Mayo Clinic

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Jun 5, 1967

165 N.L.R.B. 181 (N.L.R.B. 1967)

MAYO CLINIC
Mayo Clinic and Hotel , Hospital , Restaurant
and Tavern Employees Local No. 21. Case
AO-102.
June 5, 1967
ORDER DISMISSING PETITION FOR
ADVISORY OPINION
On May 1, 1967, Mayo Clinic, herein called the
Petitioner, filed a petition pursuant to Section
102.98 and 102.99 of the National Labor Relations
Board Rules and Regulations, Series 8, as amended,
requesting an Advisory Opinion to the effect that the
Board would assert jurisdiction with respect to a
representation proceeding involving the Petitioner's
employees. There is presently pending before the
Minnesota State Labor Conciliator, herein called
State Conciliator, a petition for the investigation and
certification of a bargaining representative of
employees of the Petitioner filed by Hotel, Hospital,
Restaurant and Tavern Employees Local No. 21,
herein called the Union, having Docket No., Notice
No. 67-R-1409. Thereafter, the Union filed a
response with a copy of its brief to the State
Conciliator urging him to accept jurisdiction.
The Board has duly considered the allegations of
I Walker Butler, Presiding Judge (Upper Lakes Shipping, Ltd),
138 NLRB 221, Mt. Pleasant Public Utilities , 156 NLRB 79
2 See The Trustees of Columbia University in the City of New
York, 97 NLRB 424, University of Miami, Institute of Marine
165 NLRB No. 29
181
the petition and response. The Board's Advisory
Opinion proceedings "are designed primarily to
determine questions of jurisdiction by application of
the Board's discretionary standards to the
`commerce' operations of an employer."' The
petition details commerce data allegedly pertinent to
the Board's discretionary standards. But the entire
submission raises the basic underlying issue
whether the Petitioner, a nonprofit voluntary
association of physicians and surgeons, the major
activity of which is providing medical care for
patients , is through all its activities and relationships
a nonprofit hospital excluded from the definition of
"employer" in Section 2(2) of the Act. Also involved
may be a question of the status of Mayo Clinic as an
educational and research institution.2 The former
issue does not fall within the intendment of the
Board's Advisory Opinion rules,3 and the latter issue
has not been presented with sufficient clarity or
detail to permit its resolution. Since each is a
threshold question which must be determined before
consideration of the applicability of the Board's
discretionary commerce standards, the petition
herein will be dismissed.
Accordingly, it is hereby ordered that, for the
reasons set forth above, the petition for an Advisory
Opinion herein be, and it hereby is, dismissed.
Science Division, 146 NLRB 1448, of Woods Hole Oceanographic
Institution , 143 NLRB 568
' Mt Pleasant Public Utilities, supra, Upper Lakes Shipping,
Ltd, supra, Interlake Steamship Company and Pickands Mather
&Co,138NLRB576
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