The Solution That Pleased Nobody

The scheduled start of a national railway strike was a few hours away.

To forestall it, the Senate had passed and sent to the House an emergency arbitration bill. Now the time had come for the House to vote.

This would be the first time in U.S. history that Congress found itself forced to legislate compulsory arbitration to avoid a specific strike. The precedent pleased nobody. And although most Congressmen felt they had no choice but to approve the bill, few cared to have their names associated with it. Thus, when a demand was made for a roll-call vote, it was drowned out by cries of "No, no, no!" Then, on a standing vote with names unrecorded, the House passed the bill, 286 to 66.

"A Mistake." As speedily signed by President Kennedy, the bill prohibited a strike for six months, set up an arbitration board to consist of two management members, two labor members and three public representatives. The board was given 90 days to dictate a settlement on two key issues between railway management and labor: the size of work crews, and the continued employment of some 32,000 unneeded firemen on diesel trains. The board's decisions, binding on both labor and management, would take effect in two more months.

At the same time, management and labor would have six months to reach a settlement of several less critical, but still sticky, issues. If they failed, the unions would again be free to strike.

The congressional intervention signaled a failure in the U.S.'s collective bargaining process. For four years, management and the five unions had been deadlocked in bitter dispute. This presidential fact-finding board had studied the issues, found in favor of management. Repeatedly, management had postponed enforcement of its new work rules at Government request. But last week, when Congress asked for still another delay, management finally balked. Snapped J. E. Wolfe, the carriers' chief negotiator: "The last extension we agreed to was a mistake."

That left the responsibility for preventing a strike right in the lap of Congress, where President Kennedy had tossed it six weeks ago. Kennedy had urged that Congress empower the Interstate Commerce Commission to arbitrate the railway dispute. But the unions, insisting that the ICC is dominated by prejudiced members, lobbied frantically against the President's proposal. The result was that the Senate Commerce Committee dumped the Kennedy plan, substituted its own version.

Heel-Dragging. The bill passed the Senate by a vote of 90 to 2--with only Texas Republican John Tower and Oregon Democrat Wayne Morse voting against it. Morse, although long known as one of labor's most vociferous champions, denounced the railway unions in a scathing Senate speech. Cried he: "I have never seen the kind of political lobby in operation that I have seen in recent days on the part of the railroad brotherhoods. [They] must take the full responsibility for the adoption of the first compulsory arbitration law in the history of Congress. The carriers have acted in good faith. The brotherhoods have dragged their heels."

In passing its first compulsory arbitration bill, the Congress may have done nothing more than delay the day of reckoning. There is nothing in the railway unions' record to indicate that they will reach a negotiated settlement on the issues that are not to be arbitrated. That being the case, the U.S. may again be confronted by a ruinous rail strike in six months--during a presidential election year, when passions run high and reasonable solutions are even more difficult to achieve.

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