Hands Off

After 24 hours of continuous negotiations, a rumpled three-man Government board last week announced tentative settlement of the 57-day strike called by nonoperating workers against the Louisville & Nashville Railroad and its subsidiaries. The walkout had affected 29,000 workers and curtailed traffic in 14 states.

The agreement provided for the issues--mostly on health and welfare plans--to be submitted to arbitration.

In the past, railroad strikes have often brought White House intervention. Examples: in 1943 President Roosevelt personally worked out an agreement giving railroad workers an extra 5-c- an hour; in 1946 President Truman coerced a settlement by threatening, in a nationwide broadcast, to order the Army to break a railroad strike (he also proposed to Congress that strikers be drafted into the Army). One result of such presidential action was to make the National Mediation Board, set up under the Railway Labor Act, little more than a front organization, with both rail labor and management looking hungrily toward the White House as the place to win concessions.

This time the White House kept hands off--despite intervention pleas by the L. & N management and the governors of Kentucky, Tennessee and Illinois. Some observers were sharply critical, pointing out that the walkout was the longest major rail strike since 1922 and was marked with violence. Snapped the New Dealing Louisville Courier-Journal: "Strikes which lose millions of dollars for all concerned, which erupt into violence and bloodshed . . . cannot be left to the mercies of 'voluntarism.' "

Against such short-range points was a long-range principle. What the hands-off policy does do is place the negotiating emphasis where it belongs: at the collective-bargaining table. It removes the incentive for either labor or management to delay settlement in hope of winning points through the White House. Members of the National Mediation Board were delighted. Said one: "We are all convinced that the Railway Labor Act will function if it is left alone. The L. & N. strike proves that."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.