Radio Corp. of America

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Apr 21, 1950

89 N.L.R.B. 699 (N.L.R.B. 1950)

In the Matter of RADIO CORPORATION OF AMERICA (VICTOR DIVISION),
EMPLOYER and INTERNATIONAL UNION OF ELECTRICAL RADIO AND
MACHINE WORKERS, CIO, PETITIONER
In the Matter of RADIO CORPORATION OF AMERICA (VICTOR DIVISION),
EMPLOYER and INTERNATIONAL UNION OF ELECTRICAL RADIO AND
MACHINE WORKERS, CIO, PETITIONER
Cases Nos. 5-RC-46.1 and 5-RC-5415.-Decided April 21, 1950
DECISION
AND
DIRECTION OF ELECTIONS
Upon separate petitions duly filed, separate hearings in these con-
solidated cases were held at Camden, New Jersey, and Pulaski, Vir-
ginia, before Ramey Donovan, hearing officer. The hearing officer's
ruling made at the hearing 1 are free from prejudicial error and hereby
affirmed. The UE's motions to dismiss are denied for reasons here-
inafter stated. The UE's motion to examine any report or analysis
of the record prepared by the hearing officer is denied for the reason
that such report is not a part of the record and for the further reason
that it is an administrative document not properly subject to in-
spection by the parties.2
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-member panel [Members Reynolds, 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 National Labor Relations Act.
I United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America, and Its Locals, 103 and 163
herein called the UE, were permitted to intervene on the basis of a contractual interest.
International Brotherhood of Teamsters , Chauffeurs , Warehousemen and Helpers of
America, AFL, Local 676, herein called the Teamsters , and Federation of Architects, Engi-
neers, Chemists , and Technicians of United Office and Professional Workers of America,
herein called the Federation, also were . permitted to intervene on the basis of a contractual
Interest , although they did not participate in the hearing.
2 West Texas Utilities Company, Inc., 88 NLRB 192.
89 NLRB No. 107.
699
700 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
2. The labor organizations involved claim to represent employees
of the Employer.
3. The Employer and the UE have been parties to national collec-
tive bargaining agreements for a number of years. Their most recent
agreement, dated July 0, 1948, is to continue until June 1, 1950, and
from year to year thereafter unless notice in writing shall be given
to either party of its termination 60 days prior to the end of the current
term. The national agreement has been supplemented insofar as it
affects the Employer's Camden, New Jersey, and Pulaski, Virginia,
plants. During the term of the agreement and pursuant to a wage
reopening clause, the UE on May 9, 1949, gave the Employer notice
of its desire to open negotiations with regard to wages and such
negotiations were thereafter held. An agreement entitled, "Wage
Reopening Settlement Agreement," dated October 14, 1949, extends
the term of the prevailing contract from June 1, 1950, to June 1, 1951.
The "Wage Reopening Settlement Agreement," in addition to wage
provisions, substantially varies other terms and conditions of the
national agreement. The record indicates that the settlement agree-
ment is to be assimilated into the national agreement and is subject
to ratification of the UE Local membership. As of the date of the
hearing herein, the UE was still considering the language of the
settlement agreement to determine whether such settlement agreement
reflected the understanding of the parties. It is this settlement agree-.
ment which the UE contends is a bar to this proceeding. We find no
merit in this contention. We have previously held that an agree-
ment which requires ratification as a condition precedent before it
becomes effective is not a bar to a petition which is filed before the
ratification occurs .3 As no ratification had occurred prior to the fil-
ing of the petitions herein ,4 we find that the Wage Reopening Settle-
ment Agreement is not a bar to this proceeding. Nor is the 1948
contract a bar since the timely filing of the amended petitions herein
precludes the automatic renewal thereof, and such contract will ex-.
pire on June 1, 1950.
Questions affecting commerce exist 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.-'
8 Pocono Apparel Mfg. Co., 73 NLRB 884; Roddis Plywood & Door Company, Inc., 84
NLRB 309; International Harvester Company , Melrose Park Plant, 87 NLRB 1101.
The amended petitions herein were filed on December 28, 1949.
8 The UE's contention that the Petitioner 's showing of interest is invalid and fraudulent,
is rejected for the reason that the Petitioner 's prima facie showing of interest is a matter
for administrative determination , not subject to litigation at the hearing. Rudolph Wur-
litzer Company, 88 NLRB 1403.
RADIO CORPORATION OF AMERICA 701
4: The following employees of the Employer constitute separate
units appropriate,for the purposes of collective bargaining within the
meaning of Section 9 (b) of the Act :
(a) All production and maintenance employees employed at the
Employer's Camden, New Jersey, plant, including the model making
shops and Section 75, production control clerk expediters in job classifi-
cation Nos. 132 and 135, leadmen, and watchmen,s but excluding
guards,' all office and clerical employees wherever located, all technical
and professional employees, time-study engineers, salaried employees,"
truck drivers, truck drivers' helpers, automobile mechanics, automobile
mechanics' helpers, and supervisors as defined in the Act; and
(b) all production and maintenance employees at the Employer's
Pulaski, Virginia, plant, including hourly paid production checkers
(leadmen), but excluding all office and.clerical employees, watchmen,
working group leaders, and supervisors as defined in the Act.
5. The UE contends that the Petitioner and its Local 163, may not
use the same numerical designation heretofore used by the UE Local.
In support of its contention, the UE maintains that the Board has no
jurisdiction to permit the Petitioner and its local to use the same local
number, for the reason that there is presently outstanding a restraining
order issued by a United States district court, which inter alia, enjoins
the Petitioner's Local 163 from using that numerical designation. The
UE further contends that even if the Board has jurisdiction for this
purpose, it should not permit the Petitioner's Local to be so designated
on the ballot because the use of identical numbers for the locals of the
Petitioner and the UE, respectively, would be confusing to the voters.
We find no merit in these contentions.
Congress, by the enactment of the National Labor Relations Act,
conferred upon the Board the exclusive jurisdiction to determine all
matters involved in resolving representation questions affecting em-
Watchmen mainly perform the duties of protecting the plant against fires or other
incendiary hazards.
. 7 Although the parties would include guards in the unit, we shall exclude them as they
clearly perform duties aimed at enforcing against employees and other persons rules to
protect property of the Employer, and are therefore guards within the meaning of the Act.
Patt d Letchworth Co. Inc., 89 NLRB 124.
8 Although the mode of payment is not a determinative factor with respect to the inclu-
sion of employees in, or their exclusion from, an over-all production and maintenance unit,.
since all the parties agree that the salaried employees are neither production nor mainte
nance employees, salaried employees are therefore excluded from the unit.
702 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
ployees subject to the Act.9 This exclusive power over representation
questions necessarily carries with it the exclusive power to decide
whether a particular name, used to designate a union on the ballot in
an election conducted by the Board under the Act, confuses, or would
tend to confuse, the employees in their free choice of a bargaining
.representative.10 In the present case we hold, as we have held in
similar cases," that the use of the Petitioner's name in conjunction
with the names of its locals on the ballot will not, in our opinion,
confuse the voters in the elections hereinafter directed or tend to pre-
vent the free choice of bargaining representative. Accordingly, we
shall permit the Petitioner's locals to be designated on the ballot by the
same local numbers as those used by the UE.
DIRECTION OF ELECTIONS 12
As part of the investigation to ascertain representatives for the pur-
poses of collective bargaining with the Employer, separate elections by
secret ballot shall be conducted as early as possible at the. Employer's
Camden, New Jersey, and Pulaski, Virginia, plants, 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, among the employees in the
units found appropriate in paragraph numbered 4, above, who were
employed during the payroll period immediately preceding the date of
this Direction, 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 reinstated prior to the date of
the elections, and also excluding employees on strike who are not
entitled to reinstatement, to determine :
0 Sections 1, 7, and 9 of the Act ; See Rice v. Santa Fe Elevator Corp., 331 U. S. 218, 236;
Bethlehem Steel Co. v. New York State Labor Relations Board, 330 U. S. 767. In the recent
case of International Union of Operating Engineers , AFL, Local No. 148 V. International
Unlpn of Operating Engineers, AFL, Local No. 8, et at., 173 F. 2d 557, the Court of Appeals
for the Eighth Circuit held that a district court is without power or authority to interfere
in any way with a representation proceeding being conducted by the Board.
. 10 Paragon Die Casting Co., 57 NLRB 1; Certain-Teed Products Corporation , 49 NLRB
360; Walgreen Company, 44 NLRB 1200; Allis-Chalmers Manufacturing Co., La Crosse
Works, 62 NLRB 995 . As the Supreme Court has pointed out , "The Board directs what
names go on the ballot ." May Department Stores v. N . L. R. B., 326 U. S : 376, 381.
11 General Motors Corporation, et at., 88 NLRB 450; The Riverside Metal Company,
88 NLRB 973 ; Minneapolis -Moline Company, 89 NLRB 395.
12 Any participant in the proceeding herein may , upon its prompt request to , and approval
thereof by , the Regional Director , have its name removed from the ballot.
RADIO CORPORATION OF AMERICA 703
(a) Whether the employees in the unit found appropriate at the
Camden, New Jersey, plant, desire to be represented, for purposes of
collective bargaining, by International Union of Electrical Radio and
Machine Workers of America, CIO, Local 103, or by United Electrical
Radio and Machine Workers of America, Local 103, or by neither;.
(b) Whether the employees in the unit found appropriate. at the
Pulaski, Virginia, plant, desire to be represented, for purposes of
collective bargaining, by International Union of Electrical Radio and
Machine Workers of America, CIO, Local 163, or by United Electrical
Radio and Machine Workers of America, Local 163, or by neither.