Harder Look at Taft-Hartley

After taking a hard look at the Taft-Hartley Act, the National Labor Relations Board decided three years ago that it had a double-barreled weapon for blasting Communists out of the labor movement. Barrel No. i: The act requires all union leaders to file non-Communist affidavits before a union may qualify for the board's vital services, of which an important one is certification of the union as a col lective bargaining agent. Barrel No. 2: it seemed logical to the board that, in cases where unions persisted in re-electing officers indicted or convicted for falsifying the affidavits, the NLRB could refuse its services to the whole union until members cleaned house and elected genuine nonCommunists.

Last week the Supreme Court, after taking its own hard look at the law, plugged up Barrel No. 2. The court ruled that--even in cases where the members are aware that their leaders are Com munists and have perjured themselves in filing affidavits--the NLRB cannot deny its services to the union membership. Principal reason, as outlined in a unanimous decision delivered by Associate Justice William O. Douglas: Congress intended to restrict the NLRB's role to getting the affidavits filed, left it to the Justice Department to examine their validity and exact penalties where required--but only "against the guilty officers." Practical effect of the decision: the NLRB's anti-Communist fire is only half as strong as it used to be.

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