TAFT-HARTLEY ACT REVISIONS WEDNESDAY, MARCH 25, 1953 COMMITTEE ON LABOR AND PUBLIC WELFARE, Washington, D. C. The committee met at 10 a. m., pursuant to recess, in room 318 of the Senate Office Building, Senator H. Alexander Smith (chairman) presiding. Present: Senators Smith (chairman), Taft, Ives, Griswold, Purtell, Murray, Neely, Douglas, and Kennedy. Senator TAFT (presiding). The committee will come to order. The first witness this morning is Mr. Powell C. Groner, on behalf of the Chamber of Commerce of the United States. TESTIMONY OF POWELL C. GRONER, IN BEHALF OF THE CHAMBER OF COMMERCE OF THE UNITED STATES Senator TAFT. Mr. Groner, you seem to have two statements. One is a summary. I understand that we have assigned about an hour for your testimony, but it might be extended if the questioning becomes unduly prolonged. Mr. GRONER. I will try to keep it within that limit, Senator. We have two statements here. The first is our so-called main statement which is 35 pages in length, and which sets forth the chamber's position somewhat in detail. The other, 15 pages, is a summation of the former statement and is virtually identical with the first fourteen and a fraction pages. With your permission I will read the summary statement with various interpolations, and then to the extent that your time permits will point up briefly some of the other issues. I do hope that the committee will give consideration, whether or not I am able to get through all of it or not, to all of the points made in our main statement. Both of these statements have been prepared by me personally in collaboration with the staff of the labor relations department of the national chamber. My collaborators in that were primarily Mr. William Barton, manager of the department, and Mr. Anthony P. Alfino, the assistant manager. Those gentlemen are here with me, available if you get over my head on some technical points. I am appearing as chairman of the labor-relations committee of the United States Chamber. Turning now to the summary statement, my name is Powell C. Groner; my address is Kansas City; my occupation is lawyer and president of the transit system serving Greater Kansas City. In that latter capacity I have had dealings with labor for over a quarter century-the last 10 years with an A. F. of L. union. During all of that period we have had the inevitable controversies but no strikes, lockouts, or serious disputes. Thus, I believe that I have learned something at first hand about industrial relations, including the problems which confront business and labor executives, the hopes, fears, and aspirations of the laboring man and the extent to which government, whether Federal or State, should take a hand in this peculiarly personal relationship. I appear before this committee to express the considered views of that great cross section of American businessmen, large and small, from the chief industrial centers, the towns, villages, and country crossroads over 1,600,000 in all— who make up the underlying membership of the Chamber of Commerce of the United States through their affiliation with approximately 3,200 local, regional, and State chambers and trade associations. I might add in that connection that the national chamber is purely and strictly nonpolitical. Its membership, comprises those of all political faith. We feel that the establishment of a sound national labor policy should transcend all partisan politics; and indicative of that is the fact that although the chamber has many bigtime, thoroughly qualified Republicans that could appear here, they have sent me a smalltime Democrat. Genuine collective bargaining is the best method for achieving labor-management harmony. Maximum emphasis is thereby placed on voluntary cooperation between employees and employers through a labor contract of their own making, tailored to meet their own needs. The function of government, whether Federal or State, in labor relations should be to recognize and promote genuine collective bargaining as the method most consistent with our political and economic traditions and most effective for the realization of our productive potential. In the performance of that function, governmental action should be neither paternalistic nor one sided. It should be limited to the enactment and enforcement of laws which will evenly balance the rights and responsibilities of labor and management in their collective-bargaining relationship and otherwise before the law, and which will protect the paramount interest of the general public against any abuse of those rights and responsibilities by either party. This concept of the principle which should guide governmental action in labor relations has not always been adhered to in practice. The Wagner Act, adopted in 1935, was admittedly one sided. It promoted union organization without regard for the interests and rights of employers and without imposing comparable responsibilities. Even more important, it failed to recognize that the public interest. must be the first concern of Government. The Labor-Management Relations Act was written in 1947 in an effort to correct these fundamental errors. Its avowed purpose, partly achieved, was to assure equality before the law for both labor and management and a proper concern for the paramount public interest. There are four basic objectives implicit in that act, none of which received real recognition in the Wagner Act. They are: 1. To protect the public interest as well as the rights of individual employees and the rights of employers, while preserving the just rights of labor unions and union members; 2. To require a higher degree of legal responsibility in the exercise of the rights vested in unions and in union members; 3. To recognize and prohibit certain abusive practices by union as well as by employers; and 4. To specify remedial procedures designed to assure the exercise and enforcement of the rights and responsibilities set forth in the act. Those basic objectives cannot be altered or modified by any action taken by this Congress without jeopardizing the development attained thus far and without reverting to the unbalanced Federal labor-law system, which for 12 years preceded the enactment of the Taft-Hartley Act. That does not mean in any way that we are rating the TaftHartley Act as perfect or that it cannot receive improvement and amendment. The national chamber urges that all proposals designed to restore the imbalance of the Wagner Act be critically scrutinized. We certainly stand on that position. In addition, the national chamber urges careful study by Congress of proposals for further improvement in the Labor-Management Relations Act. Under no circumstances should the new labor legislation be punitive in character as concerns either party, and it should be written with an eye primarily on the public welfare. As we conceive it, of first importance among the improvements suggested by the national chamber are these five: 1. The exercise of monopolistic power by labor leaders acting through union organizations should be restrained by legislation. Those exercising such power or seeking to acquire it should be denied the facilities of the National Labor Relations Board or should be made subject to the antitrust laws, or both. 2. All forms of compulsory unionism should be barred, and the right to work, with or without union affiliation as the individual may determine, thus made inviolate. 3. New legislation is necessary to cope with Communist infiltration or domination of labor unions in order to assist labor unions, employees and employers to cooperate in its elimination. 4. The constitutional right of free speech should be fully preserved. 5. The National Labor Relations Board should be reconstituted so as to eliminate prounion bias, insure impartiality for both employees and employers and restore public confidence. The following is a list of 23 specific recommendations which the national chamber makes to the Senate Labor and Public Welfare Committee. There are 23 in all: 14 provide for changes in the present act and 9 contemplate retention of existing provisions. I will next summarize these only. These are recommendations for proposed changes in the law. 1. Facilities of the NLRB should be denied to unions which seek to use the economic power vested in them through certifications or recognitions under the act to effect monopolistic bargaining patterns and combinations-any antitrust approach to that problem would presumably be through a different statute. Let me make clear right at this point, when we talk of monopolistic bargaining we are not talking necessarily about industrywide bargaining. We see a very definite distinction between those. Senator TAFT. Are you going to explain that, Mr. Groner? Mr. GRONER. I think I will adequately cover that, and I will try to later on. Senator TAFT. If you think you will have time, all right. Mr. GRONER. 2. All forms of compulsory unionism should be prohibited, and the right to work, with or without union affiliation, thus made inviolate. 3. The non-Communist oath requirement should be retained and so strengthened as to prevent its present easy evasion; there is no objection to extending the same requirement to employers. 4. The present provision guaranteeing the right of free speech should be strengthened. 5. The National Labor Relations Board and its staff should be reconstituted and reorganized. The newly created Board should be increased from the present 5 members to 7 members for more prompt and efficient action. The administrative functions should be separated from the judicial functions. 6. State and community authority in labor relations should be increased, and the scope of Federal authority reduced accordingly. 7. A number of improvements are needed in the secondary boycott provisions, particularly as concerns the boycotting of secondary employers. The definition of "concerted activities" needs clarification. 8. Ambiguities now in the act, permitting evasion of the prohibition against featherbedding, should be eliminated. 9. The right to lock out in an economic contest should be made coextensive with the right to strike. 10. The scope of collective bargaining should be defined more clearly. 11. The Federal Mediation Service should be strengthened and remain independent; but it should not encroach upon the jurisdiction of State mediation agencies. 12. A secret vote should be required on the employer's last offer whenever a strike appears imminent. 13. Loss of pay occasioned by an unfair labor practice should be assessed only against the party found to be primarily responsible therefor. 14. A new provision is needed to define the responsibility of union leaders as fiduciaries. The Labor Department should not have supervisory powers over welfare funds. Now we deal with several recommendations against proposed changes, and I realize that some of these run directly counter to some legislation that is now pending before this committee. We will try in due course and we do in in our main statement give our reasons why we must respectfully dissent from some of the views expressed in that pending legislation. 15. Use of the injunctive process by NLRB in unfair labor practices should be continued. 16. So-called economic strikers should not be permitted to vote in selection of a collective-bargaining agency. Now I realize that that has had particularly some discussion and some support in the executive branch. We will explain why we feel |