Settlement of Disputes Between Labor Unions

Report Outline
Public Protest Against Interunion Disputes
Interunion Struggles in Earlier Years
Prevalence of Jurisdictional Strikes
Special Focus

Public Protest Against Interunion Disputes

Both The National Labor Relations Board and the National Mediation Board, in their recently published annual reports for 1938, vigorously protested against the effects of the present split in the ranks of organized labor. The N. L. R. B. expressed a strong hope that the conflict between the American Federation of Labor and the Congress of Industrial Organizations would be settled in the coming year.

The Secretary of Labor, in her annual report, was equally vigorous in her criticism of the present situation. The report said:

The most difficult and troublesome disputes in the past year have been those that involved both A. F. of L. and C. I. O. unions in introducing their standing difference into a dispute. In cases of this sort the employer is placed in a most unjustifiable position, and the good-will of the public toward labor is impaired. If the two groups cannot presently make a general peace between them they will at least have to make a truce with regard to precipitating and aggravating disputes among themselves when sound relations to an employer is imperiled. There is overwhelming evidence that the vast majority of union members of both factions want peace and desire to cooperate with each other.