Court Opinion

ID: 9454800
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 18:59:36.774238+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:34:18.956991
License: Public Domain

VAN OOSTERHOUT, Chief Judge,
(dissenting in part).
I dissent from that portion of the majority opinion holding the company’s refusal to bargain with the union on January 12, 1967, constitutes an unfair labor practice and also with respect to enforcing of unfair labor practice charges based upon company activity occurring on or after January 12, 1967.
The union was certified as bargaining agent for the company employees on October 7, 1962. Our opinion requiring bargaining was filed on March 5, 1965. Thus some 22 months elapsed from the date of our enforcement order prior to the January 12, 1967, bargaining session. Therefore it would appear that the period of the irrebutable presumption of majority representation discussed in the majority opinion had expired.
In my view, any rebuttable presumption of union majority representation was dissipated by substantial evidence introduced by the company pointing to the probability that the union had lost its majority status. It was stipulated that there had been a large turnover in employees. The evidence disclosed the company had made some survey with respect to union representation and that a number of employees had expressed a lack of affiliation or interest in the union. While there had been a number of negotiation sessions since our prior decision, no contract was agreed upon. There had been a lull in union activity for a period of eight months prior to January 12, 1967, and the union representative when questioned about this responded that the activities were none of the company’s business. There was no effort at the January 12 meeting or any time subsequent thereto or at the *1094trial to prove majority representation. As stated in Stoner Rubber Co., Inc., 123 NLRB 1440, 1445:
“After the lapse of the certification year, the certification creates only a presumption of continued majority. This presumption is rebuttable. Proof of majority is peculiarly within the special competence of the union. It may be proved by signed authorization cards, dues checkoff cards, membership lists, or any other evidentiary means. An employer can hardly prove that a union no longer represents a majority since he does not have access to the union’s membership lists and direct interrogation of employees would probably be unlawful as well as of dubious validity. Accordingly, to overcome the presumption of majority the employer need only produce sufficient evidence to cast serious doubt on the union’s continued majority status. The presumption then loses its force and the General Counsel must come forward with evidence that on the refusal-to-bargain date the union in fact did represent a majority of employees in the appropriate unit.”
Most courts take the view that a re-buttable presumption disappears completely from the case upon presentation of evidence which would support a finding of the nonexistence of the presumed fact. See 29 Am.Jur.2d Evidence § 165.
As pointed out in the quotation from N.L.R.B. v. Arkansas Grain Corp., 8 Cir., 390 F.2d 824, 828, in the majority opinion, it is necessary in order to establish a refusal-to-bargain violation to prove each of the following elements:
“(1) a demand for recognition and bargaining by a union validly designated by a majority of the employees as their representative in an appropriate bargaining unit; (2) a refusal to bargain which is not motivated by a good faith doubt of the union’s majority status.”
Said case also establishes that there can be no violation if the union at the time of the demand for recognition does not represent a majority of the employees.
The General Counsel by failing to produce any evidence of majority representation on January 12, 1967, has failed to meet the burden resting upon him to establish a wrongful refusal to bargain. Such determination eliminates any need for reaching the separate and independent good faith belief issue.