Carpinteria Lemon Ass'n v. National Labor Relations Board

These five cases involve orders issued by the National Labor Relations Board against five associations of citrus fruit growers operating in the vicinity of Oxnard, California. In each case, the Board asks that we enforce its order and the association asks that we set it aside.

The facts and issues, with minor exceptions, are basically similar in all five cases. Each association was formed to process and pack citrus fruit grown by its members. In November, 1953, as the result of Board-conducted elections held pursuant to consent agreements, the United Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Growers, Local Industrial Union No. 78, CIO, was chosen the bargaining agent for the employees in each association and was certified as such by the Board. Shortly thereafter, the union began negotiations with each association for a collective bargaining contract.

Early in 1954, the associations refused to negotiate further with the union on the ground that they had received petitions from their employees repudiating the union as their bargaining agent. In each case the petition requested the association to deal with an employee committee and not with the union. However, even prior thereto, negotiations had…

(dissenting).

The amendment of certification of election made by the Regional Director on November 21, 1954, naming the United Packinghouse Workers of America in place of United Fresh Fruit & Vegetable Workers, LIU, which was actually chosen and balloted for by the workers in the *559 plant on November 4, 1953, over a year earlier, is null and void. The clause in the consent election agreement gave no authority for this substitution without consent of the electors. The majority passes over this point in silence.

All of the negotiations and incidents related to the period when United Fresh Fruit & Vegetable Workers, LIU, was the certified agent. The employers objected to the entry on the scene of United Packinghouse Workers of America after their respective employees had protested against this substitution and after the national organization had can-celled the charter of United Fresh Fruit & Vegetable Workers, LIU, which was the certified bargaining unit after the election held more than a year previously. The device of conferring the same number 78 on the new unit cannot avail.

In the above cited case an amendment to certification was held void upon circumstances which afford…