LABOR: Done to Death

Done to death last week after lingering illness in the U.S. House of Representatives: the Kennedy-Ives labor bill, which would have required labor unions to publish financial reports and take other reform measures. The end came to Kennedy-Ives after a long, bitter Democratic-Republican political battle won by neither side. All that really emerged from the unseemly performance was the identity of the loser. It was the U.S.

Actually, neither Democrats nor Republicans much liked the Kennedy-Ives bill. Many Democrats thought that it was too strong; most Republicans considered it too weak. But as labor's mess loomed high on the list of political issues for this fall's campaign, Republicans could point to the fact that it was House Speaker Sam Rayburn who had sat on the Kennedy-Ives bill for "40 days and 40 nights," thereby ruling out any real chance of its passing. The Republicans could also campaign on the fact that House Democrats had shelved a G.O.P. labor bill, stronger than Kennedy-Ives and supported by President Eisenhower and Labor Secretary James Mitchell. In reply, Democrats could say that when the Senate-passed Kennedy-Ives bill finally did get to the House floor, it was killed by a majority of Republican votes.

Almost unnoticed in the political squabbling was an eleventh-hour plea for Kennedy-Ives by the A.F.L.-C.I.O. Executive Council, meeting in the Poconos, in crying need of legislative help in cleaning up organized labor.