day by, I think, at least two witnesses, that the records of 1960 show that you are making headway in cutting down on this backlog, on getting on top of the workload. Is there anything in your 1960 record to substantiate this point that was made yesterday? Mr. MCCULLOCH. The witness yesterday referred to a sentence in our annual report for 1960 which adverted to the fact of a reduction of backlog. But it was not made clear to the committee that this was backlog in terms of all of the cases before the regional offices. In other words, this is so-called agency backlog. It is easier to expedite investigation, decision by the regional director, decision by General Counsel, one man, whether to issue a complaint. But this has been well done by our General Counsel. He has expedited those procedures, and this is the reason that the statement in the annual report on an agencywide basis is correct. But the witness did not tell you the backlog of the contested cases before the Board, the final point of the contested cases. I set those out this morning. And from 1959-60 to 1961, there has been an intake, in the unfair labor practice field particularly, which is an increase of almost 100 percent. And despite the increase in the Board's production, there has been more than 100-percent increase in the backlog of pending contested unfair labor practice cases before the Board. The precise figures are these: 196—and I am sure Mr. Mueller who testified would not deny these facts, he knows us too well, and we have had very friendly conversations since his testimony-the backlog is 196 in 1959, and a backlog of contested unfair labor practice cases of 312 at the end of 1960, and a backlog of 443 such cases at the end of 1961. Senator MUSKIE. Thank you, Mr. McCulloch. I am sure that each of us here could prolong this discussion indefinitely, it is fruitful no matter how long it continues. But I think for all practical purposes the record is complete insofar as my requirements are concerned. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The CHAIRMAN. Senator Curtis? The CHAIRMAN. Do we have another witness here to hear? Mr. McCULLOCH. Unless the Chair would like to hear from Judge Leedom, my predecessor as the Chairman of the Board. The CHAIRMAN. Would it be helpful to have him say, if he desires to, that he endorses all you said. STATEMENT OF BOYD LEEDOM, MEMBER AND FORMER CHAIRMAN, NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD Mr. LEEDOM. I do, Senator McClellan and members of the Board, I endorse everything that has been said. The CHAIRMAN. You mean everything that this witness has said? Mr. LEEDOM. I thought you asked me whether or not I endorsed everything our present Chairman said. The CHAIRMAN. That is what I asked, if you would just substantiate his testimony and corroborate it from your experience. And if you wish to make a brief statement, you may do so. I just thought it was unnecessary to go into a long series of questions. But if you desire to do that, we can give you the opportunity on the record. Mr. LEEDOM. I am Boyd Leedom, former Chairman of the National Labor Relations Board during much of the Eisenhower administration, and presently a member serving on the Board. I have heard essentially all of Chairman McCulloch's testimony in support of plan 5, and I am in accord with what he says. I do not deny that there may be people who have serious doubts about the validity of this plan, but personally I cannot see any valid objection that has been raised to the plan, and I think that enactment is an important thing to the Board in trying to keep up with the Board's terrific caseload. And I sincerely hope that the Republican members and I say that because I am a Republican-will see fit to support this plan. I can't see that it is a partisan issue at all. I can't see that it is an issue between labor and management. I say it is simply streamlining, expediting things that should be enacted. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, for giving me this opportunity to say this. I feel it is a little unfair for me to say this and then leave without questions, but I think time requires that, although I will be glad to answer any questions. The CHAIRMAN. I know it. And I think the Chairman has been subjected to quite a bit of cross-examination, so to speak. And if you generally agree with his testimony, why I see no reason, unless some Senator has some specific questions, for you to say any more. I thank you gentlemen very much. And the chairman wishes to thank all the witnesses who have testified. There are honest differences of opinion. And each one, I am sure, has been motivated by a desire to be of service to the committee and have his or her point of view, either pro or con, as the case may be, considered, and to get the facts before the committee that it ought to have in evaluating the merits or lack of merits as the case may be. And I do especially compliment you, Mr. Chairman, for the fine presentation you have made. I would say that there would be considerably more doubt as to the advisability of this plan except for your testimony. I think certainly from your point of view your testimony has tended to clear up many things which otherwise would have mitigated against the plan, and in some instances you may have been able to clear up completely what otherwise would have remained a misunderstanding about the plan. And it takes time to accomplish these things. The committee has tried to be patient, and we have tried to hear all those who want to be heard. And I think we have received a number of communications. We will try to screen them, and those that properly belong in the record, I will admit, both pro and con, as the case may be. As far as we know, then, unless there is something else, the hearing will stand closed. The Chair will make this observation. In view of the time limitation, the time for action by the Congress expires on the 23d, so we will have to move quickly toward an executive session. I am told that notices already have been given for an executive session on Monday morning. The committee will recess until 10 o'clock Monday morning, at which time there will be an executive session. (Whereupon, at 5 p.m., the committee adjourned to reconvene at 10 a.m. Monday, July 17, 1961 in executive session.) APPENDIX BILTON ENTERPRISES, ARLINGTON, VA., June 16, 1961. Re National Labor Relations Board reorganization plan. Hon. JOHN L. MCCLELLAN, Chairman, Senate Government Operations Committee, DEAR SENATOR MCCLELLAN: The business world has become greatly alarmed about the reorganization plan which is under the consideration of Congress. The Reorganization Plan No. 5 submitted by President Kennedy would make it possible for NLRB trial examiners to render final decisions without Board review. This plan threatens the most primitive and basic fair play for employers and will become law unless Congress affirmatively disapproves. As one of the many businessmen who is desperately trying to keep above the sinking level, unfortunately I did have repeated experiences with NLRB trial examiners. As a conscious and law-abiding citizen I profoundly regret that I found that these examiners are pettily biased, arbitrary in their approach to disputed cases and, on the whole, completely ignorant of facts of life and business. Are these gentlemen, the so-called trial examiners, to be final judges in our relationship with labor? Should this reorganization plan become effective our business life would be subjected to a very dangerous dictatorial trend, one not far removed from totalitarian principles which we allegedly fight. I urge you, dear Senator McClellan, that you exert every influence and power at your disposal to disapprove this reorganization plan. Very truly yours, ADOLPH BILTON. PITTSBURGH, PA., June 30, 1961. Re Reorganization Plan No. 5. Hon. JOHN L. MCCLELLAN, U.S. Senate, Washington, D.C. DEAR MR. MCCLELLAN: I wish to express my opposition and to request that you express your opposition to President Kennedy's Reorganization Plan No. 5, pursuant to which the NLRB would substantially abdicate its decisional responsibility in unfair labor practice cases. My objections are threefold. First, in the labor law field, many trial examiners are considered to be other than fully objective. It is perhaps understandable that those trial examiners whose service predates the Taft-Hartley Act may be particularly susceptible to sincerely felt, antiemployer bias, since under the Wagner Act only employers could be found guilty of unfair labor practices. Second, in addition to having serious apprehensions as to the consequences of such manifest lack of objectivity by numerous trial examiners if their decisions were subject to but a narrow type of review by the Board, I further question whether the technical competence of their decisions will match those of the Board. I would suggest a simple, quick experiment to demonstrate this point. Pick up any volume of the NLRB reports at random. Open it to any unfair labor practice decision by the Board, and see for yourself, in the first page or two of the decision, what exceptions the Board has made to the findings and rulings of the trial examiner. The obvious advantages of this Board review of the trial examiner's work product would be largely eliminated under Reorganization Plan No. 5. 233 Third, a congressional committee is currently investigating ways of best solving the very real problem of reducing the Board's backlog of cases. Even the Board does not yet fully know the full extent to which its caseload will be lightened by action already taken in its delegation of election case authority to regional directors. The NLRB is a creature of the Congress. The Congress has made the Board responsible for properly deciding unfair labor practice cases (subject to judicial review). The Congress should not permit the Executive to enable the NLRB to evade this congressionally imposed responsibility. Unless the House or Senate vetoes Reorganization Plan No. 5 before July 24, 1961, it will become effective. Your support of such a veto will be appreciated. Very truly yours, Hon. JOHN L. MCCLELLAN, JOHN C. BIRD. NATIONAL FURNITURE MANUFACTURING CO., INC., Senate Office Building, Washington, D.C. DEAR SENATOR: Reference is made to the NLRB. I do not believe it is any longer a true, legal agency of the Federal Government. In my opinion, the further decentralization of power to field examiners will be nothing more than hiring a group of labor lawyers to make decisions for the benefit of labor, right or wrong. It will be a kangaroo court. Management does not have any opportunity whatsoever at the present time to even get correct interpretations. The NLRB has turned itself into a kangaroo court type of operation. Recently, we have had quite a few NLRB encounters. I find that the investigating officer is also the man who ends up trying us. He is the man who will make the decision in the region and in many instances he is working hand in hand with the union. They are not and cannot be considered as public servants or disinterested public arbitrators because today they have become so intermingled that it is difficult to tell a union labor leader or a union organizer from an NLRB official. I am more concerned with America. I am concerned, basically, that we will not keep our America strong if there is no discipline and if people can get by by committing murder such as the NLRB will permit people to do today for they will let them destroy a plant. We recently had a decision from the NLRB which permitted people to actually pass out literature to put them out of work; they admitted same in a testimony before the NLRB. The NLRB said that it was a protective union activity. In other words, the union can do no wrong. The manufacturer is getting to the point where he has absolutely no control. It reminds me of the civil service status during World War II in which I found civil service people sleeping behind boilers on shifts when they should have been working, yet the civil service would not allow an Army officer to discharge them. It is true today. The President and Congress have absolutely no control over the people working for the Federal Government. The laws made by these people are put into effect in many different ways other than the way you actually intend them to be. Many times your laws are good laws, but they are so distorted by the time they reach us that we as public servants and the people themselves do not even recognize same. I urgently request that you review this very thoroughly, for I can see that the NLRB needs a complete investigation from the standpoint that it is becoming an agency that will break down the industrial capacity of America, make it impossible for us to fight communism, and will force this Nation into complete disorder. I believe that it is actually being used as a tool not only of socialism but of communism by people who refuse to come out in the open and state what their ultimate goals are but who have been and are using it to destroy America. Thanking you and with kindest regards, I remain, Sincerely yours, DANIEL F. CALDEMEYER, President. Hon. JOHN L. MCCLELLAN, ARKANSAS STATE CHAMBER OF COMMERCE, DEAR SENATOR: Statements in opposition to the President's Reorganization Plan No. 5 of 1961 have been submitted to the Committee on Government Operations of the Senate on behalf of the Arkansas State Chamber of Commerce and the Associated Industries of Arkansas, Inc. It is our understanding that the Organization Plan No. 5 would permit the National Labor Relations Board to delegate to trial examiners, and even to its Chairman, final decisions in unfair labor practice cases. It is our opinion that this plan would produce extremely undesirable results in that it would destroy the tripartite character of decisions by NLRB. Moreover, we have no confidence in the impartiality and objectivity of some of the NLRB trial examiners. Nor is there any evidence that adoption of such a plan would save money in the long run. For these and other reasons set forth in the statement submitted to the Committee on Government Operations, we urge you on behalf of the employers of Arkansas, to vote against Organization Plan No. 5 when it is brought to a test in the Senate. With best personal regards. Sincerely yours, FRANK CANTRELL, Executive Vice President. LOWER RIO GRANDE VALLEY CHAMBER OF COMMERCE, Hon. JOHN L. MCCLELLAN, I wish it were possible for us to send a witness to testify against this proposal as we have a hard enough time getting a decision out of the U.S. Supreme Court let alone allowing trial examiners to make actual decisions rather than recommendations to the NLRB. There is no doubt in my mind that James M. Landis, Special Assistant to the President for Regulatory Agencies, had some good reason in mind in making this recommendation; but for the Congress to permit trial examiners, regardless of their qualifications, to make final decisions unless two or more members of the NLRB agree to a review is very similar to Secretary Freeman's farm legislation. It puts entirely too much power in one man's hands. We in this southern tip of the Nation feel there is a strong tendency to take away the powers of the Congress delegating such power to too many one-man teams. This country did not become great by delegating this much power to one man. Based on your excellent record of serving this great Nation I am sure you feel it would not be wise to make dictators out of trial examiners. From all I have learned of the pending bill it appears it has been sugar-coated as a means of expediting the delay in cases pending before the NLRB, and as has so capably been stated by Eugene F. Rinta, executive director of the Council of State Chambers of Commerce, "It would get the cases out of the way, but at the expense of employers." We respectfully request you use the influence of your good office to oppose this proposal. Respectfully, JACK H. DRAKE, Executive Vice President. |