Evening star., 1941-06-15
Confessing Error

There can be no doubt that this
administration, to save the Nation
from disaster, has been obliged to
make a tacit confession of error in
its labor policies.
Until the national defense program
ran afoul of crippling strikes engi-
neered by subversive individuals,
labor, almost literally, could do no
wrong, while the employer was ever
suspect in the eyes of many admin
iStration officials. A union card,
even in the hands of a known Com
munist, was virtually Federal
license to do his worst, and it was
under the protection of Federal
statutes that radicals of all stripes
wormed their way into labor and laid
the groundwork for what seems to
have been a concerted effort to tie
up defense plants.
In the past no employer dared dis
charge these radical employees, par
ticularly if they we're active in
unions. To have done so would al
most certainly have resulted in
finding by the Labor Board that the
Wagner Act had been violated and
an order for reinstatement, with
back pay, of the discharged employe.
In 1889 J. Warren Madden, then
chairman of the Labor Board, went
so far as to express the opinion that
an employer who told his employees
a particular union leader was Com
munist might be held guilty of at
tempting to coerce his workers, even
though the statement were true.
AS might have been expected, labor,
under the protection of this law as
administered in the past. over
reached itself, and now the pendulum
is swinging back.
Responsible labor leaders through
out the country are trying to clean
their own house. That this effort is
a belated one does not detract from
its Importance at this time. And the
Government by various devices is
lending a helping hand. For one
thing, it is reported that a plan is
being worked out for the "blacklist-
ing" by the Government of Subver-
sive workers. While this is all to the
good, it presents the rather ironic
spectacle of the Government direct
ing an employer to do that which
heretofore he has been forbidden to
do-get rid of dangerous trouble
makers.
There is every reason to suppose
that this joint drive on the part of
the Government and responsible
labor leadership will produce tempo
rarily beneficial results. Certainly,
the radicals are going to be driven to
cover for the duration of this emer-
gency, but that is by no means the
end of the road
1t is necessary to look ahead now
to the day when the urgency of the
defense program will be thing OF
the past, when the country will be
trying to settle down to something
approaching a normal basis. OBJ
viously, at that time, there would be
little wisdom in retaining unchanged
an admittedly one-sided statute
which has produced conditions under
which the Government itself has
| been unable to do business success
| fully. If the Wagner Act has been
bad medicine for the Government
why is it good for private enterprise?
Although there are some who per-
Sist in refusing to acknowledge the
need for any change in this statute,
who seem to think that the acme
of legislative perfection was achieved
with it's enactment, the teaching of
experience plainly is to the contrary.
Congress should modify the Wagner
Act, but the revisions should be
carefully worked out with a view to
avoiding a repetition of the swings
from one extreme to the other which
seem to have been the outstanding
| characteristic of American industrial
|