Evening star., 1935-05-17
The Wagner Labor Bill.

The Wagner labor relations bill,
which passed the Senate by a large
vote yesterday, is a measure Of far
reaching significance and Importance
1t is acclaimed by leaders of organized
labor as a new bill of rights. 1t is
far more specific in its declarations
with regard to the right Of labor to
collective bargaining than is section
Ia of the present national industrial
recovery act. A permanent Labor Re-
lations Board, composed of three
members, is set up, with quasi Judicial
powers. This board, if the bill becomes
law, will have power to order an cleo
ton, either by secret ballot or other
wise, of representatives of employees in
collective bargaining. Perhaps more
important still, the bill defines. five
unfair labor practices and prohibits
employers from engaging in such
practices.
The employers are prohibited from
interfering with or restraining or
coercing their employees in their rights
to organize and bargain collectively
through representatives of their own
choosing. They are prohibited from
dominating any labor organization
among their employees and from max
ing monetary contributions or other
contributions to such an organization.
They are prohibited from encouraging
or discouraging membership in any
union by discrimination in regard to
hiring or tenure Of employment. Nor
may an employer discharge an en-
ploye for filing charges or giving tes-
timony under the terms of the pro-
posed act. They may not refuse to
bargain collectively with the repre-
sentatives of their employees chosen
by majority of those employees.
The effort to bring the new Federal
agency into control of labor relations
throughout the country and in the
individual States is apparent. The
courts undoubtedly will be called upon
to determine how far Congress can
60 along such lines. The power given
the Congress to regulate interstate
commerce, under the Constitution, has
been repeatedly stretched. Whether it
can be stretched to the extent now pro-
posed to give the Federal Government
control of labor in all kinds of plants
and factories and mines in all the
States will be tested.
The effort of the proposed law to
compel employers to deal only with
representatives elected by a majority
of the workers, ignoring the repre-
sentatives which might be chosen by
a minority, even though that minority
were forty-nine per cent of the total
number, is in line with the demands
of the American Federation Of Labor
ever since section Ia of the N. 1.
r. A. became law. The provisions
against company unions" are clear
enough. The whole effort is to pre-
vent such unions, organized within
company and not affiliated with
other labor organizations, from exist
ing. Farm labor and domestic labor
are exempt from the provisions of
the act.
In vain Senator Tydings of Mary
land, Democrat, sought to have placed
in the bill an amendment to prevent
any labor union from coercing en-
ployes into joining such a union. 1t is
clear that as the bill now stands
employers are prevented from coercing
any of their employees into joining a
company union, but there is nothing
to prevent any labor organization from
coercing employees to join its ranks.
Senator Wagner, author of the bill,
insisted that the courts would be
available to protect employees from
coercion by unions. And so they would
theoretically. In practice, how many
employees would dare to take such
grievances into the courts?
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Ty, arIar tn 81, fl,a