Inman Mills

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Apr 5, 1949

82 N.L.R.B. 735 (N.L.R.B. 1949)

In the Matter Of INMAN MILLS, EMPLOYER and UNITED TEXTILE
WORKERS OF AMERICA , A. F. or L., PETITIONER
Case No. 10-RC-423.-Decided April 6, 1949
DECISION
AND
DIRECTION OF ELECTION
Upon a petition duly filed, a hearing was held before a hearing
officer of the National Labor Relations Board. The hearing officer's
rulings made at the hearing are free from prejudicial error and are
hereby affirmed.,
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 named below claim to represent certain
employees of the Employer.
3. A question affecting commerce exists concerning the repre-
sentation of certain 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 the manufacture of textiles at
its plant in Inman, South Carolina, with approximately 850 employees.
The parties agree that all production and maintenance employees at the
Employer's Inman plant, including canteen and refreshment wagon
employees, maids and janitors, and spare hands, but excluding time-
study men, professional employees, policemen, watchmen, and guards,
the supply room head, overseers, second hands, and all other super-
visors, constitute an appropriate unit. The parties are in dispute re-
specting the unit placement of plant clerical employees, the chief elec-
trician, and section men and fixers.
3 The Employer and the Petitioner except to the hearing officer 's ruling granting the
motion of Textile Workers Union of America , CIO (herein called the Intervenor ), to inter-
vene in this proceeding. The Employer contends that the Intervenor is barred because its
Local 731, which admits to membership employees of the Employer and signed the contract
on which the intervention was based , was not in current compliance with the filing require-
ments of the Act. As Local 731 was then in the process of compliance and has since
achieve full compliance , we find no merit in this contention and we overrule the exceptions.
82 N. L. R. B., No. 85.
735
736 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
(a) Plant clerical employees: The Employer and the Petitioner
would include plant clerical employees; the Intervenor would exclude
them.'
Clerical employees in the plant have not been included in past bar-
gaining contracts. In an earlier representation proceeding involving
the instant parties, disagreement arose respecting the unit placement of
plant clerical employees. On the basis of past bargaining history
which excluded "clerical workers," the Board excluded specifically
"all clerical employees working in the mill departments." 3 In the
decision in this case the Board said :
This finding, however, will not preclude a later determination,
based upon a new petition and a sufficient showing of representa-
tion, that these employees may be offered an opportunity to vote
as to their inclusion in the larger unit herein found appropriate.
On the basis of the past bargaining history and the lack of present
showing of representation among them, we will exclude the plant
clerical employees from the bargaining unit of production and main-
tenance employees herein found appropriate.
(b) The chief electrician: The Intervenor would include, and the
Employer and the Petitioner would exclude, the chief electrician.
The chief electrician is a maintenance electrician, who is responsible
for the electrical work at the plant. He is under the general supervi-
sion of the master mechanic. He works alone for the most part. Two
machine shop employees, one of whom is an electrical apprentice,
occasionally assist him. These helpers are assigned to the chief electri-
cian when he requests help. The record does not disclose that the chief
electrician has any authority to effect or to recommend changes in
status. The record does not disclose that he was excluded from the
prior contract. We shall include him in the unit.4
{c) Section men and fixers: The Employer would include, and the
Petitioner and the Intervenor would exclude, section men and fixers
as supervisors.5
The Employer's Inman plant contains five production departments,
as follows : spinning and spooling, weaving, carding, cloth room, and
machine shop. The plant operates 24 hours per day on three shifts
and, with the exception of the spinning and spooling department, each
department is organized pursuant to the following chain of supervi-
sion : overseers, second hands, and section men or fixers. There is no
The Petitioner' s position respecting plant clericals is clarified in its brief.
Matter of Inman Mills, 63 N. L. R. B. 198, 204.
4 Matter of Fitzgerald Mills Corporation , 77 N. L. R. B. 198.
5 The parties agree that section men and fixers are of the same rank and status.
INMAN MILLS 737
second hand in the spinning room of the spinning and spooling de-
partment. Overseers, of whom there is one to each department, are
on active duty only during the first shift. They are directly under
the plant superintendent and are generally responsible for the pro-
duction of their respective departments, whether or not they happen
to be on duty. Second hands are in charge of each department dur-
ing the second and third shifts and whenever the overseer is otherwise
absent. One second hand works in each room of a department, and
it is his duty to supervise the work of the employees in that room.. Sec-
tion men are in charge of areas within the department rooms and are
responsible for the production within their sections. Overseers and
second hands, who the parties agree are supervisors, are salaried em-
ployees; section men are hourly paid employees.
The relative number of overseers, second hands, section mein or fixers,
and production employees in a department at the Inman plant is
illustrated by the situation in the weaving department. This depart-
ment is managed by 1 overseer. There are 2 weave rooms, each of
which is in the charge of a second hand. There are 100 employees per
shift in this department, and each second hand supervises approxi-
mately 50 employees. There are 12 section men per shift, each of
whom is responsible for the correct operation of 96 looms. Each of
these section men has from 3 to 8 employees within his area of super-
vision; section men in other departments may have from 10 to 20.
Section men are responsible for maintaining the proper quantity and
quality of production on the machines they supervise. They spend
from 25 to 65 percent of their time in performing mechanical work.
In the spinning and spooling department, these operations include
checking on high bobbins, improper threads, and other technical de-
tails of loom operation in order to keep the production of seconds, or
defective cloth, at a minimum. Section men receive a wage differen-
tial of from 25 to 30 cents an hour more than the other employees in
their section. Although the Employer's plant superintendent testi-
fied that they have authority effectively to recommend hiring, promo-
tion, discipline, and discharge of employees, there is no evidence that
they ever exercised this authority, or are expected to do so. The
record contains only one specific instance where a section man reported
an unsatisfactory employee to his overseer; in that case the section
man made no recommendation whatever, and the overseer acted upon
his independent judgment. Section men, on the other hand, testified
to the effect that they are primarily responsible for the operation of
their machines and that they are expected to report, without recom-
mendation, inefficient employees as a part of that responsibility.
738 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
It is our opinion that the main function of all the section men and
fixers is to maintain the efficient operation of the production machines.
The task of directing and assisting employees is primarily that of the
second hands. Section men receive a substantial pay differential, but
this is no more than the differential received by the chief electrician,
as to whose lack of supervisory status there can be little doubt. Sec-
tion men were deemed included under the prior contract for produc-
tion employees. Upon the basis of the entire record, we find that
section, men and fixers, excepting section men in the spinning room, are
not supervisors, and we shall therefore include them in the units
With regard to the section men of the spinning room, the record
shows that there are no second hands employed in this room and that
section men work directly under the overseer and are in charge of
that room during the substantive operating periods when the over-
seer is absent. The parties agree that they are supervisors, and we so
find. We shall therefore exclude them from the unit.
We find that all production and maintenance employees at the Em-
ployer's Inman, South Carolina, plant, including section men and
fixers, the chief electrician, canteen and refreshment wagon employees,
maids and janitors, and spare hands, but excluding plant clerical
employees, time-study men, professional employees, policemen, watch
men, and guards, the supply room head, overseers, second hands, sec-
tion men in the spinning room, and other supervisors, constitute a unit
appropriate for the purposes of collective bargaining, within the
meaning of Section 9 (b) of the Act.
DIRECTION OF ELECTION 7
As part of the investigation to ascertain representatives for the
purposes of collective bargaining with the Employer, an election by
secret ballot shall be conducted as early as possible, but not later than
30 days from the date of this Direction, under the direction and super-
vision of the Regional Director for the Region in which this case was
heard, and subject to Sections 203.61 and 203.62 of National Labor
Relations Board Rules and Regulations-Series 5, as amended, among
the employees in the unit found appropriate in paragraph numbered
4, above, who were employed during the pay-roll period immediately
preceding the date of this Direction of Election, including employees
who did not work during said pay-roll period because they were ill
or on vacation or temporily laid off, but excluding those employees
Of. Matter of Opelika Textile M7ll8 , Inc., 81 N. L . R B. 594
7 Amy participant in the election directed herein may , upon its prompt request to, and
.approval thereof by, the Regional Director , have its name removed from the ballot.
INMAN MILLS 739
who have since quit or been discharged for cause and have not been
rehired or reinstated prior to the date of the election, and also exclud-
ing employees on strike who are not entitled to reinstatement, to deter-
mine whether they desire to be represented, for purposes of collective
bargaining, by United Textile Workers of America, A. F. of L., or by
Textile Workers Union of America, CIO, or by neither.
MEMBERS REYNOLDS and MURDOCK took no part in the consideration
of the above Decision and Direction of Election.