NLRB v. Lake Butler Apparel Company

• Decision Date: 25 March 1968
• Docket Number: No. 24687.,24687.
• Citation: 392 F.2d 76
• Parties: NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD, Petitioner, v. LAKE BUTLER APPAREL COMPANY. Respondent.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit

392 F.2d 76 (1968)

NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD, Petitioner, v. LAKE BUTLER APPAREL COMPANY. Respondent.

No. 24687.

United States Court of Appeals Fifth Circuit.

March 25, 1968.

COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED

Allen J. Berk, Atty., N.L.R.B., Washington, D. C., for petitioner.

Daniel R. Coffman, Jr., Jacksonville, Fla., for respondent.

Before BELL, GOLDBERG and DYER, Circuit Judges.

GRIFFIN B. BELL, Circuit Judge.

The Board seeks enforcement of its order holding that Respondent violated §§ 8(a) (1) and 8(a) (5) and (1) of the Labor-Management Relations Act. 29 U.S.C.A. §§ 158(a) (1) and (5). The § 8(a) (1) violation is based on alleged coercion of employees in the exercise of their rights guaranteed by § 7 of the Act. 29 U.S.C.A. § 157. The § 8(a) (5) violation is said to arise from the refusal of Respondent to recognize and bargain with the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America, AFL-CIO, as the representative of a majority of Respondent's employees on and after April 19, 1964.¹ The order will be enforced as it relates to the § 8(a) (1) violation but not for all of the reasons assigned by the Board. Enforcement will be denied as to the § 8(a) (5) violation.

Respondent is in the apparel manufacturing business in Lake Butler, Union County, Florida. The union began an organizing campaign among Respondent's employees in February 1964 by obtaining signed authorization cards. The union posted a letter from New York on April 15, 1964 to Mr. Stephenson, owner and president of Respondent, advising that the union had been designated by a majority of his employees as their collective bargaining representative, and requesting an appointment in order to arrange for a card check and to commence collective bargaining negotiations. The letter stated that a reply was expected within three days. Mr. Stephenson received this letter on April 19 upon his return from an out of town trip. It reached his office on April 18.

On April 17, two days before Mr. Stephenson received the letter, the union filed a petition with the Regional Office of the Board in Tampa, Florida, requesting that it be certified as the representative of Respondent's employees. The petition was docketed in the Tampa office on Monday, April 20 and a copy was mailed immediately to Mr. Stephenson who received it on April 21. He was advised that a Board representative would contact him at an early date and full cooperation was requested. On the same day, the Regional Director through a Jacksonville staff member advised Mr. Stephenson by letter that a secret ballot vote would be held among his employees pursuant to the petition filed by the union. Stephenson, upon receipt of this letter on April 22, promptly telephoned the staff member that he would voluntarily consent to an election and that any date for the election was agreeable. He was then sent an election agreement and the election was held on May 11. Meanwhile, nothing further had been heard from the union. No demurrer of any kind was lodged to holding the election in lieu of recognition based on the cards without an election. The union lost the election by a large margin² and the complaint which forms the subject matter of the proceedings before us followed.

The theory of the complaint and of the order is that the company frustrated the election by engaging in activities in violation of § 8 (a) (1) of the Act. The Trial Examiner agreed and held, under these circumstances, that the company should be required to recognize the union as the bargaining representative of the employees. Having reached this point, the conclusion followed that Respondent also violated § 8 (a) (5) and (1) by refusing to bargain with the union as the representative of the employees. This conclusion, of course, rests on the premise which we find unwarranted that the union represented a majority of the employees by virtue of card authorization. With one minor exception, the Board simply adopted the findings, conclusions, and recommendations of the Trial Examiner.

I.

The findings and conclusions with respect to the § 8 (a) (1) violations have to do in the main with threats on behalf of management to close Respondent's plant to avoid the union. Some of the threats were made by supervisory personnel including the wife of the owner. Others were made to individual employees by certain members of the Board of Directors of the Union County Development Authority. The Authority had promoted and financed Respondent's plant and, to some extent, was financing its current operations. The Authority and all of its directors were made Respondents as agents of the Respondent company and the cease and desist order runs against them as agents.

Another threat, somewhat veiled, came in the form of a speech to the employees by Mr. Stephenson. It is argued that this speech was an effort to dissipate the effect of the prior threat or rumor that the plant might be closed if the union won the election. We agree with the Board, based on construing the speech in light of the prior threats, that it tended to substantiate the previous threats. It exceeded mere economic prophesy. Cf. Southwire Company v. NLRB, 5 Cir., 1967, 383 F.2d 235; NLRB v. Brownwood Manufacturing Company, 5 Cir., 1966, 363 F.2d 136; Texas Industries, Inc. v. NLRB, 5 Cir., 1964, 336 F.2d 128; NLRB v. Transport Clearings, Inc., 5 Cir., 1963, 311 F.2d 519.

On the other hand, we reject the finding that the letter from the Authority to the employees was violative of § 8(a) (1). It did not exceed the bounds and was no more than an economic prophesy made by one financially interested in Respondent.

The agency connection between Respondent and the Authority was established by the fact that Mr. Stephenson supplied the Authority with a list of his employees and took no action to avoid the violative conduct of the directors of the Authority. It was thus proper to hold Respondent employer for their conduct and to hold the Authority for the conduct of its directors in making the threats of plant closing to the employees. Cf. Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America v. NLRB, 1966, 125 U.S.App.D.C. 275, 371 F.2d 740; Colson Corporation v. NLRB, 8 Cir., 1965, 347 F.2d 128.

We conclude that the editorial against the union which appeared in the local newspaper and the news story regarding the fact that Respondent had cancelled its plans to expand cannot be used as a basis for finding a violation of § 8(a) (1). There was no proof of any connection between Respondent and the newspaper and it would be a dangerous concept for the Labor Board to carve out such an exception to freedom of press rights.

Respondent is also charged with violative conduct in taking the somewhat stereotype affidavits of forty two employees after the election and prior to the hearing as a part of its defense to anticipated charges of unfair labor practices. The finding that this activity was coercive of the employees in their right to organize is amply justified by the circumstances shown in the record. See NLRB v. Lindsay Newspapers, Inc., 5 Cir., 1963, 315 F.2d 709; Texas Industries, Inc. v. NLRB, supra.

In sum, the order will be enforced as it respects the § 8(a) (1) violations but no consideration is given to the letter written to the employees by the Authority or to the newspaper editorial and news article.

II.

The conclusion that § 8(a) (5) was violated involves errors of fact and law. We begin by recognizing that the remedy of requiring recognition of a union having a majority is proper where warranted by the facts although, meanwhile, the union may have lost the election. It is particularly apt where the employer has frustrated a union majority by illegal conduct during time gained through the stratagem of seeking an election. See NLRB v. Southeastern Rubber Mfg. Co., 5 Cir., 1954, 213 F.2d 11; Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America v. NLRB, supra; Colson Corporation v. NLRB, supra.

Each case must, however, turn on its own facts and circumstances and there are two rules of law to be considered in approaching the issue before us. First, the burden of proof is on the General Counsel, once representation cards are challenged as here because of misrepresentation in their procurement and proof is offered which substantiates the challenge, to show that the subjective intent to authorize union representation was not vitiated by the misrepresentation. Engineers & Fabricators, Inc. v. NLRB, 5 Cir., 1967, 376 F.2d 482. The other rule with which we are concerned is that which the Board follows in such situations of not looking beyond the face of the union authorization card to examine the signers intent except where the union solicitor has stated to the employee that the only or sole purpose of executing the card is to obtain an election. Cumberland Shoe Corporation, 1963, 144 NLRB 1268, enforced, NLRB v. Cumberland Shoe Corporation, 6 Cir., 1965, 351 F.2d 917. See also NLRB v. Winn-Dixie Stores, Inc., 6 Cir., 1965, 341 F.2d 750; NLRB v. Swan Super Cleaners, Inc., 6 Cir., 1967, 384 F.2d 609.

The Cumberland Shoe rule has been criticized³ and this court has declined to follow it. Engineers & Fabricators, Inc. v. NLRB, supra. We had previously considered the question in the context of an ambiguous authorization card and ruled against the union. NLRB v. Peterson Brothers, Inc., 5 Cir., 1965, 342 F.2d 221. Here there is no ambiguity. As in the Engineers & Fabricators case, supra, the employees accepted membership.⁴ There is no mention of an election on the cards.

The evidence before the Trial Examiner here was the testimony of the union solicitors and a number of the employees who were solicited. Although some of these employees testified that a representation was made to them that the cards would be used only for the purposes of securing an election, the credibility choices of the Examiner to the contrary cannot be set aside. The Examiner keyed on the word "only" pursuant to the Cumberland Shoe rule. He disposed of the...