R. R. Standel, Jr., Report on the Third Legal Problems Subcommittee Meeting of the Environmental Health Task Force (1969)

A four-page report of March 21, 1969, marked "Privileged and Confidential, Attorney-Client Communication," from R. R. Standel, Jr., a J-M attorney, to president C. B. Burnett, general counsel Herbert Morton Ball and other members of J-M's Environmental Health Task Force, on the March 18 meeting of its Legal Problems Subcommittee. Standel reported that settlement of the Tomplait asbestosis lawsuit in Beaumont, Texas, was imminent. On labeling, Ball reported that for fiber shipped outside North America "it had been determined that for the time being no such labeling program would be put into effect," and that Burnett had asked for a study of other countries' labeling laws and the liabilities for not complying.

What it shows

H. M. Jackson pointed out that "many of our states have labeling laws, which if they were literally enforced, would require labeling of our fibre and other products," citing California and Illinois. Ball added that the same legal questions applied to other product lines, such as Celite. The subcommittee also discussed House Resolution 2503, a bill by Congressman Patten to protect workers making asbestos products: J-M's lawyers worried that health standards set under it would be hard to overturn in court, and the group agreed that F. J. Solon, Jr. would have Hill and Knowlton follow the bill while C. L. Sheckler contacted industry groups such as the Asbestos Textile Institute. The report follows J-M's December 1968 decision to label fiber bags only for the U.S. and Canada (Policy Committee minutes, December 1968); W. P. S. Breese's survey of foreign law followed (Breese's memos to Ball, 1969). For the Tomplait case, see Standel to Ball on common law asbestosis claims, 1968.

In Johns-Manville's chronology

Johns-Manville's own chronology of what the company knew describes this document as follows:

A memorandum from R.R. Standel Jr. to C.B. Burnett, Herbert Morton Ball, J.B. Jobe etc., dated 3/21/69, Regarding: Environmental Health Task Force, Report To Policy Committee on Third Legal Problems Subcommittee Meeting. On page 2 under paragraph 2, International Labeling Problems, with regard to the international export of products, Herbert Morton Ball stated that for the time being, no labeling program would be put into effect. He advised that Burnett had requested that the laws of the various countries be investigated to determine what labeling requirements, if any, exist and what liabilities for failure to comply might pertain.