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a labor law which the unions had been instrumental in getting many years ago. That had to do wholly with the building trades. It was to the effect that whenever the government built a public building by bid, the bid should require that the prevailing rate of wages be paid. The prevailing rate of wages had always been taken to be the union rate of wages.

The unions, following the lead of this conference, bit on this and were very enthusiastic about it. Of course, some of the people who had been instrumental in developing the NRA, and Johnson himself, were very much opposed to having any such bill go in, as they thought it would muss up the general enthusiasm for the NRA and that manufacturers who had a hope of getting a government contract would be much annoyed if they had another law wished on them besides the code which they had already agreed to. But by this time the union people, by which I mean William Green and Matthew Woll, and Meany of the Plumbers, were kind of pressing us as to what we were going to do about that bill. Arthur Wharton of the Machinists was very much interested in it. Of course, the building trades people already had, or thought they had, similar protection, because the prevailing rate of wages law was good enough for them. But there was general approval.