The Pittsburgh Press (February 15, 1946)
Background of news –
Equal to general strikes?
By Bertram Benedict
The legal ban on general strikes in Great Britain is in process of being repealed by Parliament. The ban was imposed by a Conservative Parliament in 1927, following the British general strike of 1926.
Meanwhile, strong sentiment is developing in the United States Senate to amend the Case anti-strike bill, passed by the House last week, so as to forbid by law, perhaps in favor of compulsory arbitration, general strikes or strikes which paralyze whole communities by shutting down public utilities or utility-type industries.
In 1926, the British miners turned over their months-old strike to the British Trades Union Congress. This body accepted sponsorship, thus turning the coal strikes into a general strike. The Baldwin ministry called the general strike a blow at government itself, used the Army and Navy to move food, enrolled volunteers to help man the railroads and other transportation facilities.
The highest British court ruled that the general strike was illegal, and the Trade Union Congress called it off after 10 days.
General strikes banned
In the following year Parliament enacted the Trade Disputes and Trade Unions Act which in effect banned general and also sympathetic strikes. Specifically, a strike was made illegal if its object were to inflict hardship on the community, or to coerce the government directly, or to do anything except carry out a trade dispute.
If a strike coming under this ban were called, trade union funds were made liable for damages caused an employer. Penalties were provided for persons breaking a service contract with a public authority with reason to believe that thus the entire community would be harmed.
And unions were forbidden to assess any member for contributions to a political fund unless he was willing to be assessed.
Recently the United States has learned that a general strike is not needed to paralyze most of the economic activity of a whole community – a strike of comparatively few workers in a key industry will do the trick. The tugboat strike in New York, the transit strike in Philadelphia, and the power strike in Pittsburgh led to brief shutdowns of most economic activities.
Complications cited
The United States has learned also how complicated a strike picture can be. In New York, a two-hour strike of all CIO unions had been called for last Monday only to be rescinded almost immediately on pressure from national CIO headquarters.
The tugboat strike which then had much the effect of a general strike is that of an AFL union. The Philadelphia trolley strikers were CIO; the Pittsburgh power strikers, an independent union.
In Philadelphia the strike was ended by agreement, in Pittsburgh by re-opening of negotiations. In New York the strikers agreed to accept the arbitration of Mayor O’Dwyer; the operators refused.
On Lincoln’s Birthday the Auto Workers, who have agreed to accept the 19½-cents-an-hour increase recommended by a government fact-finding agency, rejected an 18½-cents increase offered by General Motors; the union argues that it is now GM which is on strike, against a government award.