The Leland Stanford Junior University

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

May 19, 1965

152 N.L.R.B. 704 (N.L.R.B. 1965)

704 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
Manati Shoe Corporation and Island Shoe Company , Inc., also located in
Manati , but excluding all office clerical employees , professional personnel,
guards, and supervisors as defined in the Act.
INTERNATIONAL SHOE CORPORATION OF PUERTO Rico,
Employer.
Dated------------------- By-------------------------------------------
(Representative ) ( Title)
This notice must remain posted for 60 consecutive days from the date of posting,
and must not be altered , defaced , or covered by any other material.
Employees may communicate directly with the Board 's Regional Office, P.O. Box
11007, Fernandez Juncos Station , Santurce , Puerto Rico, Telephone No. 724-7171,
if they have any question concerning this notice or compliance with its provisions.
The Leland Stanford Junior University and Local 617, Interna-
tional Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, AFL-CIO, Peti-
tioner. Case No. 20-RC-6157. May 19, 1965
DECISION AND ORDER
Upon a petition duly filed under Section 9 (c) of the National Labor
Relations Act, as amended, a hearing in this case was held before
Hearing Officer M. C. Dempster. The Hearing Officer's rulings made
at the hearing are free from prejudicial error and are hereby affirmed.
Pursuant to the provisions of Section 3 (b) of the Act, the National
Labor Relations Board has delegated its powers in connection with
this case to a three-member panel [Chairman McCulloch and Members
Brown and Jenkins].
Upon the entire record in this case, and the briefs filed by the parties
herein, the Board finds :
The Petitioner seeks a unit of craft shop maintenance employees at
the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC), a department of
Stanford University. The appropriateness of the unit is stipulated
and the sole issue before the Board is whether jurisdiction should be
asserted over SLAC. We do not believe it should be.
SLAC came into existence in 1961. Its purpose is basic research in
high-energy physics and it provides a facility wherein electrons can
be accelerated in a direct line and under controlled conditions to an
end point where they bombard matter. Study of the effects on the
target matter will comprise the primary research at SLAC. When
completed in 1966 or 1967, the underground accelerator will be 2 miles
in length and will constitute the largest such facility in the world.
When the decision to attempt to erect such a facility was made by
Stanford, approximately 400 acres of university land contiguous to,
and approximately 2 miles from the center of, the main campus were
152 NLRB No. 73.
THE LELAND STANFORD JUNIOR UNIVERSITY 705
set aside for the purpose. An appeal was then made to the Atomic
Energy Commission (AEC) for funding, and the result was a lease
and two contracts between AEC and Stanford covering the erection,
maintenance, and operation of SLAC. The entire expense of building
the Center, and the annual costs of maintaining and operating it, will
be borne by the Government; however, the administration of these
funds will be essentially controlled by the university.
SLAC is supervised by a director and a deputy director, both of
whom are faculty members of the university, and both of whom are
appointed by the university with final approval by the AEC. As is
the case with other departments of the university, control over hiring
and firing is vested in the above-mentioned department heads, although
SLAC is otherwise integrated into the university as a whole. All
employees are employees of Stanford, and the director and deputy
director report directly to the president of the university. The presi-
dent, in turn, is responsible to a self-perpetuating board of trustees
who exert ultimate control over SLAC as well as other aspects of the
university.
SLAC employs 940 individuals, about 25 of whom are sought herein.
Of its total complement of employees, 10 or 11 are Stanford faculty
members, 11 are graduate students, 16 are postdoctoral students, and
about 40 to 50 are scientific staff members engaged in research.' There
are no undergraduate students at SLAC, except during summers when
students of Stanford and other universities are employed. During the
summer of 1964, 34 such undergraduates were employed at SLAC.
No undergraduate courses are taught at SLAC, as that function is
performed by the Stanford physics department. However, Stanford
professors at SLAC conduct lectures and seminars both at SLAC and
elsewhere on the campus and also participate in Ph. D. examinations
in other university departments. The university considers the 40 to 50
scientific staff members at SLAC and the technical staff to be engaged
in training and teaching of the SLAC graduate students. The work
of those graduate students at SLAC is expected to afford the basis of
their doctoral theses.
Section 2(2) of the Act, which defines the term "employer," does
not expressly exclude educational or research institutions. However,
the legislative history of that section shows clearly that, when the 1947
amendments were enacted, Congress was aware of the Board's policy
that "only in exceptional circumstances and in connection with purely
commercial activities of such [nonprofit] organizations have any of
' When fully operational , SLAC will employ about 15 faculty members and 25 to 30
graduate students.
789-730--66-vol. 152-46
706 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
the activities of such organizations or of their employees been consid-
ered as affecting commerce so as to bring them within the National
Labor Relations Act." 2
Since 1947 the Board has construed the above-quoted legislative
history as a "guide, if not a mandate" in determining whether or not
to assert jurisdiction over activities of nonprofit organizations, and
has consistently applied the rule that jurisdiction would be asserted
where the particular activities involved are commercial in nature or
in the generally accepted sense, but that jurisdiction would be declined
over activities noncommercial in nature and intimately connected with
the charitable purpose and educational activities of the institution
In this case, the record shows that pioneering work in the field of
linear acceleration has been engaged in by Stanford University pro-
fessors since 1930. Since that time, Stanford has been actively involved
in the development of components of what later became linear acceler-
ators, and in the construction and operation of such accelerators them-
selves. Several smaller accelerators are currently maintained on the
main campus. The university justifies its decision to seek to have the
SLAC facility adjacent to the main campus, and its utilization of
otherwise valuable land for the Center, on its determination to main-
tain its position in the forefront of research in this field, on its value
to both faculty and students, and on its provision of a facility for
specialized training for faculty and students. The university deter-
mined to dedicate the acreage to SLAC, rather than to utilize that
land for more profitable purposes and locate SLAC elsewhere, because
it was deemed important for the Center to be easily available for the
utilization of the faculty and those students concerned.
The research being conducted at SLAC is not being performed for
the Government; it has exerted no impact on national defense, nor is
it expected to do so. The Center is considered a part of the campus
and access thereto is apparently unrestricted. The work is not classi-
fied, and the results are available to all interested parties; Soviet-bloc
visitors are, and have been, permitted free access to the facility. AEC
may dictate certain programs for SLAC, but as yet has not done so.
Stanford may refuse to conduct any project and AEC may then secure
another school to perform that work at SLAC, without affecting the
basic agreements controlling the Center. No research is conducted
for commercial firms, and no firm has shown interest in any of the
work at SLAC. In fact, no commercially utilizable research is envi-
2 H Rpt No 510, 80th Cong, 1st sess 32, 1 Leg Hist 536. See also Office
Employees International Union, Local 11 v. N.L.R.B., 353 U S. 313, 318, 319, and Trustees
of Columbia University in the City of New York, 97 NLRB 424, for Supieme Court and
Board noting of that legislative intent.
3Trustees of Columbia University, ibid.
LOCAL 300, UNITED ASSOCIATION OF JOURNEYMEN, ETC . 707
sioned. The work of SLAC is pure basic research with increased
knowledge of the basic properties of matter its only foreseeable end
product.
Clearly, therefore, 1Voods Hole Oceanographic Institution,4 upon
which Petitioner relies, cannot be controlling. For, unlike the marine
research facility therein, SLAC is not performing research for the
Government under contract for specific research problems,5 there is no
showing that SLAC's activities are beneficial to private industry, there
is no evidence of any effect on national defense, and there is a clear
showing that SLAC's activities are important to the overall purposes
and program of a university with which it is connected.
More apposite, we believe, is University of Miami, Institute of
Marine Science Division,6 in which an oceanographic research center
was also involved. There we concluded that, although the facility was
substantially supported by the Federal Government, it was first and
foremost an educational institution for advanced study of oceanog-
raphy, and its research activities contributed directly to its curriculum
and program for the practical training of scientists in the field and,
therefore, it represented an integral aspect of the center's overall edu-
cational function.
So, too, here. The activities of SLAC are noncommercial in nature
and are intimately connected with the educational purposes and activi-
ties of Stanford University. As in the University of Miami case, we
shall dismiss the petition.?
[The Board dismissed the petition.9
4143 NLRB 568.
5 That was virtually the only function of the employer in Woods Hole.
8146 NLRB 1448.
7 University of Miami, ibid.; Trustees of Columbia University, supra.
8 As indicated above, the Center is still under construction . Our decision herein is
necessarily based upon conditions and relationships existing at the present time or now
foreseeable.
Local 300, United Association of Journeymen and Apprentices of
the Plumbing and Pipefitting Industry of the United States and
Canada, AFL-CIO and D'Annunzio Bros., Inc. and Interna-
tional Hod Carriers, Building and Common Laborers Union of
America, AFL-CIO, Heavy and General Laborers Local No.
472. Case N. 22-CD-95. May 19,1965
DECISION AND DETERMINATION OF DISPUTE
This is a proceeding under Section 10(k) of the National Labor
Relations Act, as amended , following a charge filed by D'Annunzio
Bros., Inc., herein called the Employer, alleging that Local 300, United
152 NLRB No. 70.