Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1950-05-17
Labor Union Parfisans
Soon TO Ask Truman
To Remove Denham
Custer Of Board Counsel
Would Damage Whole
Reorganization Plan
By David Laurence

By David Laurence
President Truman soon will be
advised by labor union partisans
to remove Robert Denham as gen.
eral counsel of the National La
Dor Relations Board-but to fol-
low that advice will not benefit
him politically or otherwise. In
fact. it could turn out to be the
worst kind Of advice from every
viewpoint.
For If Mr.. Truman now orders
the removal of Mr.. Denham, it
will be proof positive that the
proposal submitted to Congress
under the guise of a "reorganiza-
ton" was merely a subterfuge and
that the real object of the meas
ure, which the Senate recently re-
jected by a vote of SO to 30, was
just to remove an individual. Mr..
Denham has refused to go along
with the pro-labor union bias of
the majority Of the National La
Dor Relations Board and has been
determined to pursue a course of
strict neutrality and objectivity
as between management and Ia
Dor and enforce the law.
The damage to the whole re-
organization crusade would be
considerable. Up to now the
prestige of the Hoover Commits
sion has been given great weight
in Congress, and it Is significant
that the commission took no stand
on the proposal to sabotage the
position Of the general counsel of
the Labor Board.
Would Multiply Handicaps.
If President Truman plays poll
les with the reorganization prob
lem in government, it San only
multiply the handicaps under
which this worthy movement
works today. There are plenty
of obstacles in its path without
introducing a plainly political or
partisan one.
Rejection by the Senate of the
scheme to get rid of Mr.. Denham
was recognized as vote against
subterfuge. 1t was not at all a
test vote on the Taft Hartley Act
repeal, as has been claimed in
some quarters. It was simply
refusal by majority of the Sem
ate to try to do through the re
organization" process what should
be done forthrightly by legisla-
ton revising the Taft Hartley Act.
President Truman, by the con-
tents Of his last-minute telegram
to Congress, was perhaps unwit-
tingly drawn into the position of
confeSsing that what he really
sought was new legislation and
not just a Encouragement of func-
lions in the labor board. He re-
ferred to the fact that Senator
Taft himself last year made
speech in the Senate favoring
changes in the functions and
duties of the general counsel. The
President accused the Ohio Sen
ator Of reversing himself.
The fact is that Mr.. Taft does
favor some changes, but he wants
to make them in the straightfor-
ward way of revising the Taft
Hartley Act and not piecemeal or
by, indirection. It is President
Truman who today is blocking
the repeal of the Taft-Hartley
Act and the substitution for it of
a fair labor-management statute
as called for by the Democratic
national platform on which he
was elected in 1948.
Block Set Up in House.
The labor unions, which feel
they own the administration and
can tell President Truman what
to do. have set up block in the
Labor Committee of the House of
Representatives and no vote has
been permitted by the House on
the compromise bill which passed
the Senate last year and which
correctS many of the mistakes
made in the patched-up con-
ference report that finally was
called the Taft-Hartley Act of
1947.
Meanwhile, the Presidents cab
met officers and their assistants
are spending the taxpayers money
in lobby against the Taft-Hart-
ley Act that takes the form of
speech-making around the coun-
try almost every week denouncing
the very law which the Truman
administration is pledged to up
hold. These speeches are made
before labor organizations and
amount to an encouragement to
defy the law. either in letter or
in spirit.
An attempt to remove Mr.. Den
ham now would produce litiga-
ton. 1t would stagnate enforce
ment of the Taft-Hartley Act. It
would give the administrations
opponents an excellent issue for
the coming campaign, because it
would be such clear demonstra-
ton of the misuse of the presi-
Dental Office to foster the special
privileges of pressure group.
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