## Facts

- The NLRB certified the International UAW as the exclusive bargaining representative for employees at Borg-Warner’s Wooster, Ohio facility.
- The International chartered a local, and the International and local jointly proposed a collective-bargaining agreement naming both.
- The employer proposed a contract that (1) recognized only the local and expressly excluded the certified International, and (2) required a pre-strike secret ballot of all unit employees on the employer’s last offer.
- The unions rejected both provisions; negotiations broke down and a strike followed.
- During the strike, the employer maintained it would not execute any agreement unless both provisions were included.
- The local ultimately signed an agreement containing both provisions; the International filed unfair labor practice charges.
- The NLRB found violations of NLRA § 8(a)(5) and (1) and ordered the employer to stop insisting on either clause as a condition of reaching an agreement; the court of appeals enforced only the portion concerning the recognition clause.

## Issues

1. Whether the employer’s insistence, to the point of impasse, on including the ballot clause and the recognition clause as conditions of agreement constituted a refusal to bargain under NLRA § 8(a)(5).
2. Whether either clause was a mandatory subject of bargaining under NLRA § 8(d) (“wages, hours, and other terms and conditions of employment”), permitting lawful insistence.

## Decision

- The Supreme Court reversed the court of appeals and remanded for enforcement of the NLRB’s order in full.
- The Court held that neither the ballot clause nor the recognition clause was a mandatory subject of bargaining under § 8(d).
- The employer could lawfully propose the clauses, but unlawfully refused to bargain by insisting on them as a precondition to any agreement on mandatory subjects.

## Legal Principles

- The duty to bargain in good faith under NLRA §§ 8(a)(5) and 8(d) extends only to “wages, hours, and other terms and conditions of employment” (mandatory subjects).
- Parties may discuss nonmandatory (permissive) subjects, but neither side may insist to impasse on a permissive subject as a condition of reaching agreement; such insistence is a refusal to bargain.
- Good-faith bargaining over mandatory subjects does not excuse refusing to execute an agreement unless a permissive proposal is accepted.
- A provision regulating employees’ or the union’s internal strike decision-making (such as a pre-strike employee vote on the employer’s last offer) is not a mandatory subject of bargaining.
- A provision that would exclude or displace the certified bargaining representative as a contract party is not a mandatory subject and conflicts with the statutory certification scheme.

## Conclusion

The Court sustained the NLRB’s finding that an employer commits an unfair labor practice by conditioning any collective-bargaining agreement on acceptance of permissive subjects, including clauses governing internal strike procedures or attempting to substitute a different representative for the certified union.


NLRB v. Wooster Div. of Borg-Warner Corp., 356 U.S. 342 (1958)