Huth & James Shoe Mfg. Co.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Aug 3, 1937

3 N.L.R.B. 220 (N.L.R.B. 1937)

In the Matter of HUTH & JAMES SHOE MFG. COMPANY and UNITED
SHOE WORKERS OF AMERICA
Case No. R-174.-Decided August 3, 1937
Shoe Manufacturing Industry-Investigation of Representatives: controversy
concerning representation of employees: rival organizations-Unit Appropriate
for Collective Bargaiuing: production employees ; plant ; functional coherence ;
history of collective bargaining in plant and industry ; eligibility for member-
ship in both rival organizations ; uniformity of skill and conditions of employ-
ment; community of interest-Election. Ordered-Certification of Representa-
tives.
Mr. Robert R. Rissman and Mr. S. G. Lippman for the Board.
Mr. Daniel K. Hopkinson, of Milwaukee, Wis., for the Company.
Mr. Max E. Geline, of Milwaukee, Wis., for the U. S. W.
Mr. Joseph A. Padway, by M11r. A. G. Goldberg, of Milwaukee,
Wis., for the B. & S. W. U.
Mr. Millard L. Midonick, of counsel to the Board.
DECISION
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
On May 4, 1937, the United Shoe Workers of America, herein
called the U. S. W., affiliated with the Committee for Industrial
Organization, filed with the Regional Director for the Twelfth Re-
gion (Milwaukee, Wisconsin) a petition alleging that a question
affecting commerce had arisen concerning the representation of the
employees of the Huth & James Shoe Mfg. Company, Milwaukee,
Wisconsin, herein called the Company, and requesting an investiga-
tion and certification of representatives pursuant to Section 9 (c) of
the National Labor Relations Act, 49 Stat. 449, herein called the Act.
On June 8, 1937, the Board, acting pursuant to Article III, Section
3 of National Labor Relations Board Rules and Regulations-Se-
ries 1, as amended, authorized the Regional Director to conduct an
investigation and to provide for an appropriate hearing in con-
nection therewith. On June 15, 1937, the Regional Director issued
a notice of hearing to be held at Milwaukee, Wisconsin, on June 21,
1937. The Company, the U. S. W., and the Boot & Shoe Workers
Union, herein called the B. & S. W. U., affiliated with the American
Federation of Labor, which had been named in the petition as also
claiming to represent employees of the Company, were served with
the notice.
220
DECISIONS AND ORDERS 221
Pursuant to the notice, a hearing was held in Milwaukee, Wiscon-
sin, on June 21, 1937, before Charles A. Wood, the Trial Examiner
duly designated by the Board. The Board, the Company, the
U. S. W. and the B. & S. W. U. were represented by counsel and
participated in the hearing. Full opportunity to be heard, to exam-
ine and cross-examine witnesses, and to introduce evidence bearing
on the issues was afforded all the parties. During the course of the
hearing the Trial Examiner made numerous rulings on motions
and on objections to the admission or exclusion of evidence. We
have examined all of the Trial Examiner's rulings and find that no
prejudicial errors were committed. His rulings are hereby affirmed.
Upon the entire record in the case, the Board makes the following :
FINDINGS OF FACT
I. THE BUSINESS OF THE COMPANY
The Huth & James Shoe Mfg. Company, a Wisconsin corpora-
tion, has its general offices, sales and show rooms, and its principal
plant in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. It operates a smaller plant in
Cedar Grove, 20 miles distant from Milwaukee, but the record is
bare of facts concerning that plant and it appears that the Mil-
waukee plant is an entity in itself. The Company is engaged exclu-
sively in the manufacture of women's shoes, employing in its Mil-
waukee plant approximately 437 production workers, exclusive of
supervisory employees, in addition to about 15 maintenance, janitor,
elevator, and shipping employees, and a clerical staff numbering
about 25.
Over 95 per cent of all leather used in the Company's manufac-
turing operations is obtained from tanneries primarily, in the New
England States, and 80 per cent of all other materials used by the
Company in the production of shoes are shipped to its plant from
outside the State of Wisconsin. Eighty-five per cent of all the
Company's sales are made to jobbers and retailers similarly located
outside of the State; thus, of $2,000,000 worth of shoes made by
the Company during 1936, $1,700,000 were sent to points outside
of the State of Wisconsin.
U. THE ORGANIZATIONS INVOLVED
United Shoe Workers of America is a labor organization, affiliated
with the Committee for Industrial Organization. It admits to
membership all employees of the Company in the Milwaukee, Wis-
consin plant, except supervisory and clerical employees. The Boot
and Shoe Workers Union is a labor organization, affiliated with the
American Federation of Labor. It likewise admits to membership
222 NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
all employees of the Company in the Milwaukee, Wisconsin, plant,
except the supervisory and clerical employees.
III. THE APPROPRIATE UNIT
The question of the appropriate unit for collective bargaining is
the only contested issue in the case. The Company, the U. S. W.,
and the B. & S. W. U. agree that an election is necessary if collective
bargaining is to continue. Each union, however, advances a sep-
arate theory as to the more desirable and appropriate unit for the
purpose, the U. S. W. contending for a plant-wide unit, the B. &
S. W. U. urging that the eight production departments of the plant
be held to be distinct units and that bargaining representatives be
determined for each in separate elections.
The shoe manufacturing industry today is virtually without craft
unions, its labor organizations throughout the United States being
almost universally along vertical and plant-wide lines. This indus-
trial form of organization is not only recognized by the B. & S.
W. U., but is advocated and employed by that Union in other simi-
larly constituted Milwaukee shoe factories controlled by it.
In the very plant here involved, the plant-wide unit urged by the
U. S. W. as appropriate for the purposes of collective bargaining
is coterminous with the groups of employees admitted to member-
ship not only in the U. S. W. but in the B. & S. W. U. as well. Both
of these organizations admit to membership all employees of the
Company except supervisory and clerical or office employees.
Neither organization maintains any divisions in its ranks based upon
trade classifications or occupations in the Company's plant.:, Even
the B. & S. W. U. declares that it is prepared to bargain collec-
tively for all the production workers in the plant in the event that
such a unit shall be held appropriate and a subsequent election shall
reveal a majority of the workers therein to be desirous of represen-
tation by the B. & S. W. U.
Admitting these facts, the B. & S. W. U. inclines nevertheless
toward splitting the factory into eight departmental units consist-
ing of cutting, fitting, lasting, sole leather, bottoming, finishing,
wood heel, and packing. In support of its contention, the B: &
S. W. U. urges that the Company is the striking exception to the
general rule prevailing in the industry in that by an established
course of dealing between the employers and the eight separate
departments, the departmental subdivisions of the Milwaukee plant
have been recognized to be the appropriate units. The history of
1 Cf. Matter of Acklin Stamping Company and International Union, United Automobile
Workers of America, Local No. 12 , Case No. R-142, decided May 28, 1937 , 2 N. L R. B. 872
DECISIONS AND ORDERS 223
the course and nature of collective bargaining in the plant is there-
fore of major significance in this case.
Both unions entered. the plant at approximately the same time in
the latter part of 1933. Until recently, the U. S. W. was an inde-
pendent labor organization under the name of Shoe Workers Protec-
tive Association, herein called the S. W. P. A. At the outset, and
for several years thereafter, the B. & -S. W. U. and the S. W. P. A.
had a working understanding or procedure whereby the B. & S.
W. U. would represent the workers in those of the eight depart-
ments where the B. & S. W. U. was stronger, and the S. W. P. A.
would represent the workers in those departments where the S. W.
P. A. was stronger. The procedure or mechanics of representation
for collective bargaining consisted of the appointment of a committee
from each of the eight departments, each committee composed
entirely of members of the union -dominant in that department.
These ,committees would convene in a single body called the' Shop
Council to deal with the Company. The Shop Council in 1934 was
instrumental in concluding with the Company a contract which
terminated after six months. This contract applied to the entire
plant. It is significant that the bargaining for an agreement en-
compassing fundamental employment terms such as wages and hours,
affecting all the production workers in the plant, was always a matter
to be negotiated between the Company and the entire Shop Council
acting for the whole plant. Only minor matters relating to griev-
ances in particular departments were taken up between the Com-
pany and the respective committee for each department. It is also
significant that when inter-union differences threatened the continu-
ance of collective bargaining, the Company would appeal to the two
shop leaders of both unions to come to an understanding. From this
we infer that each shop leader could and did represent and bargain
for the group of departments dominated by his union. This account
does not indicate a practice of bargaining by departmental units.
Despite the Company's attempts to bring the unions to a new work-
ing arrangement, the question of representation has remained un-
settled for about two years and a complete break-down in the
mechanics of designation of representatives brought negotiations to a
halt by approximately the first of May 1937.
In addition to the history of collective bargaining in the plant
and industry, and the eligibility of all production workers to mem-
bership in each of the labor oragnizations involved here, other
circumstances are significant. The similarity among the production
departments with regard to skilled workers, wage rates, and other
conditions of employment, and the functional coherence of the vari-
ous departments, all compel us to take the view that the plant as a
224 NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
whole is an appropriate unit for the purposes of collective bargain-
ing. Workers of various skills are distributed in not greatly diver-
gent proportions throughout the eight departments. For example,
the 39 cutters, concededly among the departments with the highest
proportion of skilled workers, are approximately 40 per cent skilled,
40 per cent semi-skilled, and 20 per cent unskilled. The 234 fitters,
on the other hand, among the least skilled of the departments, are
approximately 30 per cent skilled, 30 per cent semi-skilled, and 40
per cent unskilled. Wage rates for a similar degree of skill are
uniform throughout the plant except as affected by a difference in sex,
and the piece work basis is employed wherever possible. No special
problems regarding conditions of employment requiring a separate
-bargaining unit have been demonstrated with regard to any depart-
ment.
Under all the circumstances, the Board feels that there is no
reason for departing from the practice of both the U. S. W. and
the B. & S. W. U. throughout the shoe industry.
Despite the apparent willingness of both unions to include the
clerical employees at the Company's Milwaukee plant in the event
of a direction of a plant-wide election, the absence of any solicitation
for their membership or bargaining on their behalf by either union
at any time, and the difference in their duties, manner of payment,
conditions of employment, and other interests, from the production
and maintenance employees, prompts us to exclude them from the
appropriate unit.
In view of all the afore-mentioned facts and in order to insure the
Company's employees the full benefit of their'right to self-organiza-
tion and to collective bargaining, and otherwise to effectuate the
policies of the Act, we find that all the employees of the Company at
its Milwaukee plant, except clerical and supervisory' employees,
constitute an appropriate unit for the purposes of collective bargain-
ing.
IV. QUESTION CONCERNING REPRESENTATION
The Company, the B. & S. W. U., and the U. S. W. unite in a
request for an election, representatives of all three having produced
mutually corroborative testimony indicating that the unsettled ques-
tion of representation is the cause of the cessation of collective bar-
gaining and of the continued inability of the Company to bargain
collectively with its employees. Both unions claim to represent more
than half of the entire body of its employees constituting the ap-
propriate unit for purposes of collective bargaining.
On the basis of these facts, and other facts stated in the opinion,
we find that a question has arisen concerning the representation of
the employees of the Company.
DECISIONS AND ORDERS 225
V. THE EFFECT OF THE QUESTION CONCERNING REPRESENTATION ON
COMMERCE
All parties agree that friction and unrest have resulted from the
unsettled question concerning representation and that industrial
strife will result in the event that this question remains longer un-
settled. We find that the question concerning representation which
has arisen, occurring in connection with the operations of the Com-
pany described in Section I above, has a close, intimate, and substan-
tial relation to trade, traffic, and commerce among the several States,
and has led and tends to lead to labor disputes burdening and ob-
structing commerce and the free flow of commerce.
VI. CONDUCT OF ELECTION
We further find that an election by secret ballot is necessary to
determine the proper representatives for collective bargaining and
thus to resolve the question concerning representation. Those eligible
to vote shall be all those who come within the classification stated
above, as of May 4, 1937, the date of the filing of the petition and
to which all parties consent. This shall include, in addition to those
appearing on the pay roll as of that date, all regular employees in
such classification who were then temporarily absent for illness or
other cause, and excluding all who have since quit or been discharged
for cause. •
CONCLUSIONS OF LAW
On the basis of the above findings of fact, the Board makes the
following conclusions of law :
1. A question affecting commerce has arisen concerning the repre-
sentation of the employees of the Milwaukee, Wisconsin, plant of
the Huth & James Shoe Mfg. Company, within the meaning of
Section 9 (c), and Section 2, subdivisions (6) and (7) of the
National Labor Relations Act.
2. All of the employees of the Milwaukee, Wisconsin, plant of
the Huth & James Shoe Mfg. Company, except clerical and super-
visory employees, constitute a unit appropriate for the purposes of
collective bargaining, within the meaning of Section 9 (b) of the
National Labor. Relations Act.
DIRECTION OF ELECTION
By, virtue of and pursuant to the power vested in the National
Labor Relations Board by Section 9 (c) of the National Labor
Relations Act, 49 Stat. 449, and pursuant to Article III, Section 8
of National Labor Relations Board Rules and Regulations-Series
1, as amended, it is hereby
226 NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
DIRECTED that, as part of the investigation authorized by the
Board to ascertain representatives for collective bargaining with the
Huth & James Shoe Mfg. Company, an election by secret ballot shall
be conducted within ten days from the date of this Direction, under
the direction and supervision of the Regional Director for the
Twelfth Region, acting in this matter as agent for the National
Labor Relations Board, and subject to Article III, Section 9 of said
Rules and Regulations-Series 1, as amended, among all the pro-
duction and other employees employed on May 4, 1937, by the Huth
& James Shoe Mfg. Company in its Milwaukee, Wisconsin, plant, ex-
cepting those engaged in clerical and supervisory capacities, to deter-
mine whether they desire to be represented by the Boot & Shoe
Workers Union or the United Shoe Workers of America, for the
purposes of collective bargaining.
MR. DONALD WAKEFIELD SMITH took no part in the consideration
of the above Decision and Direction of Election.
[SAME TITLE]
CERTIFICATION OF REPRESENTATIVES
August 06, 1937
On May 4, 1937, the United Shoe Workers of America, herein
called the U. S. W., affiliated with the Committee for Industrial
Organization, filed with the Regional Director for the Twelfth
Region (Milwaukee, Wisconsin) a petition alleging that a question
affecting commerce had arisen concerning the representation of the
employees of the Huth & James Shoe Mfg. Company, Milwaukee,
Wisconsin, herein called the Company. The petition requested an
investigation and certification of representatives pursuant to Section
9 (c) of the National Labor Relations Act, 49 Stat. 449, herein called
the Act.
Pursuant to notice duly served upon the Company, the U. S. W.,
and the Boot & Shoe Workers Union, herein called the B. & S. W. U.,
affiliated with the American Federation of Labor, which had been
named in the petition as also claiming to represent employees of
the Company, a hearing was held in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, on June
21, 1937, before Charles A. Wood, the Trial Examiner duly desig-
nated by the National Labor Relations Board, herein called the
Board. On August 3, 1937, the Board issued a Decision and Direc-
tion of Election. The Direction of Election provided that an elec-
tion by secret ballot be held among all the production and other
employees employed by the Company, except those engaged in cleri-
cal and supervisory capacities, to determine whether they wished to
be represented by the U. S. W. or the B. & S. W. U. for the purposes
of collective bargaining.
DECISIONS AND ORDERS 227
Pursuant to the Direction, balloting was conducted on August 13,
1937. Full opportunity was accorded to all the parties to this investi-
gation to participate in the conduct of the secret ballot and to make
challenges.
On August 14, 1937, the Regional Director certified that a count
of the ballots cast showed :
Total number eligible------------------------------------- 362
Total ballots cast----- ------------------------------------ 360
Total number of blank ballots ------------------------------- 1
Total number of void ballots------------------------------ 0
Total number of ballots cast for United Shoe Workers of
America (C. I. O.)-------------------------------------- 211
Total number of ballots cast for Boot & Shoe Workers Union
(A. F. of L.) -------------------------------------------- 148
There was only one vote which was protested and the Regional
Director arrived at an understanding with the U. S. W. and the
B. & S. W. U. that this vote would not be considered unless the
results of the balloting were such as to make this vote decisive. In-
asmuch as the U. S. W. received a majority by more than one, it was
not necessary to tabulate this vote.
The agent of the Board who conducted the ballot caused to be
served upon the parties to the proceeding his Intermediate Report
on the conduct of the ballot. No objection with respect to the con-
duct of the ballot was filed to the Intermediate Report, and the
Regional Director forwarded the Intermediate Report tc the Board
in Washington, D. C.
Now THEREFORE by virtue of and pursuant to the power vested in
the National Labor Relations Board by Section 9 (c) of the National
Labor Relations Act and pursuant to Article III, Section 8 of the
National Labor Relations Board Rules and Regulations-Series 1,
as amended,
IT IS HEREBY CERTIFIED that United Shoe Workers of America has
been selected by a majority of the production and other employees
employed by the Huth & James Shoe Mfg. Company in its Milwau-
kee, Wisconsin, plant, excepting those engaged in clerical and super-
visory capacities, as their representative for the purposes of col-
lective bargaining, and that pursuant to Section 9 (a) of the
National Labor Relations Act, United Shoe Workers of America, is
the exclusive representative of the production and other employees
employed by the Huth & James Shoe Mfg. Company in its Mil-
waukee , Wisconsin, plant, for the purposes of collective bargaining
in regard to rates of pay, wages, hours of employment, and other
conditions of employment.
MR. DONALD WAKEFIELD SMITH took no part in the consideration
of the above Certification of Representatives.