Gulf Oil Corp.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Nov 16, 1937

4 N.L.R.B. 133 (N.L.R.B. 1937)

In the Matter of GULF OIL CORPORATION and INTERNATIONAL
BROTHERHOOD OF BOILERMAKERS, IRON SHIPBUILDERS , WELDERS &
HELPERS OF AMERICA
Case No. R-260.-Decided November 16, 1937
Oil Refining Industry-Investigation of Representatives : controversy concern-
ing representation of employees : rival organizations ; refusal by employer to
continue recognition of petitioning union as representative until certified by
Board-Unit Appropriate for Collective Bargaimi2g : craft; history of collective
bargaining relations with employer ; history of organization among employees
involved ; eligibility for membership in petitioning union ; desire and choice of
employees involved-Representatives : proof of choice ; signed authorizations
designating union as collective bargaining representative ; comparison of such
authorizations with pay rolls-Certification of Representatives : upon proof of
majority representation.
Mr. Karl Mueller, for the Board.
Mr. B. C. Clark, of Houston , Tex., for the Company.
Mr. J. N. Davis , of Kansas City, Kan., for the Boilermakers.
Mr. C. P. Humburg, of Houston , Tex., for the Oil Workers.
Mr. J. Mark Jacobson, of counsel to the Board.
DECISION
AND
CERTIFICATION OF REPRESENTATIVES
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
On May 31, 1937, International Brotherhood of Boilermakers, Iron
Shipbuilders, Welders and Helpers of America, herein called the
Boilermakers, filed with the Regional Director for the Sixteenth
Region (Fort Worth, Texas) a petition alleging that a question
affecting commerce had arisen concerning the representation of em-
ployees of the Port Arthur, Texas, refinery of Gulf Oil Corporation,
herein called the Company, and requesting an investigation and
certification of representatives pursuant to Section 9 (c) of the Na-
tional Labor Relations Act, 49 Stat. 449, herein called the Act. On
July 15, 1937, the National Labor Relations Board, herein called the
Board, acting pursuant to Article III, Section 3, of National Labor
Relations Board Rules and Regulations-Series 1, as amended,
ordered an investigation and authorized the Regional Director to
conduct it and to provide for an appropriate hearing upon due notice.
133
134 NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
On July 23, 1937 , the Regional Director issued and duly served
upon the Company and the Boilermakers a notice of hearing to be
held at Port Arthur, Texas, on August 5, 1937. The Regional Direc-
tor served notice of said hearing upon Oil Workers International
Union, herein called the Oil Workers , a labor organization claiming
to represent' employees of the Company , at its international office
in Washington, D. C. On August 5, 6; and 7, 1937, a hearing was
held at Port Arthur , Texas, before Charles E . Persons, the Trial
Examiner duly designated by the Board.
The Board and the Company were represented by counsel; the
Boilermakers and the Oil Workers, by their representatives. All
participated in the hearing. Full opportunity to be heard, to examine
and cross -examine witnesses , and to introduce evidence bearing on
the issues , was afforded all the parties.
The Trial Examiner, in the main, admitted only such evidence as
was pertinent to the bargaining unit proposed by the petitioning
union and did not admit evidence concerning the classification of
other employees of the Company at its Port Arthur , Texas, refinery.
The Board believes the Trial Examiner erred therein ; however, in
the light of the entire record, notably the failure of the Oil Workers
to introduce any evidence as to the extent of its membership among
the employees of the Company 's Port Arthur refinery, the rulings
of the Trial Examiner in this respect were not prejudicial error.
During the course of the hearing , the Trial Examiner made several
rulings on motions and on objections to the admission of other evi-
dence. The Board has reviewed such rulings of the Trial Examiner
and finds that no prejudicial errors were committed. The rulings
are hereby affirmed.
Upon the entire record in the case, the Board makes the following :
FINDINGS OF FACT
I. THE BUSINESS OF THE COMPANY
The Company was incorporated in Pennsylvania August 9, 1922,
succeeding a company of the same name incorporated in New Jersey
February 13, 1907 . It is engaged in all branches of the petroleum
industry, controlling either directly or through its many subsidiaries
extensive production , pipe line , refining, marine , and marketing facil-
ities. It operates refineries at Port Arthur, Texas; Fort Worth,
Texas; Sweetwater , Texas; Staten Island, New York; Philadelphia,
Pennsylvania ; Pittsburgh , Pennsylvania ; Toledo, Ohio; and Cin-
cinnati, Ohio. The Company's principal sales offices are located at
Boston , Massachusetts; New York City; Philadelphia , Pennsylvania;
Pittsburgh , Pennsylvania; Toledo, Ohio; Detroit, Michigan ; Louis-
ville, Kentucky ; Atlanta, Georgia; New Orleans , Louisiana; and
DECISIONS AND ORDERS 135
Houston, Texas. The Company markets a line of over 650 different
petroleum products, principally in 29 states comprising the New
England, Middle and South Atlantic, South Central, and East North
Central areas. Its sales are handled through over 1,100 distributing
plants and 35,000 retail outlets. Approximately 2,000 tank cars and
1,250 tank trucks are engaged in delivering the Company's products.
Through its foreign subsidiaries, the Company markets petroleum
products throughout central and western Europe, including the Scan-
dinavian Peninsula. It also owns a substantial interest in the United
Petroleum Securities Corporation, which controls important refining
and marketing facilities in France. The Company owns and operates
a fleet of steamships, motorships, ocean-going barges and tugs, and
liver, lake, and harbor vessels, engaged in the transportation of crude
oil from Port Arthur, Texas, and Venezuela to refineries on the eastern
seaboard, and in the distribution of refined oils to more than 60
terminals located along the Atlantic and Gulf coasts, on the Great
Lakes, and on inland waterways. The Company's pipe line system
serves practically all important fields in Texas, New Mexico, Okla-
homa, Kansas, Louisiana, and Arkansas, connecting with the Com-
pany's refineries in Texas and extending from Oklahoma east to its
refineries at Cincinnati, and through outside connections, to Toledo
and Pittsburgh.
The Port Arthur refinery, employing approximately 4,000 workers,
is a complete refinery, making gasoline, kerosene, fuel oil, lubricat-
ing oils, greases, and a number of special products. It receives an
average of 3,800,000 barrels of crude oil a month; ships by boat
300,000 barrels of crude oil a month to the Philadelphia refinery;'and
produces monthly an average of 1,500,000 barrels of gasoline, 225,000
barrels of kerosene, 400,000 barrels of furnace oil, 140,000 barrels
of lubricating oil, and 3,000,000 pounds of grease. Approximately
25 per cent of the crude oil is received from states other than Texas;
and approximately 95 per cent arrives by pipe lines and the rest by
water. Less than one-half of the refinery's output is sold for de-
livery in Texas and approximately 98 per cent of the output is
shipped by water. This refinery has terminal facilities for loading
railroad tank cars, including a rack built alongside a railroad spur
track with pipe connections to tanks, through which are run the
finished products to be loaded. It also has terminal facilities for
loading deep-water vessels, including a concrete dock, with space
for eight deep-sea vessels.
II. THE ORGANIZATIONS INVOLVED
International Brotherhood of Boilermakers, Iron Shipbuilders,.
Welders and Helpers of America is a labor organization. It is,
affiliated with the American Federation of Labor and with its Build-
67573-38-vol. iv-10
136 NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
ing Trades , Metal Trades , and Railway Employees departments and
with the Chief Executives Association of the 21 Standard Railroad
Unions. The local lodge admits to membership boilermakers,
welders, layer -outs, riveters , blacksmiths , inspectors , burners, riggers,
tankmen, punch and shearmen , buckers, beaters , caulkers, and helpers.
Oil Workers International Union is a labor organization affiliated
with the Committee for Industrial Organization . It was organized
in 1917 under the name of International Association of Oil Field,
Gas Well and Refinery Workers of America. It admits to member-
ship all persons working in the production , transportation , refining,
and marketing of natural gas and petroleum products.
III. THE QUESTION CONCERNING REPRESENTATION
The Boilermakers International was organized in 1880, and the
Port Arthur Lodge in 1904. For a period of four or five years prior
to May 1937 , the Company had recognized the Boilermakers as a bar-
gaining agent for its members at the Port Arthur refinery and had
reached oral agreements with it concerning wages, hours , and work-
ing conditions . However, prior to May 31 , 1937 , the Company in-
formed the Boilermakers that it could not continue such bargaining
unless the Union was certified by the Board. On June 1, 1937, the
Company telegraphed the Regional Director that it was prepared
to bargain collectively with the Boilermakers or any other craft that
the Board rules an appropriate unit, but that it did not feel author-
ized to decide itself the question of appropriate unit.
We find, therefore , that a question has arisen concerning the rep-
resentation of employees of the Company's Port Arthur, Texas,
refinery.
IV. THE EFFECT OF THE QUESTION CONCERNING REPRESENTATION ON
COMMERCE
We find that the question concerning representation which has
arisen, in connection with the operations of the Company described
in Section I above, has a close, intimate , and substantial relation to
trade, traffic , and commerce among the several states and with for-
eign countries , and tends to lead to labor disputes burdening and
obstructing commerce and the free flow of commerce.
V. THE APPROPRIATE UNIT
The Boilermakers urged as an appropriate unit the employees in
the boilermaking and welding department of the Company's Port
Arthur, Texas, refinery-that is, boilermakers, welders, layer-outs,
riveters , blacksmiths, inspectors , burners, riggers , tankmen, punch
and shearmen , buckers, beaters, caulkers, and helpers. The Oil
DECISIONS AND ORDERS 137
Workers, on the other hand, 'urged as the appropriate unit all the
employees at the Company's Port Arthur, Texas, refinery.
The record indicates that the employees in the Company's boiler-
making and welding department do anything in connection with
the construction and repair of boilers, tanks, towers, locomotives,
boats, railroad tank cars, and "any piece of equipment that you
might have in the refinery that would require boilermakers' work."
They may, where occasion requires, fabricate the metal out of which
the refinery storage tanks are constructed, such as designing and
rolling the metal into proper shape, shearing the metal, punching
the holes for the rivets, riveting, caulking the rivets, welding. While
they are stationed at the boiler room, they work wherever in the
refinery their construction and repair work takes them. The Port
Arthur refinery maintains 25 tanks with an average capacity of,
60,000 barrels each for storage of crude oil, 50 tanks with an aver-
age capacity of 3,500,000 barrels for storage of gasoline, kerosene,
and fuel oil, 100 tanks with a total capacity of 400,000 barrels for
storage of lubricating oils, and 20 tanks with a storage capacity of
4,000 to 5,000 tons of sulphuric acid. The construction and main-
tenance of these tanks come within the jurisdiction of the boiler-
making department.
Wherever possible, it is obviously desirable that, in the determina-
tion of the appropriate unit, we render collective bargaining of the
Company's employees an immediate possibility. In the instant pro-
ceeding the record clearly indicates that a majority of the boiler-
making employees at the Port Arthur refinery have authorized the
Boilermakers to act as their bargaining agent and that that labor
organization has for the past four or five years been recognized by
the Company as the representative of its members. On the other
hand, there is no evidence that the majority of the other employees
at the refinery belong to any union whatsoever; nor has any labor
organization petitioned the Board for certification as representative
of the refinery employees on a plant-wide basis. Consequently, even
if the boilermaking employees do not constitute the most effective
bargaining unit, as the Oil Workers contend, nevertheless, in the
existing circumstances, unless they are recognized as a separate unit,
there will be no collective bargaining agent whatsoever for these
workers, who for years have actually engaged in collective bargaining
with the Company.
At the present time and in view of the existing state of labor
organization among the refinery employees of the Company, in order
to insure to the boilermaking employees of the Company's Port Ar-
thur, Texas, refinery the full benefit of their right to self-organiza-
tion and collective bargaining, and otherwise to effectuate the policies
k
138 NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
of the Act, we find that the employees in the boilermaking and weld-
ing department of the Company's Port Arthur refinery , including
boilermakers , welders, layer -outs, riveters , blacksmiths , inspectors,
burners, riggers , tankmen, punch and shearmen , buckers, welders,
caulkers, and helpers, constitute a unit appropriate for the purposes
of collective bargaining with respect to rates of pay , wages, hours of
employment , and other conditions of employment.
VI. THE DETERMINATION OF REPRESENTATIVES
The bargaining unit stated above included at the time of the hear-
ing approximately 200 employees . The Company submitted two
lists of employees in its boilermaking and welding department :
one, the pay roll of April 29, 1937, prior to the filing of the petition,
listed 304 employees; the other, the pay roll of August 5, 1937, the
date of the hearing, listed 191 men. Considerable doubt exists as to
the status of the employees laid off between those two dates.
The Boilermakers introduced in evidence original authorizations
dated April 22, 1937, signed by 250 employees in the appropriate
unit, designating the Boilermakers as their representative for the
purposes of collective bargaining . Members of the Boilermakers
testified that these authorizations were signed in their presence by
employees of the Company in the appropriate unit who were per-
sonally known to them. Counsel for the Company raised no objec-
tion to the admission of these authorizations in evidence ; nor did he
question their authenticity . The representative of the Oil Workers
failed to offer any evidence attacking the authenticity of these
authorizations.
The Board ,has compared the names on these authorizations with
those on the two payrolls submitted by the Company . Of the names
on the authorizations examined by the Board, the Board has iden-
tified 244 on the April 29th payroll of 304 employees , and 149 on
the August 5th payroll of 191 employees.
We find that the Boilermakers has been designated and selected
by a majority of the employees in the appropriate unit as their rep-
resentative for the purposes of collective bargaining . The Boiler-
makers is , therefore , by virtue of Section 9 (a) of the Act, the exclu-
sive representative of all the employees in such unit -for the purposes
of collective bargaining in respect to rates of pay, wages , hours of
employment, and other conditions of employment , and we will so
certify.
CONCLUSIONS OF LAW
On the basis of the above findings of fact and upon the entire
record in the case , the Board makes the following conclusions of
law:
DECISIONS AND ORDERS 139
1. A question affecting commerce has arisen concerning the rep-
resentation of employees of the Port Arthur , Texas, refinery of Gulf
Oil Corporation , within the meaning of Section 9 (c) and Section
2 (6) and (7) of the National Labor Relations Act.
2. All the employees in the boilermaking and welding department
of the Port Arthur, Texas, refinery of Gulf Oil Corporation, includ-
ing boilermakers , welders, layer -outs, riveters , blacksmiths , inspec-
tors, burners , riggers, tankmen , punch and shearmen, buckers, beat-
ers, caulkers , and helpers , constitute a unit appropriate for the pur-
poses of collective bargaining within the meaning of Section 9 (b)
of the National Labor Relations Act.
CERTIFICATION OF REPRESENTATIVES
By virtue of and pursuant to the power vested in the National
Labor Relations Board by Section 9 (c) of the National Labor Rela-
tions Act, 49 Stat. 449, and pursuant to Article III, Section 8, of
National Labor Relations Board Rules and Regulations-Series 1, as
amended,
IT Is HEREBY CERTIFIED that International Brotherhood of Boiler-
makers, Iron Shipbuilders, Welders and Helpers of America has
been designated and selected by a majority of the employees in the
boilermaking and welding department of the Port Arthur, Texas,
refinery of Gulf Oil Corporation , including boilermakers, welders,
layer-outs, riveters, blacksmiths, inspectors, burners, riggers, tank-
men, punch and shearmen, buckers , beaters, caulkers , and helpers, as
their representative for the purposes of collective bargaining, and
that, pursuant to Section 9 (a) of the Act, International Brotherhood
of Boilermakers , Iron Shipbuilders , Welders and Helpers of America
is the exclusive representative of all such employees for the purposes
of collective bargaining in respect to rates of pay, wages, hours of
employment , and other conditions of employment.