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Statement by the President Upon Receiving a Report on Collective Bargaining and Industrial Peace.

May 01, 1962

I HAVE today received the Report of the Labor-Management Advisory Committee on free and Responsible Collective Bargaining and Industrial Peace.

As was the Committee's first Report on Automation, this Report is a highly meaningful and significant document.

The fact that public, labor and management representatives are in unanimous agreement that collective bargaining is an essential element of economic democracy is a mark of our progress as a nation when contrasted with the disagreements on this subject in the not too distant past. The fact that all agree on the necessity that collective bargaining be responsible and responsive to the public, or common interest is a symbol of the maturity of the parties to the collective bargaining relationship.

This Report confirms the essential validity and the strength of free collective bargaining. The Committee unanimously asserts the good in collective bargaining--and seeks then for ways to make it better. It finds the key in the inter-relationship of freedom and responsibility. To be free, collective bargaining must be responsible; so long as collective bargaining is responsible, it will always be free.

I see in this Report heartening evidence of the increased unity of purpose in all parts of the American economy. Where collective bargaining has been a way of settling disputes and differences, it is becoming even more now a way of achieving new economic strength, achieving new common purpose.

I congratulate the management, labor and public members of the Committee, who have produced a document of lasting contributions to our Country's welfare.

I appreciate very much all of the Committee's recommendations, including those designed to improve the procedures regarding disputes affecting the national health or safety. The recommendations will receive serious consideration in the formulation of the Administration's legislative proposals to the Congress.

The Committee has also today submitted to me its detailed recommendations for the White House Conference on Economic Issues, to be held on May 21 and 22. I approve of these plans and direct that the Conference proceed on the basis of the recommendations submitted.

This Conference presents an invaluable opportunity for the two-way exchange of information and ideas among the nation's public and private decision makers.

I wane to make this meeting--originally suggested by the Committee--the opportunity for the fullest possible exploration with businessmen, labor leaders and public representatives of the economic problems, and the prospects we as a people face today. The heart of the Conference will be the "roundtable" discussion meetings which are being arranged.

The agenda of the Conference will be distributed shortly by the White House Press Office.

I want again to thank the members of the Committee for their outstanding and continuing service to the country.

Note: The report (26 pp., processed), dated May 1, 1962, was released with the President's statement. For the earlier report on automation see Item 6.
See also Item 203.

John F. Kennedy, Statement by the President Upon Receiving a Report on Collective Bargaining and Industrial Peace. Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/236529

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