1. Was the union’s distribution of handbills a violation of Section 8(b)(4)(ii)(B) of the NLRA?
2. State the rule of the case.
3. Compare the impact on neutral employers of responsive consumer action in the Tree Fruits case with that in the Safeco case.
4. Does the Safeco decision modify the Tree Fruits decision?

[Safeco Title Insurance Co. underwrites real estate title insurance in the state of Washington. It maintains close business relationships with five local title companies. These local title companies search land titles, perform escrow service, and sell title insurance; and more than 90 percent of their gross income derives from the sale of Safeco insurance. Local 1001 of the Retail Store Employees Union became the certified bargaining representative for certain Safeco employees in 1974. When contract negotiations between Safeco and the union reached an impasse, the employees went on strike. The union picketed Safeco's office in Seattle, and it also picketed each of the five local title companies. The pickets carried signs declaring that Safeco had no contract with the union. A typical sign read:
Safeco Nonunion Does not Employ Members of or Have Contract with Retail Store Employees Local 1001 Union members also distributed handbills advising the public of the strike and asking consumers to support the strike by canceling their Safeco policies.

Safeco and one of the title companies filed complaints with the NLRB charging that the union had engaged in an unfair labor practice by picketing in order to promote a secondary boycott against the title companies. No issue was raised concerning the distribution of handbills. The Board concluded that the union's picketing violated Section 8(b)(4)(ii)(B) of the NLRA. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit set aside the Board's order, holding that Tree Fruits leaves neutrals susceptible to whatever consequences may flow from secondary picketing against the consumption of products of an employer involved in a labor dispute. The Supreme Court granted a writ of certiorari.]

POWELL, J.…
The question is whether § 8(b)(4)(ii)(B) of the National Labor Relations Act forbids secondary picketing against a struck product when such picketing predictably encourages consumers to boycott a neutral party's business….

…The product picketed in Tree Fruits was but one item among the many that made up the retailer's trade. If the appeal against such a product succeeds, the Court observed, it simply induces the neutral retailer to reduce his orders for the product or "to drop the item as a poor seller." The decline in sales attributable to consumer rejection of the struck product puts pressure upon the primary employer, and the marginal injury to the neutral retailer is purely incidental to the product boycott. The neutral therefore has little reason to become involved in the labor dispute. In this case, on the other hand, the title companies sell only the primary employer's product and perform the services associated with it. Secondary picketing against consumption of the primary product leaves responsive consumers no realistic option other than to boycott the title companies altogether. If the appeal succeeds, each company "stops buying the struck product, not because of a falling demand, but in response to pressure designed to inflict injury on [its] business generally." Thus, "the union does more than merely follow the struck product; it creates a separate dispute with the secondary employer." Such an expansion of labor discord was one of the evils that Congress intended § 8(b)(4)(ii)(B) to prevent….

As long as secondary picketing only discourages consumption of a struck product, incidental injury to the neutral is a natural consequence of an effective primary boycott. But the Union's secondary appeal against the central product sold by the title companies in this case is "reasonably calculated to induce customers not to patronize the neutrals at all." The resulting injury to their business is distinctly different from the injury that the Court considered in Tree Fruits. Product picketing that reasonably can be expected to threaten neutral parties with ruin or substantial loss simply does not square with the language or the purpose of § 8(b)(4)(ii)(B).…

The judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed and the case is remanded with directions to enforce the National Labor Relations Board's order.
So ordered.