Yellow-dog contract

agreement between an employer and an employee regarding labor unions

A yellow-dog contract (a yellow-dog clause[1] of a contract, or an ironclad oath) is an agreement between an employer and an employee. The employee agrees not to be a part of a trade union. This was part of a contract which employers and employees signed when employees were hired. In the United States, yellow-dog contracts or yellow-dog clauses were often used by employers to stop the creation of unions. It let employers take legal action against union organizers. In 1932, yellow-dog contracts were made illegal in the United States under the Norris-LaGuardia Act.[2][3]

The term yellow-dog clause can also have another meaning: non-compete clauses inside of or added to a non-disclosure agreement to stop an employee from working for other employers in the same industry.[4]

References

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  1. "Yellow Dog Clause". JargonDatabase.com.
  2. Basu, Kaushik (January 2006). "Coercion, Contract and the Limits of the Market" (PDF). CAE Working Paper #06-01.
  3. Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., The Crisis of the Old Order, 1919-1933, (Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston, 1957), pp. 238-239
  4. Hague, James (June 2002). "Stephen Biggs". Halcyon Days: Interviews with Classic Computer and Video Game Programmers.