National Labor Relations Board v. West Coast Casket Co., Inc

205 F.2d 902 NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD v. WEST COAST CASKET CO., Inc. No. 13515. United States Court of Appeals Ninth Circuit. June 30, 1953. Rehearing Denied July 29, 1953. George J. Bott, Gen. Coun., David P. Findling, Asso. Gen. Coun., Frederick U. Reel and Rosanna A. Blake, Attorneys, N.L.R.B., Washington, D.C., for petitioner. James S. Duberg and Holmes E. Hobart, Los Angeles, Cal., for respondent. Before DENMAN, Chief Judge, and ORR and POPE, Circuit Judges. ORR, Circuit Judge. 1 The National Labor Relations Board, hereafter the Board, petitions for enforcement of an order issued against respondent, a corporation engaged in the manufacture and sale of caskets, pursuant to findings that violations of § 8(a)(1) and (3) of the Labor Management Relations Act of 1947, hereafter the Act, 29 U.S.C.A. § 158 (a)(1) and (3), had occurred. No jurisdictional question is raised, respondent having a substantial amount of interstate purchases and sales. 2 During late September or early October of 1950, Local 15 of the Upholsterers International Union of North America, A.F.L., hereafter the Union, commenced a campaign to organize the employees in respondent's Los Angeles…

The National Labor Relations Board, hereafter the Board, petitions for enforcement of an order issued against respondent, a corporation engaged in the manufacture and sale of caskets, pursuant to findings that violations of § 8(a)(1) and (3) of the Labor Management Relations Act of 1947, hereafter the Act, 29 U.S.C.A. § 158 (a)(1) and (3), had occurred. No jurisdictional question is raised, respondent having a substantial amount of interstate purchases and sales.

During late September or early October of 1950, Local 15 of the Upholsterers International Union of North America, A.F. L,, hereafter the Union, commenced a campaign to organize the employees in respondent’s Los Angeles plants. The Board found that in the course of this organizational drive respondent violated § 8(a)(1) of the Act, 29 U.S.C.A. § 158 (a)(1), by interrogating its employees concerning their union sympathies and the reasons therefor, by threatening to discharge those employees who had refused to cross a picket line and come to work, by threatening to close one of its plants if the Union was successful, and by announcing various new economic benefits to induce the employees to reject the Union. There is ample…

I concur in so much of the opinion as finds respondent guilty of unfair labor practices in attempting to discourage the union activities, contrary to § 8(a)(1). I think, however, that the evidence wholly fails to support a finding that employee Smith was discharged for union activities, or that the Union struck on account of .Smith’s discharge. The only evidence that Smith was thus discharged is the testimony as to what Smith said forelady Settle said to her. Settle, although a supervisor for some purposes, was not an agent of the employer authorized to make statements bind? *909 ing on him, or an agent any part of whose duties included making statements. Settle was not a witness. What she said to Smith was purely hearsay and inadmissible. National Labor Rel. Board v. Amalgamated Meat Cutters, 9 Cir., 202 F.2d 671, 673 .

Numerous union members testified but none but Wells was asked as to what transpired at the union meeting, lie alone said that the Smith discharge was there discussed “quite thoroughly”. Discussed by whom ? Who else was present at that meeting? As to who was there, there is no evidence. No other union member was asked about this discussion. The Union put out…