Season-All Industries, Inc. v. National Labor Relations Board

654 F.2d 932, 107 L.R.R.M. (BNA) 3170, 1981 U.S. App. LEXIS 11280
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Third Circuit
DecidedJuly 17, 1981
Docket80-2096
StatusPublished
Cited by25 cases

This text of 654 F.2d 932 (Season-All Industries, Inc. v. National Labor Relations Board) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Season-All Industries, Inc. v. National Labor Relations Board, 654 F.2d 932, 107 L.R.R.M. (BNA) 3170, 1981 U.S. App. LEXIS 11280 (3d Cir. 1981).

Opinions

OPINION OF THE COURT

GARTH, Circuit Judge.

Once again we are asked to review the denial of a hearing by the Regional Director of the National Labor Relations Board when grave assertions are made by the company that the “laboratory conditions” of a representation election were violated by actions of a union agent.

We have recently addressed different aspects of this subject in Anchor Inns Inc. v. NLRB, 644 F.2d 292 (3d Cir. 1981); Zeiglers Refuse Collectors, Inc. v. NLRB, 639 F.2d 1000 (3d Cir. 1981); and NLRB v. Campbell Products Dept., 623 F.2d 876 (3d Cir. 1980). In Zeiglers we reviewed the election process after an evidentiary hearing had been held to investigate irregularities. In Anchor Inns, we reviewed the election process where an evidentiary hearing had been sought by the company and denied. In Campbell, no evidentiary hearing was required because the Board assumed the truth of Campbell’s contentions.

Here, Season-All seeks an evidentiary hearing to examine the conduct and status of one of its employees (Sadler) who it asserts was a union agent and whose electioneering activities, Season-All claims, influenced co-workers outside the polling place while they were waiting their turn to vote.

The Regional Director conducted only an ex parte investigation despite the company’s assertion that Sadler was a union agent and had identified himself with the union by saying that he was there “for the union, to keep management away from the polling area.”

The Board sustained the Regional Director’s refusal to investigate Sadler’s status and issued an order directing Season-All to bargain with the union. Consistent with our recent pronouncements, we grant Season-All’s petition, deny the Board’s cross-application for enforcement and remand the case to the Board for an evidentiary hearing.

[934]*934I.

Season-All Industries, Inc. produces thermal windows and doors. At issue in this case, is the representation of Season-All’s employees by the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, AFL-CIO (IAM).

A petition seeking a representation election was filed with the Board on April 2, 1979 by District Lodge No. 63 of the IAM. The election was held on June 29, 1979 and the relevant results were tabulated as follows:

Approximate number of eligible voters .... 79
Votes cast for IAM.................... 36
Votes cast for [other unions]............. 9
Votes cast against participating labor organizations ....................... 25
Valid votes counted.................... 70
Challenged ballots..................... 5
Challenges are sufficient in number to affect the results of the election.

After the election, on July 5, 1979, Season-All filed objections to the conduct of the election. Season-All objected that “[a]n agent of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers engaged in electioneering outside the polling place.” Season-All also alleged that Sadler urged waiting voters to vote for the union; that Sadler harassed female employees whom he felt were not favorably disposed to vote for the union; and that Sadler, by declaring that a company officer was improperly present at the polling area, implied to the voters that the company was engaged in wrongful conduct. The company charged that Sadler conducted his electioneering for a substantial part of the one hour period allotted for voting and within a few feet of the room where voting was taking place. In support of its objections, the company submitted affidavits of Thomas Mittlehauser, the assistant to the company’s Industrial Relations Director. The charges in the affidavits supported the objections filed by the company and, among other things, claimed that Sadler had stood outside the polling place for some time and had told Mittlehauser in a loud voice that he, Mittlehauser, was not permitted near the voting place because of his position with the company.

After an ex parte investigation the Regional Director issued a Supplemental Decision on Objections and Challenges. He found that “Sadler was a rank-and-file employee and an eligible voter. . . . [and] held no position of any kind for the [union]. . . . ” (133a) The Regional Director “conclud[ed] that Sadler’s conduct . . . can in no way be attributable to the Petitioner,” although he conceded that “[i]n Milehem, Inc., 170 NLRB 362 [other courts and the Board most often cite this case as Milehem, Inc. although it was originally reported as Mi-chem, Inc. Because many of the cases to which we refer cite the case as Milehem, we will use that nomenclature throughout this opinion.], the Board held that in situations where a party to the proceeding in cases of electioneering which is more than de minimis at the polling place while voting is in progress, the Board will find such electioneering to be per se a basis for setting aside an election.” (134a) He distinguished Mil-chem, however, by stating that in Milehem, the “conduct complained of was engaged in by an agent of the union. . . . ” Id.

The Regional Director described the testimony concerning Sadler as follows:

All of the alleged objectionable conduct attributed to the alleged agent of the Petitioner relates to conduct of a rank- and-file employee, Ray Sadler. Sadler was an eligible voter.
The election was held in an enclosed conference room at the Employer’s facility, entered through a doorway. The voting period was from 11 a. m. to 12 noon. The corridor where employees were waiting in line to vote was located outside the doorway of an office area located between the corridor and the conference room. According to Thomas Mittlehauser, the Employer’s assistant to the industrial relations director, he found it necessary to walk by the employees waiting in line to vote on his way to the nurse’s office shortly after the polls opened; that on his way to the nurse’s office, he noticed Sadler standing in the corridor, but not in the line of waiting voters; that on [935]*935his return from the nurse’s office, approximately 5 to 8 minutes later, he saw Sadler standing in the same position as previously; and that on this occasion, Sadler said to him, “What are you doing here, you have no right to be here, you are management,” to which Mittlehauser responded “that he had been busy treating an employee and was on his way back to his office,” and that Sadler then merely shrugged his shoulders. ■ According to Mittlehauser, he also saw Sadler converse with some of the other employees in the line, but he did not know what Sadler said to such employees.

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Bluebook (online)
654 F.2d 932, 107 L.R.R.M. (BNA) 3170, 1981 U.S. App. LEXIS 11280, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/season-all-industries-inc-v-national-labor-relations-board-ca3-1981.