Cooper's Inc.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Feb 5, 1951

92 N.L.R.B. 1900 (N.L.R.B. 1951)

In the Matter of COOPER'S INC., EMPLOYER and SEWING MACHINE
MECHANICS ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA, N. E. C., PETITIONER
Case No. 13-RC-1474.-Decided February 5, 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 John P. Von Rohr,
hearing officer. 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 Act.
2. The labor organizations involved claim to represent employees
of the Employer.
3. A question affecting commerce exists concerning the representa-
tion of the 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 to sever from an existing production and
maintenance unit a group limited to four journeyman sewing machine
mechanics and one apprentice. The Intervenor and the Employer
contend that the proposed unit is inappropriate because of past bar-
gaining on a broader basis, and on the further ground that these
mechanics do not enjoy a community of interest apart from other
maintenance and production employees. They also argue that be-
cause the proposed unit excludes certain apprentices, it embraces only
a segment of all employees having similar interests.
The Employer is engaged in the manufacture and sale of men's
underwear at ' its 2 plants in Kenosha and Burlington, Wisconsin,
where it has about 900 employees. For the past 14 years, the Inter-
venor has represented the bulk of these employees in a single produc-
' The Employer and Local 2268, Textile Workers Union of America , CIO, herein called
the Intervenor , contend that their current contract , executed on August 14, 1950, bars
this proceeding . The Petitioner claimed recognition on behalf of certain employees on
August 9, 1950 , and filed the instant petition on the day the contract was executed. As
the contract was executed after the rival claim, was made, and as the petition was filed
within 10 days of the claim, we find that the contract does not bar a present determination
of representatives . French Manufacturing Co., 72 NLRB 1467.
92 NLRB No. 269.
1900
COOPER'S INC. 1901
tion and maintenance unit, which includes the employees now sought
by the Petitioner.
The sewing machine mechanics, including 4 journeymen and 4
appentices, are in the Employer's general maintenance department,
under supervision of the maintenance supervisor. They repair, over-
haul, and rebuild the 580 sewing machines in the Employer's 2 plants,
working both on the production floors and at their workbenches,
where they take the machines for major overhauls 2 Three of the
journeymen and all the apprentices spend at least 90 percent of their
time repairing sewing machines. The fourth journeyman devotes
about 60 percent of his time to such work. All these employees spend
the remainder of their time maintaining equipment other than sewing
machines .3 They do no production work whatever. Although the
mechanics are also called fixers, it does not appear that their work
involves any periodic or scheduled adjustment of the sewing machines
as a repetitive or integrated part of the production process. The
production foremen tell the mechanics which machines require at-
tention but do not supervise their work..
The sewing machine mechanics and apprentices are the only em-
ployees in the plant capable of repairing sewing machines. The low-
est paid apprentice receives 40 cents per hour more than machine
operators; journeymen earn 75 cents per hour more than operators.
Although the Employer has no formal apprenticeship program, it
gives the sewing machine repair group intensive on-the-job training.
'Precise records of the apprentices' training show that the least ex-
perienced. has worked well over 2,000 hours on sewing machines alone;
one has over 6,000 hours of such experience.
Unquestionably, the journeyman mechanics here involved possess
and exercise a high degree of skill which stamps them with craftsman
status. If for no other reason, we are satisfied that their interests in
working conditions are sufficiently different from those of the other
employees to justify their separate representation for collective bar-
gaining purposes. Their distinctive function, and therefore interest,
is further emphasized by the fact that they perform no routine chores
within the production process but work entirely on maintenance. In
these circumstances, we perceive no persuasive reason for denying
them, as a craft unit, the privilege of separate representation if they
desire it, notwithstanding their previous inclusion in a broader bar-
gaining Unit .4
2 There is one such bench in each production department.
2 To the extent indicated in the record, the only equipment other than sewing machines,
serviced by these mechanics , are balers, conveyors , packaging machines, a loop dryer in
the dye department , and the plants ' central power transmission systems.
4 Singer Sewing Machine Company, 10 NLRB 696.
1902 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
Our dissenting colleagues evidently believe that some few references
in the record, and in the Employer's brief, warrant the inference that
the Employer's operations are like those in some branches of the tex-
tile industry, where the Board has on occasion declined to establish
separate units of knitting machine or loom fixers. 5 Their further
finding that the-sewing machine mechanics here involved compare to
loom fixers also rests, apparently, on facts outside this record. This
record shows that, unlike loom fixers, whose work is closely inte-
grated with the repetitive production process," sewing machine me-
chanics do only repair work. It also shows that this Employer is
engaged primarily in garment manufacturing, not in the manufacture
of textiles. The presence of more than half as many sewing ma-
chines as there are employees strongly supports this conclusion. We
therefore view the issue presented here as unrelated to unit problems
arising in the textile industry generally.'
With respect to the Petitioner's request for exclusion of some of the
apprentice sewing machine mechanics, it is clear that, despite the lack
of a formal apprenticeship program, the four apprentices share suffi-
ciently the distinctive skills and interests of the journeymen to be
included in the same unit with them s
Accordingly, we find that the journeyman and apprentice sewing
machine mechanics may, if 'they so desire, constitute a separate unit
for the purposes of collective bargaining within the meaning of Sec-
tion 9 (b) of the Act." They may, of course, remain a part of the
existing production and maintenance unit. Therefore, the Board will
make no final unit determination until it has first ascertained the
desires of the employees involved.
We shall direct that an election be held among all journeymen and
apprentice sewing machine mechanics employed at the Kenosha and
Burlington, Wisconsin, plants of the Employer, excluding all other
employees and all supervisors as defined in the Act. If a majority
of these employees select the Petitioner, they will be taken to have
indicated their desire to constitute a separate unit for the purposes of
collective bargaining.
6 Gastonia Combed Yarn Corporation , 73 NLRB 169 ; C. E. Kearns d Sons , Inc., 72 NLRB
153. Compare , Luther Manufacturing Company, 61 NLRB 858; Tower Hosiery Hills, Inc.,
64 NLRB 1245.
6 For a job description showing loom fixers ' close relationship to the production process,
see New Bedford Cotton Manufacturers ' Association , 78 NLRB 319.
7 See for example , New Bedford Cotton Manufacturers ' Association , 78 NLRB 319.
6 The Baldwin Locomotive Works, Eddystone Division, 89 NLRB 403 ; Bunker Hill and
Sullivan Mining and Concentrating Company, et at., 89 NLRB 243.
In view of our finding that both journeymen and apprentices appropriately belong in
the same unit, we deem it unnecessary to pass upon the issue raised by the parties respect-
ing the proper classification of Leroy Lundskow into one or the other of these categories.
COOPER'S INC. 1903
DIRECTION OV ELECTION 10
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 102.61 and 102.62 of National Labor
Relations Board Rules and Regulations, among the employees in the
voting group described in paragraph numbered 4, above, who were
employed during the payroll period immediately preceding the date
of this Direction of Election including employees who did not work
during said payroll period because they were ill or on vacation' or
temporarily laid off, and including employees in the military services
of the United States who appear in person at the polls, 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 election;
and also excluding employees on strike who are not entitled to rein
statement, to determine whether they desire to be represented, for the
purposes of collective bargaining, by Sewing Machine Mechanics As-
sociation of America, N. E. C., by Local 2268, Textile Workers Union
of America, CIO, or by neither.
MEMBERS HOUSTON and STYLES, dissenting :
We do not agree with the conclusion of our colleagues that the sew-
ing machine fixers should be granted separate representation. These
employees have been included in the production and maintenance unit
for 14 years. They enjoy essentially the same terms and conditions of
employment and work in the same area as the other production and
maintenance employees, are part of the Employer's maintenance de}
partment, and are supervised, along with the other maintenance em-
ployees, by the maintenance department 'supervisor. In addition to
their work on sewing machines, the fixers also do other maintenance
work. Thus, these employees clearly do not constitute a functionally
distinct departmental unit.
The primary function of the fixers is to repair production machines
The principal tools they use are screw drivers and wrenches. Al-'
though they may make some use of certain tools in the Employer's
machine shop, they do not actually make machine parts 11 and it is
clear that they are not machinists. The Employer has a number of
so-called "apprentice" sewing machine fixers, who are selected from
10 Either 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.
11 Cf. Philip Morris & Co . Ltd., Inc., 79 NLRB 56.
1904 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
among other maintenance employees, but they do not follow any for-
mal apprenticeship or on-the-job training program. They have no
prescribed course of work, study, or instruction, are not under the
tutelage of a particular journeyman, and do not advance through any
recognized apprenticeship grades. They acquire their knowledge of
fixing in a more or less haphazard fashion, and do not achieve journey-
man status in any prescribed time, but solely at the discretion of the
Employer. The fact that the Petitioner desires to exclude three of
the four apprentice fixers indicates that the fixers are not craftsmen
entitled under Section 9 (b) (2) of the Act to a self-determination
election.12
The majority, in arriving at its finding that these employees have
craft status, relies on the high degree of skill of the journeyman fixers.
However, the Board has denied craft severance to employees who are
skilled but are not craftsmen 13 Our colleagues also rely on the "dis-
tinctive function" of the journeyman fixers, but the function of one
group of employees customarily included in a production and main-
tenance unit is frequently distinct from that of other groups in the
same unit.
.Apparently the material from which the Employer produces fin-
ished garments is also made by the Employer, so that its operations
fall into both the needle trades and textile industries. The prevailing
pattern of collective bargaining in the needle trades is on an industrial
rather than a craft basis.14 In the textile industry, although the Board
has found loom fixers, who are closely analagous to the sewing machine
fixers herein,15 to be highly skilled and to have indicia of craft status,16
it has nevertheless concluded that they were not craftsmen 11 and has
generally included them in production and maintenance units.' The
Board has deviated from this policy only where the fixers had vigor-
12 Allis-Chalmers Manufacturing Company, 77 NLRB 719.
22 In this connection see the dissenting opinion of Member Houston in Montgomery Ward
d Company, Incorporated , 88 NLRB 615.
14 See, for example, Richard A. Lester, Economics of Labor ( The MacMillan Company,
New York, 1941), p. 821 ; Joel Seidman , The Needle Trades (Farrar & Rinehart , Inc., New
York, 1942 ), pp. 234-235.
35 See Job Descriptions for the Cotton Textile Industry , United States Department of
Labor, United States Employment Service, 1939, pp. 141-144 ; Job Descriptions for the
Garment Manufacturing Industry , United States Department of Labor, United States
Employment Service, 1939 , pp. 219-220.
is Luther Manufacturing Company, 58 NLRB 1307, 1311; ibid, 61 NLRB 858 , 863. Also
see Flint Manufacturing Company, 52 NLRB 63 (yarn manufacturing).
17 New Bedford Cotton Manufacturers ' Association , 78 NLRB 319.
'1s Holyoke 2f ills Company and Potomac Dyeing and Finishing Corp ., 90 NLRB No. 246;
Riverside Mills, 85 NLRB 969; Boaz Mills, Inc., 78 NLRB 1086 ;-New Bedford Cotton Manu-
facturers' Association, supra; Gastonia Combed Yarn Corporation, 73 NLRB 169 ( fixers and
overhaulers ) ; New Jersey Worsted Mills, 63 NLRB 455; Newmarket Manufacturing Com-
pany, 60 NLRB 730 . The majority states that our comparison of sewing machine mechanics
with loom fixers "rests , apparently , on facts outside this record ." We always take cogni-
zance, of course , of prior Board decisions and of official Government publications in resolving
such issues.
COOPER 'S INC. 1905
oously maintained their separate identity and had a substantial history
,of separate collective bargaining in the industry in the area.19 These
factors are not present here. On the contrary, the Intervenor has bar-
gained for the fixers as part of the production and maintenance unit
for a substantial period of time and the record establishes no different
.industry pattern of collective bargaining in the area.
. Accordingly, as the sewing machine fixers are not craftsmen and do
not constitute a functionally distinct departmental unit, we conclude
that it is inappropriate to sever them from the unit in . which they
have been included for 14 years, and would therefore dismiss the
petition herein.-
19 Luther Manufacturing Company, supra ; New Bedford Cotton Manufacturers ' Associa-
tion, supra.
70 Singer Sewing Cachine Company, 10 NLRB 696 , cited by the majority in support of its
conclusion , is not here apposite, as in that case the Board was confronted merely with the
question of whether a unit of sewing machine mechanics was appropriate and not with the
Issue of their craft severance from a production and maintenance unit.