Labor and Antitrust Action

The Labor-Management Reporting and Disclosure Act of 1959, particularly those sections which amended the Taft-Hartley Act's provisions on secondary boycotts and organizational picketing, is probably not the terminal phase of postwar governmental regulation and control of labor organizations. A substantial body of opinion argues for even stricter control and advocates removing unions from their exempt status under the antitrust laws. In effect, as the author of this discussion suggests, the antitrust approach would return the making of public policy in the labor field to the courts and limit, for a time at least, further congressional action. In this discussion, the author reviews the present status of unions under the antitrust laws and appraises some of the proposals for amending those laws to curb union practices that are alleged to be in conflict with the public welfare, In general, he believes that the assumptions underlying the antitrust approach require more critical appraisal than they have thus far received. His discussion points up some of the difficulties that may result if the proposals become law, assuming that encouragement of collective bargaining is to remain as a valid public policy. (Author's abstract courtesy EBSCO.)

Action (physics) · Business · Collective bargaining · Control (management) · Economics · Labor disputes · Labor relations · Law and economics · Management · Physics · Picketing · Political science · International Labor and Employment Law · Labor Movements and Unions · Law