The Adequacy of Taft-Hartley in Public Emergency Disputes

Abstract

The weakness of the Taft-Hartley emergency dispute provisions is that they do not operate until after a na tional emergency dispute has occurred. The point is that a satisfactory procedural substitute for a strike has yet to be found. The use of the injunction, thus far, has only added complexities to the dispute situation. Although no-strike, no lockout agreements succeeded during the war, wartime urgency is not a permanent feature of labor-management relations. Some sense of urgency to find an acceptable procedural substi tute for work-stoppage has been generated by the movement toward compulsory arbitration. In view of that movement, new approaches are being tried—in the longshore and meat- packing industries as well as between Kaiser Steel and the steel workers—to reconcile private decision-making with public in terest through exploring new possibilities in negotiation and developing means of voluntary arbitration. Two leading ques tions raised by the 1959 use of the Taft-Hartley injunction are: first, ought the disputing parties to be held accountable prior to the creation of an emergency for the manner in which they discharge their collective bargaining responsibilities; sec ond, is it wise to preclude a presidential or other board of in quiry from recommending a basis for settlement even though the parties are not close to agreement? The proposed Board of Public Accountability would provide a means of reconciling private decision-making with public interest. Certain possible shortcomings of such a board—such as its use by the disput ants for tactical purposes—would have to be gone into, but the board would represent one method for alleviating critical disputes that would be both effective and consonant with American standards.—Ed.