Fisher Corp., Ltd.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Aug 8, 1960

128 N.L.R.B. 504 (N.L.R.B. 1960)

504 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
Fisher Corporation , Ltd. and Amalgamated Lithographers of
America Local 62, Petitioner . Case No. 37-RC-602. August 8,
1960
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 David E. Davis, 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 [Chairman Leedom and Members
Bean and Fanning].
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.
4. The Employer is engaged in commercial printing and the sale
of office supplies. The Petitioner seeks to represent a unit composed
of lithographic production employees including offset pressmen and
camera department employees. The offset pressmen, together with
letterpressmen, are currently represented by Honolulu Printing
Pressmen & Assistants' Union, Local 413, AFL-CIO (herein called
Pressmen). The camera department employees are now represented
as a separate unit by Hawaii Photo Engravers Union, Local 109,
AFL-CIO (herein called Photo Engravers). The Pressmen and
Photo Engravers maintain that the requested unit is not appropriate.
The Employer contends that all pressmen should be in the same unit.
The Employer's entire printing operation is located on one floor of
its building. Both offset pressman and letterpressmen are in the
press department, under the supervision of a single foreman. Orig-
inally the Employer had letterpresses only. Offset presses, including
multilith, a Miehle 29, and an Ebco, were acquired later, and some of
the letterpressmen were trained in their operation. Employees are
now regularly assigned as either letterpressmen or offset pressmen.
There is interchange only during vacation and rush periods, when
'Honolulu Printing Pressmen & Assistants' Union, Local 413, AFL-CIO, and Hawaii
Photo Engravers Union, Local 109, AFL-CIO, intervened on the basis of their contracts
covering employees in the requested unit.
128 NLRB No. 65.
FISHER CORPORATION, LTD. 505
offset pressmen operate letterpresses and letterpressmen operate mul-
tilith presses, but not the more complicated Miehle 29 or Ebco.
Camera department employees are engaged in various photoengrav-
ing aspects of the lithographic production process-stripping, plat-
ing, and camera work. There is a system of progression which
requires 4 years' training for platemaker, 5 for stripper, and 6 for
camera leader. There are four trainees in this department. The
camera department is under the overall supervision of the foreman
of the composition department.2
The requested unit of offset pressmen and camera department em-
ployees clearly constitutes a traditional group of lithographic produc-
tion employees who the Board holds may, if they so desire, be repre-
sented in a single combined unit where, as here, the Petitioner is a
traditional representative of such employee.' However, as the camera
department employees have been separately represented, they are,
under established Board policy, entitled to a self-determination elec-
tion before being merged in a broader unit 4 Similarly, the offset
pressmen are entitled to a separate election to determine if they wish
to continue being represented by the Pressmen as a part of its existing
unit or by the Petitioner either as part of a unit of all lithographic
employees or, if the camera department employees do not vote for the
Petitioner, in a separate unit, which under such circumstances, we
find may be appropriate.' We shall, therefore, direct separate elec-
tions in the voting groups described below at the Employer's Hono-
lulu, Hawaii, commercial printing establishment, excluding letter-
pressmen, watchmen and/or guards, professional employees, all other
employees, and supervisors as defined in the Act :
A. All camera department employees, including camera leader,
stripper, platemaker, and trainees.
B. All offset pressmen.
If a majority of employees in each of the voting groups vote for
the Petitioner, they will be merged into a single unit which, under
the circumstances, we find to be appropriate. If a majority in each
vote for different unions, then the employees in voting group A shall
continue to constitute a separate appropriate unit, and the employees
in voting group B shall, if they vote for the Petitioner, constitute a
separate appropriate unit, or, if they vote for the Pressmen, remain
a part of the unit currently represented by that Union. The Regional
2 Other employees in the composition department and the bindery department are un-
represented and none of the parties seek to represent them.
s McCall Corporation, 118 NLRB 1332 . Contrary to the Employer , the inclusion of
letterpressmen in the same unit with offset pressmen is not required by the fact that the
former-do numbering and imprinting on work done by offset pressmen ( Robinson Print era,
Inc., 118 NLRB 518), nor by the fact that there is some interchange between employees
in the two groups ( National Cash Register Co., 119 NLRB 486).
' Sutherland Paper Company, 122 NLRB 1284 , 1287-1288; Tarter, Webster 1 Johnson,
Inc., 121 NLRB 579; Illinois Cities Water Company, 87 NLRB 109 , 111-112.
5 Sutherland Paper Company, supra.
506 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
Director is instructed to issue the appropriate certification or certifica-
tions as directed by the outcome of the elections .6
[Text of Direction of Elections omitted from publication.]
6 Member Fanning agrees with the majority's finding that a unit of all lithographic
production employees is appropriate for, purposes of collective bargaining However, he
does not agree with the majority 's decision to certify such a unit only if the Petitioner
achieves majorities in both the camera department and offset pressmen voting groups.
In accordance with views he has expressed in other recent cases, he would pool the votes
of the camera department employees and offset pressmen in the event they reject the
unions which have represented them in the past, for such rejection makes the overall
unit appropriate and the Petitioner would be entitled to certification if it obtains a
majority of all the votes in that unit Waskski Biltmore, Inc., 127 NLRB 82; Cook
Paint and Varnish Company, 127 NLRB 1098; Star Union Products Company, 127
NLRB 1173.
Falarski Sausage Company and Sausage Makers Local #102,
Amalgamated Meat Cutters & Butcher Workmen of North
America, AFL-CIO. Case No. 7-CA-2502. August 9, 1960
DECISION AND ORDER
On April 15, 1960, Trial Examiner Albert P. Wheatley issued
his Intermediate 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
Intermediate Report attached hereto. Thereafter, the Respondent
filed exceptions to the Intermediate Report and a supporting brief.
Pursuant to the provisions of Section 3(b) of the Act, the Board
has delegated its powers in conjunction with this case to a three-
member panel [Chairman Leedom and Members Bean and Fanning].
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 exceptions and brief, and the entire record in
this case, and hereby adopts the findings,' conclusions, and recom-
mendations of the Trial Examiner, with the following modifications.
We agree with the Trial Examiner that the Respondent's conduct
toward Mueller and Urbanski, was discriminatorily motivated because
of their activities on behalf of the Charging Union, but conclude that
they were discriminatorily denied reemployment rather than dis-
criminatorily terminated. We make this distinction because of the
indefinite employment status of both Mueller and Urbanski. Mueller
had been off work from May 12 through July 20, 1959, for an opera-
tion, while Urbanski had ceased work on May 20, 1959, because of
In the absence of exceptions we adopt pro forma the Trial Examiner 's implied con-
clusion that the Respondent did not violate Section 8(a) (4) of the Act.
128 NLRB No. 71.