Robert H. Jackson

“ Foremen are also under the Act as employers. That dual status creates serious problems. An act of a foreman, if attributed to the management, constitutes an unfair labor practice; the same act may be part of the foreman's activity as an employee. In that event the employer can only interfere at his peril. [7] The complications of dealing with the problems of supervisory employees strongly suggest that if Congress had planned to include them in its project, it would have made some special provision for them. ”

“ The struggle for control or power between management and labor becomes secondary to a growing unity in their common demands on ownership.
I do not believe this is an exaggerated statement of the basic policy questions which underly the present decision. For if foremen are 'employees' within the meaning of the National Labor Relations Act, so are vice-presidents, managers, assistant managers, superintendents, assistant superintendents-indeed, all who are on the payroll of the company, including the president ”

“ It at least tends to obliterate the line between management and labor. It ends the sanctions of federal law to unionization at all levels of the industrial hierarchy. It tends to emphasize that the basic opposing forces in industry are not management and labor but the operating group on the one hand and the stockholder and bondholder group on the other. The industrial problem as so defined comes down to a contest over a fair division of the gross receipts of industry between these two groups. ”

“ The term 'employee' must be considered in the context of the Act. National Labor Relations Board v. Hearst Publications, 322 U.S. 111, 124, 64 S.Ct. 851, 857, 88 L.Ed. 1170; Phelps Dodge Corp. v. National Labor Relations Board, 313 U.S. 177, 191, 61 S.Ct. 845, 851, 85 L.Ed. 1271, 133 A.L.R. 1217. When it is so considered it does not appear to be used in an all-embracing sense. Rather, it is used in opposition to the term 'employer'. An 'employer' is defined to include 'any person acting in the interest of an employer'. § 2 (2) . The term 'employer' thus includes some employees. ”

“ Justice Brandeis, while still a private citizen, saw the need for narrowing the gap between management and labor, for allowing labor greater participation in policy decisions, for developing an industrial system in which cooperation rather than coercion was the dominant characteristic. ”

“ Likewise in the task of determining whether in the distribution of the gain in productivity justice is being done to the worker, the participation of representatives of labor is indispensable for the inquiry which involves essentially the exercise of judgment.' Brandeis, Business-A Profession, pp. ”

“ Rosenfarb, op. cit., supra, note 6.↑ Section 9 (b) of the Act provides: 'The Board shall decide in each case whether, in order to insure to employees the full benefit of their right to self-organization and to collective bargaining, and otherwise to effectuate the policies * * * of this act, the unit appropriate for the purposes of collective bargaining shall be the employer unit, craft unit, plant unit, or subdivision thereof.'↑ See H. Rep. No. ”

“ Rosenfarb, op. cit. supra, note 6; Gartenbaus, The Foreman goes Union, 113 New Republic 563: Comment 55 Yale L.J. 754; Hearings, House Comm. on Military Affairs on Bills relating to the Full Utilization of Manpower, 78th Cong., 1st Sess., p. 299; Northrup, The Foreman's Association of America, 23 Harv.Bus.Rev. 187 ”