Evening star., 1942-04-08

1t is associated ~
with labor dis David Lawrence.
pute, and up to now the National
Labor Relations Board has repeat
edly insisted that failure to bar
gain collectively was of much more
Importance than any other law vio-
lations and hence workers must be
reinstated no matter what law they
may have violated.
The Supreme Court has tended,
in case after case, to curtail the
labor boards Interpretation of its,
rights in that regard, and now the
highest court has laid down a rule
which may serve as a warning to
labor unions generally that If they
engage in violence they may run
the risk OF losing some of the ad-
vantages Of the National Labor Re-
lations Act, especially as these re-
late to reinstatement Of strikers.
The courts latest decision is
epitomized in this paragraph from
the majority opinion:
observe that the board has not been
commissioned to effectuate the poll
cies OF the Labor Relations Act so
single -mindedly that 1t may wholly
ignore other and equally important
objectives. Frequently the entire
scope OF congressional purpose calls
for careful accommodation Of one
statutory scheme to another, and
it Is not too much to demand Of an
administrative body that 1t under
take this accommodation without ex-
cessive emphasis upon its immediate
task"
Present Statutes Cited.
Now there are Federal and State
laws which make 1t crime physi-
cally to impede interstate commerce,
or to pull switch in an electric
power plant, or to engage in violence
through mass picketing or by block
ing the entrances to plants. En-
ployers up to now who have refused
to reinstate workers they believed
to have been guilty of violence have
received scant encouragement and,
on the other hand, their legal prot
estations that they should not be
required to rehire lawbreakers have
gone unheeded.
The personnel of the National
Labor Relations Board, Of course,
has changed since the board was re-
versed by the Supreme Court after
the sit-down strike in the Fansteel
Co. plant. The board has endeavored
to feel its way since the Fansteel
decision to determine just what is
the proper scope OF its powers to
order reinstatement.
The fact that the Supreme Court
specifically says now that other
statutes enacted by Congress must
be taken into consideration fits in
with the opinion handed down by
the court recently In which the laws
of Wisconsin were upheld when they
sought to punish mass picketing and
methods of violence.
Service to Labor Seen.
It Is apparent that the Supreme
Court is performing valuable serv-
ice to the cause of collective bar
gaining by removing one Of the
principal arguments that have been
made for the modification of the
Wagner law-the orders to reinstate
or rehire workers irrespective of
what their records of violence dur
ing q strike may have been. If the
Supreme Court removes the twilight
zone from some of the legal prob
lens growing out of the enforce
ment Of the Labor Relations Act and
delineates the manner in which the
labor board can at the same time
effectuate the proper purposes of
the law, the board will attain greater
and greater Importance as a judi
tribunal.
1t Is important to note that the
latest decision Of the Supreme Court
was on 5-to-4 basis. Back in 1897,
when President Roosevelt made his
attack on the Supreme Court de-
cisions, he frequently assailed the
practice Of rendering 5-to-4 de-
cisions. There are apparently al
most as many, II not as many, of this
type Of decision in Supreme Court
IN which seven out of nine members
have been appointed by President
Roosevelt himself In the present
instance, Justices Byrnes, Frank
furter and Jackson joined Chief JUS