Source: https://case-law.vlex.com/vid/328-f-2d-820-595635590
Timestamp: 2019-04-18 22:37:04+00:00

Document:
328 F.2d 820 (3rd Cir. 1964), 14390, Metropolitan Life Ins. Co. v. N. L. R. B.
Burton A. Zorn, New York City, Owen B. Rhoads, Philadelphia, Pa., George G. Gallantz, Marvin Dicket, Thomas F. Delaney, Associate Gen. Counsel, New York City, for petitioner; Dechert, Price & Rhoads, Philadelphia, Pa., Proskauer, Rose, Goetz & Mendelsohn, New York City, of counsel.
Warren M. Davison, Arnold Ordman, Gen. Counsel, Dominick L. Manoli, Associate Gen. Counsel, Marcel Mallet-Prevost, Asst. Gen. Counsel, Warren M. Davison, Lee M. Modjeska, Attys., N.L.R.B., Washington, D.C., for respondent.
Isaac N. Groner, Washington, D.C., amicus curiae, Insurance Workers International Union, AFL-CIO.
This case is before the court upon the petition of the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company (Metropolitan) to review and set aside an order of the National Labor Relations Board (Board) issued against Metropolitan on March 11, 1963, pursuant so Section 10(e) of the National Labor Relations Act, as amended. 29 U.S.C. § 151 et seq. (1958). In its answer the Board has requested that its order be enforced in full.
Metropolitan is a New York corporation, engaged in the sale and issuance of insurance policies throughout the United States and Canada. Its operations are highly centralized and the practices and procedures established at the New York home office govern the district offices, which are the basic operating units of the company. A superintendent of agencies oversees the district offices in his territory, while each district office is under the supervision of a manager. The district offices themselves are relatively independent of each other, except in so far as they are joined by the company into a territory. There is virtually no interchange of agents among the various district offices, and there is no business or social contact among agents except on the individual district office level.
has eighteen, Kirkwood nineteen, and Dover seventeen.
It was within this organizational structure, the Insurance Workers' International Union, AFL-CIO (Union) sought to organize Metropolitan's insurance agents in Delaware. Apparently failing in its attempt to organize the agents of the three district offices, the Union petitioned the Board, pursuant to § 9(c) of the Act, requesting certification as bargaining representative of the agents at the two Wilmington district offices. The Board decided that the grouping of these two offices was an appropriate unit for collective bargaining and directed an election to be held. The Metropolitan Life Insurance Company, 138 N.L.R.B. 565 (1962). The Union won and on October 15, 1962 the Board certified the Union as the representative.
Upon Metropolitan's refusal to bargain, the Board found that Metropolitan was guilty of an unfair labor practice within the meaning of Section 8(a)(5) and Section 8(a)(1) of the Act. Metropolitan Life Insurance Company, 141 N.L.R.B. No. 37 (1963). Metropolitan has admitted that it refused to bargain but has argued consistently below and here, that the grouping of the Brandywine and Kirkwood district offices, is not as appropriate unit, that the Board's unit determination is based on the Union's extent of organization contrary to 9(c) (5) of the Act.
By virtue of Section 9(b) of the National Labor Relations Act (Wagner Act), Congress has given the Board the authority to determine units appropriate for purposes of collective bargaining. 29 U.S.C. § 159(b)(1958), as amended. The Taft-Hartley Amendments have not altered this and the determination of an appropriate unit remains one left to the wide and informed discretion of the Board. Its decision, if not final, is rarely to be disturbed. Packard Motor Car Company v. N.L.R.B., 330 U.S. 485, 491, 67 S.Ct. 789, 91 L.Ed. 1040 (1947); Texas Pipe Line Company v. N.L.R.B., 296 F.2d 208, 210 (5 Cir. 1961); Foreman & Clark, Inc. v. N.L.R.B., 215 F.2d 396, 405 (9 Cir. 1954). See N.L.R.B. v. Pittsburgh Plate Glass Co., 270 F.2d 167, 173 (4 Cir. 1959); N.L.R.B. v. J. W. Rex Co., 243 F.2d 356, 359 (3 Cir. 1957); Westinghouse Electric Corp. v. N.L.R.B., 236 F.2d 939, 942 (3 Cir. 1956); N.L.R.B. v. Botany Worsted Mills, 133 F.2d 876, 880 (3 Cir. 1943). However, the 1947 amendments, by the addition of certain sections and provisos to the Act, limited the discretion of the Board in determining appropriate units. This appeal is focused on Section 9(c) (5), 1 one such limiting section and the issue to be determined here is whether in the exercise of its said discretion, the Board went afoul of the Congressional mandate that in determining appropriate units, the extent to which the employees have organized shall not be controlling.
to the view that it was desirable in the determination of an appropriate unit to render collective bargaining of employees an immediate or reasonably early possibility. The Board regarded this view as an obedient implementation of the command of the National Labor Relations Act that it seek to 'insure to employees the full benefit of their right to selforganization and to collective bargaining and otherwise to effectuate the policies of this act.' 3 However, as the theory was brought to bear on Board determinations of appropriate units, it became clear that in certain instances, the extent of employee organization was given controlling weight. See Matter of Chase Brass & Copper Co., Inc., 4 N.L.R.B. 47, 51 (1937); New England Spun Silk Corp., 11 N.L.R.B. 852 (1939); Matter of Botany Worsted Mills, 27 N.L.R.B. 687 (1940), with which Board determination we did not interfere. N.L.R.B. v. Botany Worsted Mills, 133 F.2d 876 (3 Cir. 1943); J. L. Hudson Co., 56 N.L.R.B. 406 (1944).
These decisions and others 4 attest to the strong, if not overwhelming reliance the Board, from time to time, placed on the factor of the union's extent of organization. It was this approach Congress sought to block.
public utilities, insurance companies and other business whose operations are widespread. It is sufficient answer to say that the Board has evolved numerous tests to determine appropriate units, such as community of interest of employees involved, extent of common supervision, interchange of employees, geographical considerations, etc., any one of which may justify the finding of a small unit. The extent of organization theory has been used where all valid tests fail to give the union what it desires and represents a surrender by the Board of its duty to determine appropriate units. Its use has been particularly bad where another union comes in and organizes the remainder of the unit which results in the establishment of two inappropriate units.' 2 Leg.Hist. 1625.
Simultaneous with the hearings and debates in Congress regarding the proposed amendments to the National Labor Relations Act, the Board was confronted with a series of representation petitions 6 of which Garden State Hosiery Co., 74 N.L.R.B. 318 (1947) is most informative. For the first time the Board entered upon an extended discussion of the significance of the extent of organization theory in its consideration of an appropriate unit.

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