Hercules Powder Company v. National Labor Relations Board

297 F.2d 424, 49 L.R.R.M. (BNA) 2133, 1961 U.S. App. LEXIS 3162
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
DecidedNovember 17, 1961
Docket18401_1
StatusPublished
Cited by11 cases

This text of 297 F.2d 424 (Hercules Powder Company v. National Labor Relations Board) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Hercules Powder Company v. National Labor Relations Board, 297 F.2d 424, 49 L.R.R.M. (BNA) 2133, 1961 U.S. App. LEXIS 3162 (5th Cir. 1961).

Opinion

WISDOM, Circuit Judge.

The Hercules Powder Company petitions this Court to review and set aside an order of the National Labor Relations Board, issued April 22, 1960, under Section 10 of the National Labor Relations Act, as amended (61 Stat. 136, 73 Stat. 519, 29 U.S.C.A. § 160). In its answer, the Board requests enforcement of the order. We hold that the Board had no jurisdiction and set aside the order. N. L. R. B. v. Happ Bros. Co., 5 Cir., 1952, 196 F.2d 195 controls this case: the Board has no jurisdiction to entertain a complaint charging that an employer engaged in unfair labor practices when the processes of the Board are invoked and set in motion by a charging party as a front for a union which failed to file non-communist affidavits and reports as required by the Taft-Hartley Act.

I.

Hercules, a Delaware corporation, operates a dynamite plant in Bessemer, Alabama. District 50, United Mine Workers, Powder and Acid Workers’ Local No. 134933, has been the collective bargaining representative in the plant since 1950. The Union never complied with Sections 9(f), (g), and (h) of the *426 Taft-Hartley Act requiring the filing of noncommunist affidavits and reports.

The Union has had five successive two year contracts with Hercules including the contract of 1958. Each contract provided that if operations are discontinued for any cause, a sufficient time, not to exceed 72 hours, would be allowed during which all the nitroglycerine would be processed into finished powder and all operating buildings would be properly cleaned.

April 4, 1958, the Union served a sixty-day notice of intent to terminate the contract. The parties began bargaining negotiations and by June had made progress toward agreement. After a number of meetings, the Union accused Hercules of preparing to lock out the employees; Hercules accused the Union of planning a quickie strike. The only unresolved issue on the last day of the contract, June 4, 1958, was the seniority clause, and at the meeting that day the negotiators agreed to meet again to discuss this issue. Hollyfield, the Union representative refused to agree unconditionally to give seventy-two hours notice before going out on strike; he would agree to the extension of the sixty-day notice for any period deemed necessary, upon condition that any benefits negotiated be retroactive to June 4, 1958. The Company insisted on the seventy-two hours notice by the Union in the event of a strike or by the Company in the event of a lockout. Hollyfield refused. The Hercules representative then handed Hollyfield a letter giving notice that the plant would be closed down at 12:01 A.M., June 5, “since explosives production and shipment might become seriously hazardous in the event of sudden work stoppage and since the Company is obligated to its customers to maintain certain delivery schedules”. Hercules placed notices on the bulletin board on June 4 and in the employees’ pay envelopes on June 5 telling the employees not to report for work “inasmuch as it is impossible to operate the plant without a guarantee that a sufficient cleanup period would be observed”.

The Company’s unyielding attitude was short-lived. June 5 Hercules acceded to the Union’s demand and reached final agreement on the terms of a new contract before the alleged lockout began. Hercules would not allow the men to return to work, however, until the contract was prepared and signed. The contract was ratified June 11, signed June 12, and operations resumed June 13.

November 28, 1958, T. Z. Parsons, President of the Local, for himself and 109 members, filed charges with the Board at its Regional Office in Atlanta alleging that Hercules had engaged in unfair labor practices. The same day, the Atlanta office mailed letters to Parsons and the 109 employees requesting them “to report” at the Birmingham office December 1 and 2, 1958. Parsons and 100 of these employees showed up. Prepared by the Board and ready for signature was an abbreviated, generalized version of Parsons’ original charges. All who reported signed. At this time, and prompted by the Birmingham Board agent, Parsons withdrew his original charges. Leaving no loose ends, Parsons signed for the nine employees who failed “to report.” The Board accepted charges from these nine along with the others, treating each employee’s charge as a separate case for filing purposes but consolidating the 110 cases, thereafter treating them as one ease. In due time the Board issued a complaint against Hercules.

By a bare majority, two members dissenting, 1 the Board held that Hercules *427 violated Section 8(a) (1) and (3) of the Act by curtailing production and locking out its employees while active bargaining negotiations were still in progress with the Union. 2 127 N.L.R.B. No. 46. We do not reach the merits of the case, since the Happ decision compels us to hold that the Board had no jurisdiction. The Trial Examiner discussed the jurisdictional issue in his Intermediate Report 3 approved in full by the Board. The Board opinion is silent on this issue.

II.

Section 9(h) of the Taft-Hartley Act, 29 U.S.C.A. § 159(h), as it existed before the recent amendments, provided that:

“No investigation shall be made by the Board * - ", and no complaint shall be issued pursuant to a charge made by a labor organization under subsection (b) of section 160 of this title, unless there is on file with the Board an affidavit executed * * * by each officer of such labor organization and the officers of any national or international labor organization of which it is an affiliate or constituent unit that he is not a member of the Communist Party * * *»

This provision is jurisdictional. N. L. R. B. v. Coca-Cola Bottling Co. of Louisville, 1956, 350 U.S. 264, 76 S.Ct. 383, 100 L.Ed. 285. Its repeal, therefore, by the Labor Management Reform Act of 1959, § 201(d), did not retroactively confer jurisdiction on the Board in pending *428 cases initiated by non-complying unions. 4

The “Board’s jurisdiction will not be presumed but must be made to appear”. N. L. R. B. v. Ingram, 5 Cir., 1960, 273 F.2d 670, 672. Within the context of this case that principle requires an affirmative showing that the charging party was not a front for the Union.

In N. L. R. B. v. Happ Brothers, 5 Cir., 1952, 196 F.2d 195, this Court discussed the jurisdictional requirements at some length and on facts closely analogous to the facts here held that the requirement could not be evaded by a non-complying union using an individual as a false front.

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297 F.2d 424, 49 L.R.R.M. (BNA) 2133, 1961 U.S. App. LEXIS 3162, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/hercules-powder-company-v-national-labor-relations-board-ca5-1961.