Wall Street History

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Wall Street History

10/11/2002

Taft-Hartley

With the recent lockout of the longshoremen on the West Coast,
and the move by the Bush Administration to invoke the Taft-
Hartley Act of 1947 to get them back to work, I thought we’d
take a brief look at the genesis of the legislation that the
President relied on for his decision.

Following World War II, labor unions in America were no longer
constrained by the war’s no-strike laws and organized labor
began to flex its muscles. By early 1946, some 1.9 million
workers had been, or were, on strike, including crippling job
actions by the United Mine Workers and the railroad unions.

The unions had flourished under the New Deal policies of
Franklin Roosevelt, but with the new strife in the labor markets,
the public was getting more than a bit upset, the feeling being
that the unions had already received more than their fair share.

By the time the election of 1946 rolled around, Republicans had
themselves an issue, and, with President Truman seemingly
losing control of the situation, they campaigned with slogans
such as “To err is Truman” and the simple, yet amazingly
effective, “Had enough?”, the latter message referring to the fact
that the Democrats had controlled both houses of Congress since
the 1932 election. With an escalating crisis, both sides of the
various labor disputes blamed the President and the Republicans
swept into power in November, gaining a 51-45 advantage in the
Senate and 245-188 (with “others”) in the House. [The
Democrats’ advantage in the prior Congress was 56-38, 242-
190.]

As the new Congress convened in 1947, the Republicans
introduced 17 labor-oriented initiatives the very first day, most
relating to the belief that labor leaders had become way too
strong for their own britches and needed to be reined in. The
prime result was passage of the Taft-Hartley Act (named after
co-sponsors Representative Fred Hartley and Senator Robert
Taft). President Truman vetoed the measure, with his feelings
perhaps best expressed in the following two examples, the first
being a letter to Senate Minority Leader Alben Barkley.

“Dear Senator Barkley:

“I feel so strongly about the labor bill which the Senate will vote
on this afternoon that I wish to reaffirm my sincere belief that it
will do serious harm to our country.

“This is a critical period in our history, and any measure which
will adversely affect our national unity will render a distinct
disservice not only to this nation but to the world.

“I am convinced that such would be the result if the veto of this
bill should be overridden.

“I commend you and your associates who have fought so
earnestly against this dangerous legislation.

“I want you to know you have my unqualified support, and it is
my fervent hope, for the good of the country, that you and your
colleagues will be successful in your efforts to keep this bill from
becoming law.”

[Source: “The New York Times Century of Business”]

Separately, as part of his formal veto message, Truman added
that the bill would “reverse the basic direction of our national
labor policy, inject the government into private economic affairs
on an unprecedented scale, and conflict with important principles
of our democratic society. Its provisions would cause more
strikes, not fewer. It would contribute neither to industrial peace
nor to economic stability and progress...It contains seeds of
discord which would plague this nation for years to come.”

[Source: “The Growth of the American Republic”]

Alas, Truman’s veto was overriden by a 68-25 margin in the
Senate. So what did Taft-Hartley prescribe?

For starters, the Act banned closed shops (in which nonunion
workers could not be hired), permitted union shops (in which all
workers pay union dues even if they don’t belong to it),
prohibited jurisdictional strikes (by one union to exclude another
from a given company or field), “featherbedding” (pay for work
not done), required a 60-day cooling-off period for strikes;
authorized an 80-day injunction against strikes that might affect
national health or safety; forbade political contributions from
unions and excessive dues; required union leaders to take a non-
Communist oath, forbade strikes by federal employees, and it
made unions liable for breach of contract or damages resulting
from jurisdictional disputes. [In the case of the dockworkers,
President Bush invoked the ‘80-day’ clause.]

The political result of Taft-Hartley was to drive organized labor
back into President Truman’s arms, and in 1948 union members
turned out in droves to make for the difference in Truman’s
spectacular upset against Thomas Dewey. The Democrats
recaptured the Senate, 54-42, as well as the House, 263-171.
[Nice swings in those days, eh?] One of the Republicans that
went down was Fred Hartley himself.

Organized labor had bitterly opposed Taft-Hartley, calling it a
“slave labor” bill, but Truman’s promise to repeal the Act in
1949 still met with defeat. Being pragmatic about it, over the
previous 50 years or so, first business had all the advantages and
then labor leaders had them, so, as in the words of Senator Taft,
the purpose was to “swing the balance back to where the two
sides (could) deal equally with each other.” Not that this ended
up being the case, mind you, but it sounded good.

[A little side note about the 1948 election, Congressman Lyndon
Johnson, while a Democrat, had a conservative constituency, so
he supported Taft-Hartley. It was a crucial stance, as Johnson
defeated his primary opponent in the highly disputed Senate
primary fight that year, one which he captured by all of 87 votes,
amidst charges that his people stuffed the ballot boxes. Johnson
then handily whipped his Republican opponent to win the seat,
after which he changed his stance on Taft-Hartley, of course.]

On a related topic, in the midst of the Korean War in 1952,
President Truman had to deal with a steel strike. He didn’t want
to invoke Taft-Hartley and rile up the unions anymore than
necessary, but in effect he did, as he seized the mills in the name
of the government. But the mill owners went all the way to the
Supreme Court, which in a powerful judgment that has
influenced the application of executive power ever since
(“Youngstown Sheet and Tube Company vs. Sawyer Sawyer
being the Secretary of Commerce), invalidated Truman’s seizure
of the mills.

In a 6-3 decision, the Court ruled that only Congress could have
authorized the seizure, and in this instance it refused to do so.
Justice Black wrote for the majority:

“In the framework of our Constitution, the President’s power to
see that the laws are faithfully executed refutes the idea that he is
to be a lawmaker The Founders of this Nation entrusted the
lawmaking power to the Congress alone in both good and bad
times.”

As author Bernard Schwartz notes, “Black was saying the
President had no power to seize private property in order to keep
labor disputes from stopping production,” even in his role as
Commander in Chief.

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Sources:

“American Heritage: The Presidents,” edited by Michael
Beschloss
“America: A Narrative History,” George Brown Tindall and
David E. Shi
“The Growth of the American Republic” Morison, Commager,
Leuchtenburg
“American Law in the 20th Century” Lawrence M. Friedman
“The Presidents” edited by Henry F. Graff
“The New York Times Century of Business” Floyd Norris and
Christine Bockelmann
“A History of the Supreme Court” Bernard Schwartz

Brian Trumbore

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