Benjamin Aaron - Legal Contributions

Legal Contributions

In 1966, Aaron helped form the Comparative Labor Law Group. Aaron invited prominent labor law scholars from the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Sweden, Germany and Italy to discuss each country's unique approach to labor and industrial relations. Over the next 12 years, the Comparative Labor Law Group produced three books and helped establish the legal discipline of comparative labor law in the United States. Due to his work in the field, Aaron became editor of the Comparative Labor Law and Policy Journal. Despite his advanced age, at the time of his death Aaron still served as Senior Editor of the publication.

Aaron was also a strong critic of American labor law. He contended that most judges lack experience in how the modern workplace functions and the specialized nature of labor law, and advocated the creation of "labor courts" to adjudicate employer-union legal disputes. He also argued that the Taft-Hartley Act was deeply flawed, although union members' rights needed additional protection not offered under the National Labor Relations Act, Taft-Hartley, or the Landrum-Griffin Act. In an article in the Comparative Labor Law Journal in 1979, Aaron argued that the National Labor Relations Act failed to protect the rights of the vast majority of unorganized workers and advocated major reform of the act.