Great Lakes Sugar Co.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Jan 18, 1951

92 N.L.R.B. 1408 (N.L.R.B. 1951)

In the Matter of GREAT LAKES SUGAR COMPANY, EMPLOYER and
AMERICAN FEDERATION OF LABOR, PETITIONER
Case No. 7-RC-10441.-Decided January 18,1951
DECISION AND ORDER
Upon a petition duly filed, a hearing was held before Jerome H.
Brooks, 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
National Labor Relations Act.
2. The labor organization involved claims to represent certain of
the Employer 's field men.
3. No 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 for the reasons stated below.
The Petitioner seeks a unit of field men working out of the Em-
ployer's Blissfield, Michigan, plant, where the Employer is engaged
in the manufacture of beet sugar , beet pulp, and molasses from sugar
beets. The Employer contends that the requested unit is inappropri-
ate because the field men are supervisors.
To insure availability of a maximum beet crop commensurate with
its production needs, the Employer encourages farmers in nearby coun-
ties to grow sugar beets, and renders financial and other kinds of
assistance to farmers actively engaged in the growing of beets. In
connection with this program , the Employer employs the field men
involved herein, who act as the Employer's representatives among the
beet growers and spend only a small portion of their working hours
at the Blissfield plant. Each field man is assigned a geographical
district, and he is responsible for the growers and farms within the
district to which he is assigned.
Farmers growing sugar beets for the Employer depend to a large
extent upon migratory labor for assistance in planting, growing, and
harvesting. A Great Lakes Growers Employment Committee, in
which the beet growers hold membership, recruits laborers in Texas
and transports them to the Blissfield area . Upon their arrival , the field
92 NLRB No. 209.
1408
GREAT LAKES SUGAR COMPANY 1409
men assign the laborers to housing owned or leased by the employer.
The field men also assign the laborers, in groups, to the farms of the
various growers, transferring them as production needs require; oc-
casionally, a. field man may transfer a laborer to a farm located in
another district. The field men instruct the laborers in their tasks,
and frequently check their work to determine work performance. In
the absence of the field men from the laborers' place of work, the la-
borers are considered to be under the direction of the growers. The
growers, however, sparingly assert whatever authority they may
possess over the laborers, calling in a field man when it is necessary to
discipline or instruct a laborer. The field men can discharge un-
satisfactory laborers; they can effectively recommend that such la=
borers should not be rehired in the future, and they can, as is generally
the case, take disciplinary action against the laborers by transferring
them to another district.
The laborers work in the growers' fields during the seasonal growing
and harvesting periods, which last, respectively, from May 1 to August
1, and from October 1 to December 1. Thus during 5 months of each
year, the field men are principally concerned with the laborers.
In addition to their duties directly related to the farm laborers,
the field men have other duties connected with the growing of beets.
Thus they contact farmers within their respective districts and ar-
range for the farmers to undertake to grow beets for the Employer's
use; they tend to the maintenance and repair of housing owned or
leased by the Employer; they measure farm acreage, with the help
of. their sons, or boys whom they occasionally hire; they obtain truck-
ing to transport farm laborers and equipment; they keep the Em-
ployer's accounts with the beet growing farmers in their respective
districts, in the process of which they make cash payments to laborers
and advances to farmers ; and they schedule the shipment of beets from
the growers to the Employer's plant.
The field men are paid a monthly salary, and also receive a monthly
car allowance.
The Employer rests its contention that the field men are super-
visors upon the relationship between them and the laborers. It is
clear from the facts recited above that the field men hire, discharge,
transfer, assign, discipline, and responsibly direct other individuals.
They therefore appear to possess most of the attributes of a supervisor
specified in Section 2 (11) of the Act, and accordingly we would find
them to be supervisors were it not for the requirement in Section 2
(11) that supervisory authority be exercised over "employees" '-
I Section 2 (11) provides: "The term ` supervisor' means any individual having authority,
in the interest of the employer, to hire . . . or discipline other employees , or responsibly
to direct them, or to adjust their grievances , . . [ Emphasis added.]
1410 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
a status which the laborers do not occupy. Section 2 (3) of the Act
specifically excludes from the definition of "employee" any individual
employed as an agricultural laborer"; and it is clear that the laborers,
who perform physical work directly connected with the growing and
harvesting of an agricultural product, must be considered to be "ag-
ricultural laborers." 2 Accordingly, as the-field men do not supervise
"employees" as defined in Section 2 (3), we reject the Employer's con-
tention that the field men are supervisors.
However, although the field men are not supervisors within the
meaning of the Act, we conclude that, under the circumstances here
present, the field men are themselves agricultural laborers, and that the
Act requires that we dismiss the instant petition on that ground.
When we look to the essential nature of the work performed by the
:field men, and consider both the relationship between the field men and
the laborers working on the beet-growing farms, as well as the fact
that the field men perform services for the growers directly related
to the growing of beets, it becomes apparent that the field men are
primarily engaged in work of such a nature as to constitute them
agricultural laborers within the meaning of the Act. For this rea-
son, in 'view of the exclusion of agricultural laborers from the defini-
tion of "employee" in Section 2 (3), we find that the field men are not
employees within the meaning of the Act. Accordingly, they are out-
side the scope of Section 9 of the Act, and we shall therefore dismiss
the petition.
ORDER
IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that the petition herein be, and it hereby is,
dismissed.
2 Under the National Labor Relations Board Appropriation Act, 1.951 (Pub. L. No. 759,
81st Cong . 2d Sess., Sept. 6 , 1950), the Board is hound by the definition of agriculture
contained in the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 , 29 U. S . C. A. Sec. 203 (f).