## Facts

- Crown Cafeteria, a partnership operating cafeterias in California, prepared to open a new Long Beach location in 1959.
- Before hiring began, a union organizer presented Crown with a proposed standard collective-bargaining agreement containing a compulsory union-membership clause.
- Crown’s managing partner refused to commit to a union contract and stated employee choice should determine whether there would be union representation; the organizer replied that employee election was “not the way we do it nowadays.”
- After Crown opened without signing an agreement, the union picketed at the public entrance during business hours with signs stating Crown was “non-union” and urging the public not to patronize the cafeteria.
- The picketing continued for more than 30 days.
- The union did not file an NLRB representation (election) petition during the picketing.
- There was no evidence that employees of neutral employers refused deliveries or services because of the picket line.

## Issues

1. Whether the union’s picketing had a recognitional or organizational object and therefore violated NLRA § 8(b)(7)(C) by continuing more than 30 days without filing a representation petition.
2. Whether the picketing was protected by the § 8(b)(7)(C) “publicity proviso” because it truthfully advised the public that Crown was non-union and had no union contract, and did not induce neutral employees to withhold services.

## Decision

- The Board reversed the Trial Examiner and found the union violated § 8(b)(7)(C).
- The Board concluded the union’s picketing had a present recognitional/organizational objective: to obtain immediate recognition and execution of a contract.
- The Board held the publicity proviso did not apply because the proviso protects only activity whose object is limited to public information, not picketing that also seeks recognition or organization.
- The Board ordered the union to cease and desist from the unlawful recognitional picketing and to take affirmative remedial steps (including notice posting).

## Legal Principles

- Under NLRA § 8(b)(7)(C), picketing with an object of forcing employer recognition or employee acceptance of a union becomes unlawful when it continues beyond 30 days without the union filing a representation petition.
- The § 8(b)(7)(C) publicity proviso does not shield picketing merely because the signs truthfully describe an employer as non-union; the union’s objective controls.
- Picketing that seeks present recognition or a contract is not protected by the publicity proviso even if it also communicates truthful information to the public and does not cause neutral delivery or service stoppages.
- In determining the object of picketing, the Board may rely on surrounding conduct, including prior demands for an agreement and statements indicating an intent to secure employer recognition without an employee election.

## Conclusion

The Board held that the union’s continued “non-union” picketing was recognitional picketing barred by § 8(b)(7)(C) because it persisted beyond 30 days without an election petition, and it rejected the claim that truthful informational content alone brought the activity within the publicity proviso.


Loc. Joint Exec. Bd. of Hotel & Rest. Emps. (Crown Cafeteria), 135 N.L.R.B. 1183 (1962)