Georgia Kraft Co.

806 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD been recalled after a previous layoff and that the Employer asks its employees to inform their friends when the Employer desires addi- tional employees. Contrary to Petitioner's contentions, we do not consider these facts inconsistent with the uncontroverted evidence upon which the Regional Director relied in finding that the em- ployees in question were permanently laid off before the election. Accordingly, we shall sustain the challenges to the ballots cast by the above-named employees. The Regional Director recommended that only two of the remaining challenges be overruled. As no exceptions have been filed to these recommendations, we hereby adopt his conclusions as to these recom- mendations. As we have overruled Petitioner's objections to the election and as the number of challenges we have overruled is insuf- ficient to affect the results of the election, we shall certify the results of the election in which Petitioner failed to secure a majority of the valid ballots cast. [The Board certified that a majority of the valid ballots was not cast for United Steelworkers of America , AFL-CIO, and that said labor organization is not the exclusive representative of the employees of the Employer in the unit herein found appropriate.] Georgia Kraft Company and Office Employees International Union, AFL-CIO, Petitioner. Case No. 10-RC-4008. May 6,1958 DECISION AND DIRECTION OF ELECTION Upon a petition duly filed under Section 9 (c) of the National Labor Relations Act, a hearing was held before David L. Trezise, hearing officer. The hearing officer's rulings made at the hearing are free from prejudicial error and are hereby affirmed, in part for the reasons discussed hereinafter. Upon the entire record in this case, the Board finds : 1. The Employer is engaged in commerce within the meaning of the Act. 2. The labor organization involved claims to represent certain em- ployees of the Employer.' 3. A question affecting commerce exists concerning the representa- tion of certain employees of the Employer, within the meaning of Sec- tion 9 (c) (1) and Section 2 (6) and (7) of the Act. IInternational Brotherhood of Pulp, Sulphite and Paper Mill Workers, AFL-CIO, Locals 636 and 643, who were permitted to intervene at the hearing, currently represent a unit of E'mployer' s production and maintenance employees , from which unit are ex- eluded the office and plant clerical employees whom Petitioner seeks to represent. Inter- venors have no desire to participate in the election directed herein. 120 NLRB No. 113. GEORGIA KRAFT COMPANY 807 4. Petitioner seeks a unit of the Employer 's office and plant clerical employees. These employees are presently unrepresented , having been excluded from the production and maintenance unit presently represented by Intervenors . The Employer agrees that the unit sought by Petitioner is appropriate . Under these circumstances we find a unit of the Employer 's office and plant clerical employees to be appropriate? With respect to the unit placement of specific job classifications the Employer and Petitioner disagree only as to the traffic and payroll supervisors, whom the Employer claims to be supervisors within the meaning of the Act. The traffic and the payroll supervisor are two of the three highest paid individuals on the Employer's clerical staff. They receive in salary almost $100 a month more than the one or more clerks in their respective departments whose work they responsibly direct. In addi- tion, they have the same authority as the Employer's other super- visors to effectively recommend changes in the employment status of the clerks under their supervision; 1 payroll clerk was discharged and 1 transferred in recent years shortly after the payroll supervisor so recommended. On the basis of these facts we find the payroll and the traffic supervisors to be supervisors as defined in the Act and we shall exclude them from the unit. Accordingly, we find that the following employees constitute a unit appropriate for purposes of collective bargaining within the meaning of Section 9 (b) of the Act: All office clerical and plant clerical employees employed by the Employer at its Macon, Georgia, paper products manufacturing plant, excluding all production and maintenance employees , professional and technical employees, salesmen, guards, secretaries to the resident plant manager and industrial relations manager, registered nurses, office janitors, the messenger and dispatcher, the payroll and the traffic supervisors, and all other supervisors as defined in the Act. 5. At the hearing the Employer sought to show that Petitioner's showing of representative interest was secured through the efforts or assistance of a supervisor and was, therefore, invalid. The hearing officer refused to receive evidence in support of this allegation, ruling that the Board would entertain such evidence and investigate the validity of Petitioner's showing of interest only in an administrative proceeding collateral to the representation proceeding . The Em- ployer takes exception to this ruling and moves the Board to reopen the hearing for the purpose of admitting evidence on this issue. In general, the Board determines the validity of a union 's showing of representative interest only by means of an administrative investi- 2 Eastern Corporation, 11( NLRB 329 808 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD gation.3 Thus, the Board refuses to permit in the representation proceeding the litigation of allegations that authorization cards have been procured by fraud, misrepresentation, or coercion 4 or that they have been revoked 5 or that they are stales However, in a series of cases,7 of which the most recent is The Wolfe Metal Products Corpo- ration case,' the Board has departed from this general rule by enter- taining and resolving in the representation proceeding allegations of supervisory participation in a union's acquisition of its showing of interest. The Board has reconsidered this exception to the general rule which excludes from the representation proceeding issues concerning the validity of the showing of interest. The Board is now of the opinion that the considerations which support the general rule 9 are equally applicable to attacks upon a union's showing of interest based upon alleged supervisory assistance in the acquisition thereof. Accord- ingly, allegations of supervisory participation in, or influence upon, a union's solicitation of a showing of interest will no longer be enter- tained in a representation proceeding and will, like other attacks upon the validity of a showing of interest, be investigated only administra- tively by the Board. To the extent they are inconsistent with our decision herein, The Wolfe Metal Products case and earlier cases which involve this issue are hereby overruled. The hearing officer's ruling which rejected the evidence offered by the Employer to prove the invalidity of Petitioner's showing of interest is hereby affirmed. On the basis of our administrative investigation of the Employer's allegations and evidence relating to the validity of Petitioner's showing of interest, we are administratively satisfied that Petitioner's showing of interest submitted in support of its petition in the instant proceeding is valid and sufficient. We hereby deny the Employer's alternative motions to dismiss the petition or to reopen the hearing in this proceeding. [Text of Direction of Election omitted from publication.] MEMBER RODGERS took no part in the consideration of the above Decision and Direction of Election. 3 Globe Iron Foundry, 112 NLRB 1200. b Standard Cigar Company, 117 NLRB 852; The Babcock if Wilcox Company, 116 NLRB 1542 8 Reliable Matting Service Company, 113 NLRB 1263. 9 The Cleveland Cliffs Iron Company, 117 NLRB 668 s See, for example, Desilu Productions, Inc., 106 NLRB 179; Midland Container Cor- poration, 116 NLRB 1116. s 119 NLRB 659. Potomac Electric Power Company, 111 NLRB 553, at 556; 0. D. Jennings if Com- pany, 68 NLRB 516.