J. B. Cook Auto Machine Co., Inc.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Apr 8, 1947

73 N.L.R.B. 249 (N.L.R.B. 1947)

In the Matter of J. B. COOK AUTO MACHINE COMPANY, INC., EMPLOYER
and INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF MACHINISTS, PETITIONER
Case No. 10-R4177.-Decided April 8,1947
Messrs. Ben West and H. Y. Crockett, both of Nashville, Tenn., for
the Employer.
Mr. Paul Chipman, of Atlanta, Ga., for the Petitioner.
Mr. Lewis H. Ulman, of counsel to the Board.
DECISION
AND
CERTIFICATION OF REPRESENTATIVES
Upon a petition duly filed, the National Labor Relations Board, on
October 28, 1946, conducted a prehearing election, pursuant to Section
203.49 of the Board's Rules and Regulations, among the employees in
the alleged appropriate unit, to determine whether or not they desired
to be represented by the Petitioner for the purposes of collective bar-
gaining.
At the close of the election, a Tally of Ballots was furnished the
parties. The Tally shows that, of approximately 62 eligible voters,
59 cast ballots of which 24 were for the Petitioner and 7 against.
Twenty-eight ballots were challenged.
Thereafter, pursuant to Section 203.55, of the Board's Rules and
Regulations, a hearing was held at Nashville, Tennessee, on November
10 and 11, 1946, before Thomas T. Purdom, hearing officer. The hear-
ing officer's rulings made at the hearing are free from prejudicial error
and are hereby affirmed.
Upon the entire record in the case, the National Labor Relations
Board makes the following:
FINDINGS OF FACT
1. THE BUSINESS OF THE EMPLOYER
J. B. Cook Auto Machine Company, Inc., a Tennessee corporation,
has its principal office and place of business at Nashville, Tennessee.
It is engaged in selling and distributing new automobile parts and
rebuilding, assembling and repairing automobile parts and gasoline
and Diesel engines.
73 N. L R . B., No. 47. 249
250 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
During the year ending October 31, 1946, the Employer purchased
for its Nashville plant approximately $5,000 worth of raw materials
and approximately $500,000 worth of automobile parts; 75 percent
of the raw materials and 90 percent of the parts represented ship-
ments from sources outside the State of Tennessee. During the same
period the Employer's repair and rebuilding operations were valued
at approximately $60,000, and it sold automobile parts, valued at
approximately $800,000. Ten percent of its total sales of parts and
services represented shipments to points outside the State.
The Employer admits and we find that it is engaged in commerce
within the meaning of the National Labor Relations Act.
H. THE ORGANIZATION INVOLVED
The Petitioner is an unaffiliated labor organization, claiming to
represent employees of the Employer.
III. THE QUESTION CONCERNING REPRESENTATION
The Employer refuses to recognize the Petitioner as the exclusive
bargaining representative of employees of the Employer until the
Petitioner has been certified by the Board in an appropriate unit.
We find that a question affecting commerce has arisen concerning
the representation of employees of the Employer, within the meaning
of Section 9 (c) and Section 2 (6) and (7) of the Act.
IV. THE APPROPRIATE UNIT
The Petitioner seeks a bargaining unit confined to employees at
the Employer's Nashville plant who are engaged in the repair and
rebuilding of automotive parts, motors, and engines. The Employer
contends that the only appropriate unit is one which includes all em-
ployees at its Nashville plant, excluding executives and clerical em-
ployees.
The Nashville plant includes the following plant departments :
counter sales, stock and receiving, shipping, outside sales, electrical
or unit rebuilding, machine shop, and spring leaf. The unit sought
by the Petitioner is confined to non-supervisory employees in three
shop departments, known as the electrical or unit rebuilding depart-
ment, the machine shop, and the spring leaf department.
The work of the 3 shop departments, wherein all the Employer's
major repair and rebuilding operations are performed, is confined
to rebuilding worn or damaged automotive parts and disassembling,
repairing, and rebuilding complete gasoline and Diesel motors. The
electrical or unit rebuilding department, consisting of approximately
12 employees under the supervision of a department head, repairs and
J. B. COOK AUTO MACHINE COMPANY, INC. 251
rebuilds generators, starters, fuel pumps, clutches, and other small
automotive parts. The spring leaf department, consisting of 2 em-
ployees, repairs and retempers the leaves of damaged automotive
springs. The machine shop, consisting of approximately 20 employ-
ees under the supervision of a department head, is engaged primarily
in repairing and rebuilding complete automotive engines.
The Employer would include, and the Petitioner would exclude,
from the proposed unit, the employees of the outside sales department,
the counter sales department, the stock and receiving department,
and the shipping department. As their names imply, these depart-
ments are devoted principally to the Employer's outside and over-the-
counter sales, and its receiving, stocking, and shipping operations.
At the hearing the Employer adduced evidence which shows that
most of the employees of the departments which the Petitioner would
exclude have had some training in the repair of automotive parts;
that many of them spend some of their time on minor repair work;
and that some of them have the qualifications of skilled mechanics.
On the other hand, the record shows that the employees in the depart-
ments sought by the Petitioner work in shops which are physically
separated from the other departments and that, while a few of the em-
ployees whom the Petitioner would exclude are capable of performing
major repairs in the shops, and have done so in emergencies, this is not
a part of their regular work The repairs that are made normally by
the employees whom the Petitioner would exclude are minor in nature,
require no particular skill to perform, and consume a very small part
of the employees' working time. Transfers into and out of the shop
departments are not made without the consent of the employee in-
volved, and they are generally permanent transfers.
In similar situations, the Board has held that employees such as
those sought by the Petitioner comprise a sufficiently skilled, identifi-
able, and homogeneous group to constitute either a separate bargain-
ing unit or a part of a more comprehensive one.' In the instant pro-
ceeding no labor organization claims to represent the employees in the
larger unit claimed to be appropriate by the Employer. Accordingly,
we conclude that the unit sought by the Petitioner is appropriate at
this time.
The Employer and the Petitioner disagree with respect to the unit
placement of the following employees : the toolroom boy, the parts
washers, the carpenter, the warehouse keeper, the head of the machine
shop, and the head of the electrical or unit rebuilding department.
The Employer would exclude and the Petitioner would include the
toolroom boy and the parts washers. The Employer contends that
these employees, as unskilled workers, are not properly a part of the
' See Matter or Allison Steel Manufacturing Company, 61 N. L R B 221.
252 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
unit of skilled workers sought by the Petitioner. We cannot agree.
The toolroom boy and the parts washers work within the shop depart-
ments and, while they are not skilled employees, their work in storing
and issuing the necessary tools and cleaning parts and motors for the
mechanics and machinists is an integral part of the Employer's repair
and rebuilding operations. Accordingly, we shall include the tool-
room boy and the parts washers in the unit.2
The Employer would exclude and the Petitioner would include the
carpenter and the warehouse keeper. The carpenter is engaged in gen-
eral carpentry work throughout the plant. The warehouse keeper op-
erates a warehouse located in a separate building behind the plant.
His principal duty consists of storing excess parts that are not needed
in the main stock room. While he occasionally disassembles carbure-
tors and complete motors in order to salvage their usable parts, such
employment occupies no more than 1 hour of his time each day. Since
the principal duties of the carpenter and the warehouse keeper are
not directly connected with the Employer's repair and rebuilding op-
erations, we shall exclude them from the unit.
The final controversy with respect to the composition of the unit
concerns the head of the electrical or unit rebuilding department, and
the head of the machine ship. The Employer would include them in
the unit; the Petitioner would exclude them as supervisory employees.
The Employer's manager testified at the hearing that neither of
these department heads had authority to hire or discharge, but he
admitted that they both could make recommendations affecting the
status of their fellow employees. Other testimony given at the hearing
-discloses that they both spend the majority of their time supervising
the work of the employees within their departments, that they are
both paid a salary while the other employees in their departments are
paid, on an hourly basis, and that their. compensation, yearly bonus,
and vacation privileges are greater than those of other employees
within their departments. Inasmuch as the department heads in dis-
pute have most of the attributes of supervisory employees within our
.usual definition of that term, we shall exclude them from the unit.
We find that all employees of the Employer's electrical or unit re-
building department, spring leaf department, and machine shop
including the toolroom boy and parts washers, but excluding the
carpenters, the warehouse keeper, the head of the electrical or unit
rebuilding department, head of the machine shop, and all other super-
visory employees with authority to hire, promote, discharge, discipline,
,or otherwise effect changes in the status of employees, or effectively
recommend such action, constitute a unit appropriate for the purposes
,of collective bargaining within the meaning of Section 9 (b) of the Act.
3 See Matter of N. I. du Pont de Nemours & Company, Indiana Ordnance Works, 59
X L. R B 952, and cases cited therein.
J. B. COOK AUTO MACHINE COMPANY, INC.
V. THE DETERMINATION OF REPRESENTATIVES
253
1. The challenged ballots
As noted above, 59 ballots were cast in the election, of which 24
were for the Petitioner, 7 were against, and 28 were challenged. Of
the challenged ballots, 26 were cast by voters employed in departments
not included in the bargaining unit.3 The other 2 challenged ballots
were cast by the head of the electrical or unit rebuilding department
and the head of the machine shop," both of whom we have expressly
excluded from the appropriate unit. Since none of the 28 challenged
voters fall within the unit found to be appropriate in Section IV,
above, they are ineligible voters in the election. The challenges to
their ballots are therefore sustained, and their ballots will not be
counted.
2. Unchallenged ineligible voters
Consistent with their positions on the unit at the time of the pre-
hearing election, neither the Petitioner nor the Employer challenged
the Employer's carpenter, Eddie Williams, or its warehouse keeper,
Robert J. Watson. We have previously excluded these employees
from the bargaining unit and accordingly they were not eligible to
vote in the election. In addition to Williams and Watson, the record
reveals that employees J. D. Work and R. N. Worley also voted with-
out challenge. Work was employed in the machine shop on the eli-
gibility date, but was an outside salesman at the time of the election.
Worley was working in the machine shop when the election was held,
but was employed outside the unit on the eligibilty date. Under the
Board's Rules neither Work nor Worley was eligible to vote in the
election .5
It is apparent that, since all of the unchallenged votes were counted,
the results of the election reflect the votes of 4 ineligible voters. How-
ever, it is equally clear that these 4 ballots were not controlling in
establishing the Petitioner's majority, since the Tally of Ballots shows
that 24 of the 31 unchallenged ballots were cast for the Petitioner and
only 7 against it.
I Counter sales department • Frank Luna, R. N. Dorsett, A L Elrod, Harold Johnston,
Richard Mosier, Gordon AI Rush, M B Sanders, Ernest Williams, Jeff Garner, way no E
Murdock, outside sales department : W E Moseley, P J. Carter, A D Lancaster, M. A
Lewis, James Yokley, E N Harris. Stock and receii vag department* J M Smith, Ii Al
Anderson, Truman Draper, Edwin Felts, A. H Overstreet, Maxie D. Trisdale, Shipping
department • W. 0 Hughes, Locher Bibb, Roy A Davis, J. W Harmon
The Employer contends that the vote of employee Edwin Felts should be counted
because he was employed as a machinist in the electrical or unit rebuilding department on
September 14, 1946, the pay-roll date that was used to determine voting eligibility We
cannot agree with this contention Under the Board' s rules , an employee who was enr
ployed within the voting unit on the eligibility date is ineligible to vote unless lie is also
employed in that unit at the time of the election Felts was employed within the unit on
the eligibility date ; however, prior to the day of the election, he was transferred to the job
of stock clerk in the stock and receiving depai tment and was thus ineligible to vote
° George Wiesman and W M Justice.
5 See footnote 3, supra.
254 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
Since the results of the prehearing election show that a majority
of the eligible employees voting have selected the Petitioner as bar-
gaining representative and since the counted ballots of the ineligible
voters could not be determinative of the election, we shall certify the
Petitioner as the collective bargaining representative of all employees
in the appropriate unit.
0
CERTIFICATION OF REPRESENTATIVES
IT IS HEREBY CERTIFIED that International Association of Machinists
has been designated and selected by a majority of all employees of
the electrical or unit rebuilding department, spring leaf department,
and machine shop of J. B. Cook Auto Machine Company, Inc., Nash-
ville, Tennessee, including the toolroom boy and parts washers, but
excluding the carpenter, the warehouse keeper, the head of the elec-
trical or unit rebuilding department, the head of the machine shop,
and all other supervisory employees with authority to hire, promote,
discharge, discipline, or otherwise effect changes in the status of em-
ployees, or effectively recommend such action, as their representative
for the purposes of collective bargaining and that, pursuant to Section
9 (a) of the Act, the said organization is the exclusive representative
of all such employees for the purposes of collective bargaining with
respect to rates of pay, wages, hours of employment, and other con-
ditions of employment.
CHAIRMAN HERZOG took no part in the consideration of the above
Decision and Certification of Representatives.