the NLRA.
- The court rejected the Board’s narrower “church-operated” approach as inconsistent with controlling precedent and as risking excessive government involvement with a religious institution.

## Legal Principles

- Absent a clear statement from Congress, the NLRA is not construed to cover faculty at religious schools where Board jurisdiction would raise serious First Amendment questions (*Catholic Bishop* constitutional-avoidance rule).
- Under the D.C. Circuit’s *Great Falls* framework, the Board must decline jurisdiction over an educational institution that:
  - holds itself out as providing a religious educational environment,
  - is organized as a nonprofit, and
  - is affiliated with or controlled by a recognized religious organization (or a religiously defined entity).
- The jurisdictional inquiry is designed to avoid intrusive assessment of religious doctrine, curriculum, or the religiosity of faculty duties by focusing on objective indicia, including public representations and formal affiliation.

## Conclusion

The D.C. Circuit held that a nonprofit college affiliated with a recognized religious body and publicly presenting itself as providing a Christian educational environment falls outside the NLRB’s NLRA jurisdiction, and it vacated the Board’s order requiring the college to bargain with the faculty union.


Carroll Coll., Inc. v. NLRB, 558 F.3d 568 (D.C. Cir. 2009)