Labour Before the Law: The Regulation of Workers' Collective Action in Canada, 1900-1948

W.J.C. Cherwinski is a professor of history and Canadian Studies Program
supervisor at Memorial University of Newfoundland. He is the co-author
of Lectures in Canadian Labour and Working-Class History.

On page 54 of this book, the authors contend that the fuel famine in the
early winter of 1906 was used as a means for the state to intervene in a
strike in the Lethbridge Alberta coalfields with a new weapon, the
Industrial Disputes Investigation Act. Although they dismiss this
situation as a “highly exaggerated” pretext, a simple search of
newspapers during the period would have shown that the fear of freezing
was very real at that time, exacerbated as it was by the most brutal
winter in several decades on the Canadian prairies. This fear was
transmitted to public officials, and to Ottawa in particular, in no
uncertain terms. Government reacted firm in the knowledge that there was
much more to public interest than the needs of the coal operators. The
question, then, is what other evidence has been stressed or
de-emphasized to conform to the authors’ argument that the laws
created to regulate the relationship between capital and labor almost
invariably favored the employers during the first half of the 20th
century? This position is buttressed through a systematic analysis of
the intention and impact of every piece of federal and provincial
legislation promulgated, implemented, and interpreted during these
formative years. However, if one reads this book with that bias in mind,
one quickly sees the new and valuable perspective it provides to the
entire field of Canadian labor history, which until recently has
stressed individual labor organizations, specific industries, and
special strikes and lockouts.

The authors, both lawyers teaching at Osgoode Hall Law School, trace
the development of the legal framework governing the workplace through
the various crises after the IDIA: World War I, the Royal Commission on
Industrial Relations, the Depression and its impact, and the Second
World War and its legacy. In so doing, they provide an excellent
backdrop that will certainly inform not only those studying and teaching
human resource management but also those in the legal profession
specializing in labor law. Readers may not necessarily agree with the
perspective presented, but they should at least be made aware that
workers are not the sole villains in the industrial relations equation.