Western Electric Co., Inc.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Mar 12, 1953

103 N.L.R.B. 491 (N.L.R.B. 1953)

WESTERN ELECTRIC COMPANY, INCORPORATED 491
formed by either the hipo operator or the passenger bus operator.
Thus, the hipo operator drives over specified routes to designated post
offices. Similarly, the passenger bus driver also drives over specified
routes to designated passenger line terminals. For both hipos and
passenger bus drivers, wage rates are substantially the same, and both
groups are subject to the same general working conditions.' There
is regular interchange between the two groups. There is no evidence
in the record that either group has separate supervision apart from
the other.
We find that because the proposed unit would exclude the passenger
bus drivers, whose duties, functions, and working conditions are vir-
tually the same as the hipo drivers and because hipo and passenger
bus drivers interchange regularly with one another and there does not
appear to be any separate supervision, the proposed unit confined to
the hipo drivers is too limited in scope and not sufficiently autonomous
to be appropriate for purposes of collective bargaining; we shall,
therefore, dismiss the petition."
Order
IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that the petition filed herein be, and it hereby
is, dismissed.
* Vacations , profit sharing , and facilities , such as lockers, showers , rooms, and notices,
apply to all drivers.
See F. L. Roberts & Company, Inc., 81 NLRB 67; George F. Burnett Company, Inc., 90
NLRB 277.
WESTERN ELECTRIC COMPANY, INCORPORATED and COMMUNICATIONS
WORKERS OF AMERICA, (C. W. A.) C. I. O., PETITIONER. Case No.
18-RC-1744. March 1 2,1953
Decision and Direction of Elections
Upon a petition duly filed under Section 9 (c) of the National
Labor Relations Act, a hearing was held before Hjalmar Storlie,
hearing officer. 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 Board
has delegated its powers in connection with this case to a three-member
panel [Chairman Herzog and Members Styles and Peterson].
Upon the entire record in this case, the Board finds :
1. The Employer is engaged in commerce within the meaning of
the Act.
2. The labor organizations involved claim to represent certain
employees of the Employer.
103 NLRB No. 56.
492 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
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 Employer, the Petitioner, and International Brotherhood of
Electrical Workers, AFL, herein called the IBEW, agree that the
employees at the Employer's Duluth, Minnesota, telephone equipment
assembly plant, excluding office clerical employees,' technical-
professional employees,2 guards, and supervisors as defined in the
Act,3 constitute an appropriate unit. International Association of
Machinists, AFL, District Lodge 133, herein called the IAM, seeks to
represent toolmakers, machinists, tool gauge inspectors, and junior
tradesmen in the maintenance section of the Employer's work service
department, and the detail maker in the Employer's test set depart-
ment, in a separate craft unit. The Employer objects to the proposed
separate unit for toolmakers.
Toolmakers, machinists, tool gauge inspectors, and junior trades-
men or learners are located in the Employer's tool gauge and machine
maintenance section of the work service department on the third floor
of the Duluth plant. Their machine shop contains typical machine
tools, such as drill presses, lathes, screw machines, winches, and other
small tools. Toolmakers work principally in the machine shop.
Machinists, although they make their headquarters in the shop, work
all through the plant, repairing and maintaining the conveyor system,
contact welding machines, and winding machines under the supervi-
sion of the machine maintenance foreman. Tool gauge inspectors go
out of the machine shop and make periodic checks on the production
line gauges used for checking the quality of products. They repair
any gauges found to be out of order. The detail maker works in the
test set department adjacent to the machine maintenance section on
the third floor. He makes small metal parts and brackets that apply
to test sets. He also repairs damaged test sets. Occasionally, he uses
the tools in the machine shop for fabricating small parts.
There are no employees elsewhere in the plant who perform func-
tions similar to those of the employees sought by the IAM. While the
nature of the Employer's operations require them to be in and around
' There are 20 office clerical employees whom the Employer alleges to be confidential
employees . Their categories are as follows : Secretary -stenographers to the superintendents
and their assistants and department chiefs, auditor -bookkeeper , business methods investi-
gator, financial clerk , payroll clerk , plant inspector , employment interviewer, and results
investigator . As the Employer , Petitioner , and IBEW agree, these employees are office
clerical employees . It is not necessary to determine their confidential status for the pur-
poses of this case . According to customary Board policy, we exclude them as office elericals
from the bargaining group of production and maintenance employees . J. P. Stevens d Co.,
Inc., Republic Cotton Mill Division, 93 NLRB 1513.
2 Technical-professional employees are already represented by Council of Western Electric
Technical Employees, their certified bargaining representative.
• The parties agree that group chiefs, section chiefs, department chiefs, assistant super-
intendents , and superintendents are supervisors as defined in the Act.
WESTERN ELECTRIC COMPANY, INCORPORATED 493
the production areas, these employees work under separate supervision
at all times, and there is no interchange between them and other
employees. Combination oiler and conveyor belt maintenance men
are not skilled craftsmen. We shall exclude them from the group
sought by the IAM, and include them in the production and mainte-
nance group .4 We find that the employees sought by the IAM are a
homogeneous identifiable craft group that may appropriately be repre-
sented in a separate unit,' or may constitute a part of a plant unit.
We shall not make any final unit determination, but shall first ascer-
tain the desires of the employees in the elections hereinafter directed.
The Employer and the IBEW would exclude, and the Petitioner
would include, all plant clerical employees from the production and
maintenance group. Approximately 20 salaried clerical employees at
the plant, including the manufacturing analyst, load regulator, secre-
tary-stenographers, investigators, clerk-typists, receptionist, and shop
clericals (timekeepers), are located in production areas and work
under the supervision of the heads of various production departments
to which they are assigned. They enjoy the same hours and employ-
ment benefits as the Employer's clerical employees. The fact that
these plant clericals are salaried workers does not preclude their
inclusion in a group of production and maintenance employees. Fol-
lowing usual Board practice,6 we include them in the production and
maintenance group.
Four salaried quality checkers work in the plant. They report to
the engineering department at the Employer's Hawthorne plant in
Cicero, Illinois. They are trained by the Employer's quality control
organization, which is countrywide, and are responsible for the quality
of products produced at the Duluth plant. In the absence of evidence
that quality checkers are technical employees or office, as distinct from
plant, clerical employees, we include quality checkers in the produc-
tion and maintenance group.
We shall direct that separate elections be held among the employees
of the Employer at its Duluth, Minnesota, plant, within the voting
groups described below :
Voting Group I: All toolmakers, machinists, tool gauge inspectors,
and junior tradesmen or learners in the Employer's work service
department and the detail maker in the Employer's test set department,
excluding combination oiler and conveyor belt maintenance men, and
all other employees, guards, and supervisors as defined in the Act.
* Tin Processing Corporation , 80 NLRB 1369, 1374.
I Westinghouse Electric Corporation , 101 NLR$ 441 ; General Electric Company, 80
NLRB 174; Western Electric Company, Incorporated, 78 NLRB 160.
A. 0. Smith Corporation, Air Prame Component Division, 102 NLRB 1116 , and cases
cited therein.
494 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
Voting Group II: All production and maintenance employees, in-
cluding quality checkers and other plant clerical employees and
combination oiler and conveyor belt maintenance men, but excluding
office clerical employees, all toolmakers, machinists, tool gauge inspec-
tors, and junior tradesmen or learners in the Employer's work service
department, the detail maker in the Employer's test set department,
technical-professional employees, the doctor and nurse,' guards, and
supervisors as defined in the Act.
If a majority of the employees in voting group I select a collective-
bargaining agent different from that selected by a majority of em-
ployees in voting group II, the employees in voting group I will be
taken to have indicated their desire to constitute a separate unit; and
if a majority of employees in voting group II also select a collective-
bargaining agent, the Regional Director conducting the elections
directed herein is instructed to issue separate certification of represent-
atives to the collective-bargaining agent so selected for (1) a unit
consisting of the employees in voting group I, and (2) a unit consisting
of the employees in voting group II, which units the Board finds under
such circumstances do constitute units appropriate for the purposes of
collective bargaining. In the event a majority of employees in voting
groups I and II select the same collective-bargaining agent, the em-
ployees in voting group I will be taken to have indicated a desire to
be included in the same bargaining unit as the employees in voting
group II, and the Regional Director conducting the elections directed
herein is instructed to issue a certification of representatives to the
collective-bargaining agent so selected for a unit consisting of all
employees in voting groups I and II, which unit the Board under
such circumstances finds to constitute a unit appropriate for the pur-
poses of collective bargaining.8
5. The Employer contends that an immediate election would be
untimely because of the planned expansion of its working force at the
Duluth plant. Employees sought by the IAM now number 15 of an
anticipated 20 employees. Nonsupervisory factory employees number
426, of an anticipated total of 1,237 to be reached in December of 1953.
The Employer plans to add new employees at the rate of 60 per month,
expecting to reach one-half its anticipated total by April of 1953.
Each department or type of operation is now working with a substan-
tial quota of employees. No new departments or types of operations
are anticipated. Some operations will be expanded and divided. As
the present complement of workers constitutes a substantial and repre-
As professional employees with diverse interests from those of production employees, we
exclude the nurse and doctor from the voting group . W. F. 4 John Barnes Company, 96
NLRB 1136.
8 On March 31, 1953, the Board amended voting group II by stipulation of the parties.
VITA FOOD PRODUCTS, INCORPORATED 495
sentative proportion of the contemplated working force, the Board
will follow its customary policy of directing immediate elections.9
. [Text of Direction of Elections omitted from publication in this
volume.l
9 Kaiser Manufacturing Corporation, Richmond Machine Division , 99 NLRB 244 ; Metro-
politan Life Insurance Company, Parklebrea Resident Community, 93 NLRB 381; Westing-
house Electric Corporation, 87 NLRB 463 . Cf. General Electric Company, 100 NLRB 419.
VITA FOOD PRODUCTS, INCORPORATED , MAx BLOCK CO., INC. (DIVISION
OF VITA FOOD PRODUCTS , INCORPORATED ) and DISTRICT 65, DISTRIBU-
TIVE, PROCESSING AND OFFICE WORKERS OF AMERICA, PETITIONER.
Cases Nos. 2-RC 5243 and 0-RC-5094. March 12,1953
Decision and Direction of Elections
Upon separate petitions duly filed under Section 9 (c) of the Na-
tional Labor Relations Act, a hearing in the above-consolidated cases
was held before I. L. Broadwin, hearing officer. 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 Board
has delegated its powers in connection with this case to a three-member
panel [Members Houston, Styles, and Peterson].
Upon the entire record in this case, the Board finds :
1. The Employer is engaged in commerce within the meaning of
the Act.
2. The labor organizations involved claim to represent certain em-
ployees 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 asserts that its collective-bargaining agreement
with the Fish Smokers Trade Council, Inc., of which Vita Food
Products, Incorporated, Schnibbe Division, a wholly owned subsidiary
of the Employer located in Brooklyn, New York, is a member, bars
any election which includes fish processors employed by the Employer
in the Metropolitan New York area. We find no merit in this con-
tention. For, apart from other considerations, the contract's union-
security clause fails to provide at least 30 days for employees who
were not union members when the clause became operative to become
? Local 635, Fish, Seafood , Smoked Fish and Cannery Workers, affiliated with Amalga-
mated Meat Cutters and Butcher Workmen of America, A. F. of L., herein called the Inter-
venor, was permitted to intervene on the basis of a showing of interest and an alleged
contract interest.
103 NLRB No. 67.