NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD

VT!. PRINCIPLES ESTA13LISHED 125
to overcome the resistance of the employees to the association.
Becker attended each meeting and exhorted the representatives to
continue a vigorous organizing campaign. He also made suggestions
for their guidance, proposing that dues be lowered and that organizers
be given a share of the initiation fees collected. The former
suggestion was adopted. The association also changed its name to
"Evansville Meat Packers Local 400," in order to avoid the stigma of
a "company union," which the original name connoted.
The Board in finding that the respondent dominated and interfered
with the formation and administration of Evansville Packers,
stated:
The continuity of events which followed the official dissolution of the plan
on April 20, 1937, clearly shows that the formation of the Evansville Packers
was the natural sequel to the acts of the respondent substantinlly inviting the
formation of an "inside" organization, and while it was yet in an inchoate
state, to the presence and participation of Becker, the plant superintendent.
An analysis of the terms of the statement of policy read to the former
representatives under the plan and publicly posted reveals it to be a very
astutely worded document. It informs the employees that it is up to them
to decide whether they wish to form a new employees' representation plan.
Reference to such a plan necessarily connotes an organization limited to the
respondent's employees. There was no mention of other possible alternatives.
The statement in effect advised the employees how to organize a "plan" which
would be free from the more obvious badges of employer-domination.
The conduct of Becker and the respondent's representatives at the April 20
meeting, even accepting his version, must have given the employee representatives
at least a hint of what was expected of them. The statement was read
and left, together with a digest of the act, with the employee represenatives.
The management representatives then withdrew and left the employee representatives
still in session. Clearly, the next move was up to the employees.
And they did what was expected of them.
We need not decide whether the mere form of the statement consituted such
an invitation to form an "inside" union as to render any organization formed
in response thereto unlawful under the provisions of section 8, subdivision (2),
of the act. Becker's close association with the organizers of Evansville
Packers in its embryo state evinced the respondent's preference in the matter.
It is highly probably that the new organization would have disappeared
after the May 14 meeting, had Becker not interfered. Employees' freedom to
choose representatives involved the liberty to change or abandon representatives,
free from the employer's domination.
• • • • * • •
In considering the effect of the employer's conduct upon the selforganization
of employees, there must be borne in mind the control
wielded by the employer over his employees—a control which results
from the employees' complete dependence upon their jobs generally
their only means of livelihood and economic existence. As the natural
result of the employer's economic power, employees are alertly
responsive to the slightest suggestion of the employer. Activities,
innocuous and without significance, as between two individuals economically
independent of each other or of equal economic strength,
assume enormous significance and heighten to proportions of coercion
when engaged in by the employer in his relationship with his employees.
For this reason the Board has been guided by the disparity
in economic power between employer and employee in evaluating the
significance of an employer's .conduct as an unfair labor practice
under section 8 (2).
The purpose of section 8 (2) is apparent. The formation and
administration of labor organizations are the concern of the employees
and not of the employer. The Board has held that any conduct