The Corporation and the Rank-and-File Employee

Abstract

What is the measure of ethics in the employ ment relation? The ethical obligation of the corporate em ployers of consequence—those whose activities affect interstate commerce, thus subjecting them to federal law—is equated with their legal obligation. The legal obligation is (1) to rec ognize the rights of their employees to organize and to bargain collectively, (2) to honor the collective agreement produced by such bargaining. The resulting reapportionment of bargaining power between employer and employees provides the means for achieving continuing reconciliation of the conflicting inter ests involved. Freedom of contract, a cornerstone of the free society, is thus made viable in the employment relation. The ends it produces are ethical, as between the parties, by the most meaningful test available in a democratic context: they have been reasoned, argued, bargained out. In this process, the constantly evolving consensus of the community is brought to bear upon the collective agreement reached and upon the en suing judicial interpretation of that agreement. The legal and ethical focus of the free society, in the employment relation as elsewhere, is upon means rather than ends, upon a process for catalyzing constantly changing and maturing social compro mises.