7th Circuit holds winery violated NLRA over 'Cellar Lives Matter' slogan

The 7th Circuit recently upheld a decision from the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) in a case involving Woodbridge Winery. The ruling cemented employees' right to display a prounion message on their clothing, despite the employer's actions to remove the messaging from the workplace. The National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) protects an employee's right to self-organize. That is, the Act protects an employee's right to form a union to bargain collectively with an employer. Employers are prohibited from interfering unless they can prove an employee's exercise of the right substantially interfered with production, morale, or the organization's public image.

NLRA refresher

Section 7 of the NLRA guarantees employees "the right to self-organization, to form, join, or assist labor organizations, to bargain collectively through representatives of their own choosing, and to engage in other concerted activities for the purpose of collective bargaining or other mutual aid or protection." The Act is enforced by prohibiting employers from interfering with an employee's free exercise of the rights. An employee need not prove an intentional interference, only that the employer's actions "[tend] to interfere" with the exercise of the rights.

Section 7 protects an employee's right to wear clothing or insignias bearing prounion messages, but the right isn't absolute. An employer may restrain the speech if it can show special circumstances justifying a ban on the clothing or message. For example, the employer could prove the message would: