National Labor Relations Board v. Ona Corp.

605 F. Supp. 874
CourtDistrict Court, N.D. Alabama
DecidedMarch 12, 1985
DocketNo. CV 84-HM-5641-NE
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 605 F. Supp. 874 (National Labor Relations Board v. Ona Corp.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, N.D. Alabama 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. Ona Corp., 605 F. Supp. 874 (N.D. Ala. 1985).

Opinion

MEMORANDUM OF DECISION

HALTOM, District Judge.

This is an action brought by the National Labor Relations Board (the “Board”) through its Regional Director pursuant to Section 100 of the National Labor Rela[876]*876tions Act (the “Act”), 29 U.S.C. § 160C]),1 for temporary injunctive relief pending a final decision by the Board in Case 10-CA-20287 on unfair labor practice charges filed against Ona Corporation, a division of Onan Corporation (“Ona Corporation”). The Petition for Injunction herein was filed after issuance of a complaint by the Board based upon charges filed by International Union, United Automobile, Aerospace and Agricultural Implement Workers of America (“UAW”). The Board complaint alleges in essence that Ona Corporation has engaged in, and is engaging in conduct violative of Sections 8(a)(1)2 and 8(a)(3)3 of the Act in that “on or about June 18, 1984, it discharged its employee Roger Armstrong because of his membership in and activities on behalf of [UAW] and because he engaged in concerted activities with other employees for the purposes of collective bargaining ... ”. The Petition for Injunction before this Court is predicated on the Board’s conclusion that there is reasonable cause to believe that Ona Corporation has engaged in, and is engaging in, the unfair labor practices alleged in the complaint and that temporary injunctive relief in this case, including the reinstatement of Roger Armstrong, is just and proper.

Upon the issuance of an Order To Show Cause why injunctive relief, should not be granted as prayed for in the Board’s Petition for Injunction, Respondent Ona Corporation filed its answer herein. Respondent’s answer admits the allegations of Paragraph 3 of the Petition for Injunction that on or about June 20 and July 16, 1984 UAW filed a charge and amended charge respectively in Case 10-CA-20287 alleging violation by Ona Corporation of Sections 8(a)(1) and 8(a)(3) of the Act, admits the allegations of Paragraph 4 of the Petition that following investigation and pursuant to Section 10(b) of the Act the complaint of the Board issued in Case 10-CA-20287 charging that Ona Corporation has violated and is violating Sections 8(a)(1) and 8(a)(3) of the Act, denies that the Board has reasonable cause to believe the allegations of the complaint issued by the Board attached as Exhibit 2 to the Petition, denies that Ona Corporation has engaged or is engaged in violation of Sections 8(a)(1) and 8(a)(3) of the Act as alleged in the Board’s complaint, and specifically denies that injunctive relief is reasonable or appropriate in this case. Except as specifically admitted in its answer to the Petition for Injunction Ona Corporation specifically denies each of the factual allegations of the Petition.

An evidentiary hearing on the issues raised by the Petition of the Board and the answer of Respondent Ona Corporation was held in the courtroom of the Federal Courthouse in Huntsville, Alabama on September 12, 1984. The Motion To Intervene by UAW was denied. However, UAW’s alternative motion to appear herein as amicus curiae was granted. All parties were afforded full opportunity to be heard, to examine and cross-examine witnesses and [877]*877to present evidence bearing upon the issues. Proposed findings of fact and conclusions of law requested by the Court were submitted by counsel for the parties herein on October 1 and 2, 1984. As authorized by Rule 52(a), Fed.R.Civ.P., the Court in this memorandum of decision incorporates its findings of fact specially and states separately its conclusions of law thereon.

FINDINGS OF FACT

1. Respondent Ona Corporation, a division of Onan Corporation, is, and has been at all times material herein, a Delaware corporation, with an office and place of business located at Huntsville, Alabama, where it is engaged in the manufacture of gasoline and diesel engines and generators. At the time of the commission of the alleged unfair labor practices on June 18, 1984 which precipitated this litigation Ona Corporation employed approximately 700 workers at its Huntsville plant.

2. Since early April 1979 the International Union, United Automobile, Aerospace and Implement Workers of America (“UAW”) has engaged in a hotly contested effort to organize the Huntsville maintenance and production employees of Ona Corporation with Roger Armstrong, a long time Ona employee, being one of the primary UAW supporters in the Ona plant from the inception of the UAW organizational activities. Armstrong has shown his support of UAW through his solicitation of authorization and membership cards, distribution of UAW literature and paraphernalia and testimony at Board hearings. His termination of employment by Ona on June 18, 1974 without doubt removed from the plant one of the inside linchpins of UAW’s organizational efforts at such location.

3. Ona Corporation, the respondent in this case, was also respondent to a complaint which was the subject of the Board’s Decision and Order dated May 28, 1982, and reported at 261 NLRB 1378 (1982). In this earlier case (referred to hereafter as Ona I), Ona Corporation, the present respondent, was found guilty of a series of individual violations of Section 8(a)(1) of the Act prior to and following a Board conducted election on June 22, 1979 at Ona’s Huntsville plant facility involving International Union, UAW. In its Decision the Board concluded that Ona Corporation had committed 59 unfair labor practices during the ten-week period surrounding the Board election. Seventeen of Ona’s officials, from top ranking Plant Manager Don Fore to the front-line supervisors, were found to have engaged in this employer’s unlawful anti-union campaign. Ona’s illegal actions were deemed to be of sufficient gravity that the Board set aside the results of the election and entered an order directing Ona to bargain with UAW. The Board found that during UAW’s organizing campaign, Ona “embarked on a course of unlawful conduct calculated to destroy any majority support the Union may achieve.” 261 NLRB at 1381. Part of this unlawful conduct involved threats made by Plant Manager Don Fore to move the Company’s new diesel line out of Huntsville if UAW won the election. The Board concluded that Fore’s threats regarding the diesel line in and of themselves had a “lingering pernicious effect” on the employees, and were of such a nature as to make “the holding of a fair election or a rerun election impossible.”4 The Board therefore concluded that [878]*878a bargaining order was necessary to protect the employees’ rights.5

4. Shortly after the Board’s decision was issued on May 28, 1982 referred to in Finding of Fact No. 3, a union membership campaign was again initiated by UAW with respect to Ona Corporation’s Huntsville plant. The summer 1982 UAW membership campaign at respondent’s Huntsville plant resulted in additional charges by UAW of unfair labor practices allegedly committed by Ona during such campaign. Hearings were conducted on March 15 and 16, 1983 at Huntsville, Alabama by Administrative Law Judge Pargen Robertson who on June 30, 1983 found and determined that Ona had continued to engage in unfair labor practices: (1) by refusing to bargain with UAW over certain employee grievances; and (2) by maintaining documents in an employee’s personnel file identifying the employee as a “union pusher.”6

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605 F. Supp. 874, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/national-labor-relations-board-v-ona-corp-alnd-1985.