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The history of the Labor Relations Act is based on the experience which developed out of First: the informal adjustments of labor disputes during the NRA, and Second: in administering the 7(a) clause of the National Recovery Act. This clause in the act providing for agreements between industrialists on industrial and commercial practices (contrary to the anti-trust act) secured to workers the right to organize and to bargain with employers through representatives of their own choosing.

1 For Miss Perkins' account of NLRB background, see Book V of her reminiscences.

The unexpected wave of strikes and industrial disputes during the life of this act caused the appointment of a board or committee to whom was committed the duty of settling such strikes informally. Senator Robert Wagner, a well-known Friend of labor, was chairman of the board.

The problem of determining what constituted “representatives of their own choosing” led the board to experiment, often successfully, with taking a vote in a given factory or industry. This first board was created by Executive Order of the President in August 1933. Shortly thereafter, new problems