Railway Labor Act

“ And when the traditional railway labor organizations act on behalf of employees subject to the Railway Labor Act in a dispute with carriers subject to the Railway Labor Act, the organizations must be deemed, pro tanto, exempt from the National Labor Relations Act. ”

“ The governing outlook for construing the Railway Labor Act is hospitable realization of the fact that it is primarily an instrument of industrial government for railroading by the industry itself, through the concentrated agencies of railroad executives and the railroad unions. ”

“ The purpose of the Railway Labor Act was to provide a framework for peaceful settlement of labor disputes between carriers and their employees to 'insure to the public continuity and efficiency of interstate transportation service, and to protect the public from the injuries and losses consequent upon any impairment or interruption of interstate commerce through failures of managers and employees to settle peaceably their controversies.' H.R.Rep. ”

“ Even such a remedy, we think, 'sweeps too broadly * * * (and) might well interfere with the * * * unions' performance of those functions and duties which the Railway Labor Act places upon them to attain its goal of stability in the industry.' Ibid. ”

“ And so the question before us is whether § 2, Eleventh of the Railway Labor Act can untorturingly be read to bar activities of railway unions, which have bargained in accordance with federal law for a union shop, whereby they are forbidden to spend union dues for purposes that have uniformly and extensively been so long pursued as to have become commonplace, settled, conventional tradeunion practices. No consideration relevant to construction sustains such a restrictive reading. ”

“ The Court holds that the Railway Labor Act gives the National Railroad Adjustment Board exclusive jurisdiction of back-pay disputes between retired railroad employees and their ex-employer railroads. I cannot read the Labor Act that way. ”

“ The restrictions with which the operation of our railways has been tied up are of deleterious consequences. The acme of these is to be found in the Transportation Act of 1920, which while possessing some good features has a very bad one in the creation of the U. S. Labor Board, giving governmental authority over conditions of employment of labor for the operation of the railways and the rates of wages that shall be paid. Railway labor is therefore put into a class by itself by congressional action. ”

“ The State contends that doubts are created about congressional intent to make the Railway Labor Act applicable to state-owned railroads by the fact that in certain other federal statutes governing employer-employee relationships, Congress has expressly exempted employees of the United States or of a State. ”

“ In Moore, a railroad trainman brought an action for damages based upon an alleged wrongful discharge without first exhausting administrative remedies. Federal jurisdiction was invoked on the ground of diversity; at that time an employment contract under the Railway Labor Act was thought to be governed, like ordinary contracts, by state law. The applicable law in that case-that of Mississippi-did not require exhaustion of remedies. The Court held that nothing in the Railway Labor Act required a contrary result. ”

“ On the side of labor, it is the cherished right to strike.' Whether the source of this right be found in a particular provision of the Railway Labor Act [20] or in the scheme as a whole, it is integral to the Act. State courts may not enjoin a peaceful strike b covered railway employees, no matter how economically harmful the consequences may be. ”

“ Since nothing is a greater spur to conflicts, and eventually conflicts resulting in strikes, than different pay for the same work or unfair differentials, not to respect the centralized determination of these questions through the Adjustment Board would hamper if not defeat the central purpose of the Railway Labor Act. ”

“ The question is whether the Railway Labor Act, 48 Stat. 1185, 45 U.S.C. § 151 et seq., 45 U.S.C.A. § 151 et seq., imposes on a labor organization, acting as the exclusive bargaining representative of a craft or class of railway employees, the duty to represent all the employees in the craft without discrimination because of their race. ”

“ And absent a showing of exceptional circumstances, which rail labor was entitled to demonstrate, labor protection provisions would not be imposed. The Ex Parte 392 procedures, and the ICA, § 10505 exemption authority generally, like amendments to ICA in the last two decades, see, e.g., the Railroad Revitalization and Regulatory Reform Act of 1976, Pub.L. 94-210, 90 Stat. ”

“ The precursor of this provision was § 5 (4) (b) , as amended by the Emergency Railroad Transportation Act of 1933. That section authorized the Commission to approve consolidations 'upon the terms and conditions * * * found to be just and reasonable.' [5] There was, however, a widespread awareness in the railroad industry that many of the economies to be gained from consolidations or abandonments could be realized only at the expense of displaced railroad labor. The interests of such employees were recognized in the Washington Job Protective Agreement of 1936. ”

“ When a proposed merger involves rail carriers, the Act requires the Commission to impose labor-protective conditions on the transaction to safeguard the interests of adversely affected railroad employees. ”

“ The parties to the BLE-FEC 'major dispute,' having exhausted the procedures of the Railway Labor Act, 45 U.S.C. § 151, et seq., are now free to engage in self-help. Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers v. ”

“ Absent statutory direction to the contrary, the decision of a railroad employer to go out of business and consequently to reduce to zero the number of available jobs is not a change in the conditions of employment forbidden by the status quo provision of § 156. In these cases, P & LE concluded that it must sell its assets, and its agreement to sell to Railco, if implemented, would have removed it from the railroad business; no longer would it be a railroad employer. No longer would it need the services of members of the rail unions. ”

“ The railway employee has a responsibility to the railway-user to be sober, industrious, and careful, so as to furnish the best and safest transportation to the public, and he has a responsibility to the railway-owner to furnish a full day's honest and efficient work for the compensation that he receives, whatever it maybe. The industrial supremacy of America cannot be maintained unless that is done, and every patriotic man, no matter what his employment, should stop waste in labor as well as in material, and expect hard work and rigid economy. ”

“ In no other occupation has such a showing ever been made. If the wage scale of 1899 had been in effect, the item of labor cost would have been some $300,000,000 less. Against liberal wages the railways do not protest, because they know that they can render safe, adequate and satisfactory service in proportion as their employes are well fitted and well paid for their work. But new outlay must be balanced by new income unless operation is to cease. Public sentiment almost always supports the demand of employes for higher wages. ”

“ Economically and theoretically it is not up to the railways to solve this world old conundrum. Practically they are called on to meet every advance in the cost of living of their employes to which in twenty years they have not added a nickel, and they are denied the privilege, enjoyed by every other employer of labor, to add its increased cost to the price of their only commodity or service—transportation.
Today the advances in the scale of railway wages awarded, proposed and demanded mean an increase of from $60,000,000 to $75,000,000 in the annual "cost of living" of the railways. ”

“ Then the Pennsylvania appealed to the courts, where the entire matter is at present ensnarled. The railroad is loud in its protestations that it is not attacking the Railroad Labor Board as an organization; that it merely is seeking to keep it within the bounds laid down by the intent and purpose of the remarkable Transportation Act, which, in the long run, may come merely to a fine use of words. ”

“ There is much about the service that is attractive, and, on the whole, the wages paid railroad employees are probably in excess of the rates for similar talent in any other industry, although labor in every other industry in the United States is protected by high tariffs, while in this it is under the incubus of legislation as oppressive as constitutional limits will permit. ”