Law Commons^™

Determination Of The Appropriate Unit For Collective Bargaining, Jerome Ackerman, Lawrence A. Sullivan

West Virginia Law Review

The provisions of Section 9 of the National Labor Relations Act, as amended, establish a procedure for ascertaining the identity of the representatives of employees with whom an employer will be required to engage in collective bargaining. The ultimate issue of identity involves two component questions of fact: (1) What is the appropriate unit and (2) What union, if any, do a majority of employees within that unit prefer? While the latter issue is resolved through the relatively simple process of an election, the former is more complex. It requires the NLRB to appraise a wide variety of evidential materials …