JI Case Co v National Labor Relations Board

Facts

The JI Case Co complained that it had not committed an unfair labor practice, when it refused to bargain with a new union belonging to the Congress of Industrial Organizations, because it had made individual contracts with its employees at the Rock Island plant in Illinois. There was no allegation of coercion when these individual contracts were made. JI Case Co contended it should be able to abide by the contracts, and not bargain in good faith to change them in favor of employees through a new collective agreement. Nevertheless the National Labor Relations Board stated that these contracts were no justification for refusing to engage in collective bargaining.

Judgment

Jackson J, for a unanimous Supreme Court, held that JI Case Co had committed an unfair labor practice, because the policy of the National Labor Relations Act of 1935 required bargaining regardless of individual contracts. Terms of individual contracts would be replaced, for the benefit of the employee, by terms of a collective agreement. Jackson J said the following in the course of the Court's judgment.