Telechron, Inc.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Feb 27, 1951

93 N.L.R.B. 474 (N.L.R.B. 1951)

474 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
3. American Guild of Variety Artists, A . F. of L., is a labor organization within
the meaning of the Act.
4. The Respondent has not engaged in unfair labor practices within the mean-
ing of Section 8 (a) (1), (3 ), and (5 ) of the Act.
[Recommended Order omitted from publication in this volume.]
TELECHRON, INC. and UNITED ELECTRICAL, RADIO & MACHINE WORKERS
OF AMERICA (UE), PETITIONER. Case No. 1-RC-1452. February
27,1951
Second Supplemental Decision and Order
On December 12, 1950, the Board issued a Supplemental Decision
and Order 1 in this proceeding, finding merit in the objections to the
conduct of the election which had been filed by the United Steel-
workers of America, and directing that the election of August 10,
1950, be set aside. Thereafter, on December 26, 1950, the Employer
filed a motion to reconsider the Supplemental Decision and Order, and
the Petitioner, herein, filed objections to said motion.
We have considered the Employer's motion to reconsider, and find
it to be without merit.2
The statements which were found to have interfered with the em-
ployees' free choice in the election were contained in a letter the
Employer sent to the employees on August 8, 1950. In this letter
the question "What can you expect from any union?" was posed; and
to it the following reply was offered "To have wage increases, insurance
and other benefits held up." This was followed by two examples, in
one of which reference was made to the fact that at another plant
of the Employer (the Ashland plant) "employees now represented by
UE are being prevented right now from enjoying your recent wage
increase and insurance benefits." In the other example given, the
statement is made that "You'd have an improved pension plan now
too if both UE and CIO were not to-day making it impossible for
us to give it to you and other Telechron employees."
In its motion, the Employer contends in substance that the em-
ployees were generally aware of certain circumstances surrounding
negotiations at the Ashland plant and of the special reasons for the
delay in instituting the contemplated improvement in the pension plan.
As a consequence, the Employer urges the employees reasonably in-
192 NLRB No. 113.
2 Although , pursuant to Section 3 (b) of the Act, the Decision and Direction of Election
as well as the Supplemental Decision and Order in this matter were considered by a three-
member panel of the Board , all Members of the Board have considered the Employer's
motion to reconsider . Chairman Herzog and Member Reynolds disagree with the result
reached herein for the reasons set forth in their separate opinion.
93 NLRB No. 67.
TELECHRON, INC. 475
terpreted the statements of August 8 as nothing more than a descrip-
tion of the delays which are inherent in collective bargaining and not
as a threat or a promise of benefit flowing from the rejection of all
unions. However, as-the Employer itself recognizes, this considera-
tion did not go unnoticed in the Board's supplemental decision, where
the instant case was distinguished from one in which statements, such
as were made here, are more fully explicated in a manner which makes
the employer's proper purposes clear. The difficulty with the present
statements is that there was no such explication. Nowhere in these
statements is reference made to the particular circumstances which the
Employer now asserts should have served to give what was said a
meaning devoid of threats or promise. Preelection statements which
on their face contain improper threats or promises of benefit cannot
be condoned because external circumstances, to which no reference is
made in the statements themselves, would give those statements a
different meaning.3
We cannot agree with our dissenting colleagues that the Employer's
statements were not coercive on their face. The plain lesson which
these statements seek to'teach is that important benefits would be im-
mediately available to the employees if there were no unions in the
picture. We rely on no meaning not expressly stated, and we hold
that employees are not required to look behind the plain meaning of
coercive words to find an unexpressed reason for their utterance.
We shall, accordingly, deny the motion to reconsider, and because
we regard the circumstances surrounding the Employer's statements
as immaterial we shall also deny the Employer's alternative motion
to reopen the record for the purpose of introducing evidence with
respect to these circumstances.
Order
IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that the Employer's motion to reconsider the
Board's Supplemental Decision and Order in this matter, or to remand
the case for further hearing be, and it hereby is denied.
CHAIRMAN HERZOG and MEMBER REYNOLDS,4 dissenting :
The Employer moves the Board to reconsider and reverse its deci-
sion setting aside the election in this case. In the alternative, it asks
8 The Employer's letter of August 8 also answered the query, "what can you expect from
any Union" with the following : "To be deprived of the opportunity to work on certain
war work, or maybe to work at all at Telechrone, if you select some union, should we have
to convert to war work entirely " Because we have found the statements discussed herein
sufficient to warrant setting aside the election, it is unnecessary for us to rely on the
above-quoted remark. We note in passing, however, that this remark suffers from the
same defect inherent in the statements upon which we do rely.
4 Board Member Reynolds, in joining the Chairman in his dissent, considers the addi-
tional matters alleged in the Employer's motion as warranting a rrversal of his prior
posi tied.
476 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
the Board to remand the case for hearing to receive evidence relating
to the circumstances surrounding its letter of August 5, 1950, to its
employees. We are constrained to dissent from our colleagues' deci-
sion to deny this motion.
The portions of the Employer's letter found to have exceeded the
bounds of legitimate preelection propaganda, were set out in the
Board's Supplemental Decision in -this case, substantially as follows :
"What can you expect from any union?
3. To have wage increases, insurance and other benefits held
up. For example-Ashland Telechron employees now repre-
sented by UE are being prevented right now from enjoying your
recent wage increase and insurance benefits. You'd have an im-
proved pension plan now too if both UE and CIO were not today
making it impossible for us to give it to you and other Telechron
employees. This improved pension plan would provide a mini-
mum pension of $100 to $125 per month to people with 25 years
of service."
This quoted language is not explicitly coercive. It contains no
express threat or promise of benefit by the Employer, but attributes
any envisaged postponement of employee benefits to the unions. Only
by implication of something not said can these remarks be regarded,
as the majority regards them, as meaning that the Employer would
resort to economic action to defeat self-organization among its em-
ployees in this plant.
The Employer asserts, in explanation of its reference to the Ashland
Telechron employees, that at its Ashland plant 19 miles distant, the
ZJE and the Employer had been engaged in negotiations for several
months preceding the date of the August 8, 1950, letter. During this
time, certain benefits had been given the employees in the plant in-
volved in this case, that were not given to the Ashland employees
because of the pending negotiations. The Employer further asserts,
in explaining the reference to delay in inaugurating an improved
pension plan, that this referred to a situation existing throughout the
plants of General Electric Company and its affiliates, of which the
Employer is one. The inability of General Electric and the UE
and IUE to agree upon proposed increases in pension benefits had
been preventing institution of revision of the pension plan on a Nation-
wide scale, including the plant here concerned. Thus the Employer
in effect alleges that both the "examples" cited by it in the above quota-
tion involved instances of delays attributable to the process of collec-
tive bargaining; that both instances were well known to the employees
in this plant; and that the employer's remarks were interpretable in
the light of this knowledge.
NATIONAL WASTE MATERIAL CORP. 477
The decision of our colleagues condemns the statements in the
Employer's letter, first by implying a meaning that is not expressly
stated, and then by finding that the quotation, having said so much, did
not say enough. We would not thus impute a latent significance to
the Employer's statements, without first affording it full opportunity
to present evidence that might bear upon their proper interpretation.
As the Employer's remarks were not patently coercive, and especially
as the Employer has offered evidence that'may have a bearing on their
significance, we would remand this case for a further hearing. There
the Employer and all other parties would be given an opportunity to,
present evidence relating to the circumstances referred to in the quoted
language from the August 8 letter, the extent to which the employees
were aware of these matters, and any other pertinent evidence that
might assist the Board in appraising correctly the significance of these
statements to the employees. Perhaps that evidence would prove our
colleagues' conclusion correct. But perhaps it would not. There-
fore, in the absence of a hearing, we would not now find sufficient
cause in these remarks to justify setting aside the election.
NATIONAL WASTE MATERIAL CORP., PETITIONER and TEXTILE WORKERS )
OF AMERICA, CIO. Case No. 14-RM-40. February 27,1951
Decision and Direction of Election
Upon a petition duly filed under Section 9 (c) of the National
Labor Relations Act, a hearing was held before Milton O. Talent,
hearing officer. 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 Act, the Board
has delegated its powers in connection with this case to a three-mem-
ber panel' [Members Houston, 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 Act.
2. The labor organization involved claims to represent certain em-
ployees of the Employer.
3. The Union moves to dismiss the petition on the ground that a
certain informal settlement agreement and card check, discussed be-
low, bar this proceeding. The Employer takes a contrary position,
contending that whatever right to recognition the settlement agree-
ment and card check conferred upon the Union was subsequently,
I As the record and the brief of the Employer adequately present the issues and, posi-
tions of the parties, the Employer's request for oral argument is denied.
93 NLRB No. 71.