LABOR: The Right to Marry

For 15 years pretty Dolores Mann worked hard and well as a one-woman office staff for Local 2227 of the United Steelworkers in the tough steel town of West Mifflin, Pa. But last week, bundled in long underwear and layers of sweaters, coats and scarves, Dolores trudged up and down in biting winds and swirling snow before her employer's shabby office bearing a defiant placard: "On Strike." Her complaint was that the union would not let her keep her job if she married a construction worker named Victor Bosnak.

The issue arose when the steelworkers refused to write a...