The Folklore of Unionism

Ex-Trust-Buster Thurman Arnold, now a not-too-august U.S. Court of Appeals Associate Justice, last week wiped off the dust that had gathered on his club since he left the Department of Justice, and whammed it down on the collective pate of organized labor. The blow, wrapped in the current issue of Cosmopolitan magazine, was delivered with the same kind of gusto with which he had smashed so savagely at various A.F. of L. unions (building trades, teamsters, musicians) as harmful monopolies. His kick upstairs to the bench brought no heartier sighs of relief from any area than from labor's.

In his article ex-Buster Arnold judicially recorded his opinion that labor has become a national headache, that it is perhaps more unpopular in the slit trenches of World War II than in the posh clubs of professional New Deal haters, and that the great body of public approval essential for effective labor support is crumbling all along the line.

Indictment. Justice Arnold put his case against organized labor in one word --coercion. He wrote:

"Some of these labor organizations are beginning to take on the color of the old Anti-Saloon crowd in its palmy days before Repeal. They have the same kind of political and financial power to coerce government agencies, to threaten individual Congressmen and to frighten liberal critics by labeling them as opponents of a great moral cause. . . . Independent businessmen, consumers and farmers have had to sit back in enraged helplessness while labor used coercion for the following purposes: Price control, eliminating cheap methods of distribution, creating local trade barriers by restricting the use of materials made outside the state, preventing organization of new firms, eliminating small competitors and owner-operators, preventing the efficient use of machines and materials, retarding the efficient use of labor, limiting the work done, requiring that the employer pay for no work at all.

"Labor unions have exploited labor itself in the following ways: the refusal of one local to honor membership of another local of the same union, requiring workmen to pay dues to a large number of unions, compelling employers to break their contracts with the unions of their choice, compelling employers to break off relations with unions certified by the National Labor Relations Board, failure to hold elections, intimidation, packing of membership to win elections, refusal to admit competent workmen to union membership . . . exorbitant charges for dues, fees, work permits, and denial of the right to membership because of race or because of personal prejudice of officials."

Question & Answer: Asking, "What is the reason for all this?" ex-Buster Arnold gives a trust-busting answer: Says he:

"A certain percentage is graft and corruption, but a larger percentage is the result of the age-old struggle for economic power by men who love power. . . . Labor acquired its present extensive power as a result of a series of Supreme Court decisions.* These decisions fell like a bomb on the Department's policy of prosecuting indefensible labor restrictions.

"The obvious answer lies in directly prosecuting abuses of union power rather than in an alien program of government regulation of unions. If we protect the right of workers to join competing unions we will end the perpetual control by a few and restore democracy to unionism. . . . If we want to preserve strong unions, free to bargain collectively without government interference or control, we must re-establish the power in the Department of Justice to prosecute those who abuse the privileges of organized labor to gain ends which are not only against the public interest but against the interest of labor itself." ^

* (Mainly those by Justice Felix Frankfurter: Hutcheson case, 1941; Chicago Milk Wagon Drivers, A.F. of L. Teamsters Union Local 807, 1942.)

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