Esquire Products Co.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Aug 27, 1959

124 N.L.R.B. 747 (N.L.R.B. 1959)

ESQUIRE PRODUCTS COMPANY 747
any other material. The Respondent shall also sign copies of said
notice for posting at the premises of Bachman Machine Company, if
it is willing.
(b) Notify the Regional Director for the Fourteenth Region in
writing, within 10 days from the date of this Order, what steps it has
taken to comply herewith.
MEMBER FANNING took no part in the consideration of the above
Supplemental Decision and Order.
APPENDIX
NOTICE TO ALL MEMBERS OF WAREHOUSE AND DISTRIBUTION WORKERS
UNION, LOCAL 688, AFFILIATED WrrH INTERNATIONAL BROTHERHOOD
OF TEAMSTERS, CHAUFFEURS, WAREHOUSEMEN AND HELPERS OF AMER-
ICA AND TO ALL EMPLOYEES OF BACHMAN MACHINE COMPANY
Pursuant to a Supplemental Decision and Order of the National
Labor Relations Board, and in order to effectuate the policies of the
National Labor Relations Act, we hereby notify you that :
WE WILL NOT engage in, or induce or encourage the employees
of Bachman Machine Company, or of any employer other than
Plastics Molding Company, to engage in, a strike or concerted
refusal, in the course of their employment, to perform services,
where an object thereof is to force or require any employer or
person to cease doing business with Bachman Machine Company.
WAREHOUSE AND DISTRIBUTION WORKERS UNION,
LOCAL 688, AFFILIATED WITH INTERNATIONAL
BROTHERHOOD OF TEAMSTERS, CHAUFFEURS,
WAREHOUSEMEN AND HELPERS OF AMERICA,
Labor Organization.
Dated---------------- By-------------------------------------
(Representative ) ( Title)
This notice must remain posted for 60 days from the date hereof,
and must not be altered, defaced, or covered by any other material.
Esquire Products Company and United Service Employees Union,
Local 329, AFL-CIO , Petitioner. Case No. 13-RC-6506. Au-
gust 27, 1959
DECISION AND DIRECTION OF ELECTION
Upon a petition duly filed under Section 9 (c) of the National La-
bor Relations Act, a hearing was held before Frances P. Dom, hear-
ing officer. The hearing officer's rulings made at the hearing are free
from prejudicial error and are hereby affirmed.
124 NLRB No. 97.
748 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
Pursuant to the provisions of Section 3(b) of the National Labor
Relations Act, the Board has delegated its powers in connection with
this case to a three-member panel [Chairman Leedom and Members
Bean and Jenkins].
Upon the entire record in this case, the Board finds:
1. The Employer is engaged in commerce within the meaning of
the National Labor Relations Act.
2. The labor organizations involved claim to represent employees
of the Employer.'
3. A question affecting commerce exists concerning the representa-
tion of employees of the Employer within the meaning of Section
9(c) (1) and Section 2(6) and (7) of the Act.
The Intervenor advances as a bar to the petition filed April 1, 1959,
a contract which it executed with the Employer on December 22, 1958,
and amended January 14, 1959. The Petitioner contends, among other
reasons, that the contract is not a bar because it contains illegal union-
security and checkoff clauses. The Employer took no position.
Among the contractual provisions urged by the Petitioner as ex-
ceeding the permissible limits of union-security under Section 8(a) (3)
is the following :
Article XII, Section 7. Any employee who is guilty of any dis-
ruptive influence tending to interfere with the relationship be-
tween the Employer and the Union or his fellow workers shall
be disciplined up to and including discharge, by agreement of the
parties to this Agreement.
The contract also contains the following provision :
Article XVII, Section 9. It is further mutually agreed that any
employee acting or conducting himself in violation of the terms
of this Agreement, without written authorization or ratification
by the International President of the Union shall be disciplined
by the parties with loss of seniority and including discharge.
The validity of the foregoing clauses, and in consequence the valid-
ity of the union-security provisions of the contract for bar purposes,
must be determined in the light of the policies established by the
Board in its decision in the Keystone case.2 In that case the Board
specifically indicated :
Examples of clauses in contracts which will be deemed to be in-
valid for contract bar purposes and which will remove the con-
tracts as bars include those . . . delegating to a union unlawful
control of hire, tenure, seniority, wages, or other terms and con-
ditions of employment; or . . . making a condition of employ-
1 Upholsterers International Union, Local 41, AFL-CIO , intervened on the basis of a
contractual interest.
2 Keystone Coat, Apron f Towel Supply Company, et al., 121 NLRB 880.
SOUTHERN AIRWAYS COMPANY 749
ment the performance of any obligation of membership other
than the payment of "periodic dues and initiation fees uniformly
required." . . . Under our holding herein, we shall no longer
treat as bars to elections contracts . . . containing ambiguous
union-security provisions which may be interpreted as either
lawful or unlawful because the language employed is not clear or
is in general terms. . . . We have further decided that no ex-
trinsic evidence will be admissible in a representation proceeding
for the purpose of determining the validity of a union-security
or check-off clause in a contract for bar purposes... .
The Board has held that a contract containing a provision that "The
Employer agrees to discharge . . . any employee who has been ex-
pelled or suspended by the Union for . . . undermining the Union,"
threatens employees with loss of employment and is invalid because
it clearly exceeds the bounds of permissible union security,' in that
it unlawfully restricts employees in the exercise of the rights guaran-
teed them by Section 7 of the Act.'
Similarly invalid are the contractual provisions in question here,
threatening as they do, loss of employment to any employee for any
conduct which may violate the terms of the agreement unless author-
ized or ratified by the Union's international president; or which may
be a disruptive influence tending to interfere with the relationship
between the Employer and the Union. Accordingly, we find that the
contract violates the rules of the Keystone case, and therefore, does
not bar the instant petition.'
4. We find that the following employees of the Employer constitute
a unit appropriate for the purposes of collective bargaining within
the meaning of Section 9(b) of the Act: All production and main-
tenance employees at the Employer's Chicago, Illinois, plant, exclud-
ing foremen , office employees, clerical and professional employees,
guards and watchmen, and all supervisors as defined in the Act."
[Text of Direction of Election omitted from publication.]
sLocal 229 , United Textile Workers o f America, AFL-CIO (J. Radley Metzger Co.,
Inc.), 120 NLRB 1700.
See Kale .1 Pulp & Paper Corp., 120 NLRB 714, 731-732.
' In view of our disposition herein, we find it unnecessary to pass on other issues raised
by the parties.
s The unit is consistent with that covered by the contract and is in accord with the
stipulation of the parties.
Southern Airways Company and International Association of
Machinists, AFL-CIO. Case No. 16-CA-1077. August 27, 1959
DECISION AND ORDER
On November 4, 1958, Trial Examiner Thomas S. Wilson issued his
Intermediate Report in the above-entitled proceeding, finding that
124 NLRB No. 93.