Landrum-Griffin Act
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Landrum-Griffin Act
Landrum-Griffin Act
(Labor-Management Reporting and Disclosure Act of 1959), a law passed in the USA on Sept. 14, 1959, pushed by the monopoly circles and aiming at weakening the trade unions and establishing control over them.
The Landrum-Griffin Act strengthens government interference in the internal affairs of the trade unions (it regulates the system of setting membership dues, holding elections, imposing disciplinary penalties, and so on) and compels the trade unions to present detailed accounts on all officers and their earnings, on the trade union bylaws, and on revenue and expenditures. The secretary of labor has the right to conduct an investigation against a trade union if the bylaws or the election procedures have been violated.
The Landrum-Griffin Act substantially curtails the ability of the trade unions to defend the economic interests of the working people: it prohibits certain types of picketing, including those aimed at the recognition of a trade union if the union is not registered with state agencies, and it completely prohibits the secondary boycott, which is an instrument of solidarity with strikers and a means of exerting pressure on the entrepreneurs. These provisions expand the entrepreneurs’ opportunities for disrupting strikes and erecting obstacles to the growth of trade union membership, and they even threaten collective bargaining itself. Violation of the statute is punishable by a fine of $10,000 or a prison term of up to one year.