RECOVERY ACT

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXX, Issue 21596, 14 September 1933, Page 9

RECOVERY ACT

AMERICAN SCHEME SERIOUS DIFFICULTIES ) THE LABOUR CLAUSES' STRUGGLE INTENSIFIED FEAR OF DISTURBANCES Telegraph—Press Association—Conyrfght (Received September 13, in.s p.m.) \ NEW YORK. Sept. 12 It is dearly indicated that tho Js.Tt.A. A National j Recovery Act 1 ) is beine subjected to its severest strain on the issue of the labour clauses. The essential motive behind the Act js balanced sacrifice and gain from controlled. nation-wide, economic modifications. It seems inevitable now that the Act must intensify the struggle betweou employer and worker rather than prove an amelioration, and consequent disturbances may shatter the whole plan. America already is enjoying the expensive luxury of large strikes on tho one hand and on the other is faced with the grim decision of some of her largest, industrialists, such as Mr. Henry Ford, that they will have no truck with a thinly disguised scheme for the creation of a "workingman's paradise." Labour and Opposing Critics As early as June 27 the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers sent President Roosevelt a sensational letter severely criticising General Hugh Johnson, chief administrator, and his deputies, in their handling of tho labour aspects of the various cod?s. They alleged, and gave book and chapter for it, that representatives of great industries had been openly guided and instructed during the hearings hy the N.RtA. representatives to circumvent and defeat every, labour aspiration. This sounds comical in tho light of the recent declaration of war by the motor, steel, oil and other great industries against the N.R.A. on the ground that it openly favours labour. It is true that the appointment of Miss Frances Perkins, Mr. Roosevelt's Secretary of Labour, last March was strongly opposed by the American Federation of Labour, but it was not because she was not well known as a labour champion, but rather that she did not agree with all its policy. Collective Bargaining Clause / / Mr. Donald Richberg, general coun«el for the N.R.A., upon whom depends the interpretation of tho Act, was the framer of railway labour law of 1926, under which the transportation men obtained a 300,000,000 dollars increase in wages.' Mr. Roosevelt's Government and party are regarded as pro-labour. Competent observers in Washington say that /this pro-labour bias is part and parcel of a "bloodless revolution," but one must £o to the Act itself to get the most light on the question. Sectibri seven, which has become a battle-ground, grants the right of collective bargaining as concerns rates of wages, hours and conditions of employment to labour groups through representatives of their own choosing. All interpret this as compulsion by law for the workers to join unions. Those who claim to know the intention 'of Congress in framing, or rather approving, the Act say that section seven was intended only as a safeguard against the old practice of dismissal by certain open shop employers of those worker's who joined trades unions. Trades Unions' Activities The realities of the situation became immediately evident, however,, when it was realised that the trades unions' organisers for several weeks past have appeared in offices and factories that never before had been unionised. When the body economic of a nation sick unto death is undergoing a sensitive experiment for recovery it seems hardly the time to try to settle the problem of the open and closed shop, which it was impossible to settle when the nation was in full health and rigour. In 1916 there were 2,800,000 trades unionists in America. By 1920 there were 5,000,000. This increase was due to two factors —the alleged labour support of President Wilson and concessions to prevent a stoppage of the production of war supplies. The trades unions, by 1923, however, / had lost almost all their gains and by 1932 they were estimated by their pre-war numbers. To-day 70 per cont. of unionism is concentrated in five " sheltered " 4 trades —railways, building, printing, public service and theatres. In short trades unionism apparently has not been able to retain the advantages which the pro-labour Government and the emergency gave it. ' V *' • Advantages May be Dissipated The more earnest commentators.'on the present situation are inclined to point a moral to the American Federation of Labour. They say that if the Government does favour labour in the N.R.A. and in order to avoid disastrous strikes (as one cynical observer phrased it: " If necessary Mr. Roosevelt can. put a few recalcitrant indusin gaol, but not 100,000 strikers") promulgated emergency closed shop regulations all these advantages will be dissipated under other Governments and other economic skies. In justice to the Roosevelt philosophy, at least to that part which underlies the N.K.A., it must be said that he is in no sense " just another trades unionist himself." The framers of the Act had the whole, not a partial, outlook. The system of codes aspires to create " a federation of industries co-exten-sive with a super-federation of labour. In general terms this is even specified in the Act which aims " to induce and maintain united action of laboui and management; under adequate Government sanctions and stipervisibn.' Mr. IlichJjerg himself only yesterday blamed both organised labour and the employers for the present bad industrial relations., In anticipation of the inevitable problems Mr. Roosevelt on August 5 created a National Board ot Arbitration with Senator Wagner at its head. This body- has been more or less scrupulously „ avoided by disputants. Some industrialists show, with reason, that tho instrument of unionisation is frequently employed to concentrate power in the hands of labour leaders and organisers for their own benefit. It is a sorry truth that America Buffers from the trades union racketeer aa perhaps nowhere else. It is asked

whether Mr. Roosevelt has not - power under the N.R.A. first to compel the codification of the trades unions themselves, and, secondly, to order an inquiry into their finances.

Mr. William Green, of the Federation of Labour, on the other hand says the N.R.A. is not only an instrument of to-day. "We see in it a vast programme of industrial reconstruction," he says, " out of which there must come a permanent new deal for the workers and a permitnent stoppage of that brutal exploitation which gave us the great depression and its 13,000,000 unemployed."

One must, however, conclude that even if the best motives are imputed the fact remains that the American trades unions are as badly prepared for the technique of intelligent cooperation in industry as a social phenoifien'on as the great majority of the individualistic employers.