714
Opinion of the Court
by detailed orders and regulations issued by the employer. So, for example, in Chevron Shipping Co., 317 N. L. R. B. 379, 381 (1995), the Board concluded that "although the contested licensed officers are imbued with a great deal of responsibility, their use of independent judgment and discretion is circumscribed by the master's standing orders, and the Operating Regulations, which require the watch officer to contact a superior officer when anything unusual occurs or when problems occur."
The Board, however, argues further that the judgment even of employees who are permitted by their employer to exercise a sufficient degree of discretion is not "independent judgment" if it is a particular kind of judgment, namely, "ordinary professional or technical judgment in directing less-skilled employees to deliver services." Brief for Petitioner 11. The first five words of this interpretation insert a startling categorical exclusion into statutory text that does not suggest its existence. The text, by focusing on the "clerical" or "routine" (as opposed to "independent") nature of the judgment, introduces the question of degree of judgment that we have agreed falls within the reasonable discretion of the Board to resolve. But the Board's categorical exclusion turns on factors that have nothing to do with the degree of discretion an employee exercises. Cf. Whitman v. American Trucking Assns., Inc., 531 U. S. 457, 481 (2001) ("[T]he agency's interpretation goes beyond the limits of what is ambiguous and contradicts what in our view is quite clear"). Let the judgment be significant and only loosely constrained by the employer; if it is "professional or technical" it will nonetheless not be independent.1 The breadth
1 The Board in its reply brief in this Court steps back from this interpretation and argues that it has only drawn distinctions between degrees of authority. Reply Brief for Petitioner 3. But the opinions of the Board that developed its current interpretation of "independent judgment" clearly draw a categorical distinction. See, e. g., Providence Hospital, 320 N. L. R. B. 717, 729 (1996) ("Section 2(11) supervisory authority does
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