J. I. Case Co.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Feb 15, 1949

81 N.L.R.B. 651 (N.L.R.B. 1949)

In the Matter of J. I. CASE COMPANY , EMPLOYER and PATTERN MAKERS
ASSOCIATION OF THE QUAD CITIES, PATrEEN MAKERS LEAGLrE OF
N. A., A. F. OF L., PETITIONER
Case No. 18-RC-300.-Decided February 15,1949
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.
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-man panel consisting of the undersigned Board
Members.*
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 involved herein claim to represent
employees 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 Petitioner seeks a unit of all pattern makers and pattern
makers' apprentices excluding all other employees. Neither the
Employer nor the Intervenor takes any position with respect to the
appropriateness of the unit, except that the Employer urges the Board
to exclude the apprentices should a unit of pattern makers be found
to be appropriate.
The Employer, a Wisconsin corporation with its principal office
and place of business at Racine, Wisconsin, maintains at Bettendorf,
Iowa, a plant for the manufacture of farm implements, which plant
was acquired in early 1947 and is the only plant involved in this pro-
ceeding. There is no history of collective bargaining with respect
to the employees herein concerned.
*Reynolds, Murdock, and Gray.
1 United Automobile, Aircraft and Agricultural Implement Workers of America. CIO
intervened in this proceeding. United Farm Equipment and Metal Workers of America
appeared at the hearing but did not intervene or participate formally in the proceedings.
81 N. L. R. B., No. 118. 651
652 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
There are approximately 2,500 production and maintenance em-
ployees employed at the Bettendorf plant, including 12 pattern mak-
ers and 2 apprentices in Department 281 of such plant.' The func-
tions and duties of the pattern makers and their apprentices are de-
voted entirely to the making of new patterns, and the maintenance,
repair, and alterations of existing patterns. They constitute a typical
highly skilled and apprenticeable craft group,3 who have been estab-
lished in separate units for collective bargaining purposes in other
plants of the Employer.* We believe in accordance with well-
established Board practice that the pattern makers and their appren-
tices herein may, if they so desire, constitute a separate appropriate
unit for collective bargaining purposes .5 However, the Board will
make no final unit determination until it has ascertained the desires of
the employees involved.
We shall direct an election among all the pattern makers and pattern
makers' apprentices, employed in Department 281 of the Employer's
plant at Bettendorf, Iowa, excluding all other employees and super-
visors as defined in the Act. If a majority of these employees voting
select the Petitioner 6 as their bargaining representative, they will be
taken to have indicated their desire to constitute a separate unit for
the purposes of collective bargaining.
DIRECTION OF ELECTION 7
As part of the investigation to ascertain representatives for pur-
poses of collective bargaining with the Employer an election by secret
2 Ineluded in Department 281 are 1 laborer , 2 carpenters , and 1 pattern vault man, whom
the Petitioner woald exclude from the unit. The work of this group, except for the
laborer who does janitorial work, is more closely associated with the work of the foundry
than that of the pattern shop.
2 The apprentices are indentured to the Employer under an indenture which provifes for
an apprenticeship period of 3 or 4 years at specified rates of pay with automatic progression
within the wage scale. The system appears to be State approved or supervised
4 See Matter of J. I . Case Company, 80 N. L . R. B. 217 ; 24 N. L . R. B. 600; and Case
No. 13 M-R-12 (unpublished Decision and Direction of Election issued June 23 , 1948.)
See footnote 4 supra.
6 The Petitioner herein had failed to receive notice, in time to intervene as a party,
of an earlier representation proceeding, initiated by a petition of the International Asso-
ciation of Machinists, filed May 14, 1948. The earlier proceeding involved all production
and maintenance employees , including the group of pattern makers and pattern maker
apprentices sought herein. ( See Matter of J. I . Case Company , 79 N. L . R. B. 1070.1
The Petitioner 's subsequent request to be placed on the ballot was denied . The election
in that case was inconclusive as to the residual production and maintenance unit and a
run-off election was scheduled . Prior to the holding of Me run -off election , the Petitioner
filed its present petition . The Board , having been put on notice of the foregoing facts,
directed the Regional Director, by order dated December 1, 1948, to challenge, segregate,
and impound the ballots of the pattern makers and pattern makers ' apprentices to be cast
in the run -off election and to conduct a hearing on the present petition as soon as possible.
7 We shall omit the name of the Intervenor from the ballot inasmuch as the Intervenor
indicated at the hearing that it did not desire to have its name on the ballot should the
Board find that pattern makers might constitute a unit appropriate for purposes of collec-
tive bargaining.
J. I. CASE COMPANY 653
ballot shall be conducted as early as possible but not later than 30 days
from the date of this Direction, under the direction and supervision
of the Regional Director for the Eighteenth Region, 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
voting group described 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
temporarily laid off, but excluding those employees who have since
quit or been discharged for cause and have not been rehired or rein-
stated prior to the date of the election, and also excluding employees
on strike who are not entitled to reinstatement , to determine whether
or not they desire to be represented , for the purposes of collective
bargaining, by Pattern Makers Association of the Quad Cities, Pat-
tern Makers League of N. A., A. F. of L.