1940: Trade Unions

Growth and Membership.

The course of trade unionism in 1940 was colored by the national defense program, the presidential election, and the business revival, which began to reach substantial proportions in the final quarter of the year. These factors gave a new impetus to the organized labor movement and helped it to resume the advance which had been interrupted by the business recession of 1937-38, and by the public reaction against labor unions arising out of the wave of sit-down strikes of 1936-37, and the conflict between the C.I.O. and the A. F. of L. It is probable that the aggregate membership of all sections of the American labor movement reached 8,000,000 by the end of the year and was still increasing. This means that the number of union members had grown since 1933 from 3,000,000 to 8,000,000 and stood in 1940 at the highest point in American history. The level reached in 1940 exceeded even the war peak of 1920 by 3,000,000 members. These figures assume added significance when it is observed that the membership of 1940 was spread among practically all of the country's basic industries — mining, steel, metal, food, and textile manufacturing, transportation, and construction. While the unions were not equally strong in each of these classes of industry, they were strong enough in all of them to play an important, if not decisive, role in determining labor policy.

Labor's Place in the National Defense Program.

Political influences contributed much to the latest gains of organized labor. The initiation of the vast program of defense production immediately raised the question of labor's place in that program. This question was answered in organized labor's favor. The Defense Advisory Commission, created by the President to administer the program, had as one of its original members, Sidney Hillman, president of the Amalgamated Clothing Workers and vice-president of the C.I.O. The choice of one of the foremost union leaders for this post was an expression of the administration's labor policy. It was obviously intended to give organized labor an equal voice with industry in making and in executing defense policy. Mr. Hillman, with a long and varied experience with union problems and tactics, promptly established within his division the necessary machinery of labor representation. He associated with himself a species of policy committee composed of the presidents of leading A. F. of L. and C.I.O. unions. This agency served the double purpose of moderating the antagonisms between the two organizations and of creating the means of labor participation in the many decisions on labor policy in the defense program. The office of Mr. Hillman, likewise, took a leading part in settling industrial disputes either through special conciliators appointed for this purpose or through representatives of the joint trade union committee. Finally it was through Mr. Hillman's initiative that the defense commission recommended to the Government purchasing offices that they deny contracts to firms that violated, among other laws, the Wagner Labor Relations Act.

The effect of these steps was to put union labor in a position of great prestige and power. Participation by union leaders in the settlement of disputes increased their chances of gaining union recognition in unorganized plants and of winning more favorable terms in plants that were already unionized and operating under union contracts. The position the defense commission took on the Wagner Act and its violators paved the way for the unionization of many nonunion firms which had for some years successfully resisted union organizing campaigns and decisions of the Labor Relations Board. There was, indeed, at the close of 1940 almost a consensus of opinion that the labor policy of the defense commission, of which Mr. Hillman was the author, would shortly force such outstanding nonunion firms as Ford, Bethlehem, and Republic Steel into contracts with the steel and automobile unions.

The business revival of 1940 proved another fertile source of union gains. Since much of the revival was due to defense programs, its effects were most noticeable during the second half of the year. It was then that the unions began to direct their organizing activities toward plants busy with defense contracts. Before the year was over, unions affiliated with the C.I.O. and the A. F. of L. succeeded in winning recognition from companies in the airplane, machine tool, metals, and steel industries.

Continued Administration Support of Labor; National Labor Relations Board.

Fears that the outcome of the presidential election would break the continuity of our national labor policy were, of course, dissipated by the results of the election. Although Mr. Willkie frequently reiterated his sympathy with the labor and social reform legislation of the Roosevelt administration, it was believed that a Republican victory might so radically modify the administration of some of these laws as to weaken the hold of union labor. That, at any rate, appeared to be the opinion of the overwhelming majority of unions. For, in spite of the defection of John L. Lewis, the urban labor vote was cast preponderantly for Mr. Roosevelt. His re-election and the continuance of a Democratic majority in both houses of Congress assured organized labor the invaluable support of the administration and its multifarious agencies.

In addition to the benefits gained by organized labor through its participation in defense activities, the unions received inestimable support in the form of strong opposition by the administration to any vital revision of the Wagner Act. Pressure from the White House prevented the adoption of a series of thoroughgoing amendments to this Act in the face of powerful support in both the Senate and House. The President vetoed the Walter-Logan Bill which was aimed at curbing the powers of New Deal administrative agencies like the National Labor Relations Board. And even when the defense program was well under way, the administration resisted all pressure to suspend or modify the Fair Labor Standards Act. Thus the political foundations of the American labor movement, which contributed so heavily to the movement's growth after 1933, were, if anything, firmer in 1940 than in the years before.

Decisions of the Labor Relations Board during the year generally accepted the contentions and allegations of the unions and, hence, encouraged the progressive unionization of industry. Changes in the personnel of the Board hardly affected the main lines of policy established since 1935, except as to the position of craft unions and the conflicting claims of the C.I.O. and the A. F. of L. The United States Supreme Court, in all major matters of policy, consistently sustained the Board. The Court upheld the Board in its increasingly liberal definition of interstate commerce, refused to review the Board's findings in representation cases by holding that the Wagner Act did not provide for judicial review of the procedures and orders of the Board in cases pertaining to employee elections and certifications of unions, allowed the Board wide latitude in the determination of the facts in all types of cases, and in general showed great reluctance to limit the Board's powers by means of judicial decision. In the case of the Apex Hosiery Company, the Court found that the Sherman Antitrust Act was not applicable on the ground that it had not been shown that a sit-down strike had 'operated to restrain commercial competition in some substantial way.' In the equally important case of the Republic Steel Company, the Court supported a decision of the Board ordering the company to reinstate 5,000 employees who were not re-employed after the 'little steel' strike of 1937.

Problems Created by Defense Production.

The rapid developments in labor relations created new problems for the labor movement. The pressure for large and increasing defense production made the public and the administration critical of all stoppages of production. Strikes in airplane and other defense industries aroused universal protest and were the occasion in Congress for many proposals of new legislation, prohibiting or restricting the right to strike. The year, however, passed with no widespread or prolonged stoppages and Congress took no action. But the relation of organized labor to defense production remains a serious problem for the next years. The great expansion in the requirements for army camp construction brought to public attention practices of several of the building trades unions affiliated with the A. F. of L. As this type of employment increased, the unions were charged with exacting excessive initiation fees and dues from applicants for jobs. The sums alleged to be assessed by the unions amounted in some cases to several hundred dollars per person. Although these allegations received wide publicity and the unions concerned said that they would fix uniform fees of moderate size, the practices of unions on government jobs were not made the subject of public investigation and the size of the fees and dues they collect has so far failed to become a matter of public record.

In 1940 the trade unions of the United States began to face relatively novel conditions and problems. After ten years of persistent and large-scale unemployment, the combination of private business and vast public expenditures turned the tide of American employment. In many localities and occupations there were shortages of labor. The number of unemployed has steadily shrunk. Wages started rising once more, partly because of competition for labor and partly because of union demands. Organized labor has had to begin to reconsider its policies — to shift the emphasis from measures aimed to reduce the volume of unemployment to those calculated to avoid overexpansion and prevent inflation. See also LABOR LEGISLATION; SOCIALISM; WAGES, HOURS AND WORKING CONDITIONS.