Experts Doubt High Court Decision Will Spur Right-to-Work Legislation

Experts here last night said that Monday's Supreme Court decision would not affect national sentiment about right-to-work laws. The Court upheld unanimously the prerogative of state courts to enforce these laws.

The ruling had prompted one leader of the National Right to Work Committee to predict a speed-up in the movement for the laws, which prohibit a company from requiring union membership of employees. Two University professors commented, however, that the decision had been fully expected and, in the words of one, "should not be regarded as a bombshell."

No Court Backing

Robert G. McCloskey, professor of Goverment, emphasized that the decision did not imply court backing of right-to-work laws. Such an interpretation would be a "pretty far-fetched of the ruling," he said.

Twenty states, most of them in the South, now have right-to-work laws. Maynard T. Kennedy, professor of Business Administration, doubted that the decision would prompt the spread of the laws to industrialized northern states.

Kennedy noted that in Ohio, for example, Republicans had sponsored right-to-work laws without success in 1958. Most Republicans, he said, felt that the issue had caused them "severe damage."

Both McCloskey and Kennedy predicted that Senator Berry Goldwater, a strong advocate of right-to-work laws, would not increase his support of the measures as a result of the decision. In fact, Kennedy suggested that the Senator's support for the laws may become increasingly unwise as he becomes prominent nationally.

At the recent AFLCIO national convention, New York's Gov. Rockefeller, a leading candidate for the Republican presidential nomination along with Goldwater, announced his opposition to the right-to-work laws