Evening Star Newspaper, March 31, 1937, Page 11

Opinion Backs Negotiation in Industry Court Says Congress| | Has Right to Compel Strike Curb. BY DAVID LAWRENCE. HAT the Supreme Court did on Monday in deciding by unanimous vote that the majority-rule provision of the railroad labor act was a valid | exercise of power by Congress is necessarily limited to working condi- tions of an instrumentality of inter- state commerce and not to all busi- | nesses in interstate commerce, but | there were in that same opinion some | significant observations which may have a direct bearing on collective | bargaining disputes such as recendly | have led to ‘“sit-down” strikes and other excesses of o | labor warfare. First of all, what is meant by “majority rule?” §& Usually labor g leaders claim it means that if an election is held in a plant and 51 per cent of the employes s & ¥ they want a cer- tain union com- mittee of indi- viduals to repre- gent them the rest of the em- ployes—the 49 per cent—are bound to accept the results of the election and be bound by the contracts with the employers for wages made in their behalf by the majority spokesmen. Employers dispute this interpreta- tion and say majority rule means that the elected spokesmen may act only for the majority and that the minority are free agents and can if they like elect their own committee of spokes- men and negotiate with the employer. Now the Supreme Court, being con- fronted with a statute which requires | the acceptance of the majority-rule | idea as related to an instrumentality of commerce—a railroad—did not attempt to rule what might be the situation in other flelds of law. But it is important to note that in con- struing the majority rule the Supreme Court did say that when once there was an election, a majority of those actually voting could select spokes- men and these spokesmen are the only ones with whom a collective agreement applying generally to the plant or business can be negotiated. ‘This is because the railroad labor act specifically compels negotiation with & majori spokesmen. David Lawrence. Leaves Individuals Free. ‘What then becomes of the minority? The Supreme Court declared that as individuals they were free to negotiate for their own working conditions, but they could not select a representative purporting to speak for other employes. 1t will be seen, therefore, that the | Supreme Court drew a distinction be- tween an exclusive bargaining privi- lege and an exclusive negotiation by spokesmen on behalf of ocertain | employes who gave their assent. The | inference is plain that although em- ployes may not stay away from an election and thus claim to be partici- pants in affecting the majority vote —the Supreme Court holding that a STAR, News Behind the News Hughes Hand Seen in Decisions—Comprehensive Grouping Held Answer to New Deal Charges. BY PAUL MALLON. THOSE who know their certioraris will tell you Chief Justice Hughes has done as neat a job of rebutting President Roosevelt as ever was performed by a judge upon an Executive. The flock of Supreme Court rulings which came over the bench all at once Monday could have been joined together by natural circum- stances, but no legal authority believes they were. The remarkable executive talents of Mr. Hughes are seen by all to be behind the comprehensive group- ing. Also to his inside leadership is attributed the altered line of majority thought on the bench. The plain purport was to point the way in which New Dealing could be done for the farmer and the laborer without packing the court or amend- ing the Constitution. No court follower missed the point of how Mr. Roosevelt could accom- plish minimum wages, maximum hours, abolition of child labor, some farm price fixing and farm mortgage protection, least of all the White House. What the court had said sim- ply in various decisions was this: The matter of farm price fix- ing may be handled constitutionally by State Legislatures, to the extent of fixing arbitrary minimum prices (virginia milk decision) ‘The States may also legislate to protect labor with an arbitrary rule of minimum wages and maximum hours for men, women or chil- dren (Washington minimum wage decision). Interstate labor can be protected by the Federal Government, even to the extent of forcing exclusive collective bargaining under majority rule (Virginian Railway decision). As for farm mortgages, they can be carried through this period of stress of Federal legislation (Frazier-Lemke de- cision). In a single day and a single grouping of decisions, the court seemed to cover the range of New Deal ambitions. ERE There are two sides to the story of how the Supreme Court came to change its mind on this. One is the legal side. Some legal authorities are inclined to blame the lawyers who lost the New York minimum wage case for not raising the question on which the court upheld the Washington minimum wage statute, which was far more drastic than New York's law. At any rate, courts, as a rule, do not go outside the evidence and argu- ments on their own initiative to decide questions which are not specifically raised. This, apparently, is the explanation why Justice Roberts voted against the New York law a few months ago, but supported the Washington law when the broader point was raised. He is the only justice who changed, but his conversion was enough to change the court. * x ¥ x The political side is that one of Mr. Roosevelt's most serious objections to the court has now been answered. He complained that, when the court ruled against the New York minimum wage law and declared Federal minimum wage efforts unconstitutional (N. R. A. decision), it left a no man’s land where no authority could regulate wages. The court has now cut this contention out from under the Pres- ident's position. Together with the ezcavations previously made by Chief Justice Hughes in his letter to Semator Wheeler, it indicates the court reform argument may now involve a reorganization of position by both sides. * ok x % There was a time, after the spiritual folding of the Blue Eagle, when many New Dealers suspected that a State, or at least a sectional, method of meeting these wage and price problems might be more practical than Fed- The N. R. A, for example, eral action. kflf’m : found it could not apply the same = =mm=—'= wage and price standards to work- Rotanizer ers living in the East under one u standard of living and in the South or West under two different standards. Similarly, that Virginia milk statute is supposed to be one which was inspired by the A. A. A. crowd after they discovered early in the New Deal game that they could not adopt the same milk price standards for every section of the country. They had to divide the country into marketing areas. However, many of these old believers in the practicability of sectional action to meet sectional conditions have passed from the new order and fe¥® heretics remain in official life who fail to believe the Federal Government does everything better than any one else. A movement is afoot to have Senator Ashurst amend his statement that no one can change positions faster than he. The correction being suggested in the cloak room is that he give credit where credit is due and add the name of Justice Roberts. (Copyrisht, 1937 1% WASHINGTO D. C, q'HE opinions of the writers on this page are their own, not necessarily The Star’s. Such opinions are presented in The Star’s effort to give all sides of questions of intereststo its readers, although such opinions may be contradictory among themselves and directly opposed to The Star’s. Heartening Decisions Supreme Court Discloses it Does Not Oppose Fresh Interpretations. BY DOROTHY THOMPSON. HE Supreme Oourt, less than & year ago, declared the New York State minimum wage law for women unconstitutional by a five-to-four decision. Monday by & five-to-four decision it declared the ‘Washington minimum wage law con- stitutional. The former decision : was based upon & previous decision in the Adkins case, made in 1923 by a court whose personnel was not identical with the present one. A minority of the court last year believed that the New York statute was dis- tin g uishable in material ways from the Adkins case. However, the Court of Appeals in New York itself had held the New York act to be un- constitutional, so that the Supreme Court was upholding the decision of & State court in regard to & State law. Now, in sitting upon the Washington case, it had to consider a law which the Supreme Court of that State had upheld as constitutional, the State court in Washington having refused to regard the Supreme Court decision in the Adkins case as determinative. There was, therefore, the case of the Supreme Court of a State being in conflict with the Supreme Court of the United States, and this was certaiuly a reason why the Supreme Court should reconsider, especially as its de- cision had been almost universally de- plored throughout the country on & perfectly non-partisan basis, and the decision had caused the suggestion of an amendment to be written in the platform of both political parties. In no case, therefore, can the changed decision of the Supreme Court be regarded as yielding to par- tisan political pressure. Dorothy Thempson. Fresh Interpretation. The most interesting and encour- aging feature of the new decision is that it gives a fresh interpretation to +he due process clause of the four- teenth amendment, an interpretation which may, by inference, be extended | to the fifth amendment. It has been the contention of liber- als—a contention which this column believes to be sustained by many court decisions—that the due process clause has often been used to protect prop- erty in a too narrow sense of the term, treating property as though its ownership and management were ‘rompleuly free from any social re- sponsibilities. The majority decision Monday has a few sentences of great value. It says: “The Constitution does not speak of freedom of contract. It speaks of lib- erty and prohibits the deprivation of liberty without due process of law. prohibiting that deprivation, the Con- In| stitution does not recognize an abso- lute and uncontrollable liberty. ‘The liberty safeguarded is liberty in & social organization. * * ¢ Liberty un- der the Constitution is thus neces- sarily subject to the restraints of due process and to regulation which is rea- sonable. Liberty implies the absence of arbitrary restraint, not immunity from reasonable regulations.” In commenting upon the majority decision last June this column said: “The majority argument is disturb- ing. It is founded upon freedom of contract and an eighteenth century interpretation of that phase. The same argument was brought up against all the protective legislation introduced 50 years ago in Germany and England, but it has not been heard elsewhere for a generation. No modern interpretation of competitive economy includes the right to pay labor Jpss than must, by the very na- ture of things, be paid to a machine! For machines must be maintained! Competition starts with rules, one cannot throw human bones and blood into the scales. The decision is dis- turbing because of possible public reaction. The great danger exists that a revolt against the decision will become a revolt against the Supreme Court, which for 150 years has helped to stabilize this Republic, and repub- lics are not, historically considered, strong institutions. No republic can last without standards, without ome ultimate authority to which to appeal.” Must Face Reality. And it was on the basis of that de- cision that this column ventured & prophesy : “We must face the reality of a crisis in government. If we do not face it the Supreme Court may be under- mined directly or, worse, by indirec- tion. Indirectly, for instance, its membership may be extended, thereby turning it admittedly into a political That the Supreme Court itself has had the courage to reverse a previous decision on the basis of further thought, knowing as it did so that it would throw itself open to charges of ylelding to threat, is a heartening thing. There is nothing new in it. Decisions have been reversed before in our history. The present one is upheld unani- mously. In rejecting the first bill the Supreme Court enumerated mort- gagees' rights, which were five in number and made it clear that the protection of those rights did not out- law alleviation to the farmers in the form of a moratorium, but that the moratorium must offer protection for those rights. It was on the basis of that decision that the legislators were able to draft another bill. This deci- sion indicates that the Supreme Court is conscious that new conditions re- quire new laws regulating economic relationships. But the two decisions on the two Frazier-Lemke bills show that the court realizes that legislation must not take the form of a chaotic redistribu- tion of privileges. (Copyright. 1937.) WEDNESDAY, MARCH 31, This Changing World French and British Hopes for U. S. Entrance Into European Mess Are Revived. BY CONSTANTINE BROWN. HE departure for Europe of Norman H. Davis, the President’s “peace dove,” on an alleged sugar conference mission, and the return of William Bullitt to his post in Paris after a long conversation with Mr, Roosevelt at Warm Springs, has revived the hopes of France and Great Britain that the United States shortly may take & hand in the European mess. There is no doubt that the President is deeply concerned about Euro- pean affairs. His sympathies are with the democracies of Europe—France and Great Britain. His representatives abroad have been trying to establish some sort of s link between the present economic situation of Europe and the armament race. They hoped that the strain on the finances of Ger- many and Italy will be such that within a reasonably short period these two countries will beg for mercy and welcome the idea of & limitation of arms conference. _ These were hopes expreased by our diplomats in most of their com- munications to Washington, but somehow or other there are no signs yet that the two dictators have reached the point where they want to place the future of their countries at the mercy of an international conference. There is an increased feeling in Italy and in Germany that should these countries agree to enter into an international con- ference, they will get the worst of it. This feeling is due mostly to the fact that they believe that this country is sternly opposed to the system of government prevailing in the Central European dictator- ships and that at an international gathering France and Great Britain, with the assistance of the United States, will have the whip hand. Norman Davis will spend some time in London and in Paris to find out what the actual layout is *x x % While the Italians are taking their participation in the Spanish civil war seriously, the Germans are using it as a convenient maneuver area for a tryout of their air force on & miniature scale. This includes not only the exercise of aircraft types, old, new and experimental, but also of every single item of ancillary equipment con- nected with armament. Spain is their laboratory, where radio, photography, etc., togeth- er with full practice of personnel, both ground and air, are being tested. The Germans form a completely self-contained organization with headquarters at Seville and keep very much to themselves. Their uniforms are plain khaki without insignia ezcept those indi- cating rank. Every two months the pilots and crews return to their native land and are replaced by others. * % % % ‘The Italian national press has become a “service” organization almost like the army, the navy and the diplomatic corps. Changes, transfers and promotions are on a “service” basis. It is easy for an Italian newspaper man to be transferred to a diplomatic post, then return to the composing room. A thorough change in the personnel of the Italian press is being prepared now. Virgilio Gayda, the editor of the Giornale d'Italia and Mussolini’s spokesman for the press, is slated to get an important am- bassadorship. Amicucci, the editor of the Gazetta de Popolo, will be given an undersecretaryship in an important ministry to make him more fa- miliar with the innerworks of the Fascist government machinery. Alfredo Signoretti, the political writer for the Stampa of Turip, will also be given a diplomatic post. Editors of provincial news- papers are being transferred to Rome while Roman editors and writers are being sent for a term of years to provincial newspapers. Despite the war rumors and revolutionary scares, the coronation festivities in London and the Paris exhibition are attracting such s large number of American tourists that there is not a single state room available on any of the ships going to Europe from May to August. In London, hotels, apartments and boarding houses are booked up to their capacity. The foreign ofiice and the home office are worried sick about the housing problems which are brought to them every day. The ofiicial guests demand much more space than it was thought at first The latest blow which has fallen on the foreign office is the announce- ment that his highness the Sultan of Yemen—Arabia—will attend the coronation festivities accompanied not only by a large staff of servants, cooks, bodyguards and whatnot, but also by 75—the youngest—ladies of his harems and 10 eunuchs. And he indicated that he wishes to be housed in a palace with a large garden, shady trees and some spring fountains if possible. Headline Folk "and What They Do Justice Owen J. Roberts Human Crux of Su- preme Court Power. BY LEMUEL F. PARTON. OTH the loose and tight con- structionists in the Supreme Court issue, and everybody in between, figured in everything but the imponderables 8oon after Owen J. Roberts was named for the Supreme Court, in May, 1930, his friend, George Wharton Pep- per, wrote of him “Roberts ought not to be classified as a liberal or a conservative. By that I mean that, while all groups will find him friendly, none will ever be able to claim him as an ally.” His controlling vote in the Su- preme Court vali- dation of the Washington mini- mum wage law is | one of 17 which | have revealed him as standing l even closer* to | fulcrum of court | power than Chief Justice Hughes |“The Constitution is what Justice Roberts says it is,” as one Washing- | ton correspondent put it He began to be recognized as the key man of the court when his controlling vote in- validated the railroad pension act on | May 11, 1935. His, in Romeo's line, is | “A greater power than we can contra- dict.” Bertrand Russell, fashioning his l“chance" theory of history, will find another item here. It was chance that made Owen J. Roberts a member | of the Supreme Court, with all that | now implies, and all that may derive from Mr. Justice Roberts’ single potent word. President Hoover named John J. Parker, a North Carolina judge. Charges of anti-Negro and anti-labor bias were made against Judge Parker. There was a hotly-fought battle i the Senate on confirmation. By a vote of 41 to 39, confirmation was refused. After the railroad pension act de- cision, the late Theodore Wallen, one of the most astute of Washington | correspondents, wrote | “The latest decision of the court | has heightened administration un- easiness over the national recoverv | administration. Many think it will | turn, in the final analysis, on the decision of one man—Associate Justice | Roberts.” This writer saw Owen J. Roberts prosecuting Fall, Doheny et al. in the | case which gave him national promi- | nence and revealed his Supreme Court stature. He talked easily and infor- mally, with his hands in his pockets. He is a big man, roughly blocked out in features and person, of Penn- sylvania German and Welsh antece= | dents | He was a director of many corpora- | tions when President Hoover named | him for the court He brought all this out in the open, and everything was squared before he accepted the ap= pointment. (Copyrizht, 1937.) Justice Roberts. majority of those actually voting is a true majority—there is nothing to | prevent an employe from withdrawing | his consent from a particular spokes- | man or refraining from giving it in the first instance. Each workman has a right to make | his own contract and he may or may | not belong to & union. As a practical | matter, however, if there is an over- whelming number of union men in his plant, he will not long remain an inconspicuous minority, hoping in- stead by the joining of a union to make his voice and influence felt for the things which may have previously caused him to hold himself aloof. But if the division is close and there is 8 bare majority of, say 51 per cent, the 49 per cent on a railroad unit may now find it difficult to negotiate as individuals. Can they employ agents to represent several of them jointly? Point Left Unclear. This point is not cleared up by the latest Supreme Court decision itself, though this paragraph from the Mon- day opinion may have a bearing: “Adalr vs. United States and Cop- page vs. Kansas have no present ap- plication. The provisions of the rail- way labor act invoked here neither compel the employer to enter into any agreement nor preclude it from en- tering into any contract with individ- ual employes. They do not ‘interfere with the normal exercise of the right of the carrier to select its employes or to discharge them.'” Now the Adair and Coppage cases | dealt with the right of an employer to hire union or non-union men and to make this a condition of contract at the beginning of employment, some- thing that was upheld by the Supreme Court on the ground that the employe has as much right to refuse to accept employment in & union or non-union shop as has the employer the right to choose & union or non-union work- er from the list of applicants. When the Supreme Court this week said plainly that the Adair and Coppage / Get the | treat with” the spokesmen of a ma- | hint in future labor legislation. Along cases “have no present application” it was tantamount to saying that the court found no necessity for overrul- ing these decisions of 1908 and 1914. Minority Protected. What the unanimous opinion this week really did was to say that Con- gress had a right to insist on com- pulsory negotiation, that railroad em- ployers could be required by law “to jority of their employes, but that Con- gress could not compel the parties to reach an agreement nor could Con- gress deprive a minority of the work- men of their right to “treat with” their employers provided the minority did not seek collective or group rights which purported to make a rule as applying to general working conditions in which the majority spokesmen had been designated as the “true repre- sentative.” In other words, in the case of a rail- roads, which is, of course, directly un- der Government regulation, the power of & minority to impair or interfere with the negotiations conducted by & majority was to be limited, though their rights as individuals—and doubt- less this covers the rights of their duly chosen agents—were not to be curtailed. It would appear that the Supreme Court has pointed to compulsory ne- gotiation as an essential pre-requisite to industrial peace. Congress and the States will not be slow to take the with compulsory recognition or ne- gotiation of majorities in industrial units, however, would no doubt come some form of legislation, such as is already included in the railway labor act, which definitely limits the right to strike until certain processes of mediation have been exhausted by both sides, a circumstance that makes virtually illegal anything in the na- ture of an arbitrary “shut-down” or “sit-down.” (Copyright, 1937.) advice from the man who knows! Do your eyes bothe the registered opto see what a remark: the correct glasses Can you come in tol r you? Then visit metrist here and able improvement will bring to you. morrow? 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