Evening star., 1950-01-08
Political Dilemma

The urgent appeal from Senate Majority
Leader Lucas for action by the administra-
ton to ease the coal crisis puts the Demo-
Gratis in a serious political dilemma and
exposes the unworthiness of the President S
campaign for repeal of the Taft-Hartley
Act.
Senator Lucas statement came three
days after the President, in his state of
the Union message, renewed his demand
for repeal of the labor statute, which he
described as being punitive in purpose,
>one-sided in operation and inconsistent
with the practice of true and effective
collective bargaining.
AS majority leader, Mr.. Lucas will be
expected to lead the hopeless fight in the
Senate for repeal of the law at this session.
But as Senator from Illinois, faced with a
stiff battle for reelection next November,
he finds it necessary.to seek for his con-
stituents the protection which can be
found only In the Taft-Hartley Act. And
the need for this protection is SO urgent,
in his opinion, that the majority leader
has announced that unless the mine oper-
ators and John L. Lewis reach some agree
ment under which the miners return to
work on a five-day basis he will "be
constrained to take the floor of the United
States Senate and protest as vigorously as
know how against the continuation of
these conditions"
1t is possible to sympathize with Senator
Lucas For he is~a trapped man. On the
one side he is beset by the fiction, culti-
vated by the Democrats for partisan poiiti-
cal reasons, that the Taft-Hartley Act is
an oppressive. union-busting law which
must be wiped from the statute books.
And on the other side he Is hemmed in by
the facts of life. His constituents, he
believes, are suffering, and in an election
year at that. This being so, he is forced
to turn to the berated Taft-Hartley Act,
which provides the sole statutory author
ity for cracking down in the public interest
on Mr.. Lewis and the operators. 1t is not
an enviable position for such an estimable
gentleman as Mr.. Lucas to be in. One
hopes that he will not be driven by events
to the unhappy length of appealing as
vigorously as he knows how, in one breath,
for action under the Taft-Hartley law in
behalf of the people of Illinois, and then,
in the next breath, demanding repeal of
the Taft-Hartley law in behalf of the
President and the party's political for
tunes.
Mr.. Truman has taken the position that
he will invoke the national emergency
provisions of the law if and when a ma
tional emergency arises. In his opinion,
that stage has not been reached, and here,
obviously he differs from Senator Lucas.
1t should be remembered however, that
Mr.. Truman has large responsibility. If
he invokes the law, he must be prepared
to satisfy the courts that real national
emergency exists, and, this being so he is
entitled to wait until satisfied as to the fact.
But if the Presidents reluctance to act
hastily is understandable, his continued
attack on the law itself is not. The Taft
Hartley Act is designed not to punish
unions, but to protect the people from
excessive punishment at the hands of ire
sponsible labor leaders and employers. If
Mr.. Truman really disbelieyes this, he
ought to have little talk with Senator
Lucas. And all of the Democrats who have
joined in this disingenuous attack on q
law, the essentials of which are needed for
the protection of the public, should remem-
Der that some day they, too, may be in the
unhappy position of Senator Lucas What
will they say to their constituents then If
they should succeed In scrapping the Taft
Hartley Act?