Disposition Authorities for Individual Classifications for Headquarters Case Files. Part B: Classification 112. Labor Management Relations Act, 1947.

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United States. Federal Bureau of Investigation. Disposition Authorities for Individual Classifications for Headquarters Case Files. Part B: Classification 112. Labor Management Relations Act, 1947.

Disposition Authorities for Individual Classifications for Headquarters Case Files. Part B: Classification 112. Labor Management Relations Act, 1947.

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/122397411

The FBI established this classification in 1947 to cover investigations of violations of the Taft-Hartley Act. Of the Act's provisions, that prohibiting Communist Party members from holding union offices became the most controversial and problematic. The law required that all union leaders (including local officials) sign affidavits stating that they were not members of the Communist Party and did not advocate violent overthrow of the government. Most Party members resigned their membership before signing the affidavits. Communist affiliated union leaders acting as Bureau informants, however, found themselves in a difficult position. They were faced with the choice of resigning their Party memberships (and thereby losing their value as informants), maintaining their memberships and perjuring themselves on the affidavits, or maintaining their memberships and refusing to sign the affidavits. Documentation of the 00 file indicates that the Bureau would provide no guidance in this matter. In 1951, the Department of Justice blamed its failure to prosecute these case files on the reluctance of informants to serve as witnesses. This reluctance made it difficult to establish that a union official had denied Party membership in violation of the Act. With the repeal of the affidavit provisions of the Act in 1959, the Bureau placed greater emphasis on those provisions of the Act prohibiting strikes endangering public health and safety or payoffs from employees to union officials. In 1965 the designation of the classification was changed from "security" to "criminal." The most recent edition of the FBI's MANUAL OF INVESTIGATIVE OPERATIONS AND GUIDELINES (MIOG) excludes agricultural workers, independent contractors, railroad and airline employees and employees of Federal, state and local governments from investigations under the provisions of this act.

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