Chesapeake & Potomac Telephone Co. of Baltimore

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Apr 6, 1950

89 N.L.R.B. 231 (N.L.R.B. 1950)

In the Matter of CHESAPEAKE & POTOMAC TELEPHONE COMPANY OF
BALTIMORE, EMPLOYER and E. K. GuNDERSDORFF, PETITIONER and
COMMUNICATION WORKERS OF AMERICA, C. I. 0., DIVISION 34, UNION
Case No. 5-RD-34.-Decided April 6,1950
DECISION
AND
ORDER
Upon a petition for certification duly filed, a hearing was held
before John J. A. Reynolds, Jr., 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 National Labor
Relations Act, the Board has delegated its powers in connection with
this case to a three-member panel [Members Reynolds, Murdock, and
Styles].
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, employed by the Company as an engineering
assistant, filed a petition on behalf of himself and some 88 other
engineering assistants, to decertify the Maryland Federation of Tele-
phone Workers, and/or Division 34, CWA (CIO) as the bargaining
agent for the engineering assistants, under Section 9 (b) of the
National Labor Relations Act, as amended.
3. The alleged question concerning representation :
The Company and the Maryland Bell Telephone Plant Employees,
Inc., signed a collective bargaining contract on August 4, 1937, for a
3-year term, covering the plant department employees, including the
engineering assistants.' In 1940, the union changed its name to the
Maryland Federation of Telephone Workers, Inc., and a second 3-year
contract was executed in that year. Bargaining continued thereafter
and the last contract was signed on July 1, 1948, also for a 3-year term.
On October 4, 1949, the membership adopted a resolution to dissolve
' There are some 2,700 employees in the plant department, including the 89 engineering
assistants.
89 NLRB No. 25.
231
232 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
the Maryland Federation of Telephone Workers, Inc., and to become a
Division of the Communication Workers of America, affiliated with the
CIO, and on October 12, the CWA issued a charter to the local as
Division 34. The present petition for decertification was filed on
October 25 , 1949. On October 26, the next day, the Company and
Division 34 signed an agreement continuing in force and effect the
contract of 1948, which expires June 30, 1951.
The Petitioner contends that since the Maryland Federation of
Telephone Workers, Inc., has been dissolved , the contract. of 1948
entered into by it no longer has any legal existence and therefore is
not a bar; furthermore that the engineering assistants are professional
employees and are entitled to be represented in a separate unit under
Section 9 (b) of the Act.
The CWA, Division 34, urges that the contract of 1948 is a bar.
It contends that the predecessor , Maryland Federation of Telephone
Workers, Inc., has been legally liquidated , in compliance with Mary-
land law, and that the bargaining unit, as well as the offices , officers,
bylaws, and regulations governing the local union, have remained the
same after affiliation with the CWA.
The Company's position is neutral but it was of the opinion that
a question of representation exists.
We find no merit in the Petitioner's contention that since the prede-
cessor local union was liquidated, the contract of 1948 became in-
effective . We are of the opinion that the facts here are analogous to
those in the Michigan Bell Telephone case.2 The record here is de-
void of evidence that the affiliation with the CWA (CIO) has had any
effect upon the structure, functions , or membership of the local union.
The only change which we note in the character and status of the local
union is one of designation and affiliation. There is no question of
its continuing and current representative position . Under these cir-
cumstances we are of the opinion that the contract of 1948 is a valid
and subsisting agreement between Division 34, CWA (CIO) and the
Employer.
'Moreover , we find no merit in Petitioner's contention that the engi-
neering assistants are professional employees. The Intervenors con-
tend that the assistants are not professionals because their work , is
routine in character and that practically all the information necessary
to carry out their duties can be obtained from the Bell System Practices
Manuals, which any one can learn to use while being trained on the
job. They argue that the assistants do not satisfy the requirements of
the statute for professional employees in any respect.
2 85 NLRB 303.
CHESAPEAKE & POTOMAC TELEPHONE COMPANY 233
The Company would leave the determination of professional status
to the Board but its representatives were of the opinion that the
assistants were probably professional employees.
The record shows that the main duties of the engineering assistants
are generally as follows : (1) To make a preliminary survey for the
approval of the plant engineer, showing the location, size, and type of
poles, wires, cables, circuit layouts, switchboards, and any other equip-
ment required for a proposed project; (2) to make field surveys of ex-
isting and future facilities for new projects showing the areas to be
covered, probable type of construction to be used, whether aerial or
underground, location of routes to be followed, and the estimated
cost of materials and labor involved; (3) on occasion, to obtain rights-
of-way from private owners. Estimates of future growth in popula-
tion are obtained for the assistants from other departments. Of the
89 engineering assistants, 12 are college graduates, 32 have had some
college work, 9 completed some kind of post high school training in
a night technical school, 21 are high school graduates, and 15 have
had less than a high school education. The evidence does not show
whether the assistants who have had college work took courses in-
engineering or related subjects, nor does it show how many, if any,
are members of engineering societies. The Company stated that ad-
vanced education was not a prerequisite for the duties to be performed
and that there was no specific job classification for this category of
employees. The Company also stated that engineering assistants
were in the main selected from other departments in the plant on the
basis of their ability and potentialities to do the work and that they
were trained on the job. In 1949, the Company introduced a theoret-
ical course of study for the assistants consisting of 120 hours of attend-
ance. Some 30 percent of the assistants have enrolled for this course.
Previous contracts, which had always included the engineering assist-
ants with the rank-and-file of plant department employees, indicate
that the assistants are hourly paid for both their regular and over-
time work.
We are of the opinion that employees who are generally recruited
from the labor force in a plant and who are primarily trained on
the job were not intended to be included in the category of professional
employees as defined in Section 2 (12) (2) of the Act. Subsection
(iv) of the cited section establishes as a general educational pre-
requisite to professional classification a requirement that such em-
plovees must have "knowledge of an advanced type in a field of science
or learning customarily acquired by a prolonged course of snecializerl
intellectual instruction and study in an institution of higher learning
or a hnenit.al. as distinguished from a general academic education or
234 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
from an apprenticeship or from training in the performance of rou-
tine mental, manual or physical processes." The record here estab-
lishes that the engineering assistants are not required to have obtained
this type of education or to perform duties requiring such education.3
On the basis of all the foregoing facts, we find that the proposed.
unit is inappropriate. We shall therefore dismiss the petition.
ORDER
Upon the entire record in the case, the National Labor Relations
Board hereby orders that the petition herein be, and it hereby is, dis-
missed.
31nter-Mountain Telephone Company, 79 NLRB 715 . See also Southern Bell Telephone
Co., 78 NLRB 814, where the Board excluded engineering field men from a unit of profes-
sional engineers on the ground that they did not meet the requirements of the statute for
professional classification . These men performed work comparable to the engineering
assistants in the present case ; they were , in the main , recruited from the other jobs and
their work did not require advanced type of scientific knowledge. Cf. Illinois Bell Tele-
phone Company, 77 NLRB 1073 , where the Board held that four categories of engineers
were professionals . The record there showed that 60 percent of the engineers were college
graduates or had college education and where, in the Chicago area alone, 62 percent of the
engineers are licensed under the State of Illinois Professional Engineering Act as Registered
Professional Engineers.