## Facts

- Whirlpool operated a household-appliance manufacturing plant in Ohio that used an overhead conveyor system.
- A wire-mesh guard screen, located about 20 feet above the plant floor, was designed to protect employees from falling objects; maintenance workers sometimes stepped onto it to perform repairs.
- In 1973, several employees fell through the screen; Whirlpool began installing a stronger screen.
- On June 28, 1974, a maintenance employee fell through an old portion of the screen and died.
- On July 7, 1974, maintenance employees Virgil Deemer and Thomas Cornwell complained about the safety of the old screen.
- The next day, Deemer and Cornwell were instructed to perform maintenance on a section of the old screen and refused based on safety concerns.
- Whirlpool ordered them to leave the job without pay for the remainder of the shift and placed written reprimands in their personnel files.
- The Secretary of Labor relied on a regulation treating as a protected right an employee’s refusal to perform a task due to a reasonable apprehension of death or serious injury and a reasonable belief that no less drastic alternative is available.
- The Secretary sued for relief under OSH Act § 11(c)(1), which prohibits discrimination against an employee for exercising “any right afforded by” the Act.

## Issues

1. Whether a regulation protecting an employee’s refusal to perform an assigned task based on a reasonable apprehension of death or serious injury, and no reasonable alternative, is authorized by OSH Act § 11(c)(1).
2. Whether such a regulation impermissibly creates a “strike with pay” right or otherwise conflicts with the OSH Act’s text, structure, or legislative history.

## Decision

- The Supreme Court unanimously affirmed the judgment in favor of the Secretary and upheld the regulation’s validity.
- The Court held the regulation was a permissible interpretation of § 11(c)(1) and within the Secretary’s delegated authority.
- The regulation did not create a general right to stop work or a right to be paid while refusing; it prohibited retaliation when the refusal meets the regulation’s narrow conditions.
- The case was returned for proceedings consistent with recognizing the regulation as valid and applicable to the employees’ refusal.

## Legal Principles

- OSH Act § 11(c)(1) protects employees from retaliation for exercising rights “afforded by” the Act, including rights reasonably defined through valid regulations.
- A regulation may protect an employee’s refusal to perform assigned work when the employee has a reasonable apprehension of death or serious injury and reasonably believes no less drastic alternative exists.
- Protection is limited by objective reasonableness requirements, which reduce the risk of abuse and tie the refusal to imminent, grave hazards.
- Legislative history rejecting a broad “strike with pay” proposal does not preclude narrower anti-retaliation protection for refusals meeting the regulation’s conditions.
- Courts give substantial weight to the Secretary of Labor’s reasonable regulatory interpretations that fit the Act’s purpose of preventing occupational death and serious injury and that complement the Act’s enforcement scheme.

## Conclusion

The Court held that the Secretary of Labor validly interpreted OSH Act § 11(c)(1) to protect employees from employer retaliation when they refuse work posing a reasonable apprehension of death or serious injury and no reasonable alternative is available, and it rejected the claim that this protection amounted to an unauthorized “strike with pay.”


Whirlpool Corp. v. Marshall, 445 U.S. 1 (1980)