Evening star., 1950-02-23
The Evil of Too Much Power

Before much longer, by one means or another,
some kind of settlement will be reached in
the coal strike But there is very little prospect
that this settlement will bring solution of the
towering problem which arises from the simple
fact that unions have acquired too much power
too much power for their own good and too
much power for the good of the country.
The strike of the United Mine Workers is
intended to show that that union has the power
to impose its will on the people and the Gov
ernment of this country. The effort may not
be entirely successful 1t is possible that contempt
fines levied on the union treasury, on individual
union officers, or on both, may get the miners
back to work. Another possibility is that the
Government may seize the mines, and then bend
the knee to Mr.. Lewis as 1t has done in the
past.
settlement achieved by either method,
however, would be distasteful one. The former,
even if successful, would involve questionable
use of the power of the Federal courts And the
latter, while possibly an easy way out would be
no better than an abject capitulation to union
blackmail. In either event, the day of reckoning
would merely be postponed. Within year, the
union would be back pounding on the door, its
appetite whetted by the memory of past success.
Makeshift devices which nibble at the fringes of
this problem will never bring solution. It can
only be solved by legislation which goes to the real
heart of the problem-the inordinate power of
monopoly unions.
The unions have acquired this power in two
ways. On the one side there has been the dellb-
crate policy of building and strengthening unions
best exempliied in the philosophy of the Wagner
Act. On the other has been a series OF enact
ments designed to exempt unions from the
restraints laid by law on all other monopolies.
Outstanding among these enactments have been
hotn noI 4ho t Ono 10 Act
The result of these policies, as stated by the
Supreme Court in 1941 in the Hutcheson case,
has been this: $50 long as union acts in its
self Interest and does not combine with nom
labor groups, the licit and the Illicit under Sec
tion 20 "a section of the Clayton Act protecting
lawful activities of unions) not to be dis
tinguished by any judgment regarding the
wisdom or unwisdom, the rightness or wrongness,
the selfishness or unselfshness of the end of
which the particular union activities are the
means"
That was the green light The court in
effect, was telling unions that, so long as. they
acted alone, they were free to use any means
not forbidden by law to seek any selfish end no
matter how wrong it might be. And it is here
that the problem must be attacked if it is to be
solved
Senator Robertson of Virginia has proposed
legislation making the antitrust laws applicable
to defined illegal union objectives. The proposal
has not evoked unrestrained enthusiasm at the
Capitol or at the White House For politicians are
sensitive to political considerations and the
unions also have enormous political power. But
when Senators and Representatives make
speeches demanding that the President do this
or do that in behalf of their suffering constitu
ents, those constituents ought to understand that
there is not great deal that the President could
do, even if he wanted. to act. 1t is Congress that
has the power to act and the remedy will come
when Congressman stop kidding themselves and
strip away the utterly unreasonable protection
which Congress has given to unconscionable
monopoly union conduct.