U.S. Emergency Board No. 119 Records, 1956-1957
Collection Number: 5046

Kheel Center for Labor-Management Documentation & Archives
Cornell University Library


DESCRIPTIVE SUMMARY

Title:
U.S. Emergency Board No. 119 Records, 1956-1957
Repository:
Kheel Center for Labor-Management Documentation & Archives
Collection Number:
5046
Abstract:
Transcript of proceedings and exhibits of the Emergency Board No. 119, 1957. Wages and benefits case. General Managers' Association of New York vs. the International Organziation of Masters, mates and Pilots, Inc., 1937-1957. There are also copies of 35 exhibits which provide a picture of the wage structure of the railroad and marine industries and describe in detail the jobs performed by union members.
Creator:
U.S. Emergency Board
Quanitities:
1 cubic feet
Language:
Collection material in English

Biographical / Historical

Emergency Board No. 119 was created under an Executive Order of the President dated August 6, 1957. To the fact-finding board were appointed James J. Healy of Boston, an arbitrator and assistant professor of Industrial Relations at Harvard University's Graduate School of Business Administration; Walter R. Johnson of Arlington, Va; special counsel of the National Association of Attorneys General and former Attorney General of Nebraska, and Benjamin C. Roberts of Brooklyn, N.Y., a lawyer active in mediation and arbitration, Healy was appointed chairman.
On November 21, 1956, the Masters, Mates and Pilots union presented the carriers with their demands, which Included a 35% increase in pay for captains and pilots, a 25 cent per hour increase for mates, deckhands and other crew members (both demands to be retroactive August 1, 1956), double time and one-half for work performed on holidays, differential pay of $1.50 per day for bridge motormen and ferry wheelsmen, and health and welfare Insurance for employees and their families.
The carriers countered by offering the MMP the 1956-1957 "pattern" established In negotiations with the non-operating railroads. This proved to be important in the Board's later decision because the MMP from 1937 through 1953, had bargained jointly with and had agreed to, the same settlements as the non-operating unions. More specifically, the carriers offered a pay increase of 10 cents an hour across-the-board, retroactive to November 1, 1956, with additional 7 cent hourly increases in November of 1957 and 1958, health and welfare benefits or equivalent wage increases of 2.5 cents per hour, and semi-annual cost of living adjustments of 1 cent per hour for each one-half point change in the Consumers' Price Index, in return for a moratorium on contract changes for three years.
Conferences between the General Managers' Association of New York Harbor Railroads and the Masters, Mates and Pilots Organization in December 1956, February 1957 and March 1957 produced no agreement. In March, the services of the National Mediation Board were invoked. Originally intending to strike on July 21 the union postponed its strike deadline at the suggestion of the Mediation Board representative to 12:01 A.M. of August 7.
On August 2 and August 7, with agreement still not in sight, the carriers obtained temporary restraining orders from the Federal Courts to prevent the MMP from striking. These were made unnecessary, however, when the President under Section 10, of the Railway Labor Act on the Mediation Board's report that the situation threatened substantially to interrupt interstate commerce to a degree such as to deprive a section of the country of essential transportation service, created the Emergency Board and halted the strike for sixty days. Nine public hearings and two inspection trips were held by the Emergency Board, the investigation beginning on August 14 and being completed on August 30. With the agreement of both parties, the Board was granted a two week extension in which to make its report.
On September 20, the Board made public its recommendation that settlement be, basically, on the terms offered by the railroads. The Board recommended the 26.5 cents "pattern" settlement of the non-operating railroad unions (10 cents per hour retroactive to November 1, 1956, 7 cents per hour effective November 1, 1958, and 2.5 cents in health and welfare benefits or wages at the option of the MMP,) plus a cost-of-living adjustment of 1 cent an hour for each half point change in the CPI, double pay for designated holidays or 16 cents per day increase in basic wages (again at the choice of the union) and Increases to captains and pilots of $1.00 a day retroactive to December 21, 1956, and 50 cents a day effective November 1, 1957 and November 1, 1958.
The union, however, termed these proposals Inadequate and threatened to strike again at 1 A.M. of October 22, the day after the cooling-off period was to end. Masters, Mates and Pilots' president C.T. Atkins termed the parties still "far apart," and the rank-and-file backed him up by voting affirmatively in the strike vote held October 17. The threatened strike did take place, but lasted for only 90 minutes, as union and management with the aid of Federal Mediator, T.E. Schoonover, reached agreement at 2:30 A.M. on management's terms.
Over the three-year period of the agreement, the settlement meant a daily increase of $4.36 in wages for captains and pilots (in addition to their then current $22.50,) and an increase of $2.36 per day for mates and deckhands (in addition to their respective $16.80 and $16.40,) plus the cost-of-living adjustments which were estimated at an additional 32 cents.
The International Organization of Masters, Mates and Pilots was the bargaining Agent for 872 of the 3,231 railroad marine service employees then employed in New York Harbor. Although this amounted to only 27% overall, the MMP represented 90.1% of the captains and pilots, 59.1% of the mates and 61.8% of the deckhands.
The eleven railroads represented by the General Managers' Association of New York were the New York Central, the New York, New Haven and Hartford, the Brooklyn Eastern District Terminal, the New York Dock Railway, the Bush Terminal Railroad, the Baltimore and Delaware, Lackawanna and Western and the Central Railroad Company of New Jersey.
The eleven railroads conduct both ferry and towing operations as extensions of their railroad service. Combined, they handled in 1956 approximately 27 million tons of freight and had an annual gross of approximately $250,000,000, Dally business was estimated at $725,000 and daily-losses in perishable goods, in case of a strike, at $5285,000.
The ferry service of the New York Central, Erie, Delaware, Lackawanna and Western and Jersey Central Railroads handles a total of 69,000 passengers and 4,500 motor vehicles a day, mainly between points in Manhattan and New Jersey.

The collection consists of the transcript of the proceedings (9 vol.) along with the final report (38 pp.). There are also copies of 35 exhibits which provide a picture of the wage structure of the railroad and marine industries and describe in detail the jobs performed by union members.
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Conditions Governing Use

This collection must be used in keeping with the Kheel Center Information Sheet and Procedures for Document Use.

INFORMATION FOR USERS

Preferred Citation

U.S. Emergency Board No. 119 Records #5046. Kheel Center for Labor-Management Documentation and Archives, Cornell University Library.

Related Materials

Related Collections: 5006: U.S. Emergency Board No. 174 Records 5007: U.S. Emergency Board No. 175 Transcripts and Exhibits 5012: Saul Wallen Papers 5027: U.S. Emergency Board No. 178 Transcripts 5030: U.S. Emergency Board No. 179 Exhibits and Related Material 5036: U.S. Emergency Boards under the Railway Labor Act Reports 5037: U.S. Emergency Board No. 81 Records 5038: U.S. Emergency Board No. 94 Records 5039: U.S. Emergency Board No. 98 Records 5040: U.S. Emergency Board No. 106 Records 5042: U.S. Emergency Board No. 111 Records 5043: U.S. Emergency Board No. 114 Records 5044: U.S. Emergency Board No. 116 Reports and Exhibits 5045: U.S. Emergency Board No. 118 Records 5047: U.S. Emergency Board No. 120 Records 5048: U.S. Emergency Board No. 121 Records 5050: U.S. Emergency Board No. 124 Records 5051: U.S. Emergency Board No. 125 Records 5052: U.S. Emergency Board No. 129 Records 5053: U.S. Emergency Board No. 130 Records 5054: U.S. Emergency Board No. 133 Exhibits 5055: U.S. Emergency Board No. 134 Records 5056: U.S. Emergency Board No. 135 Records 5057: U.S. Emergency Board No. 137 Transcript of Proceedings and Exhibits 5058: U.S. Emergency Board No. 138 Records 5059: U.S. Emergency Board No. 142 Records 5060: U.S. Emergency Board No. 145 Records 5061: U.S. Emergency Board No. 146 Records 5062: U.S. Emergency Board No. 154 Records 5064: U.S. Emergency Board No. 169 Transcript of Proceedings and Exhibits 5075: U.S. Emergency Board under the Taft Hartley Act Records 5579: National Mediation Board Emergency Board 180, Train Crew Consists 5934: Arthur Stark Papers on the President's Emergency Board #219

SUBJECTS

Names:
General Managers' Association of New York650
International Organization of Masters, Mates, and Pilots
United States. Emergency Board No. 119.
Subjects:
Train ferries--New York (State)--New York.
Train ferries--Employees.
Merchant mariners x Labor unions z United States.
Arbitration, Industrial z United States x Sources.
Arbitration, Industrial. Train ferries. New York (N.Y.)
Mediation and conciliation, Industrial. Train ferries. New York (N.Y.)
New York (N.Y.). Harbor.
Strikes and lockouts. Train ferries. New York (N.Y.)
Wages. Mediation and conciliation, Industrial. New York (N.Y.)
Wages. Train ferries. New York (N.Y.)

CONTAINER LIST
Container
Description
Date
Box 1
Exhibits for the railroads, report, transcript
Box 1 Folder 1
The Parties and Issues Before the Board
Box 1 Folder 2
Standard Rates of Pay and Schedule Agreements, Railroad Marine Employees - New York Harbor
Box 1 Folder 3
Classes and Number of All Railroad Employees
Box 1 Folder 4
Exhibit 4 - no information listed
Box 1 Folder 5
Classes, Numbers and Representation of Railroad Marine Employees
Box 1 Folder 6
New York Harbor Terminals Max
Box 1 Folder 7
Local, Joint, and Proportional Freight Tariff Naming Lighterage and Terminal Regulations in New York Harbors Vicinity.
Scope and Contents
Including rates, rules, and charges for grain, live stock, and storage, deliveries and handling of freight between terminals on domestic, import, export, coastwise, and Intercoastal freight.
Box 1 Folder 8
Tonnage and Equipment
Box 1 Folder 9
Wage and Earnings Data
Box 1 Folder 10
Casualty Data
Box 1 Folder 11
Pattern Settlements in the Railroad Industry
Box 1 Folder 12
Participation of International Organizations of Masters, Mates and Pilots with Other Railroad Non-operating Employees of Collective Bargaining
Box 1 Folder 13
Pattern Settlements in the Railroad Industry - National Agreements
1956-1957
Box 1 Folder 14
Number and Percent of Railroad Employees Covered by 1956-1957 Industry Pattern Agreements
Box 1 Folder 15
Railway Express Agency Settlements
1956-1957
Box 1 Folder 16
Letters from E.C. Thompson, Executive Secretary of the National Mediation Board
Scope and Contents
To: H.F. Wyatt of the Reading Circle; J.W. Orem of the Pennsylvania Railroad; R.L. Harvey of the Baltimore and Ohio Company; and Captain John M. Bishop of the International Organization of Masters, Mates, and Pilots, Incorporated.
Box 1 Folder 17
United States Bureau of Labor Statistics Bulletin Number 1188-17 New York, New York
1956
Scope and Contents
April 1956
Box 1 Folder 18
Wage Diversity
Box 1 Folder 19
Illustrations of Uniform Wage Change for Unions Within an Industry or Company
Box 1 Folder 20
Rate of Return on Net Investments as of December 31
Box 1 Folder 21
Annual Straight Time Potential Earnings and Average Annual Earnings - New York Harbor Employees Represented by International Organization of Masters, Mates, and Pilots
Box 1 Folder 22
Agreement between Marine Towing and Transportation Employees' Association and National Maritime Union, United Marine Division, Local 333
1957
Scope and Contents
February 1, 1957
Box 1 Folder 23
Non-Railroad Tow Boats - New York Harbor
Box 1 Folder 24
Basic Daily Rates - Deck Personnel, commercial Marine Operators and Railroad Marine Service
Box 1 Folder 25
Licensing and Classification of Officers of Merchant Vessels
Box 1 Folder 26
Penalty Pay for Work on Holidays
Box 1 Folder 27
Sick Leave with Pay
Box 1 Folder 28
Exhibit 28 - no information
Box 1 Folder 29
Pattern Settlements with Miscellaneous Labor Organizations
1956-1957
Box 1 Folder 30
Pattern Settlements with Railroad Labor Organizations Representing Marine Employees - New York Harbor
1956-1957
Box 1 Folder 31
Pattern Settlements with Railroad Labor Organizations Representing Marine Employees - New York Harbor
1956-1957
Scope and Contents
Supplement to Exhibit 30
Box 1 Folder 32
Pattern Settlements with Railroad Organizations Representing Marine Employees other than New York Harbor
1956-1957
Box 1 Folder 33
Cost Data
Box 1 Folder 34
New York Central System - "Rules of the Operating Department"
Box 1 Folder 35
Cost of Holiday Proposal Based Upon Employment in 1956
Box 1 Folder 36
Report to the President by the Emergency Board, 38 pages
Box 1 Folder 37
Transcripts. 9 Volumes. 1082 Pages