I. S. Berlin Press

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Feb 5, 1951

93 N.L.R.B. 13 (N.L.R.B. 1951)

I. S. BERLIN PRESS 13
of permanent employment. The Board agrees with the parties that
these seasonal employees are ineligible to vote?
[Text of Direction of Election omitted from publication in this
volume.]
7 F. B Silverwood , a corporation, d/b/a Silverwod 's, supra.
I. S. BERLIN D/B/A I. S. BERLIN PRESS 1 and BOOKBINDERS ' AND PAPER
CUTTERS' UNION OF CHICAGO, LOCAL No. 8, INTERNATIONAL BROTHER-
HOOD OF BOOKBINDERS , AFL, PETITIONER . Case No. 13-RC-1511.
Feb'r'uary 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 Joseph A. Butler, 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-member
panel [Chairman Herzog and Members Houston and Reynolds].
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
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 requests a unit composed of cutting machine
operators, joggers, and folding machine operators, excluding all other
employees. The Employer agrees with the scope of the proposed
unit, but, unlike the Petitioner, would include a number of board
loaders and packer pullers, whom it classifies as folding machine
operators. There is also disagreement, not crystallized in the record,
emerging from the parties' changing contentions based on the alleged
supervisory status of certain employees in the folding machine and
cutting machine groups.
The Employer is engaged in commercial printing at its plant in
Chicago, Illinois, where it has about 300 employees?
' The name of the Employer appears as corrected at the hearing.
s Local 4, Amalgamated Lithographers of America , CIO, which did not appear at the
bearing, represents about 1.10 of the Employer 's workme'n in other departments. The
employees involved here have never been represented in collective bargaining.
93 NLRB No. 6.
14 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
There are eight cutting machine operators, who, as their title im-
plies, operate paper cutting machines, assisted by unskilled helpers.
The Employer's representative conceded that cutting machine opera-
tors need 4 to 41/2 years' experience before becoming skilled workmen,
and agreed with the Petitioner's assertion that in this plant these
employees are highly skilled craftsmen.
There are four joggers in the jogging department; they handle
paper, aligning the edges of piles of paper to prepare them for inser-
tion into various production machinery used in the plant. Although
there are indications that jogging may lead to paper cutting and that
joggers possess some degree of skill, the record shows, and no con-
trary contention was made, that jogging is not a highly skilled occupa-
tion. Despite testimony that the Petitioner sometimes admits joggers
to membership, such membership appears to result from the joggers'
occasional status as apprentice paper cutters, or from the existence
of union-shop contracts in certain plants. However, it is clear that
joggers as an occupational group do not necessarily become cutting
machine operators, and it is equally clear that the joggers here
involved are not apprentice paper cutters.
The dispute between the parties respecting folding machine opera-
tors arises from their disagreement as to the proper classification of
these employees in the folding department. Of the 17 employees in
this department, the Employer described 13 as folding machine opera-
tors, 2 as foremen and 2 as assistant foremen. The Petitioner asserts
that those designated "operators" are in fact "board loaders" and
"packer pullers," and that those designated foremen and assistant
foremen are the only true folding machine operators, or "set-up men,"
in the plant.
The record as a whole shows that the so-called foremen are in effect
the setup men in the department. They adjust and set the folding
machines to make the appropriate number of folds in flat printed
material required to produce a pamphlet or folder. They are highly
skilled and each must have a tool kit worth between $75 and $100.
In addition to the adjustment of folding machines, these setup men
are responsible for their proper operation, clearing all major jams,
correcting malfunctions, and doing whatever routine maintenance
work is necessary. The record is not clear as to the experience neces-
sary for the acquisition of their skill. The Petitioner claims that it
requires a 5-year indenture, but its representative admitted that this
is not an inflexible rule. Whether persons with less experience are
accepted by the Petitioner as apprentices or as exceptions to its rule,
it is clear that 5 years' experience is not required of all such members.
I. S. BERLIN PRESS 15
The record does not show what differential, if any, exists between the
pay of the setup men and others in the department.
The 13 "operators," or board loaders and packer pullers, perform
duties entirely different from those of the setup men. Loaders and
pullers feed flat printed material into the folding machines, and
remove, stack, and band the folded products. When the workload
in the folding department is light, they are used in other parts of
the plant. Although some of them have considerable experience, it
does not appear that their work regularly leads to setup work, or that
knowledge of loading and pulling is essential to becoming a setup
man. In support of the Employer's assertion that the loaders and
pullers should be grouped together with the setup men, its repre-
sentative stated that the former are capable of doing setup work, but
he admitted that in actual practice, when the setup needs changing,
"it is much simpler for them [loaders and pullers] to call the foreman
or assistant to assist them while they are off to some other point of
the plant and let them do the setting up because they are much faster."
It is,apparent that, whatever hidden skills the loaders and pullers
may possess, they do not share them with the setup men.
Upon these facts, and on the record as a whole, we are satisfied that
the cutting machine operators and those folding machine operators
who are, in fact, setup men, possess and exercise sufficient skill to
warrant their establishment in a separate unit as craftsmen 3 It is
clear, however, that the folding department employees who are more
appropriately called board loaders and packer pullers neither have
nor exercise a skill comparable in degree or kind to that of the setup
men. We perceive no reason, therefore, for including them in the
same unit as the craftsmen .1 Further, despite the parties' agreement
to join them with the skilled operators, it is equally apparent that
the joggers, like the pullers and loaders, are at best semiskilled work-
men whose interest in working conditions is insufficiently related to
that of the craftsmen to warrant their placement in the same unit.
Moreover, consistency with the craft character of the unit herein
found appropriate requires exclusion of the joggers notwithstanding
the parties' contrary agreement.,'
$ Lloyd Hollister, Ire, 55 NLRB 32.
4 The Petitioner claims that Liedbiedz , one of the group of loaders and pullers , should be
included in the unit of skilled setup men . This claim is founded on this employee's past
experience as a setup man and his present status as understudy for absent setup men
However , it is clear that lie is not employed as a setup man, that he functions as such very
rarely, and that for a 3-month period preceding the hearing , lie had done no setup work at
all. As his interests are more closely related to those of the pullers and loaders , we shall
exclude him fioni the unit hereinatter found appropriate.
5 We note that joggers were not included in the Petitioner ' s original demand as set forth
in the petition.
16 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
On its payroll the Employer describes all of the setup men in the
folding department as either "foreman" or "assistant foreman." The
record is not clear as to the exact nature and extent of their super-
visory duties. However, it does appear that their responsibility,
so far as it was discussed at the hearing, is the normal responsibility
of highly skilled machine operators. There is no evidence that they
have been vested with authority to hire, fire, or otherwise discipline
other employees. Nor does it appear that they responsibly direct other
employees in their tasks. In fact, the Employer's representative, con-
ceding that they had few supervisory duties, stated that they were
called foremen only to make it easier for them to meet the production
responsibilities normally to be expected of such skilled craftsmen.
In view of those facts, we find that these four employees are not
supervisors within the meaning of the Act. We shall therefore include
them in the unit .6
Accordingly, we find that all cutting machine operators and folding
machine setup men, excluding helpers, joggers, board loaders, and
packer pullers,? all other employees, and all supervisors as defined in
the Act, constitute a unit appropriate for collective bargaining pur-
poses within the meaning of Section 9 (b) of the Act .8
[Text of Direction of Election omitted from publication in this
volume.]
6 Member Reynolds would exclude as supervisors the two set-up men described as fore-
man," but agrees that those described as "assistant foreman" should be included.
a Including Liedbiedz
8 Although some testimony indicates that Nizick , who works in the cutting department,
may be a foreman , the record does not contain sufficient evidence to support a final deter-
mination as to his supervisory status. We shall therefore allow him to vote subject to
challenge.
EDWARD REINELL, AN INDIVIDUAL D/B/A REINELL BOAT WORKS and
UNITED BROTHERHOOD OF CARPENTERS & JOINERS OF AMERICA, LOCAL
UNION 562 , A. F. L., PETITIONER . Case No. 19-RC-654 . February
6, 1951
Decision and Order
Upon a petition duly filed under Section 9 (c) of the National Labor
Relations Act, a hearing was held before Robert E. Tillman, 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-member
panel [Chairman Herzog and Members Reynolds and Murdock].
93 NLRB No. 9.