National Labor Relations Act of 1935

The Law Federal law establishing the right of employees to organize and establishing the National Labor Relations Board

Also known as Wagner Act; NLRA

Date July 8, 1935

The National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), also known as the Wagner Act, was a landmark piece of legislation that enshrined into law labor’s right to organize and bargain collectively, creating an unprecedented relationship between the American labor movement and the federal government.

From the late nineteenth century through the early twentieth century, the right of American workers to organize for mutual protection was severely limited by laws and customs that favored employers and emphasized individual rights. As a result, the nascent American labor movement operated largely outside the law, fighting the legal system not to be defined as “conspiracies in restraint of trade,” which finally happened with the passage of the Clayton Act of 1914, as labor unions were exempt from the antitrust laws set forth by the act. Even then, the American legal climate remained so unfavorable to organized labor that the American Federation of Labor, the most successful labor organization to arise during this period, rejected reliance on governmental protection of labor as less reliable than protections achieved through union contracts. The craft orientation and other exclusionary practices of the AFL, however, drove the majority of American workers to seek legislative protection. The role of the government in protecting the rights of workers and the right of labor to organize dramatically increased during the 1930’s.

The New Deal and the American Labor Movement

The federal government’s role in protecting and expanding labor’s rights both coincided with and inspired the rise of the industrial union movement that culminated with the founding of the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO). The increased governmental involvement in labor-management regulations was also part of a larger pattern of New Deal efforts to regulate industry. For that reason, the NLRA was both an outgrowth of the earlier regulatory efforts of the National Industrial Recovery Act (NIRA) of 1933 and a turning point from a governmental focus on shoring up business to one focused on aiding people. Nonetheless, there was an important thread of continuity when it came to labor-management relations. Section 7a of the NIRA granted workers the right to organize and collectively bargain and required employers to bargain in good faith with their employees’ chosen representatives. Additionally, it set up the National Labor Board (NLB) to mediate disputes. However, the NLB proved ineffectual, and the voluntary nature of the codes undercut their effectiveness. Even with these limitations, the CIO took advantaged of section 7a to rapidly advance the organization of unskilled workers.

Meanwhile, mixed reaction existed to the possibility of greater labor organization among industrialists. While many industrial leaders were sharply opposed to any infringements on their right to manage, others, whose industries had experience with regulatory unionism, appreciated the role that the relatively conservative unions could play in maintaining industrial peace and, hence, productivity. These industrialists therefore cautiously favored these kinds of regulations, as long as their competitors were required to adhere to them as well. The kind and scope of regulation, however, remained controversial, leading the Supreme Court to invalidate the NIRA on May 27, 1935.

The passage of the NLRA also resulted from an unprecedented labor and working-class influence on the American political environment during President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s second term. The act was introduced by the progressive New York senator Robert F. Wagner, on February 28, 1934. The passage of the NLRA in July, 1935, was aided by the support of Secretary of Labor Frances Perkins and eventually of President Roosevelt, along with the rising political power of industrial union movement and the cautious support of industry. Hailed as “labor’s Magna Carta,” the NLRA legally required employers to bargain with their employees’ chosen independent bargaining representatives. It also banned company unions, allowed for closed shops, and forbade numerous employer efforts to thwart unionization as unfair labor practices. Finally, it created the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to mediate labor disputes in private industry.

Impact

The NLRA had profound, immediate effects on the American labor movement. It further energized the CIO and helped shore up the industrial union movement, especially important because organization began to falter by the late 1930’s and public opinion began to turn against organized labor over the continued strikes against companies that refused to abide by the NLRA’s provisions. The NLRA survived its first constitutional test with the case of National Labor Relations Board v. Jones and Laughlin Steel Corp., settling a lawsuit over discrimination against union members in labor’s favor. It made the labor movement fully “legal” but also made it subject to government regulation. In turn, this closer relationship between labor and the government made the American labor movement vulnerable to both subsequent legislation that was less prolabor and NLRB rulings that have not always been favorable to the labor movement. The enforcement of the act’s prolabor provisions have been weakened, showing how the NLRA fulfilled both labor’s greatest hopes and worst fears about full legal recognition by the federal government.

Bibliography

Babson, Steve. The Unfinished Struggle: Turning Points in American Labor, 1877-Present. Lanham, Md.: Rowman & Littlefield, 1999. Study of the major watershed periods in American labor history, highlighting the 1930’s as a significant period of the expansion of labor’s rights.

Folsom, Burt, Jr. New Deal or Raw Deal? How FDR’s Legacy Has Damaged America. New York: Threshold Editions, 2008. Revisionist account of the New Deal that argues that the New Deal lengthened the Great Depression and created problems that lasted well beyond it.

Gordon, Colin. New Deals: Business, Labor, and Politics in America, 1920-1935. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1994. Groundbreaking interpretation of the New Deal that demonstrates the essentially pro-big-business focus of the economic reforms of the New Deal.

Lichtenstein, Nelson. State of the Union: A Century of American Labor. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2002. Study of the rising and then declining role of the labor movement as a democratizing force in the American workplace and American life.

National Labor Relations Board. Legislative History of the National Labor Relations Act. 2 vols. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1985. Commemorative documentary history of the NLRA published in honor of the fiftieth anniversary of its passage.