Danita Hoisery Manufacturing Co., Inc.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Feb 4, 1952

97 N.L.R.B. 1499 (N.L.R.B. 1952)

t ANITA HOSIERY MANUFACTURING COMPANY, INC. 1499
From the record, it is clear that the operation of the office building
a component part of the Employer's business and that the building
,employees contribute services essential to the operations of such busi-
ness through their work in the Employer's offices and in other parts
.of the building. We reject, therefore, the Employer's contention that
the Board does not have jurisdiction of the employees here requested
because the functions which they perform do not affect commerce.'
We find that all elevator operators, charwomen, and maintenance
employees at the Employer's Baltimore, Maryland, place of business,
excluding all office and clerical employees, watchmen and guards pro-
fessional employees, and supervisors as defined in the Act, constitute
a unit appropriate for the purposes of collective bargaining within the
meaning of Section 9 (b) of the Act.
[Text of Direction of Election omitted from publication in this
volume.]
e Dunlap Chevrolet Company, 91 NLRB 1115; see also Tri -State Casualty Insurance
Company , 83 NLRB 828 , enforced 188 F. 2d 50 (C. A. 10) ; The Northern Trust Company,
69 NLRB 652 and cases cited therein.
DANITA HOISERY MANUFACTURING COMPANY, INC. and AMERICAN
FEDERATION OF HOSIERY WORKERS, AFL, PETITIONER. Case No.
41-RC-4230. February 4,1950
Decision and Order
Upon a petition duly filed, a hearing was held before Harold X.
Summers, hearing officer. The hearing officer's rulings made at the
hearing are free from prejudicial error and are hereby affirmed.'
Pusuant 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 [Chairman Herzog and Members
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 labor organizations involved claim to represent employees
of the Employer.
3. The Employer and United Textile Workers of America, AFL,
the Intervenor herein, contend that their current contract constitutes
a bar to this proceeding. The Petitioner disagrees, alleging that the
contract contains an illegal union-security clause.
'The petition and other formal papers are amended to show the correct names of the
Employer and the Petitioner, respectively.
97 NLRB No. 223.
1500 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
On March 23,1950 2 the Board certified the Intervenor as authorized
to make a union-security agreement with the Employer, as set forth
in Section 8 (a) (3) of the Act. The current contract, dated June
19, 1950, effective from April 10, 1950, to August 31, 1952, with a
30-day automatic renewal clause, contains the following union-security
provision which the Petitioner contends is unauthorized under Section
8 (a) (3) of the Act:
Sec. 1. This agreement shall apply to the hosiery mill operated
by the Employer at 200 South Chapel Street, Newark, Delaware,
and shall cover all employees of said Employer at that mill who
are members of Local 205, United Textile Workers of America,
American Federation of Labor.
Sec. 2. The Employer agrees to continue to employ none but
members of the Union, in good standing, in the mill, covered by
this agreement, excepting the office workers, general clerical work-
ers and employees engaged in any kind of managerial work and
all employees, with the aforesaid exceptions, not presently 3 mem-
bers of the union shall be required to become members of the
Union within thirty days from the date of this contract.
Sec. 3. The Union recognizes the Employer's right to hire new
employees on a six weeks trial period, at the end of which trial
period employees must join the Union, if the Employer finds
they are competent enough for the job.
The union-security provision of this contract does not exceed the
limitations imposed by Section 8 (a) (3) of the Act. Section 2 of
the contract affords employees, who on the effective date of the con-
tract were not union members, 30 days in which to join the Union 4 So
far as employees hired thereafter are concerned, the only require-
ment-the one which appears in section 3-is that they join the-Union
when they have completed a trial period of 6 weeks.b
We find therefore that the current contract is a bar to a present deter-
mination of representatives, and that no question affecting commerce
exists concerning the representation of employees of the Employer
within the meaning of Section 9 (c) (1) and Section 2 (6) and (7)
of the Act. We shall accordingly dismiss the petition.
2 Case No 4-UA-1969.
8 We find no merit in the Petitioner 's contention that the protective features of the
contract are limited to "16" employees of the Employer . In one of the earlier drafts
of the contract , through a typographical error , the word "presently " in section 2 appeared
as "present 16."
4 Contrary to the Petitioner 's contention . the contract is not defective in not providing
an escape period for employees who on the effective date of the contract were members of
the Union . Charles A . Krause Milling Co., 97 NLRB 536
We think it plain that the first clause of section 2 of the contract (which section does
not deal with new hiring in any other respect ) does not impose any obligation to hire only
such new employees as are members of the Union , but is merely a statement of the
Employer 's general obligation to continue to abide by the union-security provisions as set
forth in the remainder of section 2 and in section 3.
CALDWELL FURNITURE COMPANY 1501
Order
IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that the petition filed by American Federation
of Hosiery Workers, AFL, be, and it hereby is, dismissed.
CiALDWELL FURNITURE COMPANY,and UNITED FURNITURE WORKERS OF
AMERICA, CIO. Case No. 34-CA-283. Februarys 5, 1952
Decision and Order
On August 15, 1951, Trial Examiner Reeves R. Hilton issued his
Intermediate Report in the above-entitled proceeding, finding that the
Respondent had engaged in and was engaged 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. The Trial Examiner also found that
the Respondent had not engaged in certain other unfair labor prac-
tices and recommended that the complaint be dismissed as to such
allegations. Thereafter, the Respondent filed exceptions to the Inter-
mediate Report. The General Counsel did not file exceptions to that
part of the Intermediate Report which recommended that the com-
plaint be dismissed as to certain allegations.
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 Herzog and Members
Murdock and Styles].
The Board has reviewed the rulings made by the Trial Examiner
at the hearing and finds that no prejudicial error was committed. The
rulings are hereby affirmed. The Board has considered the Inter-
mediate Report, the Respondent's exceptions, and the entire record in
this case, and hereby adopts the findings, conclusions, and recommen-
dations of the Trial Examiner, with the additions and modifications
noted below.
1. The Respondent asserts that the Trial Examiner accepted its
contention that the union representatives had reasonable opportunities
to contact the employees at a place other than upon its property,
namely at the intersection of the Respondent's road and 'the public
highway. We think that implicit in the Trial Examiner's description
of the premises and the manner in which employees leave the plant,
and in his citation of the Le Tourneau and Carolina Mills cases,' is
the finding that distribution of literature to employees off the Re-
spondent's property is virtually impossible and, at times, hazardous,
'Le Tourneau Company of Georgaa, 54 NLRB 1253, enforcement ordered 324 U. S, 793
( 1945) ; Carolina Mills , Inc., 92 NLRB 1141, enfd . 190 F. 2d 675 (C. A. 4, 1951).
97 NLRB No. 240.