20 Years After

Hardheaded old Steelmaster Charles M. Schwab and his smoother, younger prototype, Eugene Grace, made labor history 20 years ago when they installed an "Employe Representation Plan" in Bethlehem Steel Corp. By the standards of the nonunion steel industry of 1918, E. R. P. was revolutionary. It assumed that workers had a right to some voice in the conduct of the plants where they worked.

When organized Labor shortly pressed the same idea, the industry (Bethlehem included) fiercely repulsed the steel strikes of 1919, and E. R. P. became synonymous to Labor with company unionism. The fact that U. S. Steel and many another company which did not tolerate orthodox unions adopted E. R. P.s of their own soon confirmed Labor's opinion.

As E. R. P. worked in steel, automobiles, rubber, etc., management paid all the costs. "Employe representatives" did good work for group health programs, plant safety, sports, etc. but rarely went to bat on basic questions of wages or hours. This saved employers trouble but it was not a cheap form of insurance. Even in companies (Bethlehem included) where E. R. P. worked best, it cost employers time and money to keep it going.

In 1936, when times had changed, C. I. O. adherents captured many posts in U, S. Steel's E. R. P. They brazenly howled for higher wages, and set up an inter-plant council to link hitherto isolated "locals." Just how much of a nuisance this might have become U. S. Steel never learned. Having digested the Wagner Act, Big Steel suddenly dissolved its E. R. P., recognized C. I. O. Most of the industry followed suit, and today some operating men think that C. I. O. is cheaper and more satisfactory than E. R. P.

Now the Steel Workers Organizing Committee has contracts with 565 producers and fabricators of steel, but Little Steel producers, including Messrs. Schwab and Grace, still stick to E. R. P. (modified so that the workers now support it). Last week NLRB Trial Examiner Frank Bloom, investigating a C. I. O. complaint, recommended that Bethlehem be required to abolish E. R. P. in nine of its 21 plants.

Snorted Eugene Grace, who helped to found revolutionary E. R. P. in 1918:

"The right of our employes to form their own organizations for collective bargaining ... is fundamental. We have recognized that right for more than 20 years. . . . The trial examiner's report recommends that the existing collective bargaining organizations of our employes be disestablished. That should be for our employes to decide. . . . We intend, therefore, to contest the findings of the report."

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