The Taft-Hartley Act
By Kim Fleshman
Please click sound on each slide 
Name of Law & Why I Picked
This Law
• The Taft-Hartley Act
– A.k.a. The Labor Management
Relations Act
• My political ideals
• My prior union representative
experience
• My curiosity
H
i
s
t
o
r
y
• Senator Robert A. Taft
– Son of President William Howard Taft
– 14 years in the senate
– “Mr. Republican”
– From Ohio
• Congressman Fred A. Hartley Jr.
– 20 Years in congress
– Also, a republican
– From New Jersey
History
• The depression in the 1930’s
• 1935 – 1947 the number of unions increased greatly
• WWII in the 1940’s
• The Atomic Bomb
• Civil Rights concerns
• The mob being associated with unions
• The strikes of 1946
• 4.5 million Americans on strike
• We were a factory production economy
• With the strikes production is lost, our economy stopped
• FDR dies and Truman takes over the presidency
• In the 1946 elections, republicans gained control of the house and the
senate.
Background
• The Norris-LaGuardia Act of 1932
• Guaranteed the right to bargain collectively
• “Limited the courts’ ability to issue injunctions” against
peaceful picketing
• Declared yellow dog contracts unenforceable
• The Wagner Act 1935
• A.K.A. National Labor Relations Act
• Was enacted to reduce industrial strife
• Allowed for secret-ballot elections for unions
• Created the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB)
• Banned certain unfair labor practices
The Wagner Act 1935
• Five Unfair Labor Practices
– Unfair for employers to restrain or coerce
employees from self-organizing
– Unfair for a company to interfere with the
formation or administration of unions
– Employers are prohibited from discriminating
against employees for their legal union
activities
– Employers are forbidden to discharge or
discriminate against employees if they file
unfair labor practice charges against the
company
– Unfair for employers to refuse to collectively
bargain with the chosen union representative
Dessler, pg. 600
The Taft-Hartley Act of 1947
• A.K.A. The Labor Management
Relations Act
• Amends the National Labor Relations
Act by limiting unions in four (4) ways
– Prohibiting unfair union labor practices
– List the rights of employees as union
member
– List the rights of employers
– Allowing the president of the U.S. to
temporarily bar national emergency
strikes
Dessler, pg. 602
Rights of Employers
• Employers are allowed to express
their views about unions.
• They can suggest voting against the
union if in the normal work area or
where the employees gather
• Employers cannot threaten or
promise anything to an employee
• He or she cannot meet with an
employee on company time within
24 hours of an election
Rights of Employees
• The Taft-Hartley Act protects
employees against the union
• It allowed for “right-to-work” laws
– 19 states in the beginning
– 22 states now have “right-to-work”
laws
Some Definitions
Closed Shop- The most extreme form of union control. Only
members of the union can be hired into a job. Therefore,
you must join the union before you can even apply.
• This was outlawed with the passing of the Taft-Hartley Act
Union Shop- A new employee must join the union within a
specified length of time.
• This is outlawed in right-to-work states
Agency Shop- Employees who do not belong to the union still
have to pay the “fair share” because whatever the union
bargains for will still benefit all workers.
Open Shop- Workers choose to join or not join a union. Those
who do not join do not pay union dues.
Purpose of Legislation
The Taft-Hartley Act helped “Equalize
the positions of management &
labor”
Our New national Labor Policy: the Taft-Hartley Act and the next steps
by Fred. A. Hartley Jr. pg. 1
Purpose of Legislation
• To forbid secondary strikes
• To ban “closed shops”
• Free speech for employers & union
members
• To outlaw featherbedding
• To make the National Labor
Relations Board (NLRB) more of a
watch dog or referee instead of
enforcing the Wagner Act and
always siding with the union.
• Unions now have to file their
constitution & bylaws with the
Secretary of Labor to qualify
for the NLRB privileges
Courtesy of the Holt Labor Library Collection
“Pamphlet s in the fight against Taft-Hartley 1947-1948”
“We accepted the basic
principle of the Wagner
Act, namely that the
employer must deal with
his men as one unit
recognizing the
representative chosen by
a majority of those men
without the influence or
coercion of the employer.”
Our New National Labor Policy, Forward by Robert A. Taft pg. XIV
Purpose of Legislation
• Presidential
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Power to stop a
strike
• When it is in the best
interest of the United States
and our economy
• 80 day “cool down” period
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Comparing the Acts
Wagner Act 1935
• Purpose: “the government is
committed to advancing the
banner of trade unionism.”
Taft-Hartley 1947
• Purpose: “To protect the
principles of trade unionism
but eliminate those elements
of the U.S. National Labor
Policy which had been the
direct cause of industrial
controversy.”
Copyright 1948. Graphic by Gilbert. Reproduced courtesy of the
Holt Labor Library Collection
Important Dates
Dates of Passage
Amendments
• The Hartley Bill passed the House • President Nixon proposed
of Representatives
the Emergency Public
• April 17, 1947
Interest Protection Act of
• It now become the Hartley
1970
Act
– This would have affected Taft• Senator Robert A. Taft coHartley & the Railway Labor
sponsored the act
Act
• Now referred to as the TaftHartley Act
– The House & Senate Labor
• President Truman vetoed TaftCommittees did not respond
Hartley
• June 20, 1947
• Congress over turned the veto
• June 23, 1947
Attempts to invoke TaftHartley
• President Harry S. Truman
– Although he vetoed the original act, he
invoked this law 10 times
•
President Dwight D. Eisenhower
– Invoked this law 7 times
• Presidents John F. Kennedy &
Lyndon B. Johnson
– Invoked this law 12 times during their
combined administrations
• President Richard M. Nixon
– Successfully invoked this law twice
Attempts to invoke
Taft-Hartley Continued
• President Jimmy Carter
– Invoked Taft-Hartley March 1978 due
to the Coal Miner’s Strike but the court
refused the injunction
•
President Ronald Reagan
– Used Taft-Hartley August 1981 for the
Air Traffic Controller’s Strike.
• President George W. Bush
– Invoked Taft-Hartley October 2002
because of the Longshoremen’s Strike
Most Recent Legal Case
• The Secretary of Labor tried to
negotiate a 30-day contract
extention with the International
Longshore and Warehouse Union to
reopen the ports.
• The main contract dispute was
about new technology that
management wanted to introduce.
• The union would not accept the
new technology unless all jobs
involved where union jobs.
Summary
• Taft-Hartley Act 1947
• A.K.A. The Labor Management Relations Act
• Date passed:
• June 23, 1947
• Enforcement Agency:
• National Labor Relations Board (NLRB)
• Purpose of Legislation:
• Limited unions in 4 ways
• Prohibited unfair union practices
• Listed the rights of employees as members of unions
• Listed the rights of employers
• Allowed the president to temporarily stop national emergency strikes
Bibliography
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Oct. 2009. http://www.jstor.org/stable/2524846.
Review of Has Labor Law Failed? An examination of Congressional Oversight and Legislative Proposals (1968-1990) by Daniel V. Yager
Hartley, Fred A. Our New National Labor Policy: The Taft-Hartley Act and the Next Steps. With a foreword by Robert A. Taft. New York:
Funk & Wagnalls Company, 1948. Print.
Ludwig, Jordan. The Passage and Events Surrounding the Taft-Hartley Act: An Analysis. The University of Maryland Undergraduate
History Journal. Spring 2007.
http://www.janus.umd.edu.
Millis, Harry A., and Emily Clark Brown. From the Wagner Act To Taft-Hartley. Chicago: The University of Chicago, 1950. Print.
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Web. 13 Oct. 2009. http://www.jstor.org/stable/2523698.
Ross, Phillip. "The Role of Government in Union Growth." Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, The Crisis in the
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Sanger, David E., and Steven Greenhouse. "Bush Invokes Taft-Hartley Act to Open West Coast Ports." The New York Times. The New York
Times, 09 Oct. 2002. Web. 06 Nov. 2009. http://www.nytimes.com/2002/10/09/politics/09PORT.html.
“Taft-Hartley Act.” West’s Encyclopedia of American Law. The Gale Group, Inc. 2005. Encyclopedia.com. 26. Oct. 2009
Wagner, Steven. "How Did the Taft-Hartley Act Come About?" History News Network. 14 Oct. 2002. Web. 06 Nov. 2009.
http://hnn.us/articles/1036.html.