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House committee debates bill to pause NLRB
By Amanda Becker

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Lawmakers held a spirited discussion on the immediate future of the National Labor Relations Board on Wednesday, after a recent appeals court ruling that cast doubt on the board's authority to make decisions.

Republicans said the labor board was thumbing its nose at the court by continuing business as usual, while a Democrat accused Republicans of adding to the confusion created by the court's ruling.

In Noel Canning v. NLRB on Jan. 25, the District of Columbia Circuit Court of Appeals invalidated appointments to the board by President Barack Obama, casting doubt on some 600 decisions the board has made since January 2012.

The Republican-controlled House of Representatives is considering a bill that would stop the board from taking official action until either the Supreme Court rules on the D.C. Circuit's decision or the Senate confirms a quorum of the NLRB.

At a hearing on the bill in the House Rules Committee on Wednesday, New Jersey Democrat Robert Andrews said the proposed legislation was "at best irrelevant" and "at worst exacerbates" the confusion of unions, workers and employers.

"What we have is this bill that purports to reduce chaos. It adds to the chaos," Andrews said, in a reference to the bill's name, Preventing Greater Uncertainty in Labor-Management Relations.

Rules Committee Chairman Pete Sessions of Texas took the board to task for going about its business as usual despite the ruling by the D.C. Circuit. "The NLRB and the president have ignored this ruling and have chosen to politically thumb their nose at the court of appeals," Sessions said.

Obama on Tuesday nominated two Republicans to the board and renominated the board's current chairman, a Democrat, to a new term. He has also asked the Senate to confirm the two Democrats he put on the board in recess appointments in January 2012.

The five-member NLRB is an independent federal agency and quasi-judicial body that oversees union elections, polices unfair labor practices and issues decisions.

The full House is expected to vote on the bill later this week.

Andrews, who was a witness at Wednesday's hearing, said that the proposed bill would invalidate the work of nearly a dozen of the board's 28 regional directors. That would create a dichotomy between areas of the country that still had an acting regional office and those that did not, he said.

"You want to talk about legal questions? That could be an equal-protection-under-the-law question," said Andrews, who was an attorney in private practice and an adjunct law professor at Rutgers School of Law before coming to Congress.

NLRB regional directors investigate claims of unfair labor practices and have the authority to either bring or dismiss a complaint against an employer.

Andrews asked committee Republicans to join him in calling on the Senate to hold a confirmation vote on the three most recent nominees, which would for practical purposes render legislation unnecessary.

"The solution to the chaos is for the United States Senate to do its job," Andrews said.

Republican Virginia Foxx of North Carolina said the House had a responsibility to take action itself rather than leave it to the Senate. "To push the responsibility off to other people is not something we should be doing," she said.

It is unclear what action the Democratic-led Senate will take. The office of Majority Leader Harry Reid on Wednesday did not respond to a request for comment. A spokesman for Republican Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina said there had been "no change in position" since Graham promised to put an indefinite hold on all NLRB nominees in late 2011.

The board drew the ire of Graham and other Republicans after it filed a complaint against Boeing over plans to relocate its plant from Washington to South Carolina. The complaint was withdrawn after the company reached an agreement with its union.

The new members nominated on Tuesday are management-side attorneys Harry Johnson, a partner at Arent Foxx in Los Angeles, and Philip Miscimarra, a partner at Morgan, Lewis & Bockius in Chicago.

Current Chairman Mark Gaston Pearce represented unions and plaintiffs at Creighton, Pearce, Johnsen & Giroux in Buffalo, New York, before joining the board.

Of the two nominated in 2012, Sharon Block and Richard Griffin, Block is a former labor counsel to Senator Edward Kennedy and Griffin is a former general counsel for the International Union of Operating Engineers.