This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1950.
In The Blue Eagle at Work, Charles J. Morris, a renowned labor law scholar and preeminent authority on the National Labor Relations Act, uncovers a long-forgotten feature of that act that offers an exciting new approach to the revitalization of the American labor movement and the institution of collective bargaining. He convincingly demonstrates that in private-sector nonunion workplaces, the Act guarantees that employees have a viable right to engage in collective bargaining through a minority union on a members-only basis. As a result of this startling breakthrough, American labor relations may never again be the same. Morris's underlying thesis is based on a meticulous analysis of statutory and decisional law and exhaustive historical research.Morris recounts the little-known history of union organizing and bargaining through members-only minority unions that prevailed widely both before and after passage of the 1935 Wagner Act. He explains how vintage language in the statute continues to protect minority-union bargaining today and how those rights are also guaranteed under the First Amendment and by international law to which the United States is a committed party. In addition, the book supplies detailed guidelines illustrating how this rediscovered workers' right could stimulate the development of new procedures for union organizing and bargaining and how management will likely respond to such efforts.The Blue Eagle at Work, which is clear and accessible to general readers as well as specialists, is an essential tool for labor-union officials and organizers, human-resource professionals in management, attorneys practicing in the field of labor and employment law, teachers and students of labor law and industrial relations, and concerned workers and managers who desire to understand the law that governs their relationship.
The author is convinced that there is a ruling class in America today. He examines the American power structure as it has developed in the 1980s. He presents systematic, empirical evidence that a fixed group of privileged people dominates the American economy and government. The book demonstrates that an upper class comprising only one-half of one percent of the population occupies key positions within the corporate community. It shows how leaders within this "power elite" reach government and dominate it through processes of special-interest lobbying, policy planning and candidate selection. It is written not to promote any political ideology, but to analyze our society with accuracy.
By examining the history of the legal regulation of union actions, this fascinating book offers a new interpretation of American labor-law policy—and its harmful impact on workers today. Arguing that the decline in union membership and bargaining power is linked to rising income inequality, this important book traces the evolution of labor law in America from the first labor-law case in 1806 through the passage of right-to-work legislation in Michigan and Indiana in 2012. In doing so, it shares important insights into economic development, exploring both the nature of work in America and the part the legal system played—and continues to play—in shaping the lives of American workers. The book illustrates the intertwined history of labor law and politics, showing how these forces quashed unions in the 19th century, allowed them to flourish in the mid-20th century, and squelched them again in recent years. Readers will learn about the negative impact of union decline on American workers and how that decline has been influenced by political forces. They will see how the right-to-work and Tea Party movements have combined to prevent union organizing, to the detriment of the middle class. And they will better understand the current failure to reform labor law, despite a consensus that unions can protect workers without damaging market efficiencies.
The purchase of this ebook edition does not entitle you to receive access to the Connected eBook on CasebookConnect. You will need to purchase a new print book to get access to the full experience including: lifetime access to the online ebook with highlight, annotation, and search capabilities, plus an outline tool and other helpful resources. The Ninth Edition of this widely used casebook maintains the problem-based emphasis of prior editions. Text is taken seriously but always in the full context of the attendant policy issues. The Trump Board’s decisions are addressed, alongside treatment of difficulties that will motivate change in the Biden years. The coverage of current issues complements the casebook’s comprehensive and nuanced treatment of all the important law on a topic that has become central to contemporary debates about income and wealth divisions in the society. This treatment spans from the protection of concerted employee activity to the organizing process to the bargaining and implementation of collective agreements. It covers other important topics including the preemption of state law and interaction with antitrust and immigration law. New to the Ninth Edition: Coverage of the most salient and controversial issues posed by developments at the National Labor Relations Board over the past six years, including: The independent contractor distinction, including the emerging “ABC” test The joint employer debate Defining appropriate bargaining units The effects on protected concerted activity of neutral employer personnel rules and the Supreme Court’s endorsement of class action waivers in arbitration The regulation of bargaining during the term of collective agreements Board deferral to arbitration As part of its contemporary focus, the Ninth Edition highlights past and current proposals to amend the National Labor Relations Act (NRLA), including those in the pending Protecting the Right to Organize Act (PRO Act) The new edition’s Statutory Supplement aids discussion by including the PRO Act as passed by the House of Representatives this year and again presents the NLRA with easy to view indications of its evolution, as well as the other major statutes and examples of innovative collective bargaining agreements. Professors and students will benefit from: A book that consistently poses problems for students and gets deeply into factual issues and important points of law. Careful editing of cases that preserves the decisional antecedents for the court’s action is a hallmark of the book.