Threat to Picket. The NLRB ruled that a union did not violate the LMRA by repeated threats to picket "the job" if a general contractor with whom it had a dispute did not comply with union contract provisions. The object of the threats, the Board held, was elicitation of the contractor's aid in persuading the subcontractor to comply with the contract rather than the dismissal of the subcontractor.

A general contractor for a new post office building assigned the painting and plastering work to a company which was a party to a union contract prohibiting spray painting and work on Saturday, except by the union's permission. The subcontracItor proceeded to spray paint without permission = and the union reminded it that this was in violation of the contract. The company then requested the union to provide additional painters, and to permit spray painting and work on Saturdays. When there was no reply, the company resumed spray painting and-to meet a deadline-began to to work on Saturdays, even though the union threatened to picket and fine it. The union warned the general contractor that if the subcontractor did not cease the objectionable practices, "the job" would be picketed. At no time did the union request removal of the subcontractor from the job. In finding the evidence insufficient to establish that the union's objective was in violation of section 8(b) (4) (ii) (B) of the act, the NLRB said that "it is a reasonable inference that [the general contractor] was informed of Respondent's picketing intentions in order to elicit its aid in resolving [the] dispute. . . . But it does not follow that the assistance which Respondent was seeking was... removal of [the subcontractor] from the job."

The Board pointed out that the dispute was not with a nonunion employer but over noncompliance with a contract, and the threatened picketing was to be exclusively against the subcontractor. Hence, there was reasonable indication that the union was seeking the general contractor's influence to have the other company comply with its bargaining contract.

Secondary Boycott. A U.S. court of appeals held a lower court justified in finding that a union in dispute over wage scales with an ununionized general contractor violated the LMRA by picketing a construction site entrance used only

by neutral employees who worked in a different part of the site from that occupied by the primary employees. The union was properly found liable for damages caused to the primary employer by the unlawful picketing, the court held.

The company was under a general contract to construct a school building; its common laborers were not represented by a union. The sinking of caissons was awarded to a unionized subcontractor. The company's laborers entered the construction site from Westview Drive, those of the subcontractor used an entrance at Fair Street. After failing to persuade the general contractor to adopt its wage scale for its common laborers, the union established a picket line near the Fair Street entrance. The neutral employees responded by walking off the job twice-the last time for about 19 days and each walkout was followed by the removal of the pickets.

The company successfully sued (under secondary boycott provisions of the act's section 303) for damages allegedly resulting from the picketing, and the union appealed on the grounds that the court's decision was not supported by sufficient evidence and that the picketing was organizational, hence lawful.

In upholding the trial court's decision, the appeals court found, upon examination of the record, that the primary employees were working in an area far removed from the location where the neutral employees were working. It also found that "the picket line was withdrawn within a few days after the secondary employees walked off the site and was restored only after they returned to work"; and that neither the primary nor the secondary employees were involved in a dispute with their employer.

The court pointed out that lawful picketing directed solely against a primary employer does not become unlawful because it may influence the actions of neutral employees and, consequently, affect adversely their employer. However, the court said: "If the object of the picketing is to encourage and induce the secondary employees to engage in concerted refusal to work in order to coerce or restrain their neutral employer, the activity is within the statutory prohibition."

Painters Local 720 and J. M. Miller Decorating Co., 156 NLRB No. 32 (Dec. 24, 1965).

5 Construction & General Laborers Local 438 v. Hardy Engineering and Construction Co. (C.A. 5, Dec. 21, 1965).

207-233 O-66-5

Here the trial court correctly applied the law, the court held.

In rejecting defendant's contention that the picketing was organizational and was designed to organize the laborers, the court said: "The picketing was confined to a location from which it could have had a meaningful appeal only to the secondary employees; and the defendant made no effort to maintain a picket line at the Westview Drive entrance, a more advantageous location if the appeal was directed solely to the primary employees."

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Discriminatory Discharge. The U.S. Appeals Court in Boston held the NLRB to have been justified in inferring that discharges of employees for allegedly valid reasons were in reality retaliations for their union activities, since at that time the employer resisted a union's drive to organize its employees and looked for pretexts to get rid of the leading advocates of the union. Drawing of inferences in doubtful situations is within the competence of the Board, the court ruled.

During an intensive drive by a union to organize its employees, the employer, a poultry raiser and processor, began "harassing" in various ways some of its employees known to favor the union and to do organizational work. Several employees were suspended on "various pretexts," and four were discharged (with one of the discharges being "constructive" since the man resigned under harrassment). The employer provided plausible reasons for the discharges, such as infraction of company rules, but the employees affected had previously been made to understand that the company would welcome even insignificant causes for firing them if they persisted in union activity.

The discharged men complained to the NLRB. The Board ruled that all four employees were unlawfully discharged by the company in violation of the LMRA's unfair labor practice prohibitions under sections 8(a), (3), and (1), and one employee also in violation of the ban on discharge for testifying under the law (section 8(a), (4)), and ordered that they be reinstated with backpay. The company contested the findings as not based on substantial evidence in the record.

In upholding the order of the Board, the court held that the question of the evidence raises questions of credibility from which inferences are to be drawn, and "the drawing of inferences is a matter best left to the Board with its vast experience in dealing with labor disputes. Such inferences, if reasonable, are not to be set aside by the court'," the court said, citing its earlier decision in "El Imparcial."

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The court further held that the record contained ample evidence to support the Board's findings, since the company's vehement opposition to the union was significant in determining a motive for the discharges. The record seems to indicate that the company seized upon only technical grounds for the discharges, which even if proven valid in each case, "hardly justified the drastic action," the court said. "It is well settled that the mere existence of a valid ground for discharge is no defense to an unfair labor practice charge if [it] was a pretext and not the moving cause," the court said, affirming the Board's order.

NLRB v. Lipman Brothers (C.A. 1, Jan. 21, 1966).

'Editorial "El Imparcial,” Inc. v. NLRB, 278 F. 2d, 184 (C.A. 1, 1960).

Developments in Industrial Relations*

Wages and Collective Bargaining

Construction and Transportation. Early in February, a strike in Chicago was settled by an agreement between the Builders Association and Local 150 of the Operating Engineers, on a package increase of $1.30-an-hour spread over a 4-year period for some 1,500 workers. Pay scales in the fourth year of the contract will range from $5.15 to $6.05 (compared with scales under the previous contract of $4.15 to $5.05), with a 20-cent increase. retroactive to January 1, 1966, another on January 1, 1967, and 30-cent increases on January 1 of 1968 and 1969. Contributions were increased to 20 cents (from 10 cents) for welfare and to 15 cents in the first year and 20 cents in the second for pensions (from 10 cents); a vacation fund of 10 cents was to be established in 1967.

Approximately 4,000 transit workers in the Boston area were to receive wage increases totaling 472 cents over the life of a 3-year contract negotiated early in February. An increase of 142 cents in wage rates was made effective as of January 1, 1966, with semiannual increases to go into effect as follows: 8 cents on January 1 and 7 cents on July 1, 1967; and 7 cents on January 1 and 11 cents on July 1, 1968. A cost-of-living clause which had been dropped in the 1963 negotiations was reinstituted. Hospitalization benefits were liberalized; eligibility for a fifth week of vacation was reduced from 25 to 23 years; and the maximum permissible accumulation of sick leave was increased to 120 from 90 days.

were to receive an additional 8 cents an hour in September of both 1966 and 1967; inequity adjustments were also provided. The companies immediately began to pay 8 cents an hour toward a funded pension plan; health and welfare benefits were also improved, and a fifth week of vacation was provided after 25 years of service.

Ending a 1-week strike, the Greater New York Wholesale Grocers Association and the Teamsters agreed on January 7 to a 2-year contract which provides 1,000 workers weekly wage increases of $6 the first year and an additional $4 in January 1967. The pension plan was improved, and it was agreed to establish a welfare plan. The wholesalers supply independent food stores, restaurants, and institutions such as hospitals and schools.

About 25,000 building service workers in New York City office and loft buildings were to receive an $11-a-week pay increase over a 3-year period, under an agreement announced on February 2 by Local 32B of the Building Service Employees and the Realty Advisory Board on Labor Relations, Inc. The agreement provided a $4-a-week wage increase retroactive to January 1, with additional raises of $3 on January 1, 1967, and $4 a year later. Previous minimum scales ranged from $89.90 for porters to $104.74 for handymen. Pensions and hospitalization and surgical benefits were increased.

A 3-year agreement, ratified on December 27. between the Cincinnati Hotel Association and the Hotel and Restaurant Employees provided a 12cent-an-hour package increase for 2,300 workers. The agreement provided a 10-cent-an-hour increase over the 3 years, plus an additional holiday beginning in 1967, 3 weeks' vacation after 15 years effective in 1968, and improved pensions.

An arbitration award granted about 3,000 nonprofessional workers in 16 hospitals in Minneapolis-St. Paul a 13-cent-an-hour wage increase over a 3-year period. Handed down by County District Judge David E. Masden on December 31, the award also changed the health and welfare and pension plans. (State law forbids strikes at "charitable" hospitals and makes an arbitrator's decision final and binding.) The hospitals were

*Prepared in the Division of Wage Economics, Bureau of Labor Statistics, on the basis of published material available in early February.

1 Representing major grocery chains and independent stores, excluding A. & P. and Kroger.

represented by the Twin City Hospital Association, and the workers by the Public Building Service and Hospitals and Institutional Employees' Local 113.

Government. Michigan's Civil Service Commission on December 7 approved a general pay increase ranging from 4 to 112 percent for about 34,000 State employees, effective July 1, 1966. Most minimum pay scales were to increase about 5 percent and most maximums about 6 percent. The Commission also approved a policy allowing each employee to increase his life insurance to the next highest $1,000 above his annual salary. The State was to continue to pay 24 cents and the workers 12 cents for each $1,000 of coverage. The most recent general pay increase for these employees was effective July 1, 1965, and averaged 3.6 percent.

In Cincinnati, the City Council on December 28 approved an 8-cent-an-hour across-the-board wage increase, effective January 2, for 5,500 city employees. In a separate action, the Cincinnati Board of Education approved wage increases, effective in 1966, ranging from $10 a year for those with 3 years' experience to $125 for those with 12 years or more. The Board also agreed to pay onehalf the group hospitalization and medical insurance premiums of unmarried teachers, and an equal amount for married employees; and it will provide 2 days of paid personal leave.

On December 31, the Chicago Board of Education announced pay increases averaging $370 a year for 11,500 nonteaching employees. The cost for 1966 was estimated at $4,233,000.

Manufacturing. Westinghouse Air Brake Co. at Wilmerding, Pa., and its Union Switch and Signal Division at Swissvale, Pa., and the United Electrical Workers (Ind.), negotiating under a wage reopener, agreed on a 30-month contract that was ratified January 3, 1966. Affecting about 5,000 workers (including office and technical personnel), the agreement provided a 7-cent-an-hour wage increase effective January 1, 1966, and 9-centan-hour increases on April 1, 1967, and July 1, 1968. Pension and insurance plans, open for negotiation for the first time in 5 years, were improved. The minimum pension was raised to $6 a month for each year the employee had been

2 See Monthly Labor Review, December 1965, p. 1475.

covered by the contributory pension plan and $2.50 for the years prior to January 1, 1937 (when a noncontributory plan was in effect), up to a maximum of 35 years. Early retirement at 62 without reduction of benefits per year of service was provided. The earnings base on which employee contributions were made at the rate of 12 percent was increased to $6,600 (from $4,800), with the 3-percent contribution continuing for higher earnings. All group life insurance benefits were increased $1,000. Daily hospital benefits were to be gradually increased to $32 a day from $26. Other items under hospital insurance were increased proportionately.

The 1965 round of aerospace negotiations reached into 1966, when 6,000 Machinists voted on January 22 to ratify a 5-year contract with General Dynamics' Fort Worth Division. (The previous contract had expired in November with work continuing under terms of the previous agreement until the settlement.) Terms were generally similar to the Machinists' mid-October agreements with the company's Convair and Pomona Divisions.2 Wage increases of 8 cents an hour were provided in each of the 5 years, with the two top labor grades receiving an additional 5 cents on the effective date of the contract. A $30,000-a-year Job Inequity Fund was established, with its distributions to be determined by a joint labor-management committee. The Friday after Thanksgiving was added as a seventh paid holiday, with an eighth-Good Friday-to become effective in the fourth year. Three weeks' paid vacation became effective after 10 years of service (instead of 12), with a fourth week to be added in the fourth year for employees with 20 years of service.

Minimum pensions were increased to $4.25 instead of $2 a month for each year's service for employees earning less than $3.18 an hour, and up to $5.75 a month for employees earning over $3.75 an hour. Early retirement, reduced for retirement below 60, became available at age 55 (instead of 60). Effective January 1, 1970, employees with age and years of service totaling 85 were to be eligible for retirement. Insurance benefits were liberalized and the Extended Layoff Benefit Plan was converted into a savings and stock investment plan with the company matching half of the employee contributions. A modified union shop was negotiated, to become effective if section 14(b) of the Taft-Hartley Act is repealed.