Taft-Hartley Act is the popular name for the federal Labor-Management Relations Act of 1947. The act was named for its main sponsors, Senator Robert A. Taft and Representative Fred Hartley. It was an amendment to the Wagner Act (National Labor Relations Act of 1935). It continued the Wagner Act’s basic guarantees of workers’ rights, outlawed certain union tactics, and expanded the act’s concept of unfair labor practices to include practices of labor organizations. The Taft-Hartley Act provided that the start of strikes which might cause a national emergency can be delayed for 80 days.
The act forbids unions to use force or discrimination against individuals during organizing campaigns. It also prohibits unions from using dues collected from members for political contributions in national elections. The act prohibits use of the secondary boycott, sympathy strike, and jurisdictional strike. A secondary boycott occurs when striking employees bring pressure on a party not involved in the dispute in hopes that the party will stop doing business with their employer. A sympathy strike is called by one union in support of another union that is striking against its employer. A jurisdictional strike is called by rival unions over which union has the right to work on a job.
The Taft-Hartley Act outlaws the closed shop, the practice of hiring only union members. The act also gives the states power to restrict the union shop, in which employees have to join the union after being hired. The act requires unions to file such information as constitutions and financial statements with the federal government.
Taft-Hartley supporters said the act equalized power between union and management. Unions called it a “slave labor law,” and tried to repeal or amend it.
