r growth in high-tech industries. Many of the decertification actions in the United States are supported (some suspect instigated) by employers, with the assistance of highly trained and educated (and highly paid) consultants. Employer support for decertification actions in the United States is strictly regulated, and blatant attempts to pay lower wages through decertification (as a sort of a bribe to keep jobs) has not been a part of the employer tactics in the United States (this type of bribe has been used effectively, however, by some employers in the negotiation of concessions from labor unions representing their employees).
Organizing Activities of Labor Unions and Industrial Governance in the United States
While labor organization has been present in American society from almost the beginning of nationhood, unions were repressed legislatively, judicially, and socially until the early-1930s. At that point, under the "New Deal" programs of the Roosevelt Administration, progressive labor legislation began to be introduced. From that time through the mid-1940s, organized labor grew, became a socially acceptable institution, and suffered far less from judicial repression.
The development of organized labor followed a rocky road in the 1930s, marked by bloody labor wars which occurred, as industrial managements attempted to thwart the development of the labor movement. The 1947 United States Congress marked the first time since the initial election of Franklin Roosevelt as President that the Republicans held a majority in both the Senate and the House of Representatives. That Congress enacted the Taft-Hartley Act, which imposed new restrictions on organized labor in the areas of practices, internal administration, collective bargaining procedures, and strike actions deemed harmful to the health and safety of the nation (McConnell 121).
In the 1920s, 1930s, 1940s,and 1950s the workers' control movement and the labor mo...