Evening star., 1946-03-27
Beyond the Law

Court in the Massachusetts, "kick-
back" case serves as another illus
tration Of the extreme reluctance of
majority OF the judges to apply
criminal statutes to the activities
Of members or officials of labor
unions.
The case before the court involved
the correctness OF a district judges
decision to dismiss an indictment
brought against four AFL union
officials under the "kickback law"
passed by Congress in 1894. It was
held in the District Court that the
law did not apply to activities of
union officers, and the Supreme
Court, with Chief Justice Stone and
Justices Frankfurter and Burton
dissenting, sustained this view.
The complaint against the union
officials concerned a familiar racket
during the early days of the rearm-
ament program. First, according to
the indictment, they secured closed
shop agreement with the contractors
involved. Then they required every
one Of $500 laborers employed on the
project to pay S. fee before going
to work. This was credited against
a union initiation fee ranging from
$40 to $50, collected in weekly levies
by stewards on the job. II the
worker paid the entire amount he
was duly admitted to the union and
proper accounting made. But If he
quit the job before completing his
payments, as happened in many
cases, there was no accounting made
to any one, and, according to the
Government, there is no record of
what happened to the collected fees,
although the inference is that they
went into the pockets of the union
officials.
1t is true that Congress, in passing
the law in 1884, was aiming primarily
at kickbacks extorted by contractors
on Federal Jobs from their workers.
But 1t is also true that participation
IN this racket by union officials was
the subject OF testimony during the
hearings, and unquestionably had
been brought to the notice of the
committee members who wrote the
law. As finally passed, however, the
statute was neither made applicable
exclusively to contractors and their
agents. nor did it specifically exempt
kickback activities by union leaders.
This is what Congress said: who
ever shall induce any person en-
ployed in the construction of
any work financed in
whole or in part by loans or grants
from the United States +" = to give
up any part of the compensation
to which he is entitled under his
contract OF employment, by force,
intimidation, threat Of procuring
dismissal from such employment, or
by any other manner whatsoever,
shall be fined or imprisoned etc.
The majority of the Supreme
Court now says that the term who
ever" as used by Congress, does not
really mean whoever, but applies
only to employers, and excludes
racketeering union officials.
No such tortured construction OF
language is made by the dissenting
judges. They acknowledge, as did
the Government, that the law was
not intended to apply to legitimate
checkoff or collection of union dues
or initiation fees. But, as the dis
senters see it, "the statute is for the
protection of the laboring man and
the taxpayer. It should be so inter-
preted and enforced. 1t should not
be interpreted so as to protect those
described in the indictment as col
lecting funds by coercion, through
their control over jobs, for their
own personal advantage at the
expense of the wage Garner, the
labor union and the taxpayer"
D.