Is Nation-Wide Bargaining Ahead?

» The coal strike left the country and the Congress mad as blazes. But, emotions aside, do we realize what nation-wide bargaining means?

by ALMON E. ROTH

1

DURING the First World War the labor unions of this country were chiefly concerned with recognition. At that time the unions were considered the underdogs in our social structure; they needed protection and special privileges as an aid in t heir efforts to secure recognition and the right to collective bargaining. The public, therefore, looked with favor upon the continuance of the prerogatives which union labor established during the war. The right of collective bargaining has since been guaranteed by the Wagner Act.

It is a far cry from the day when a sympathetic Congress passed the Wagner Act to the day when an angry Congress, alarmed by open defiance of government by a power-drunk labor leader, passed the Smith-Connally bill to curb labor’s power. Now that the public has become apprehensive of the power of unionism to enforce its will upon government, it may be well to take stock of some of labor’s current objectives and the gains which it hopes to make during the present emergency.

Most significant is labor’s demand for a greater degree of active participation in government. In general, our American unions have followed the pattern of British unionism in this respect. Realizing that many of the so-called prerogatives of labor inevitably would lie modified under the exigencies of war, the British unions offered to suspend these prerogatives in exchange for an increased class recognition on the councils and administrative boards of government. As a result, they are now represented in the Cabinet and in various administrative agencies which deal with the prosecution of the war.

While American unions have felt the same impulse as British labor, they have not been so successful in achieving their objective. In one instance only have they managed to secure any real governmental authority for their group: on the present National War Labor Board they have been given governmental authority on a tripartite basis with industry and representatives of the public.

Labor has also demanded and has finally secured representation on various committees connected with the War Production Board and the War Manpower Commission. Its function on these joint committees, however, is an advisory one. We may be sure that labor will continue its drive to secure the same degree of authority in relation to manpower, price control, and war production that it now enjoys as a tripartite member of the War Labor Board.

The War Labor Board was established by an executive order founded upon an informal agreement by individual leaders of labor and industry. None of the subscribing parties had any legal authority to bind individual unions or individual employers.

With us the representation of industry on governmental boards is quite different from that which prevails in England. We have no employer agency in this country comparable to the British Confederation of Employers, which can speak officially for organized employers. For instance, we find that many of our unions enjoy such a high degree of autonomy that the authority of international labor leaders to speak for them is questionable. It is therefore not surprising t hat we have some 250 wildcat strikes each month in violation of the national no-strike pledge, and that individual employers have challenged the authority of the Board and questioned its representative character.

The greatest threat to the War Labor Board’s continuance on a tripartite basis arises from the pressure of union politics upon its spokesmen and from inter-union rivalries.

It should be noted that the recognition and authority now accorded to labor on the War Labor Board extends only to the A. F. of L. and the CIO, and that many strong independent unions, including some of the oldest and most stable in this country, are not represented on the Board. Because of the various jurisdictional conflicts in our labor movement we find that, as a practical matter, the government must either hold to this formula or extend representation to such a large number of labor organizations that the War Labor Board and its various subsidiaries would become unwieldy. The inevitable result is that a very large segment of organized labor is excluded from participation in government, to say nothing of the complete exclusion of unorganized workers.

It also should be noted that the CIO and the A. F. of L. organizations nominate their representatives on the War Labor Board.

Thoughtful labor leaders have stated that they consider that participation of labor on the War Labor Board is one of the most significant things that have ever happened in the history of the labor movement. Both the A. F. of L. and the CIO were much upset when the President’s stabilization directive gave to Administrator Byrnes the authority to determine a national stabilization policy. The delegation of this authority to Director Byrnes was considered a curtailment of that power which labor had recently gained.

It was, therefore, only natural that when it became necessary to decentralize the functions of the War Labor Board on a regional basis, labor should insist that the tripartite principle of representation, coupled with actual authority to make decisions, be also extended on a regional basis. We thus find that on our Regional Boards we have representatives of the CIO and the A. F. of L., but no representative of other labor organizations or unorganized workers.

The principle of tripartite representation is also applied to the panels which are to hear cases. Some concession has been made to other elements in our labor movement by providing that, where independent unions or unorganized workers are involved in a case, they shall be permitted to nominate the labor representatives on the panels. Inasmuch as the decisions of the panels are merely recommendations, the CIO and A. F. of L. have not surrendered any real prerogative of representation by consenting to this arrangement.

A significant aspect of this new governmental institution (the tripartite War Labor Board) is its independence of the Department of Labor.

The authority of the Secretary of Labor, a Cabinet member, covers conciliation, which is a purely voluntary process, the interpretation of the President’s directive on overtime payments, and the administration of such statutes as the Fair Labor Standards Act and the Walsh-Healey Act.

The average citizen probably has no conception of the significance of the departure from our pattern of government which is involved in the establishment of this tripartite War Labor Board. In every other instance of which I can think, the members of a governmental agency, whether it be the courts, the legislature, or administrative departments, are either elected by the public or appointed by their elected representatives. In the case of the War Labor Board, however, the labor representatives and the industry members have been nominated by two special interests — organized labor and industry — and act in their behalf.

I am not saying that this system of class representation is not the most satisfactory method by which to deal with our labor-relations problems. I am merely pointing out its significance as a departure from our fundamental system of government.

This class recognition in governmental matters in all probability will continue after the war. Labor is already looking ahead and talking of the necessity of perpetuating this type of tripartite machinery for the settlement of labor disputes. In any event, we are weaving a new pattern, and its significance should be evaluated.

2

THE second important trend in our collective bargaining is the extension of the collective bargaining unit to an ever broadening base. Some exponents of the need of employer organization on a communitywide basis, in order to balance labor’s power in the pressure game of collective bargaining, are becoming alarmed concerning the possible overextension of this principle.

The CIO appears to be committed to the extension of collective bargaining on a national industrywide basis. As an incident, it hopes to abolish community wage differentials and raise all wages throughout the country to the level of the highest paid in any particular area.

The CIO at its recent convention endorsed the principle of industry-wide bargaining and urged its extension on a national basis. It did not go so far as to suggest that wages be standardized throughout the United States. Since the convention, however, prominent CIO officials have stated frankly that it is the intention of their organization to abolish area and community wage differentials.

The A. F. of L. has not yet officially committed itself to such a program. One of the strongest of our independent groups of unions, the printing unions, has long adhered to a policy of establishing wages on a strictly local basis, with due regard for what the traffic can bear in the light of local conditions.

The implications of this new force in collective bargaining are startling. An examination of our present collective bargaining structure in this country indicates that we have already gone further along the road toward nationalization of collective bargaining, and toward the centralization of power in the hands of a few labor officials, than is generally recognized.

In the steel industry we find that, while the contract provisions have not yet been so fully standardized as they are in coal, we do have the Steel Workers of America, through their national officials, writing the ticket for all the steel workers of the country.

Incidentally, the CIO has been greatly aided and abetted in its program by the National War Labor Board, which has extended the wage structure of the basic steel companies to many concerns which have not been commonly regarded as members of the basic steel industry.

In another vital industry, transportation, we find that we still have a much higher degree of local autonomy so far as both employers and unions are concerned. But here, also, the trend is evident. The tendency is very definitely toward the enlargement of collective bargaining units. We already have one such unit, which comprises the “over road” operators of eleven states.

The establishment of national and area commissions and panels by the War Labor Board will help to promote this movement. The following such commissions have been established: —

A Lumber Commission has been established to hear disputes and approve rates in the Pacific Coast lumber industry. Although it was the original intention that jurisdiction of this commission should be limited to the manufacture of raw-lumber products in the Pacific Northwest, it soon found itself involved in the fixing of rates in the retail lumber yards of Los Angeles, one thousand miles away.

The unions were quick to take advantage of this agency to urge that rates fixed in the retail yards be extended to the industries engaged in the fabrication of lumber products. So much confusion has resulted that the War Labor Board has now restricted the Lumber Commission to the limited jurisdiction originally intended.

A national tripartite commission has been established to deal with disputes and wage increases in the trucking industry. A national panel has been set up for the newspaper publishing industry. A commission administers standard wages and job classifications for the Pacific Coast airframe industry. Now it is suggested that this program be extended on a nation-wide basis.

A Copper Commission was recently appointed to deal with wage problems in the copper industry in the eleven Western states. Although it was distinctly understood that this commission should be limited in its geographical jurisdict ion to the Western states, it had hardly been appointed when union representatives urged that it be given national jurisdiction.

There is nothing in these setups which requires national standardization of wages or working conditions. On the contrary, I think that the War Labor Board intends these commissions to have due regard for existing community and area wage differentials. But labor is already endeavoring to use this machinery to advance its program for common termination dates of contracts—this being a first step in the standardization of wages.

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WHAT are the far-reaching implications of this trend in our national labor relations? Perhaps the most significant result will be the centralization of tremendous power in the hands of a few national labor leaders, with a corresponding curtailment of local autonomy in collective bargaining.

The coal industry is a striking example of what may lie ahead. John L. Lewis has become so powerful as president of the United Mine Workers that he was able to destroy the National Defense Mediation Board. More recently, he has challenged the anthority of the War Labor Board and defied the government of the United States.

Once a union obtains the closed shop on a national basis, the hierarchy of officials in charge of that union possesses the power to determine whether any individual citizen shall have the right to earn a livelihood in that industry in any part of this nation. This is now true in the coal industry; it may soon be true in many other industries.

Under decisions by our Supreme Court, labor unions are exempt from all provisions of our antitrust laws. As a result, they are permitted to exorcise monopolies and to carry on malpractices in which no other citizen in this country can engage. It chills the mind to contemplate the combined power over the economic processes of this country which the nationalization of steel, trucking, and mining would place in the hands of a small group of union officials.

Mr. William Leiserson, in a recent article in the United States News, has discussed the concentration of power in union government and has pointed out that union conventions seem to be increasingly willing to amend their constitutions to grant unrestricted authority to their officials. One union has provided that its president “shall be vested with unlimited discretion in the application and admimst ration of his powers and duties.”

The constitution of another union expressly gives its president the power to “issue such orders or mandates as he may deem necessary or advisable.”

The constitution of the American Federation of Musicians provides that its president “may (a) enforce the Constitution, By-laws, etc., or (b) may annul or set aside same or any portion thereof.”

Unfortunately, possession of such concentrated power does not carry with it a corresponding control over the action of the local unions in so far as strikes and slowdowns arc concerned. As evidence of this fact, I need only refer to the recent anthracite coal strike over the collection of increased union dues, where it was apparent that John L. Lewis either was powerless to prevent local miners from striking in violation of their contract, or was reluctant to exercise any such authority.

The constant alibi given by national labor leaders for strikes in violation of the national no-strike pledge is that these are wildcat strikes.

Many examples could be given to prove that the delegation of power and authority to central labor organizations does not necessarily result in greater union responsibility. On the contrary, centralization of authority can be used to carry on a widespread program of disruption. It fits readily into the communist pattern of using labor-union machinery to create industrial disorder as a means toward social revolution. We have had a bitter foretaste of this program in the maritime industry of this country and other nations.

When the condition exists that some of our national unions are not only organizing supervisory employees but are actually engaged in the unionization of small employers themselves, the centralization of authority in the hands of union executives should cause the public to sit up and take stock of what lies ahead if this process continues.

4

BOTH the rank and file of labor unions and individual employers have a very real stake in the development of a pattern of national collective bargaining. Such a system to a great extent will mean the end of local autonomy in labor relations. The delegation of the power to negotiate and to interpret labor contracts on a national basis to a few topside representatives on each side will place the balance of power in the hands of large locals and large employers. It will constitute a form of regimentation for both unions and employers which will in a large measure disregard local conditions and individual rights.

In a recent case before the National War Labor Board, the Bakery Wagon Drivers Union asked the Board to compel scores of individual employers throughout the New England states to execute a common master contract — despite the fact that heretofore contracts have been negotiated and administered on a community basis. At the hearing in this case the employers made the point that the establishment of collective bargaining on such a large area basis would mean the end of the small operator’s independence and the curtailment of his right to negotiate a contract in the light of his individual needs and local conditions.

The coal industry is a striking example of the extent to which such regimentation can be carried, for in this industry the unions have finally succeeded in standardizing both wages and working conditions on a national basis without respect to capacity of the individual operator to pay, location of the mines, efficiency of labor, or any other factor normally receiving consideration in labor relations.

Many nation-wide industries and large utilities are wondering whether they shall standardize wages and working conditions throughout their systems or insist on local negot iations geared to community wages and working conditions.

The extension of high wages paid by concerns in high-wage areas to their plants in low-wage areas will unquestionably have an unstabilizing eflect upon the wage structures of the low-wage communities and will be strongly resented by local employers.

If the War Labor Board were to adopt a theory that a company which operates on a national basis can equalize wages at the highest level paid at any of its plants, such a company would have a decided advantage over local concerns in the competition for manpower.

Such standardization of wages takes no account of many competitive factors, such as proximity to raw materials and to markets, and the efficiency of labor or management. Obviously, if wages are standardized, many industries will find it impossible to compete with those that enjoy more favorable conditions. Wage differentials have heretofore made possible the survival of many industries in competition with their more favored competitors. Standardization of wage structures on a national basis will put a premium on the use of laborsaving machinery, with a resulting decrease in the number of workers to be employed.

To those who would ask, What can and should employers do with regard to these trends in collective bargaining? I would offer the following suggestion: —

The trend toward nation-wide bargaining is so significant for the future of American business and our American system of free enterprise that it merits the attention of the best brains that industry can assign to the job. The danger is that labor, through its superior organization and its favored position with the government, will be able to develop this pattern of nation-wide bargaining before American business is fully aware of its significance and its implications.

I would not have you think from anything that I have said that I do not favor industry’s bargaining through organization of employers. On the contrary, I think that it is only through employer organization that wo can maintain a proper balance in collective bargaining and preserve a reasonable degree of local industrial autonomy. Where I differ from my labor friends is on the size of the unit. From the standpoint of effective employer organization and from the standpoint of competition, the bargaining unit should be limited to a community or area in which the fundamental conditions of operation, such as markets, materials, efficiency of labor, and cost of living, are fairly uniform.