Court Opinion

ID: 9653474
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 17:47:24.285229+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:12:59.505583
License: Public Domain

MAGRUDER, Circuit Judge
(concurring).
The letter which the president of respondent company sent to all employees on the eve of the election was, on its face, fair and temperate in tone. It set forth respondent’s view that the past relationship between management and employees had been a satisfactory one; that grievances had been adjusted on an honest and fair basis; that the company had been guided by a broad rule of seniority in regard to. promotions, choice of shifts, layoffs, etc.;. that tile company had followed a liberal, wage policy, with extra bonuses when conditions warranted, and vacations with pay. The question was posed “whether you think you need a Union as your bargaining agent in order to get along fairly and successfully in this Company.” On the other hand the letter emphasized the secrecy of the ballot;, that the decision was for the employees to make; that the company recognized the right of the employees to join the United. Steelworkers of America (C.I.O.), or any union of t-heir choosing, and to select a un*593ion as bargaining agent if they so desired; that membership in any union “will not affect your position or your prospects in the Company.”
Whether this letter was a lawful exercise of the employer’s right of free speech, or constituted, in its particular context, an unfair labor practice, raises an issue of “peculiar gravity and delicacy.” It is an issue which, it seems to me, this court is not now required to determine, for, as was true in National Labor Relations Board v. Reed & Prince Mfg. Co., 1 Cir., 1941, 118 F.2d 874, 889, 890, there was other evidence in the case sufficient to warrant the Board’s finding that respondent had been guilty of unfair labor practices, and sufficient to support the Board’s general cease and desist order which, I agree, we are obliged on this record to enforce.