Frank Murphy

“ If I really wanted to discourage fraud, collusion, and mistakes, and protect the integrity of elections and the rights of both minority and majority, I should hold that such elections can be looked into whenever irregularity appears to have affected the result. ”

“ Long experience has demonstrated the fairness and efficaciousness of the general rule that once a ballot has been cast without challenge and its identity has been lost, its validity cannot later be challenged. This rule is universally recognized as consistent with the democratic process. And it is generally followed in corporate elections. The Board's adoption of the rule in elections under the National Labor Relations Act is therefore in accord with the principles which Congress indicated should be used in securing the fair and free choice of collective bargaining representatives. ”

“ The principle of majority rule, however, does not foreclose practical adjustments designed to protect the election machinery from t e ever-present dangers of abuse and fraud. Indeed, unless such adjustments are made, the democratic process may be perverted and the election may fail to reflect the will of the majority of the electorate. One of the commonest protective devices is to require that challenges to the eligibility of voters be made prior to the actual casting of ballots, so that all uncontested votes are given absolute finality. ”

“ The fact that cutting off the right to challenge conceivably may result in the counting of some ineligible votes is thought to be far outweighed by the dangers attendant upon the allowance of indiscriminate challenges after the election. ”

“ But because there was no challenge at the time her ballot was cast, the Court holds there can be no inquiry into its validity. Comparison with the practice at general public elections is specious, for in those elections every citizen has a right of challenge and registration lists usually are made up and available in advance. No comparable safeguards for the employees opposed to the union appear to exist here, though both the employer and the union were protected. ”

“ The Court says that in the absence of evidence it will assume that such interests were adequately represented, at the same time closing the door to hearing evidence as to whether those interests were prejudiced unless those who are denied affirmative representation or challenge rights should have made affirmative objection before the wrong was consummated by casting the illegal ballot. ”

“ Moreover, the rule in question is one that is peculiarly appropriate to the situations confronting the Board in these elections. In an atmosphere that may be charged with animosity, post-election challenges would tempt a losing union or an employer to make undue attacks on the elegibility of voters so as to delay the finality and statutory effect of the election results. ”

“ To permit such challenges, it is said, would invade the secrecy of the ballot, destroy the finality of the election result, invite unwarranted and dilatory claims by defeated candidates and 'keep perpetually before the courts the same excitements, strifes, and animosities which characterize the hustings, and which ought, for the peace of the community, and the safety and stability of our institutions, to terminate with the close of the polls.' Cooley, Constitutional Limitations (8th Ed., 1927) , p. ”

“ Such challenges would also extend an opportunity for the inclusion of ineligible pro-union or anti-union men on the pay-roll list in the hope that they might escape challenge before voting, thereafter giving rise to a charge that the election was void because of their ineligibility and the possibility that they had voted with the majority and were a decisive factor. ”