Finally, I think that there ought to be a modest retroactive feature to this part of the bill reading somewhat as follows:

If within 3 months of an election, within 3 months prior to an election, held under the authority of the National Labor Board, the employer shall have negotiated an agreement with persons whom the National Labor Board finds are not authorized to represent the employees, the Board may, upon petition of the certified representatives, order an abrogation of the agreement, and the agreement shall no longer be binding upon the employees. Notice of such abrogation shall be posted by the employer within the plant.

Now that, Mr. Chairman, completes the constructive suggestions which I have to offer. They are based, as I said before, upon the conviction that it is both futile and unwise to attempt to tie the employer's hands completely in starting organizations among his employees, but it is sound policy to expose any organizations which exist to prevent fair competition and to prevent any organization from initiating collective agreements in cases where a substantial number of employees question the right of its personnel to represent them.

The CHAIRMAN. Do you think limitations should be put upon industries affected by this bill so as to prevent industries with only a few employees from being subjected to its provisions?

Dr. SLICHTER. I should hesitate very much, Mr. Chairman, to approve of such a limit, although its administrative convenience is obvious. Some of our worst labor problems are in industries such as branches of the needle trades, where most of the plants are exceedingly small, the plants may be small and yet the number of employees involved may be large because it may be a simultaneous affair affecting dozens of the small plants. I do not think that the same considerations apply in this kind of an act as would apply in an act for unemployment reserves where you get into a large amount of book work for small concerns. After all, the National Labor Board would presumably handle minor disputes through examiners much as the Interstate Commerce Commission handles minor rate cases through examiners.

Mr. HANDLER. We have experienced cases where it would have been relatively easy to have reached a satisfactory agreement between the parties to the dispute but no agreement was reached because of the competition of the small plants with bad labor conditions prevailing in them, whom we were unable to make parties to the agreement, so that I should think that the exemptions might cause considerable difficulty.

Dr. SLICHTER. I should like to conclude, if there are no further questions, Mr. Chairman, with this observation:

I heard the Secretary of Labor this morning suggest that the contemplated Labor Board be placed under the Department of Labor. With all due respect to the Department of Labor, if it were to be placed under any department I should say that would be the last place to put it because the Department of Labor, quite properly, is looked upon as the guardian of the interests of the wage earners. It is intended to be a partisan Department in a way, and, rightly or wrongly it will always be regarded as more partisan than it actually is, so it would diminish the prestige of the Labor Board and impair its usefulness if it were placed under that Department.

As a matter of fact, I do not quite catch the importance of putting the Board in any Department, but the strategy of it, if it were to be placed under any department, would seem to me to dictate that it go in the Department of Commerce, because, after all, it is going to be mainly a protector of the rights of labor and its effectiveness is going to depend primarily upon its prestige with the employers and the way to give it that effectiveness would be to place it in the Department of Commerce. I do not think, however, there is any particular reason, any compelling reason, for placeing it under any Department, and Í like to regard it as an independent agency comparable to the Interstate Commerce Commission.

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you very much. You have been most helpful and I want you to know the committee appreciates very much your giving us the benefit of your well thought-out views. You may feel free also, Doctor, to write us any suggestions that you may have on further study of the bill.

Ďr. SLICHTER. Thank you very much.

(Whereupon, at 1:30 p.m., the committee adjourned until 10 a.m. to-morrow, Thursday, March 15, 1934.)

TO CREATE A NATIONAL LABOR BOARD

THURSDAY, MARCH 15, 1934

UNITED STATES SENATE,

COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION AND LABOR,

Washington, D.C.

The committee met at 10 a.m., pursuant to adjournment, in room 335, Senate Office Building, Senator David I. Walsh presiding. Present: Senators Walsh (chairman), Thomas, Borah, Walcott, and Davis.

Also present: Senator Robert F. Wagner.

The CHAIRMAN. The meeting will come to order, please.

Mr. Green.

Mr. GREEN. Yes, sir.

The CHAIRMAN. We will be pleased to have you address the committee.

STATEMENT OF WILLIAM GREEN, PRESIDENT OF THE AMERICAN FEDERATION OF LABOR

Mr. GREEN. Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, I appear this morning in behalf of the American Federation of Labor, in support of Senate bill 2926, introduced by Senator Wagner. I ask for the privilege of offering some amendments to the bill, which I hope may be favorably considered.

The CHAIRMAN. We will be pleased to have you do so.

Mr. GREEN. But I wish to assure the committee that the American Federation of Labor stands wholeheartedly and unreservedly behind Senator Wagner in support of this bill. I understand that the bill introduced by Congressman Connery is a companion bill and is practically the same as the bill introduced by Senator Wagner.

It might be appropriate for me to say that it is the opinion of labor that this measure is of tremendous importance. We have learned through experience during the last few months the necessity of the enactment of a measure of this kind. We believe that if labor is to be free, economically and industrially free, and is to enjoy the rights guaranteed labor as declared in section 7 (a) of the National Recovery Act, that it is necessary to enact this Wagner bill into law.

I am further of the opinion that this bill will be bitterly opposed by many employers of labor, by the manufacturers' associations, and by the organizations of employers who are known to be uncompromisingly hostile to the bona fide trade union movement as represented by the American Federation of Labor. But labor asks for this bill. It believes that it ought to have the right to identify itself with an organization of its own choosing and to be represented in negotiations with employers by its own chosen representatives selected free from

coercion and intimidation. It asks that labor be placed upon a basis of equality with industry and with the employers of labor.

It can only be placed upon that basis of equality when it is accorded the right to organize and select its own agency through which the workers may collectively bargain. It opposes paternalism as reflected and represented by company unions. It objects and protests against being placed in a position of inferiority, and that is the position in which it is placed when it is compelled to accept company unions, organized, formed, fostered, financed, and maintained by the company. The labor disputes act is proposed to facilitate realization of the purposes of the National Recovery Act. It is intended to further the permanent interests not only of labor, but of industry and the general public. It seeks to give concrete expression to the spirit of the National Recovery Act, by establishing for producing workers that status that would enable them to meet employers upon an equal footing necessary for collective bargaining.

The functional factors concerned in business-investors, producers, buyers must be equally prepared to promote their interests if we are to have that balance in business which will assure sustained production and consumption. One of the major causes of the industrial collapse of 1929 was the inability of wage earners and small salaried persons to participate proportionately in the increased wealth produced through technical progress. Prices and production both depend upon capacity of consumers to buy and use. If the largest group of consumers-the wage earners make more than 66% percent of the purchases in retail markets-if they were in a position to maintain their incomes at a level that would absorb the output of industry, we would have operating a condition essential for balance in distribution and regularity in production. That condition is that workers be given industrial status that makes possible bargaining power equal to that of their employers.

The National Recovery Act frees trade associations from restraints formerly imposed by anti-trust laws and assures them opportunity for, industrial self-government. Industrial management has gained a priceless opportunity for self-government and can demonstrate its long-boasted capacity to manage industry for the best interests of all concerned. Since the power of government has been definitely increased, it is of the utmost importance that labor have that status that will provide equality in bargaining. That status rests upon recognized and accepted right to organize and to negotiate collective agreements. Section 7 (a) of the National Recovery Act was intended to assure the right to organize and to bargain collectively and 7 (b) charged the President with the duty of encouraging collective bargaining.

Now the right to organize in organizations of their choosing, free from employers' interference, as the President recently declared, means just what it says. But employers have shown their unwillingness for employees to have equal rights with them or even rights that would substantially better their conditions. The general counsel for the National Association of Manufacturers who has been the relentless foe of the principle of union organization for two decades, now seeks to show that provisions to assure free choice to workers is special privilege. Any such charge ignores the obvious organized effort of employers to substitute "unions" planned and controlled by the