Rights for Employers

The most newsworthy of last week's Supreme Court decisions gave a significant victory to labor. But it also brought unexpected tidings of comfort to employers apoplectically gagged in labor disputes by previous court rulings.

The Supreme Court (5 to 4) told C.I.O.'s Roland Jay Thomas he did not have to get an organizer's card from the State of Texas before soliciting union memberships (TIME, Oct. 4, 1943). The Texas registration law, said the court in giving labor the nod, was unconstitutional because it infringed on the rights of free speech and free assembly.

Justice Robert H. Jackson concurred with the majority decision. But in his agreement, he took occasion to write words of cheer for businessmen. Employers, he said in effect, have not been getting their rights to free speech under labor's Magna Carta--the Wagner Act. Said Jackson: "I must admit that in overriding the findings of the Texas court we are applying to Thomas a rule the benefit of which in all its breadth and vigor this court denies to employers in NLRB cases. . . . However, the remedy is not to allow Texas improperly to deny the right of free speech but to apply the same rule and spirit to free speech whoever the speaker."

Businessmen, looking forward to the next employer appeal from an adverse NLRB ruling, hoped that at least four of Justice Jackson's colleagues would agree.

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