Socony Vacuum Oil Co., Inc.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

May 26, 1952

99 N.L.R.B. 268 (N.L.R.B. 1952)

268 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
The Regional Director, upon the ground that Peace had regular
status as a sewing machine operator during the eligibility period of
the election, and was only on trial as a clerical, recommended that
the challenge to her ballot be overruled. No exceptions were filed by
the Amalgamated or the Garment Workers. Although the Employer
filed a document entitled "Exceptions to Report on Challenged
Ballot," it took no exception to the Regional Director's recommenda-
tion, but merely "excepted" to the omission in the Regional Director's
report of the alleged fact that Peace, subsequent to the election, on
April 10, 1952, chose to retain her job of sewing machine operator.
The Board,2 having duly considered the entire record with respect
to the challenged ballot, finds merit in the Regional Director's recom-
mendation. Moreover, there are actually no exceptions to such recom-
mendation. Accordingly, we shall overrule the challenge to the ballot
cast by employee Peace and direct that the ballot be opened and
counted.
Direction
As part of the investigation to ascertain representatives for the
purposes of collective bargaining with W. Shanhouse Sons, Inc.,
Magnolia, Arkansas, the Regional Director for the Fifteenth Region
shall, pursuant to National Labor Relations Board Rules and Regula-
tions, within ten (10) days from the date of this Direction open and
count the ballot of Patsy Peace and thereafter prepare and cause to
be served upon the parties a supplemental tally of ballots, including
therein the count of the challenged ballot.
2 Pursuant to the provisions of Section 3 (b) of the Act , the Board has delegated its
powers in connection with this proceeding to a three -member panel [ Members Houston,
Murdock, and Styles].
SOCONY VACUUM OIL COMPANY, INCORPORATED and OIL WORKERS
INTERNATIONAL UNION, CIO, PETITIONER
SOCONY VACUUM OIL COMPANY, INCORPORATED and JAMES THATCHER,
PETITIONER. Cases Nos. 14-RC-1776, 14-RC-1777, 14-RC-1778,
and 14-RD-55. May 26, 1950
Decision and Direction of Elections
Upon petitions duly filed under Section 9 (c) of the National Labor
Relations Act, a consolidated hearing was held before Benjamin E.
Cook, hearing officer. The hearing officer's rulings made at the hear-
ing are free from prejudicial error and are hereby affirmed.
Pursuant to the provisions of Section 3 (b) of the Act, the Board
99 NLRB No. 58.
SOCONY VACUUM OIL COMPANY, INCORPORATED 269
has delegated its powers in connection with this case to a three-mem-
ber panel [Chairman Herzog and Members Murdock and Peterson].
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 Petitioner, Oil Workers International Union, CIO, in Cases
Nos. 14-RC-1776, 1777, and 1778, hereinafter referred to as the Oil
Workers, and the Intervenor, Refinery Workers Federal Labor Union,
Local No. 19119, AFL, hereinafter referred to as the Refinery
Workers,' and the Warehouse and Distribution Workers, Local 688,
affiliated with International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Chauffeurs,
Warehousemen & Helpers of America, AFL,2 are labor organizations
claiming to represent certain employees of the Employer. The Peti-
tioner in Case No. 14-RD-55, an employee of the Employer, contends
that the Refinery Workers, the currently recognized bargaining rep-
resentative, is no longer the representative of certain employees of the
Employer as defined in Section 9 (a) of the Act.
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.
4. The appropriate units :
The Oil Workers, in separate proceedings,3 seeks appropriate units
of (1) office custodian employees at the Employer's office building in
St. Louis, Missouri; (2) employees at the Employers bulb plant in
St. Louis, Missouri; and (3) production and maintenance employees,
at the Employer's refinery in East St. Louis, Illinois. The individual
Petitioner in Case No. 14-RD-55 seeks a decertification election for
office clerical employees at the refinery.' The parties are agreed as
to the appropriateness of the first two units sought by the Oil Workers
in Cases Nos. 14-RC-1776 and 14-RC-1778.5 As to the third unit,
the Oil Workers and the Refinery Workers agree that the appropriate
unit should be the production and maintenance unit, including the
office clerical employees, the cafeteria employees, and the guard de-
partment employees with the usual exclusions. The Employer how-
ever, urges that there should be three appropriate units consisting of
(1) the office clerical employees; (2) the cafeteria employees; and (3)
1 The Refinery Workers Union which has represented the employees involved in this pro-
ceeding for many years was allowed to intervene on the basis of its contracts with the
Employer , which contracts expired April 1, 1952.
1 The Teamsters was permitted to intervene in Case No . 14-RC-1778 on an adequate
showing of interest.
3 Cases Nos. 14-RC-1776, 14-RC-1777, and 14-RC-1778.
4 The Petitioner in Case No. 14-RD-55 and the Employer in Case No. 14 -RC-1777 claim
that a unit of office and clerical employees is appropriate As the record indicates that
only office clericals are involved , we shall limit our consideration of this group to office
clericals only.
a As there are no issues as to these units , we shall find these units appropriate and shall
direct elections therein as hereinafter appears.
270 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
the remaining production and maintenance employees with the usual
statutory exclusions. The Employer further urges that the guard
department employees are guards within the meaning of the Act and
may not be included in the production avid maintenance unit. In the
decertification proceeding, the individual Petitioner and the Employer
claim that the office clerical employees constitute a separate appro-
priate unit. The Oil Workers and the Refinery Workers urge that
these employees are part of the production and maintenance unit and
that the decertification petition should be dismissed.
The Employer is engaged in the production, refining, transportation,
and sale of petroleum and allied products throughout the United
States. The Employer's operations involved in these proceedings
include an office building and a bulk plant in St. Louis, Missouri, and
a refinery in East St. Louis, Illinois.
Case No. 14-RC-1777
As noted above, the Oil Workers Union seeks a unit of all produc-
tion and maintenance employees at the refinery, including the office
and clerical employees, the cafeteria workers, and the guard depart-
ment employees. The Refinery Workers Union, which has represented
this requested unit for many years, agrees that this unit is appropriate.
The Employer urges that there should be excluded from this unit
the cafeteria workers, the employees classified as guards, and the
office clerical employees.
The Cafeteria Employees
These employees work in the cafeteria which is located on the
ground floor of a building in the outer gate area, separate from the
buildings in the inner gate area assigned to the production and main-
tenance employees. The function of the cafeteria employees is to pre-
pare and serve food to employees of the Employer. They work under
separate supervision and at different hours than do the production
and maintenance employees. They have been included in the broader
unit represented by the Refinery Workers for more than 11 years.
While it appears that the duties of these employees are not directly
related to the production process, we have frequently included
cafeteria employees in units of production and maintenance employees
especially where, as here, they have been a part of the unit during an
effective bargaining history and no other labor union seeks to repre-
sent them separately. We shall therefore include the cafeteria
workers in the production and maintenance unit.,'
6 Kohler Company, 93 NLRB 398 and cases cited in footnote 20; Bendier Aviation Corpo-
ration, 72 NLRB 642.
SOCONY VACUUM OIL COMPANY, INCORPORATED 271
The Guard Department Employees
The Oil Workers and the Refinery Workers urge that the employees
in the guard department are not "guards" within the meaning of
the Act and therefore should not be excluded from the historic pro-
duction and maintenance unit, in which they have been included for
many years. The Employer urges the contrary.
The evidence indicates that the employees in this department are
classified into two groups, patrolmen and gatemen. Both groups
wear uniforms and badges marked "guard" and both are under the
direct supervision of the chief guard.
The patrolmen are engaged primarily in patrolling the property
and must be on the lookout for unauthorized persons and for anything
which may appear as a fire hazard. While making the rounds, they
punch clocks and report by telephone to the gatehouse. Between
rounds they come to the gatehouse and relieve the gatemen.
The gatemen remain in the gatehouse where time clocks are kept.
Their main duty is to prevent any unauthorized person or product
from entering or leaving the inner gate. They check passes and
badges of all employees entering or leaving the gate. They interview
all visitors and after proper authorization from management they
write out passes for such visitors, after collecting any matches or
cigarette lighters the latter may have on their persons. They check
all trucks coming into or leaving the gate against the bills of lading
which are kept on file in the gatehouse. The gatemen operate the
switchboard when the regular operator is not on duty. In case of
fire they are authorized to call out the fire crews.
The Oil Workers and the Refinery Workers contended that because
of the clerical duties of the gatemen and occasional nonguard duties
of the patrolmen, these employees cannot be considered "guards"
within the meaning of the Act. We do not agree. Although it ap-
pears that the gateman on the first shift spends considerable time in
checking the trucks going to the loading rack and leaving the gatej
this work is an integral part of the gateman's primary function which
is to watch out for any unauthorized product not properly entering or
leaving the premises.
On the basis of the above, we find that the patrolmen and gatemen
are guards within the meaning of the Act and we shall therefore
exclude all employees of the guard department from the voting groups
for which elections are hereinafter directed."
' The evidence is somewhat conflicting as to the proportion of time spent by the gatemen
in checking the trucks going in and out of the gate. The evidence indicates that on the
shift from 7 a. m. to 3 p. m ., there may be from 75 to 80 trucks going into the loadin--
rack and that it takes about five minutes to check each truck ; that on the shift from 3 to
11 p m, there may be some 20 trucks involved and that there are about 10 trucks on the
night or third shift.
8 Westinghouse Electric Corporation, 96 NLRB 1250 ; Locke, Incorporated, 92 NLRB 864.
272 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
The Office Clerical Employees
-This group, which is the same group as is involved in Case No.
14-RD-55 includes some nine employees who perform the customary
clerical duties. The group comprises the switchboard operator, the
yield clerk, the shipping clerk, typists, and time clerks. The em-
ployees in these classifications work in a separate building from the
production employees. They are under separate supervision and the
basis of their compensation, except for the matter of overtime, is
different from that of the production workers. Their duties do not
ordinarily involve contact with the production workers. The Oil
Workers and the Refinery Workers urge that the office clerical em-
ployees should remain in the production and maintenance unit for
the reason that they have always been a part of that unit and- for the
additional reason that they are subject to the same general working
conditions. The Employer urges the contrary.
It is the usual policy of the Board to permit the severance of office
clerical employees from a production and maintenance unit even
though there has been an established bargaining history on a single
unit basis.° We shall, therefore, direct a separate election for this
group of employees. We shall also direct an election for the produc-
tion and maintenance group. If the majority of the office clerical
employee group vote for the Oil Workers or the Refinery Workers
and their choice of bargaining representative is also the choice of the
production and maintenance group, the office clerical employees will
continue to be represented as part of the production and maintenance
group; otherwise, if their selection of a bargaining representative is
not the same as that of the production workers, they will constitute
a separate appropriate unit.10 If, on the other hand, the majority
of the office clerical employees vote for neither, they will be excluded
from the production and maintenance unit and the Refinery Workers
will be decertified as to them.
Case No. 14-RC-1776
We find, in agreement with the parties, that the following consti-
tute a unit appropriate for purposes of collective bargaining within
the meaning of Section 9 (b) of the Act :
All office custodian employees at the Employer's plant at 4140
Lindell Boulevard, St. Louis, Missouri, excluding all other employees,
guards, and all supervisors as defined in the Act.
9 Cutter Laboratories , 98 NLRB 414.
10 J. I. Case Company , 81 NLRB 969.
NATIONAL GAS COMPANY
Case No. 14-RC-1778
273
We find, in agreement with the parties, that the following consti-
tute a unit appropriate for collective bargaining within the meaning
of Section 9 (b) of the Act:
All employees at the Employer's bulk plant located at 125 Potomac
Street, St. Louis, Missouri, excluding truck drivers, professional em-
ployees, guards, and all supervisors as defined in the Act.
We shall direct separate elections in the units found appropriate
above and in the following voting groups :
(a) All production and maintenace employees at the Employer's
refinery in East St. Louis, Illinois, including the cafeteria employees,
but excluding the office clerical employees, professional employees,
guards,11 and all supervisors as defined in the Act. (Case No.
14-RC-1777.)
(b) All office clerical employees in the Employer's refinery at East
St. Louis, Illinois, excluding all other employees, professional em-
ployees, confidential employees, guards,12 and all supervisors as defined
in the Act. (Case No. 14-RD-55.)
[Text of Direction of Elections omitted from publication in this
volume.]
"Excluded under this category are all employees of the guard department
1R See footnote 11.
NATIONAL GAS COMPANY and UNITED GAS, COKE AND CHEMICAL
WORKERS, C . I. O. Case No. 14-CA-480. May 07, 1952
Decision and Order
On August 3, 1951, Trial Examiner Eugene F. Frey issued his Inter-
mediate Report in the above-entitled proceeding, finding that the
Respondent had engaged in and was engaging in certain unfair labor
practices and recommending that it cease and desist therefrom and
take certain affirmative action, as set forth in the copy of the Inter-
mediate Report attached hereto. Thereafter, the Respondent filed
exceptions to the Intermediate Report and a supporting brief. The
Respondent's request for oral argument is hereby denied because the
record, exceptions, and brief, in our opinion, adequately present the
issues and the positions of the parties.
The Board 1 has reviewed the rulings of the Trial Examiner made
at the hearing, and finds that no prejudicial error was committed.
'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
[ Members Houston , Murdock, and Styles].
99 NLRB No. 44.