National Labor Relations Board v. Crystal Spring Finishing Co.

116 F.2d 669, 7 L.R.R.M. (BNA) 346, 1941 U.S. App. LEXIS 4447
CourtCourt of Appeals for the First Circuit
DecidedJanuary 7, 1941
DocketNo. 3597
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 116 F.2d 669 (National Labor Relations Board v. Crystal Spring Finishing Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the First Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
National Labor Relations Board v. Crystal Spring Finishing Co., 116 F.2d 669, 7 L.R.R.M. (BNA) 346, 1941 U.S. App. LEXIS 4447 (1st Cir. 1941).

Opinion

PETERS, District Judge.

This case is before the court on petition of the National Labor Relations Board for enforcement of an order issued against the respondent under Section 10(c) of the National Labor Relations Act, 29 U.S.C.A. § 160(c). The respondent is a Massachusetts corporation doing business at Freetown, in that State, where certain unfair labor practices are alleged to have occurred.

Upon charges made by the United Textile Workers of America, a labor union, the Board issued its complaint against the respondent alleging conduct constituting unfair labor practices within the meaning of Section 8(1), (2), (3), and (5) of the Act, 29 U.S.C.A. § 158 (1-3, 5). The respondent did not file an answer but appeared and participated in the hearing.

The Trial Examiner filed his report to which the respondent filed exceptions. The Board rendered its decision with findings of fact, conclusions of law, and an order to cease and desist from certain practices, and to take certain affirmative action.

From findings of fact which are supported by substantial evidence, largely undisputed, it appears that the business of the respondent is that of bleaching, dyeing, mercerizing and finishing textile fabrics in its plant where it employs between 80 and 90 men; that the plant finishes between 2,500,000 and 3,000,000 yards of cloth per month. Respondent’s customers are Converters, so-called, who have and retain title to the goods sent to the respondent’s plant to be processed. Respondent’s customers are about twelve in number, of whom eight are located outside the state. Twenty per cent of the cloth processed is shipped into the plant from outside the state. Twenty-five per cent of all the goods processed is sent directly to various points outside the state. A batch of unfinished goods comes into the plant and the finished cloth goes out in a period of about one week. Respondent has no transportation facilities of its own and no control over the method by which the materials are shipped into or out of its plant, v(diich is largely by truck. The flow of goods in and out of the plant is fairly constant. An officer of the respondent testified that “these customers in New York have their special trucking concerns that they give that business to, and they inform them to call on us and make arrangements to take their merchandise to points of destination. When they start they know what time to come up there and call for the goods. We usually have a truck in at three and one at four, from the different trucking concerns, to take care of the trucking for the [671]*671customer.” The trucking was largely handled by interstate transportation lines.

It is claimed in behalf of the respondent that the National Labor Relations Act does not apply to this situation; that its attempted application is unconstitutional and that the Board has no jurisdiction, because the respondent is merely a local manufacturer and not engaged in interstate commerce.

The two cases cited by counsel for respondent in support of his general proposition that the Act cannot be- applied to this respondent in the .conduct of its business— Foster Bros. Mfg. Co. v. National Labor Relations Board, 4 Cir., 85 F.2d 984, and Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corp. v. Meyers, D.C., 15 F.Supp. 915, affirmed 1 Cir., 88 F.2d 154 — are no longer authority. The Foster Case, decided in 1936, ceased to be an authority after the decision in 1937 of the case of National Labor Relations Board v. Jones & Laughlin Steel Corp., 301 U.S. 1, 57 S.Ct. 615, 81 L.Ed. 893, 108 A.L.R. 1352.

The Bethlehem Shipbuilding Case cannot be relied upon by respondent to support his contention since the decision in Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corp. v. National Labor Relations Board, 1 Cir., 114 F.2d 930. See also Myers et al. v. Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corp., 303 U.S. 41, 58 S.Ct. 459, 82 L.Ed. 638, and Santa Cruz Fruit Packing Co. v. National Labor Relations Board, 303 U.S. 453, 58 S.Ct. 656, 82 L.Ed. 954.

The point raised by respondent is also directly covered by the decision in National Labor Relations Board v. Fainblatt et al., 306 U.S. 601, 59 S.Ct. 668, 83 L.Ed. 1014, which decides that the Act is applicable to employers not themselves engaged in interstate commerce who are engaged in a relatively small business of processing materials which are regularly transmitted to them by the owners through the channels of interstate commerce, and after the processing are returned to the owner’s agent at the factory and by him shipped to interstate destinations — the same situation, which is present here to a considerable extent. It appears from the evidence as to the respondent’s business that a substantial amount of interstate commerce is involved which would be injuriously affected by a strike of the workmen. It is unimportant that the respondent’s finishing operations were performed upon goods belonging to others who furnished their own transportation. National Labor Relations Board v. Bradford Dyeing Association, 310 U.S. 318, 60 S.Ct. 918, 84 L.Ed. 1226.

The unfair labor practices found by the Board were, (a) the discharge of an employee, one Manuel Rapoza, of Fall River, and the refusal to reinstate him because of union membership and activities, (b) refusal to bargain collectively with the Union which was the duly designated bargaining unit of the respondent’s employees; (c) the locking out of and refusal to reinstate ten employees because of union activities, for the purpose of discouraging membership in the Union and to avoid collective bargaining with it, and (d) domination and interference with the formation of a labor organization.

By such conduct the respondent was alleged to have engaged in unfair labor practices affecting commerce within the meaning of Section 8 (1), (2), (3) and (5) and Section 2 (6) and (7) of the Act.

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116 F.2d 669, 7 L.R.R.M. (BNA) 346, 1941 U.S. App. LEXIS 4447, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/national-labor-relations-board-v-crystal-spring-finishing-co-ca1-1941.