Evening star., 1947-02-17
Talk Of Wiping Out
Wagner Act Is Folly,
|HaIIeck Declares
Auto Dealers Hear Leader
Of House; $500, 900
Cars Seen This Year
BY the Associated Press

ATLANTIC CITY, N. j., Feb.
17.-House Majority Leader Hal
leck said today it was folly" to
talk about wiping out the Wag-
ner Act and about the passage
of any legislation prohibiting all
strikes.
In an address at the opening of
the National Automobile Dealers
Association convention, Mr.. Halleck
asserted this kind of legislation
simply is not going to be passed and
there is no sense in talking about
it or getting excited over the pros
pect of it being even seriously agi-
tated."
Mr.. Halleck did predict Congress
would materially revise existing
labor laws, but contended that res
toration of industrial peace in the
Nation depended largely upon the
common efforts of management, la
Dor and the public.
100000 Cars This Year.
The auto dealers previously heard
George Romney, managing director
of the Automobile Manufacturers
Association, predict that the Ma
tion's auto industry would produce
approximately 100000 passenger
cars and 100000 trucks and coaches
in 1947
"All that Government can do"
he continued, "is make fair rules
for labor and management to work
by and then endeavor to see that
these rules are enforced.
What everybody must do-and
this goes for employers. employees
and the general public-is approach
this labor management problem in
spirit of fairness to all
Laws Cannot Bring Peace.
He emphasized that mere writing
of new legislation was not going to
cure the evils that have grown up
under our present employer and
employe relations system" Laws
themselves simply cannot bring
about complete industrial peace,
continuous work and justice for all,
he said.
Mr.. Romney told the National
Automobile Dealers Association
Convention that export markets are
likely to take about the same vol
ume of vehicles as last year. This
amount to ST. per cent of the output
of cars and 20 per cent of the trucks
or 144,000 cars and 10000 trucks.
Predicting fewer and smaller
strikes than occurred in 1916, Mr..
Rommey said
1--WE can expect good union con-
duct until Congress acts. What
happens then will depend on
whether Congress has done the
thorough job the voters demanded"
No Auto Show This Year.
Because new-model introductions
are likely to be scattered, he said
there probably will be no national
duGOiuOUAiC ollOW IlllS yCdl. nc
said, however, that he believed the
show will resume in 1948.
Steel, coal and other strikes last
year cost dealers and the public
l 400, 900 vehicles, Mr.. Rommey as
serted. GAS costly as the big strikes
were" he said, "the hundreds of
strikes in small companies, resulting
from arbitrary application to such
companies of the wage and contract
patterns worked out with big in
dustries and big companies we're
just as disrupting."
Earlier today, w. L. Mallon, presi-
dent of the dealers, predicted that
used car prices are going to de-
cline" but that there is little like
lihood" df rapid reduction of new
automobile prices.
Asserting that there were about
1000, 600 fewer cars on the road now
than before the war, Mr.. Mallon said
There is probably potential mar
ket now for 20, ,000, 900 new cars"
He said retail prices of new cars
would depend on manufacturing
costs.