Reply #4: Repeal the "slave-labor bill"? Outrageous! Thank heavens mainstream

[Karmadillo]

Democrats can be counted on not to embrace such extremism.

http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taft-Hartley_Act

The Taft-Hartley Act, passed over the veto of President Harry Truman in 1947, severely restricted the activities and power of unions in the United States. President Truman described the act as a "slave-labor bill". The act, officially known as the Labor-Management Relations Act, was sponsored by Senator Robert Taft and Representative Fred Hartley.

It outlawed closed shops, where only labor union members could be hired. Union shops, where non-union workers hired must join the union within a certain amount of time, are permitted only if the majority of workers approve. The act provides for a 60-day cooling-off period after a contract expires before a strike may be called. Jurisdictional strikes, where two unions attempt to gain control of a particular group of workers, and secondary boycotts and picketing, where unions boycott or picket businesses associated with a target business, are forbidden. Unions are forbidden from contacting workers at the workplace. All union leaders must file affadavits with the US Department of Labor declaring that they are not supporters of the Communist Party.

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http://www.gpnj.net/tafthartley2.html

The Taft-Hartley Act of 1947:
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· Re-instituted court injunctions against strikes

· Gave the government the ability to break strikes by declaring 80 day cooling off periods

· Outlawed organizational picketing

· Gave employers the right to hire scabs as permanent replacements for striking workers

· Banned election campaign contributions from union dues and union treasuries (but not from corporations)

· Banned “secondary boycotts” making it illegal for workers to refuse to cross a picket line when they themselves were not directly party to a labor dispute and illegal to refuse to handle so-called “hot cargo” -- goods coming from or going to a struck enterprise. (This essentially made what Staughton Lynd has characterized as “solidarity unionism” illegal).

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