Truman v. Pan Am

In the days when American commercial air policy was being set, President Truman had shown no particular interest in it. He had let the Civil Aeronautics Board plot the course and fly the plane. But last week, to the vast discomfiture of Pan American Airways, the President took over--plane, pilot, CAB and all.

For 17 months CAB had been studying the application of eleven U.S. lines for Latin American routes. Finally it decided that four domestic lines should be given Caribbean routes to compete with Pan Am. But the board did not think Pan Am needed any U.S. flag competition on its lucrative Bermuda and South American runs. When CAB's recommendations went to the President he decided that, on the contrary, more competition was needed--and plenty of it. In jigtime he overruled CAB on four important routes. Moreover, he peremptorily told CAB just exactly which U.S. airlines should get two of the routes.

Puzzle for Lawyers. While aviation lawyers wondered if the President had the authority to do what he had done (CAB regulations give him power to approve CAB actions, say nothing about actually designating lines and routes), CAB hastily did exactly what he wanted.

CAB gave Braniff Airways a route from Mexico City down the west coast of South America, then across to Buenos Aires and Rio de Janeiro. It gave Colonial Airlines permission to fly from Washington and New York to Bermuda--much to the surprise of Colonial, which had applied only for a route from New York. Again on presidential orders, CAB gave Eastern

Airlines a nonstop Miami to Puerto Rico route. The President had ordered the Los Angeles-Mexico City route taken away from Pan Am and given to Western Airlines. A badly flustered CAB issued certificates to both Pan Am and Western. Best break for Pan Am was that it got something it has long wanted, a nonstop route from New York to Puerto Rico.

Puzzle for Pan Am. But this was only a crumb compared to the vast bite the President had taken out of Pan Am's onetime monopoly in Latin America. For the first time, Pan Am has competition from U.S. lines the full length of the rich Latin American travel area.

Why the President had acted no one seemed to know, least of all CAB. Best guess seemed to be that it was the work of brasshats who have often been miffed by Pan Am's way of doing business. If so, their plan may yet backfire. As long as so many domestic lines are to compete with Pan Am abroad, CAB will be hard put to it to find logical reasons why Pan Am should not compete with them at home, as it wants to do.

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