The Problem Clauses

The vital issues in the steel strike are the twin threats of inflation and foreign competition, which have stiffened the stance of management toward the steelworkers' bid for higher wages. By last week, the fifth week of idleness for the biggest U.S. industry, these broad matters revolved around a little-known section of the steel contract that has brought negotiations to a virtual standstill. The section: the past-practices clause. Written into contracts since 1947, the clause jealously protects local working practices or customs that have existed regularly over a long period, in effect provides that if a man did a job one way several years ago, he is entitled to do it the same way today.

Management insists on greater control over such working conditions, which it claims nurture featherbedding, and it refuses to grant a penny in wage hikes unless it can increase efficiency by changing work practices as it sees fit. Otherwise, say the steel companies, any wage hike would be inflationary. Union Boss David McDonald charges that any changes would have the effect of "reducing the employees to mill slaves and the union to an ineffective puppet." He has even more personal reasons for standing firm: rank-and-file union members are deeply aroused over the threat to local working practices, and they might give McDonald real trouble--perhaps through wildcat strikes--if he permitted any weakening of the clauses.

Source of Friction. While the companies once proposed eight contract changes, they have now reduced them to four, involving changes in past working practices, penalties for wildcat strikes, scheduling hours of work, and vacations. Of these, says U.S. Steel President Walter Munford, the past-practices clauses "have become the source of more friction and grievances than any other section of the labor agreements." In its efforts to get them changed, management is pinning its hopes on a single clause that it has drawn up. But the clause is completely unacceptable to the union, and even impartial arbitrators say it is unworkable. It agrees that employees may file grievances, as now, but its language is so broad (the company cannot be stopped from "improving the efficiency and economy of its operations") that any arbitrator would almost have to decide any grievance in management's favor.

Even under the present contract, the steel companies have a great deal of power to change working conditions to improve efficiency. Arbitrators have long conceded management's right to change any practice--e.g., crew reductions--if it has put in new machines or otherwise eliminated the basis for the practice. During the 13 years that the union has had past-practice clauses, U.S. Steel has won 145 of the 186 cases that have been submitted for arbitration.

Coffee on the Job. Most of the practices that management would like to change are not really featherbedding in the sense that they are widespread through the industry or that they can be eliminated at once. Instead, they are special problems that vary from job to job, cannot be included in any overall contract. Some of them are actually the result of management decisions. In one department where workers were drinking coffee in their spare time, for example, the foreman decided that they should all stop work for ten minutes to take a coffee break. Now the company would like to go back to the old way, because it costs no actual working time, and the workers are fighting the move.

Outside labor experts feel that the past-practices problem could be cleared up if trust existed on both sides. But mistrust has grown so great that no one expects any settlement until strong economic pressures on both sides force it. Last week there were few signs of such pressures. Steel users have not yet begun to hurt as a result of the strike, still have enough steel on hand to last well into September. Nor have the steelworkers themselves been hurt badly; relief rolls are growing and some workers are running out of their vacation pay, but department-store sales in steel towns across the U.S. last week showed no cut in spending. Cleveland department store sales were up 15% over the same week a year ago, Pittsburgh up 7%, Youngstown up 6%, Canton up 8%.

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