The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) recently deemed
unlawful a work rule that restricted the display of union insignia
by requiring employees to wear uniforms or other designated
clothing that implicitly prohibited them from substituting union
clothes for the required uniform or clothing. Tesla, Inc.,
370 NLRB No. 131 (2022).
In l975, the U.S. Supreme Court held employees have the right to
display union insignia under the National Labor Relations Act
(NLRA) unless the employer could establish special circumstances
justifying the need to limit such a right. Thereafter, in 2010, the
NLRB held an employer could not enforce a company uniform policy in
an effort to prevent employees from wearing union clothing.
Limiting the reach of that prior decision on the issue, the NLRB
decided in 2019 that the "special circumstances" standard
was not applicable to a Wal-Mart dress code policy that partially
restricted the display of union buttons and insignia.
