NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD v. MATTISON MACHINE WORKS.
No. 74.
Argued January 9, 1961.
Decided January 23, 1961.
Norton J. Come argued the cause for petitioner. With him on the brief were Solicitor General Rankin, Stuart Rothman, Dominick L. Manoli and Allan I. Mendelsohn.
J. Warren McCaffrey argued the cause for respondent. With him on the brief was Charles B. Cannon.
Harold A. Katz and Irving M. Friedman filed a brief for the United Automobile, Aircraft & Agricultural Implement Workers of America, as amicus curiae, urging reversal.
Per Curiam.
The judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed and the case remanded to that court for the entry of a decree enforcing the Board’s order. The refusal of the Court of Appeals to enforce that order because the Board’s notices of election contained a minor and unconfusing mistake in the employer’s corporate name, was plain error. It was well within the Board’s province to find, as it did, upon the record before it that this occurrence had not affected the fairness of the representation election, particularly in the absence of any contrary showing by the employer, upon whom the burden of proof rested in this respect. That finding should have been accepted by the Court of Appeals. In the absence of proof by the employer that there has been prejudice to the fairness of the election such trivial irregularities of administrative procedure do not afford a basis for denying enforcement to an otherwise valid Board order.
What follows is an opinion from the Supreme Court of the United States. Your task is to determine the ideological "direction" of the decision ("liberal", "conservative", or "unspecifiable"). Use "unspecifiable" if the issue does not lend itself to a liberal or conservative description (e.g., a boundary dispute between two states, real property, wills and estates), or because no convention exists as to which is the liberal side and which is the conservative side (e.g., the legislative veto). Specification of the ideological direction comports with conventional usage. In the context of issues pertaining to criminal procedure, civil rights, First Amendment, due process, privacy, and attorneys, consider liberal to be pro-person accused or convicted of crime, or denied a jury trial, pro-civil liberties or civil rights claimant, especially those exercising less protected civil rights (e.g., homosexuality), pro-child or juvenile, pro-indigent pro-Indian, pro-affirmative action, pro-neutrality in establishment clause cases, pro-female in abortion, pro-underdog, anti-slavery, incorporation of foreign territories anti-government in the context of due process, except for takings clause cases where a pro-government, anti-owner vote is considered liberal except in criminal forfeiture cases or those where the taking is pro-business violation of due process by exercising jurisdiction over nonresident, pro-attorney or governmental official in non-liability cases, pro-accountability and/or anti-corruption in campaign spending pro-privacy vis-a-vis the 1st Amendment where the privacy invaded is that of mental incompetents, pro-disclosure in Freedom of Information Act issues except for employment and student records. In the context of issues pertaining to unions and economic activity, consider liberal to be pro-union except in union antitrust where liberal = pro-competition, pro-government, anti-business anti-employer, pro-competition, pro-injured person, pro-indigent, pro-small business vis-a-vis large business pro-state/anti-business in state tax cases, pro-debtor, pro-bankrupt, pro-Indian, pro-environmental protection, pro-economic underdog pro-consumer, pro-accountability in governmental corruption, pro-original grantee, purchaser, or occupant in state and territorial land claims anti-union member or employee vis-a-vis union, anti-union in union antitrust, anti-union in union or closed shop, pro-trial in arbitration. In the context of issues pertaining to judicial power, consider liberal to be pro-exercise of judicial power, pro-judicial "activism", pro-judicial review of administrative action. In the context of issues pertaining to federalism, consider liberal to be pro-federal power, pro-executive power in executive/congressional disputes, anti-state. In the context of issues pertaining to federal taxation, consider liberal to be pro-United States and conservative pro-taxpayer. In miscellaneous, consider conservative the incorporation of foreign territories and executive authority vis-a-vis congress or the states or judcial authority vis-a-vis state or federal legislative authority, and consider liberal legislative veto. In interstate relations and private law issues, consider unspecifiable in all cases.