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From The Militant, Vol. 13 No. 9, 28 February 1949, p. 1.
Transcribed & marked up by Einde O’Callaghan for ETOL.
NEW YORK, Feb. 26 — Farrell Dobbs, National Chairman of the Socialist Workers Party, today called on the Senate Labor Committee to specifically provide safeguards on the rights of labor by making it illegal for any government agency, “be it executive, legislative or judicial, to restrict, restrain or deny the right to strike and picket by injunction, seizure of struck facilities, or by any other means.” The full text of Dobbs’ letter to the Senate Labor Committee follows:
Senator Elbert D. Thomas, Chm.
Senate Labor Committee
Washington, D.C.
Dear Senator Thomas:
There is grave cause for public alarm in President Truman’s sweeping claim of “inherent power” to break strikes by injunction.
More is involved than the fact that the Democratic Party’s pledge to repeal the Taft-Hartley Act can mean little when the President claims authority to continue the very worst features of that anti-labor law.
The nation faces a growing threat of one-man rule by executive decree.
In flagrant violation of the Bill of Rights, the Truman Administration has decreed the blacklisting of opponent political organizations as “subversive.” No bill of particulars has been furnished the accused organizations and demands for a public hearing on the “subversive” charge have been denied.
The legless war veteran, James Kutcher, and many others have already been victimized because of this blacklist.
Through the proposed North Atlantic military pact, the Administration is also attempting to circumvent the Constitution by shifting the actual war-making powers away from Congress into the hands of the President.
The political blacklist and the military pact, of course, have no direct bearing on the labor legislation under consideration by your committee. However, these examples of Administration policy make it crystal clear that the President’s claim of “inherent power” to break strikes by injunction is not an isolated episode but rather part of a definite trend toward concentration of dictatorial powers in his hands.
Unless your committee and the Congress answer the President with legislation specifically forbidding him to break strikes by injunction, you will have sanctioned by your silence his claim of “inherent power” to fasten a one- man dictatorial rule upon the country.
In the name of the Socialist Workers Party, I call upon your committee and the Congress to provide the following safeguards of the right to strike:
Since my request for an appointment to appear in person before your commitee has not been granted, I ask you to insert this letter in the record of the committee hearings.
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Yours truly |
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