Question

Who was Senator Robert Wagner, what was his relationship to the Taft-Hartley Act, and why did he oppose the act?

Answer 1

Senator Robert Wagner was an American politician and a democratic U.S. Senator from New York from 1927 to 1949. He helped to pass the National Labor Relations Act, which greatly expanded the rights of labor workers by allowing them to organize into trade unions and bargain for better working conditions. The Taft-Hartley act is also known as the Labor Management Relations Act of 1947, which amended the National Labor Relations Act to restrict the activities and power of labor unions. Since Robert Wagner worked immensely hard on the National Labor Relations Act, he did not approve of such restrictions from the Taft-Hartley Act.

Answer 2

Wagner was a senator from New York who helped pass the National Labor Relations Act, or Wagner Act, in 1935. The Wagner Act supported organized labor, and the Taft-Hartley Act sought to reverse the power of the Wagner Act. Senator Wagner said that the Taft-Hartley bill would destroy the effort to build “industrial peace through democracy.”