The Wagner Act

You may not be familiar with the Wagner Act, but it’s the law that makes your union membership and benefits possible.

In May 1935, Senator Robert Wagner’s bill to establish guaranteed protection for workers who wanted to organize passed in the United States Senate. In June, it cleared the House, and in July President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed it into law.

The Wagner Act, also known as the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), created a new independent agency — the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), which oversees union filings, elections, and unfair labor practices.

Though the Act and the NLRB remain steadfast fighters for labor rights, their permanency isn’t guaranteed. Just two years after Roosevelt signed the Act into law, the United States Supreme Court would see a case to overthrow these vital protections.

The Act Stands

In 1937, Jones & Laughlin Steel, one of the largest steel producers in the U.S. at the time, would make the case that the NLRA was unconstitutional. After the company had fired several workers for organizing with the steelworkers in Pennsylvania, the NLRB ordered the company to rehire the employees with back pay. Jones & Laughlin Steel refused, sparking their case in the supreme court.

National Labor Relations Board v. Jones & Laughlin Steel Corporation threatened to remove the hard fought protections that made union organizing federally protected and put strong restrictions on employers seeking to union-bust. Without it, workers would be back in the wild, wild, west of unionizing.

Jones & Laughlin Steel tried to argue that the federal government didn’t have the right to regulate interstate commerce, citing the Commerce Clause. However, in a victory for labor across the nation, the court ruled against Jones & Laughlin Steel, upholding the NLRA and all of its authority.

While the Act spelled out huge protections for many workers in the U.S., it also held deeply divisive exclusions for many workers, including those in agricultural industries.

Left Out

Writing for The Baffler in 2022, Shamira Ibrahim said, “By excluding agricultural and domestic workers from key labor protections, the Wagner Act of 1935 drew a bright line between the white and non-white working class.”

According to 2022 data from the National Center for Farmworker Health, approximately 70% of agricultural workers in the U.S. are foreign born. Sixty-six percent are male, 34% were female, and 78% of all agricultural workers self-identify as Hispanic.

Unfortunately, these exclusions still exist for much of the United States. Grassroots unions like United Farm Workers and Oregon’s Pineros y Campesinos Unidos del Noroeste fight for better wages and working conditions for farmworkers, without the actual teeth that legal protection provides to do so.

In 1945, Hawai’i passed the Hawai’i Employee Relations Act, extending collective bargaining rights seen within the NLRA to agricultural workers.

Oregon and Washington have yet to specifically extend these rights to our agricultural workers. While agricultural workers are free to organize and hold union elections, their exclusion from the NLRA means the employer can choose whether they want to recognize the union or not.

The labor movement still has a long way to go in ensuring equal and equitable workers' rights for all, but even as we move forward, we are still threatened by wealthy corporations who threaten to pull us back.

Current Battles

As in 1937, corporate greed has struck again, and some of America’s wealthiest employers are trying to have the NLRA declared unconstitutional.

Like with Jones & Laughlin Steel, these four companies -- SpaceX, Starbucks, Amazon, and trader Joe's' -- found themselves with a “union problem,” as thousands of workers fought to organize at their companies. Collectively, these companies have accrued hundreds of unfair labor practice charges. And so, they are fighting to remove the institution holding them accountable for their wrongs.

The current NLRB and presidential administration are supporters of the labor movement. Such support can’t be guaranteed with a change in presidential administration.

With the impermeability of the NLRA, it is crucial that workers stand up, and fight back against corporate greed and all attacks against our rights. Our struggle is not over.

Additional Reading:

July 19, 1935 Passage of the national Labor relations Act

The Wagner Act Stands

Excluding agricultural and domestic workers

What’s behind the corporate effort to kneecap the National Labor Relations Board?