The National Cash Register Co.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Jun 18, 1951

94 N.L.R.B. 1288 (N.L.R.B. 1951)

1288 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
and a welder, who works with the millwrights under the supervision
.of the machine shop foreman. Working in the toolroom under the
toolroom foreman are tool and die makers who, using the tools of
their craft, work from blueprints to close tolerances; welders who
work on dies and fixtures for the die makers; and die service and die
chipper employees, who chip and grind dies to fit patterns to close
tolerance. Associated with the tool and die makers is a heat treat man
and helper, who anneal, harden, and test tools and parts for tool
makers in the electric and gas-fired heat treat furnaces; and a skilled
grinding machine and dust box maintenance man who, using stand-
ard repairman's tools, removes and replaces motors, and repairs and
maintains dust boxes, grinding and polishing machines and other
maintenance machines at the plant. Gauge makers, who work in
the gauge room, are former tool makers of the Employer who do
work, under the toolroom foreman, similar to that of the tool makers,
but requiring greater precision.
It seems clear that employees in the toolroom, machine shop, and
.gauge room set forth above, including their apprentices and .assigned
helpers, but excluding supervisors, constitute an identifiable, homo-
geneous group of skilled employees who may constitute a traditional
separate unit for bargaining purposes, notwithstanding their prior
inclusion in an over-all unit of production employees, if they so
desire 4 We shall direct an election among them. We shall make no
final unit determination at this time. If a majority of the employees
select the Petitioner; they will be taken to have indicated their desire
to constitute a separate bargaining unit, and we shall certify the
Petitioner as their exclusive bargaining representative.
- [Text of Direction of Election omitted from publication in this
volume.]
4 Layne & Bowler, Inc., 90 NLRB 1872 ; Victor Metal Products Corporation ,. 90 NLRB
No. 144 , not reported in printed volumes of Board decisions . We are not persuaded that
there is such a degree of integration among the Employer 's several operations, as the
Employer contends , as to preclude the severance of this proposed unit. International
Harvester Company, Harvester Division, East Moline Works, 90 NLRB 1905, and cases
cited therein.
ALLEN WALES ADDING MACHINE DIVISION OF THE NATIONAL CASH
REGISTER COMPANY and ROBERT RIBBLE, PETITIONER and LODGE 1607,
INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF MACHINISTS. Case No. 3-RLD-42.
Jume 18,1951
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 Ralph E. Kennedy,
94 NLRB No. 192.
ALLEN WALES ADDING MACHINE DIVISION 1289
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 Petitioner, an employee of the Employer, asserts that the
Union, the currently recognized bargaining agent, is no longer the
bargaining representative of certain employees of the Employer as
defined in Section 9 (a) of the Act.
3. The Union contends that its current contract with the Employer
bars consideration by the Board of the instant petition. We do not
agree. The present contract between the parties was executed on
June 14, 1950, for a period of 2 years with provision for automatic
renewal in the absence of written notice, and contains the following
clause :
All employees who on June 14, 1950 at 6 P. M., are members of
the Union and all employees who thereafter become members
shall, as a condition of employment, remain members of the
Union until May 5, 1951. On May 8, 1951 all employees who
are members of the Union and all employees who thereafter be-
come members shall, as a condition of employment, remain mem-
bers of the Union until May 5, 1952.
The Union, before the execution of the June 14, 1950, contract, was
authorized, pursuant to the provisions of Section' 9 (e) of the Act,
to negotiate a union-security agreement with the Employer? The
maintenance-of-membership clause incorporated into the June 14 con-
tract, however, exceeds the limited form of union-security agreement
permitted by the statute through its failure to provide a period of at
least 30 days following the effective date of the agreement or the be-
ginning of employment for an employee to refrain from membership.
Accordingly, it cannot serve to bar consideration of the instant peti-
tion by established rule.2 The Union's contention that the illegality
of the clause was purged by amendment of the contract at a later date
is equally without merit as to the contract bar question. The parties,
on November 17, 1950, modified the maintenance-of-membership clause
by including a period of 30 days from June 14, 1950, or from the date
of employment in which employees might withdraw or refrain from
membership. The petition in this case was filed on October 30, 1950.
Assuming correction of the illegality of the contract provision was
& An election under Section 9 (e) was held in May 1948, in which the Union won the
authority to execute a union-security agreement . This election took place in a unit of
all production and maintenance employees excluding the model room employees who are
concerned herein.
'See Shepherd Manufacturing Company, Inc., 90 NLRB 2196 and cases cited therein.
1290 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
'thus accomplished retroactively , the correction did not take place
until after the petition had been .filed and accordingly cannot act to
preclude a present determination of representatives.3
The Board finds that a question affecting commerce exists con-
cerning the representation 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 that a decertification election be held
in a unit of all model makers , model assemblers , and model inspectors
at the Employer 's Ithaca, New York, adding machine plant. The
Employer agrees with the Petitioner 's unit request , while the Union
contends the only appropriate unit is one merging the model room
employees with production and maintenance employees.
In 1943, the Employer recognized the Union as representative of its
production and maintenance employees in a unit excluding the model
room employees who are the subject of this petition . Contractual
relationships have ' been continuous since that time. In 1948, follow-
ing a consent election, the Union won union -security bargaining rights
in the same unit of production and maintenance employees excluding
the model room. In June 1949 , as the result of another consent elec-
tion, the . Union was separately certified as representative of a unit
limited to model makers , model assemblers , and model inspectors.
Model room employees were thereafter included in the same unit with
production and maintenance employees in collective bargaining con-
tracts between the Union and the Employer.
The Employer 's Ithaca plant has a working force of approximately
750 employees , of which 12 are in the classification sought to be de-
certified by the Petitioner. Four model makers A, 6 model makers
B, 1 model assembler , and 1 model inspector work in the model room
which occupies a separate location on the second floor of the Em-
ployer's plant . Experimental machines and parts for custom made
special machines are fabricated in this department, which is under
the separate supervision of a general foreman whose jurisdiction
is limited to the group in question . No production work is done in
the model room and there is virtually no interchange with personnel
engaged in production processes . Although the Employer does not
at present have an apprenticeship program in operation in the model
room there is no question , and the parties agree, that the work done
by these employees is of a highly skilled type . Model makers A and
B make dies and special parts and are comparable in skill to tool and
die makers , while the assembler and the inspector perform the duties
indicated by those job titles. A bench hand B, who does odd jobs
and is in the process of learning the skills of a model maker, and a
See Anaconda Wire and Cable Company, 90 NLRB No. 5 and cases cited therein.
ALLEN WALES ADDING '1VIACHINE DIVISION 1291
model egineer, who advises on clearances, tolerances, and changes in
parts, also work in the model room.
The Union contends that the model room employees constitute only
a portion of the production and maintenance unit and do not comprise,
of themselves, an appropriate unit. In support of this argument, the
Union notes the similarity of skills and rate of pay of the model makers
and of tool and die makers working in the toolroom at the plant, and of
the bench hand in the model room and the bench hands in the produc-
tion section as well as the bargaining history in a plant-wide unit.
The Employer's toolroom is located near the model department and is
equipped with the same types of machinery as the -latter. The tool
and die makers who are assigned to the toolroom are ranked in the same
labor grade as the model makers and possess comparable, if not in some
cases identical, skills. The functional operations of 'the toolroom,
however, differ from those of the model room in several respects.
Thus, the toolroom is engaged in the production of tools for use in pro-
duction of the Employer's standard products, while the-model maker
"hand makes" individual parts and pieces for experimental or custom
built machines of a special nature. The model room, because of its
experimental work, is closed to all employees except those assigned to
that department, while the toolroom is not so restricted. Despite the
similarity of skills and work background of employees in the two
groups there is no interchange of model makers and tool and die
makers. Seniority at the Employer's plant is determined by length of
service in each job classification.
Although bench hands, in the past, have transferred to and from the
'production departments, the same general situation applying to model
makers is true of this classification. Bench hands assigned to produc-
tion work do highly repetitive operations such as straightening, and
filing on the same parts as they are produced. The bench hand in the
model room, however, does more individualized work on pieces to be
used in the-models.
On the above facts it is clear that a unit restricted to employees in
the Employer's model room would be appropriate in the absence of any
history of collective bargaining on a plant-wide basis. Indeed the
Board has conducted an election in precisely this unit of these employ-
ees. Moreover, for 6 years prior to the inclusion of these workers in
.the contract covering production and maintenance employees, the
model room personnel were specifically excluded from the basic pro-
duction and maintenance unit. There has been some bargaining at
this plant, however, on an over-all basis. It is the contention of the
Union that this bargaining demonstrates that a plant-wide bargaining
unit has been established herein, and that the requested unit is inappro-
priate because it comprises a noncraft group not entitled to severance
1292 DECISIONS. OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
from the larger unit. We find no merit in this contention. To estab-
lish the existence of an over-all bargaining unit at the Employer's
plant, it is necessary to accord final and conclusive weight to the fact
that, only a year before this petition was filed, the Union and the
Employer merged the model room personnel into the production and
maintenance unit covered by their contract. The position of the
Union, accordingly, rests upon the limited 1-year period at the plant
which followed the inclusion of model room employees in the.broader
unit without Board sanction.'-
. While the Board has, under certain circumstances, found that a
previously appropriate unit has later, through merger, become an
inappropriate grouping, no adequate basis for such a conclusion
appears in the instant case.' In our opinion, plant-wide bargaining
for the brief period of time involved does not constitute such a decisive
demonstration of bargaining patterns as to foreclose a timely and
effective protest from the employees concerned. Such a protest, of
course, is best evidenced by the petition for decertification of the Union
as representative of the model room which is now before us.
In view of the nature of the work in which the model room employees
are engaged, their segregation, lack of. interchange with production
and maintenance personnel, separate supervision, and the absence of
any decisive history of bargaining on a broader basis, the Board finds
that the model makers, assemblers, and inspectors are a homogeneous,
skilled, cohesive, and well-defined departmental group who may prop-
erly constitute a separate bargaining unit for the determination of a
question concerning representation.'
There remains the question of the inclusion of the bench hand and
the model engineer in such a unit. Neither of these employees was
expressly included in the unit requested by the Petitioner and the
record does not clearly show the parties' positions as to these employ-
ees. It appears that the model engineer and the bench hand, however,
were included in the model room unit when the consent election was
held in that unit in June 1949.6 As these employees work entirely
within the model room and share the conditions of employment of
that group, we shall include the model room bench hand and the model
engineer.
Accordingly, the Board finds that all model makers, model assenl-
blers, and model inspectors at the Employer's Ithaca, New York, plant,
including the model room bench hand and the model engineer, but
excluding office and clerical employees, guards, professional employ-
4 Cf. McDonnell Aircraft Corporation, 93 NLRB 1268 . In that case the employees
involved had been included in the broader unit without protest for a period of over 7 years.
5 See International Harvester Company, 82 NLRB 185.
6 The model engineer formerly worked in the assembly department of the plant and
transferred from assembly to his present position.
ALLEN WALES ADDING MACHINE DIVISION- 1293
des, and all supervisors as defined in the amended Act, may constitute
a unit appropriate for the purposes of collective bargaining within
the meaning of Section 9 (b) of the Act. We shall direct an. election
among these employees . If a majority of the employees vote against
the Union , the latter organization will be decertified as representative
of the Employer's model room. If, however , a majority of the em-
ployees cast their ballots for the Union , they will be taken to have indi-
cated . their desire to be a part of the production and maintenance unit
and the Union may bargain for model room employees as a part of that
unit.
[Text of Direction of Election omitted from publication in this
volume.]
MEMBERS HOUSTON and STYLES, dissenting :
We cannot agree with the conclusion of our colleagues that the
model room employees may now constitute a separate appropriate
-unit, as these employees have been effectively merged into the pro-
duction and maintenance unit. Although the Union was certified in
June 1949 as the bargaining representative of all model makers, model
assemblers , and model inspectors, it never bargained for them sepa-
rately. These employees, who had previously been unrepresented,
were instead immediately merged into the larger unit already repre-
sented by the Union. Apparently none of the model room employees
objected at that time to their inclusion in the plant -wide unit.
Our colleagues , however, would now fractionalize this more compre-
hensive unit in disregard of the merger and of the Board's require-
ments for severance from an existing plant-wide unit. ' As to the
merger, the record is clear that the only bargaining history affecting
the model room employees is one of inclusion for the past year and
a half in the production and maintenance unit. Not only is this
merger of substantial duration ,' but it is the type of consolidation
which the Board has heretofore indicated it would approve 8 Further-
more, severance of these employees 'ignores the transfer of bench
hands to and from the production departments and disregards the
similarity between the skills, work backgrounds, and rates of pay
of the model makers and the tool and die makers working in the tool-
room , who, as part of the existing production and maintenance unit,
are also represented by the Union.
Accordingly, as the model room employees have been effectively
merged with the production and maintenance employees and as they
comprise only a segment of employees possessing identical skills and
' General Mills, Inc., Sperry Division , 91 NLRB 984 ; American Radiator and Sanitary
Corporation , Case No. 9-RD-69 (unpublished).
8 John Deere Harvester Works, 66 NLRB 1078 ; Deere & Company , 57 NLRB 411.
1294 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
performing comparable work, we perceive no basis for establishing
them as a separate units We would therefore dismiss the petition.
O McDonnell Aircraft Corporation, 93 NLRB 1268; Kaiser-Frazer Corporation, 93
NLRB 892; Milprint, Inc., 90 NLRB 98. But cf. General Aniline d Film Corporation,
Ansco Division, 80 NLRB 1352 , where the Board held that a similar unit could appro-
priately be severed from a production and maintenance unit and included in a toolroom
unit.
REPUBLIC STEEL CORPORATION and UNITED STEELWORKERS OP AMERICA,
CIO , PETITIONER. Case No. 10-1i'C-108.11. June, 18) 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 S. Patton, 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 seeks to represent a unit composed of all office
Ind clerical employees at the main office of the Employer's Gadsden,
.Alabama, plant, excluding employees in the invoice, industrial en-
gineering, industrial relations, and combustion departments, plant
clerical employees,' employees of the Truscon Steel Company, guards,
professional employees, and all supervisors as defined in the Act. The
Employer asserts that the unit is inappropriate, contending that, in
addition to the exclusions requested by the Petitioner, as to which
the parties agree, all other employees should also be excluded on the
ground that they are either confidential, supervisory, or professional
employees.
The clerical employees in the Gadsden offices do routine clerical
tasks, maintaining records, posting figures in ledgers, preparing ac-
counts, computing payrolls, and performing the Employer's local ac-
'The record shows that two inventory clerks and three production clerks, who are
stationed in plant production areas , do not work with the employees in the requested
unit. In accordance with the Employer ' s contention , therefore , we find that they are
plant clericals , and we shall exclude them from the office clerical unit and, in keeping
with the Board 's practice , leave them in the existing production and maintenance unit.
94 NLRB No. 199.