Trainman News

House OKs Bill Banning Union Shop Elections

WASHINGTON -- Banning of the special poll required by the Taft-Hartley Law for union shop contracts is the aim of a bill passed by the House last week and sent to President Truman.

President Truman was expected to sign this, first amendment to the T-H Law, which will validate over 4,600 CIO union shop elections.

The bill would make it possible for employers and unions to make union shop agreements without special elections, if the union is the legitimate bargaining agent of the employes and has qualified under T-H requirements for affidavits and financial report filings.

Present law requires special elections before union shop agreements may be made.

An election may be forced to abolish an existing union shop under the amendment to T-H, if 30 per cent of the workers petition for it.

The union shop requires that all workers must join the recognized union within 30 days after they have been hired. The closed shop--banned under T-H--requires that all workers be a member at the time of hiring.

About 4,700 union shop agreements would be validated by this amendment, agreements that came under recent Supreme Court and National Labor Relations Board decisions.

These invalidations grew out of delay by union officers in signing non-Commie affidavits. The NLRB ruled that union officers, but not federation officers, must sign the affidavit. Supreme Court ruled otherwise.

In agreements won between signing of the law and filing of non-Commie affidavits, the CIO had won over 4,600 union shop contracts. All would have had to be held over at government expense if the amendment had failed.

Vote on the amendment was 307 to 18 in the House. The Senate passed the measure in August without objection. Some firm opposition came from pro-union men who opposed piecemeal changes in the T-H Law.

The bill was sponsored by Sens. Robert A. Taft (R-Ohio) and Hubert H. Humphrey (D-Minn).

They are, with two other members, sponsoring another union shop measure favored by the AFL. The bill is still in the Senate Labor Committee, and it is not expected to emerge this session.