NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS ACT TUESDAY, AUGUST 13, 1940 HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, SPECIAL COMMITTEE TO INVESTIGATE THE The committee met at 10:40 a. m., pursuant to adjournment on Thursday, August 1, 1940, in room 362 of the Old House Office Building, Representative Howard W. Smith, chairman, presiding. Present: Representative Howard W. Smith of Virginia, Abe Murdock of Utah, Harry N. Routzohn of Ohio. Edmund M. Toland general counsel to the committee, exofficio. Charles Fahy, general counsel to the National Labor Relations Board. The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Fahy. TESTIMONY OF IRVING HEBLING, CHIEF OF MAIL AND FILES DIVISION, NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD, ARLINGTON, VA.— Recalled Mr. FAHY. Mr. Hebling. This witness has already been sworn, Mr. Chairman. State your full name. Mr. HEBLING. My name is Irving Hebling. Mr. FAHY. Mr. Hebling, you have been sworn and testified before in these hearings? Mr. HEBLING. That is right. Mr. FAHY. And what is your position with the Board? Mr. HEBLING. I am now chief docket clerk of the Board. Mr. FAHY. In the record now at pages 6, 7 and following, in volume II, there are exhibits introduced by counsel for the committee, Nos. 456, 457, 458, 460, and 462, consisting of requests to the committee to return formal and informal files in certain cases. Are you familiar in general with the testimony covered by those exhibits? Mr. HEBLING. Yes; I am. Mr. FAHY. Did you prepare for your use in the file room a form of request of the committee and its staff for files that were needed? Mr. HEBLING. That is right. Mr. FAHY. Is this paper I hand you the form used? Mr. HEBLING. Yes; it is. 1 Indicates reference to verbatim transcript of committee proceedings, January 15, 1940. Mr. FAHY. Mr. Chairman, I offer in evidence the paper which the witness has just identified as form of request used by the file room, asking return of files. I ask that it be spread on the record. (The Form Z-651, requesting return of files, was received in evidence and marked "N. L. R. B. Exhibit No. 247," and follows:) Date: Z-651 SPECIAL COMMITTEE TO INVESTIGATE THE NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD PURSUANT TO HOUSE RESOLUTION 258: It is requested that the { Case No. Formal Informal Files on- be returned to the National Labor Relations Board for the use of and for the purpose of These files will be returned to you in approximately days. NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD. Mr. FAHY. Mr. Hebling, the cases I just referred to by number were requested by the file room? Mr. HEBLING. That is right. Mr. FAHY. And how does it happen that the request was both for the formal and informal file? Mr. HEBLING. Mr. Fahy, the request was made out for both files; there was no intention when the request went to the committee for a certain file that either the formal or informal part of it-it calls for both; it is mimeographed, and it was our intention to strike out the file that wasn't needed. Mr. FAHY. Was that because you knew that the review attorney who requested the file was not entitled under instructions of the Board to the informal file? Mr. HEBLING. That is right. Mr. FAHY. Now, Mr. Hebling, there is testimony in the record that shows that certain files of the Board which were involved in cases pending before the review section bear the name of review attorneys written on them. Are you familiar with that? Mr. HEBLING. Yes; I am. Mr. FAHY. Can you explain how the name of the review attorney happens to appear on the informal files in those instances? Mr. HEBLING. Yes. The name of the review attorney and his supervisor is always placed in the informal file when the case is assigned to a review man, and it's done too for the secretary's office when they are using that file of the person who is assigned to the review and if there is an assignment. Mr. FAHY. Under the system which you have used, does the fact that the name appears there indicate that the review attorney had the informal file on which his name appears? Mr. HEBLING. No; it doesn't in any sense at all indicate that he has had the file. That label was placed in there by the file room, and it is done automatically on assignment of a case. Mr. FAHY. That is all. The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Fahy, do you mind suspending a minute? Mr. Yates is here from the General Accounting Office, and I don't like. to keep him waiting. TESTIMONY OF FRANK L. YATES, ATTORNEY-CONFEREE, OFFICE OF COMPTROLLER GENERAL, WASHINGTON, D. C. (The witness was duly sworn and testified as follows:) Mr. SHAUGHNESSY. Will you give the reporter your name? Mr. YATES. Frank L. Yates. Mr. SHAUGHNESSY. Where do you reside, Mr. Yates? Mr. YATES. 4628 Reservoir Road. Mr. SHAUGHNESSY. What is your present business or occupation? Mr. YATES. Attorney-conferee from the office of the Comptroller General of the United States. Mr. MURDOCK. What was that? Mr. YATES. Attorney-conferee in the office of the Comptroller General. Mr. MURDOCK. Attorney-conferee? Mr. SHAUGHNESSY. Did there come a time after the Appropriations Committee made known its desire with respect to the appropriations of the National Labor Relations Board for the fiscal year 1941 that a gentleman from the Board contacted you? Mr. YATES. Yes, Mr. Glaser; some time not long after the approval of the appropriations act containing the appropriation for the National Labor Relations Board. He came to see me and asked me the legal question whether under the appropriations act money would be available for the payment of salaries of the employees of the division of economic research or the salaries of the employees employed in the Labor Relations Board for the purpose of performing similar duties. Mr. SHAUGHNESSY. Mr. Yates, when did that conversation take place? Mr. YATES. I don't recall it exactly, but it was, I would say, sometime during the latter part of June or the early part of July of this year. Mr. SHAUGHNESSY. Do you know the position held by Mr. Glaser at the Board? Mr. YATES. I believe he is the chief clerk or administrative assistant. Mr. SHAUGHNESSY. Did you have any conversations with anyone else on the Board with respect to the same matter? Mr. YATES. Not with respect to the same matter. Mr. SHAUGHNESSY. Did you discuss this question with any official down at the General Accounting Office before you gave Mr. Glaser an informal opinion? Mr. YATES. I believe not. I don't recall. The CHAIRMAN. Tell us what your informal opinion was. Mr. YATES. After looking at the language of the act and recalling that the National Labor Relations Act gave the Board authority to employ such personnel as it might determine to be necessary for the performance of its duties and after observing that the appropriation language in question didn't in any way limit the use of the money appropriated for salaries, I advised him that the appropriations for the salaries would be available for the payment of any salaries determined by the Board to be necessary in carrying out the purposes of the National Labor Relations Act, but I cautioned that the Appropriations Committee had made it very clear that it expected the Board in effecting the reductions made in the appropriation, or rather in bringing its expenditures within the reduced appropriation, to effect reductions in a certain way, particularly by not paying any salaries for the division of economic research and that the Board, if they did spend more money for those purposes, would probably have to make its peace with the Appropriations Committee and with the Congress. Mr. SHAUGHNESSY. Mr. Yates, is it customary for representatives of various Government agencies to approach your office and ask you concerning what disposition may be made of their funds before the payment of any money? Mr. YATES. That is customary. The General Accounting Office does not encourage that practice, but the business of the Government has grown so and have grown along with it the number of such questions, the perplexity of them, that we do have many inquiries informally made of the character of which we speak, and we have to try to help out the administrative and legal officials of the departments whenever we can. Mr. SHAUGHNESSY. And then is it customary in such cases to give informal opinions? Mr. YATES. That is right, but with the understanding on the part of all experienced Government officials that they really are not opinions or decisions but they represent merely our views helpfully tendered to aid them in reaching their own conclusions. Mr. SHAUGHNESSY. They are not binding? Mr. YATES. They are not binding. Mr. ROUTZOHN. I wonder if in the detail of the entire conversation anything was said with response to your advice? Mr. YATES. I believe not, sir. The question was asked two ways, as you will recall my statement. First, Is the appropriation available for the payment of salaries of employees of the particular division? Secondly, Is it available for the payment of salaries of employees of the Board who are used for similar purposes? Mr. ROUTZOHN. But after you stated what you have just detailed here, was anything said at all by the gentleman who came to see you? Mr. YATES. As to the further plans of the Board, for example? Mr. ROUTZOHN. Yes. Mr. YATES. I believe not. Mr. FAHY. Mr. Yates, as I understand, you were giving simply your informal opinion as to the legal powers or obligations of the Board; is that correct? Mr. YATES. That is correct. Mr. FAHY. And not your opinion at all as to the question of policy involved. Mr. YATES. Oh, no. Mr. SHAUGHNESSY. Mr. Yates, do you know of any other similar occurrence where money has been appropriated without limitation within the act, but where the recommendation of the Appropriations Committee was carried in its report, and then a representative of that agency approached your office and asked for a similar opinion? Mr. YATES. No; I do not recall a parallel situation, one exactly parallel, but there have, of course, been instances when the Appropriations Committee has relied on a suggestion to an administrative |
