Groveton Papers Co., Inc.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Nov 6, 1951

96 N.L.R.B. 1369 (N.L.R.B. 1951)

GROVETON PAPERS COMPANY, INC. 1369
GROVETON PAPERS COMPANY, INC., (NORTHUMBERLAND BRANCH)i and
INTERNATIONAL BROTHERHOOD OF PAPERMAKERS , AFL, PETITIONER.
Case No. 1-RC-2306. November 6, 1951
Decision and Direction of Election
Upon a petition duly filed under Section 9 (c) of the National
Labor Relations Act, a hearing was held before Robert E. Greene,
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, 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 Act.
2. The labor organizations 2 involved claim to represent certain
employees of the Employer.
3. The Employer and Intervenor assert a contract bar to the peti-
tion. On August 8, 1950, they entered into a contract with an expira-
tion date of May 31, 1951. Beginning in April 1951, and continuing
through May, the parties met several times to negotiate a new contract,
and on May 31, reached complete agreement as to the new terms.
Simultaneously therewith they signed a memorandum reciting merely
the fact of their agreement and that the contract was to be effective
on June 1, 1951, subject to ratification by the Intervenor's member-
ship. It stated further that the wage increases agreed to in the new
contract were to be submitted to the Wage Stabilization Board for
approval, and that the approved wage increases were to be retroactive
to June 1, 1951. The memorandum also provided for the inclusion
of a wage reopening clause in the new contract, and stated that to
avoid a work stoppage the expiring contract was extended for 2 weeks.
On the night of May 31 the Intervenor's membership ratified the con-
tract, and on June 1 the Employer's superintendent, Walter F.
Wemyss, was notified of this action. Thereafter, the contract was
reduced to writing and signed by the Employer and Intervenor on
June 14 or 15.
On June 13 or 14, 1951, 1 day before the contract was signed, repre-
sentatives of the Petitioner advised Walter F. Wemyss at his office
that the Petitioner represented a majority of the Employer's em-
ployees and requested recognition as their representative. Wemyss
refused to accord such recognition. Thereupon, on the same day, the
3 The Employer ' s name is amended to conform to the record.
m District 50, United Mine Workers of America , herein called the Intervenor, was granted
intervention on the basis of a contract interest.
96 NLRB No. 199.
1370 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
Petitioner sent a telegram to James C. Wemyss, the Employer's presi-
dent, confirming the representations made to Walter F. Wemyss.8
This communication also failed to evoke recognition. On June 21,
1951, the Petitioner filed the petition in this proceeding.
The Employer contends that the May 31 memorandum constituted
a complete bargaining contract which, having been signed and made
effective before the Petitioner's claim of representation and the filing
of the petition, should result in the dismissal of the petition in accord-
ance with the Board's established contract bar principles. The Em-
ployer also contends that the contract signed on June 14 or 15 should
operate as a bar because it was signed before the filing of the petition.
As to the first of the Employer's contentions, it is apparent on the
face of the May 31 memorandum that the wage rates,under the new
contract differed from the rates in the expiring contract, but the
memorandum does not set out the new rates. Nor is it completely
ascertainable from the memorandum whether the new contract other-
wise modified or added to the terms of the old contract, and precisely
how such modifications or additions changed the old contract. Thus
the full agreement between the parties was not determinable from
the memorandum or by reference to the old contract. Such deter-
mination was possible only by reference to the oral agreement which
was reduced to writing and signed after the Petitioner's claim of repre-
sentation and request for recognition 4 We are satisfied, therefore,
that the May 31 memorandum did not constitute a sufficient and com-
prehensive written statement of the understanding between the parties
to stabilize their industrial relations, and cannot, consequently, bar
the petition.5
With respect to the contention that the contract signed on June 14
or 15 is a bar, we note that under the Board's General Electric X-Ray
8 The telegram inadvertently indicated that it confirmed a conversation with the
addressee , rather than with Walter F. Wemyss. It sufficiently revealed the nature of that
conversation , however, to serve notice of the Petitioner's claim of representation.
4 In this respect the instant memorandum differs from that which the Board held a bar
to a petition in The Carborundum Company case ( 78 NLRB 91 ), relied upon by the Em-
ployer in its brief, for in that case the memorandum agreement incorporated by reference
the terms of the expiring contract and specifically recited the changes and modifications
agreed upon . Thus the full agreement of the parties was readily ascertainable from
written documents signed before the filing of the petition.
In support of its contract -bar contention , the Employer argues that a valid contract
enforceable at law was consummated on May 31, 1951, or at sometime before June 14, or
15, the date when the written contract between the parties was signed . In furtherance
of this argument the Employer, after the close of the hearing, moved to reopen the record
to receive evidence that the terms of the contract were made operative on June 1, 1951,
and that application had in fact been made to the Wage Stabilization Board for approval
of the new wage terms. This motion is denied , for the inclusion of such evidence in the
record would not alter our conclusion that no written signed agreement was in existence
before June 14 or 15 which could operate as a bar . Southern Heater Corporation, 91
NLRB 1118 . Moreover the enforceability as a matter of contract law of the May 31
memorandum or the oral agreement between the Employer and the Intervenor in existence
on the foregoing date , is not determinative of the issue of whether such agreements may
operate as a bar to a present determination of representatives. See American Hoist J,
Derrick Company, 87 NLRB 654.
GROVETON PAPERS COMPANY, INC. 1371
rule e the Petitioner could file a timely petition within 10 days from
the date of its claim of representation to the Employer despite the
signing of the contract in the intervening period. As the petition
was filed less than 10 days from that date, it appears that the require-
ments of the rule have been met. The Employer argues further that
the petition was untimely because it was not preceded by an effective
claim of representation. It contends that Walter F. Wemyss had
no authority to grant recognition and therefore lacked authority to
receive the claim, and that it did not receive notice of the Petitioner's
telegraphic claim before the contract was signed because James C.
Wemyss, to whom it was addressed, was absent when the telegram
was received at the plant and did not read it until his return on or
about June 18. Neither of these arguments is meritorious. Whether
Walter F. Wemyss was authorized to grant the Petitioner's request
for recognition is not significant. What is material is the fact that
he was the Employer's chief operating official at its plant and an
active participant in the Employer's bargaining negotiations. Os-
tensibly he was a proper person to receive the Petitioner's claim, and
the presentation of the claim to him effectively constituted notice
thereof to the Employer. Nor is it significant that James C. Wemyss
did not read the Petitioner's telegram until June 18. The record
establishes and the Employer concedes in its brief that the telegram
was received at the plant on the date when the oral claim was made
to Walter F. Wemyss. The telegram-therefore constituted an effective
notice on that date.7 Accordingly, we find that the contract signed
June 14 or 15 is not a bar.8
We find that a 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.
4. The Employer is engaged at its Northumberland, New Hamp-
shire, plant, in the production of raw paper and in the conversion of
this product into paper towels, toilet paper, wax paper, and napkins.
The Petitioner seeks a unit comprising the paper production em-
ployees, maintenance employees, and power area employees, exclud-
ing the production employees who produce the afore-mentioned end
products as well as all other employees. In the alternative, if the
Board finds such unit inappropriate, the Petitioner is willing to pro-
ceed to an election in a plant-wide production and maintenance unit.
The Employer and Intervenor contend that only a plant-wide unit is
appropriate.
• General Electric X-Ray Corporation, 67 NLRB 997.
* Belle-Moc, Inc., 81 NLRB 6; Williston on Contracts , Rev. Ed . vol. 1, sec. 89.
In view of the above finding it is unnecessary to rule on the Petitioner 's contention
that the contract contains an alleged illegal union -security provision.
1372 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
The Employer's plant consists of several interconnected buildings
which are divided into two groups by an abandoned road which runs
between them. An overhead passageway in turn links the buildings
on both sides of the road. Generally, the production of raw paper
takes place in the buildings on one side of the road, and the conversion
processes occur in the buildings on the other side. In the area where'
raw paper is produced are also the departments where steam and
electricity for the entire plant are produced, and the maintenance
department. The maintenance mechanics for the most part report
to this locality, but perform their duties throughout all the plant de-
partments. Together with the conversion departments on the other
side of the road are the printing department, which produces labels
for the Employer's products, and the shipping department. There
is also a yard department whose location is not specifically fixed by
the record. The loading and unloading functions of this depart-
ment, however, are performed in the areas on both sides of the, road.
One superintendent is in charge of the entire plant with depart-
mental foremen reporting directly to him. Wage scales and condi-
tions of employment are uniform throughout the plant. Employees
are frequently transferred between departments on either side of the
road to fill vacancies due to absences or to help the yard department
in emergencies. All employees are eligible to bid for job openings in
any plant department subject to plant-wide seniority. A single pay-
roll department and employment office service the entire plant. Fol-
lowing the Board's certification of the Intervenor in 1943, the Em-
ployer has continuously bargained with it for a plant-wide unit of
production and maintenance employees.
The Petitioner took the position at the hearing that because of the
alignment of the Employer's buildings, and the fact that the Employer
could, if it so desired, merely produce raw paper for sale or manufac-
ture its end products from raw paper procured from other producers,9
the Employer's business comprises two independent self-contained
plants; and because the proposed primary unfit is composed only of
employees in the paper producing plant, it is appropriate for separate
representation. The Petitioner argues further that the skills of the
paper producing employees are sufficiently superior to those of the
employees engaged in producing the end products, to warrant separate
representation for its proposed unit. We disagree with these views.
Although the Employer admitted the feasibility of conducting its
paper producing and converting operations separately, the record
° Some of the raw paper processed by the Employer is shipped to the plant involved
herein from the Employer's Groveton, New Hampshire , plant.
GROVETON PAPERS COMPANY, INC. 1373
shows that, consistent with its past practices, the Employer is ex-
clusively_ engaged in the manufacture and sale of its end products and
produces raw paper, not for marketing, but for its own conversion
purposes only. As such, the production of raw paper is a preliminary
and integral step in the Employer's total operations, and furnishes'no
logical basis for a conclusion that this activity involves the mainte-
nance of a plant separate and distinct from the Employer's other
operations. Nor do we regard the physical separation of the Em-
ployer's production departments by the above-mentioned road as suffi-
ciently significant to justify the Petitioner's position, for it is not
uncommon for public roads to run between the buildings of a unitary
industrial plant. Moreover, despite the intrusion of the road, all
buildings are joined and access is possible from those on one side to
the others without leaving the plant premises.
As the Petitioner's primary unit consists of less than the Employ-
er's total complement, it may be justified only on the basis of craft
considerations or on a showing that it is an appropriate departmental
unit. Although there is some testimony in the record to the effect
that the skills of the paper production employees are more extensive
than those of the other production employees, it has not been demon-
strated that they possess the skills or training of craftsmen. Nor
does the record show that the maintenance or power area employees
are craftsmen. In any event, it is obvious that the skills and duties
of the paper production employees, maintenance, and power area em-
ployees are so diverse as to preclude the possibility that together they
constitute a craft group appropriate for severance. Nor could they
constitute an appropriate departmental unit in view of the facts ad-
verted to above indicating a substantial community of interest be-
tween these employees and the Employer's other employees. For
these reasons, and because of the bargaining history on a plant-wide
basis,, we find that the unit primarily proposed by the Petitioner is
inappropriate for separate representation,10 but shall grant the-alter-
native request for an election in a plant-wide production and mainte-
nance unit.
We find that all production and maintenance employees, excluding
guards and supervisors as defined in the Act constitute a unit appro-
priate 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.],
.. '° Flora Cabinet Company, 94 NLRB 12; Rem Paper Company, 83 NLRB 265.