Railroad seizure
Railroad seizure refers to the U.S. government's intervention in railroad operations during labor disputes, particularly under President Harry S. Truman in the late 1940s. As the nation transitioned from wartime production to consumer goods, economic pressures led to significant labor agitation and strikes, with railroad workers being particularly active. In 1946, Truman intervened in a national railroad strike that severely disrupted transportation and threatened food and fuel distribution, particularly grain shipments to post-war Europe. Truman's administration seized control of railroads and implemented measures to compel workers to return to work, including threats of military draft for strikers. He argued that maintaining railroad operations was essential for national security. This approach, while effective in the short term, faced significant political backlash and ultimately led to a Supreme Court ruling that deemed such seizures unconstitutional outside of wartime. The events surrounding railroad seizure illustrate the complex interplay between labor rights, government authority, and national security interests in post-war America.
Railroad seizure
The Event Federal government’s taking control of U.S. railroads in response to labor strikes
Dates Spring, 1946, and 1948
Place Washington, D.C., and throughout the United States
Truman used the executive powers of the presidency to compel the railroad industry and its workers to act in support of government policies even though these actions were against the industries’ own best interests. The railroad seizures set a precedent for later seizure of steel mills, which was ruled unconstitutional.
A Democrat, Harry S. Truman ran for public office on a prolabor platform and acted on those ideas while he was in office as president from 1945 until 1953. His actions included vetoing the Taft-Hartley Act (Labor-Management Relations Act) of 1947, though it passed over his veto. He thought that the act restricted too many labor activities, while giving too much power to management. Despite his objections to this law, Truman invoked it twelve times during his seven-year presidency.
Economic Pressures
Truman oversaw the transition of the U.S. economy from military production toward consumer products for the civilian sector. During World War II, U.S. industrial production was under indirect military control to ensure production of suitable products in sufficient quantities to meet U.S. military demands. Prices of many commodities were fixed by the government, as were wages, for the duration of the war. At the conclusion of the war, however, pent-up demand for consumer goods caused severe shortages, thus driving up prices on available goods. Inflation became widespread, so workers began to agitate for higher wages, particularly as expired contracts came up for renegotiation. In response to labor strikes, the U.S. government, under Truman’s orders seized operational control of two dozen industries, including steel mills, meatpacking facilities, and Class I railroads.
In the spring of 1946, Truman intervened in a railroad labor dispute when a national railroad workers’ strike stopped both passenger and rail freight service for more than a month throughout most of the country. Eighteen railroad unions agreed to federal arbitration that would have resulted in a wage increase of about 18 cents per hour. The two largest railroad unions, however, voted to strike—the Brotherhood of Railway Trainmen and the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers. The railroad strike, by severely curtailing transportation, caused shortages of raw materials in manufacturing, forcing factories to idle their workers. The strike also disrupted the distribution of food and fuel throughout the United States. More important, the United States was the largest provider of grain to more than 45 million Europeans struggling to survive in the immediate aftermath of World War II, and the railroad strike disrupted transportation of grain as well. Truman feared large-scale starvation and death in Europe if railroads did not immediately resume grain shipments to American port cities, so that the grain could be sent to Europe.
The strike ended mostly on the government’s terms, after one month. Truman intervened again in 1948, when railroad workers serving the Chicago area threatened to strike in order to achieve wage increases. In this instance, the striking workers returned to work while contract negotiations continued.
Truman was under intense pressure to keep the railroads functioning. He argued that the proper functioning of the railroads was essential for national security. By continuing to strike, now against the federal government, railroad employees were engaging in an illegal activity. Truman authorized the immediate firing of any and all railroad employees who called in sick without a doctor’s verification. The employee would lose not only his or her job but also all seniority and pension benefits.
Truman ordered the Office of Defense Transportation to form railway battalions of troops who would operate essential routes. Truman further ordered that executive orders be drawn up to draft into immediate military service any railroad employee who refused to report for work. He also informed the leaders of the striking unions that if the Army had to continue operational control of the railroads, the president would permanently deauthorize the railroad unions. All members would lose their jobs, seniority, and benefits. He urged Congress to set up a labor board that would require both management and labor to remain at work and in negotiations, in the railroad industry and other industries that directly affected the American population as a whole.
Impact
President Truman proved willing to force organized labor to remain in negotiations with corporate management, even threatening to draft striking workers immediately into the military, claiming “national security interests.” The success of this threat led him to believe such threats would work in any large-scale labor dispute, though the action hurt him politically and alienated workers. He tried the same tactics in 1952 against steel mill workers, whose union took the president to court, eventually proving victorious in the Supreme Court case Youngstown Sheet and Tube Co. v. Sawyer, decided on June 2, 1952. Seizure of private property for national security reasons, as commander in chief but without congressional approval or even notification, was deemed unconstitutional outside wartime emergencies.
Bibliography
Ayers, Eben A. Truman in the White House: The Diary of Eben A. Ayers. Edited by Robert H. Ferrell. Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1991. Edited by a leading authority on Truman, this is a literate, intelligent, abbreviated account of the flow of events, rail strike included, during the Truman administration. Needs to be supplemented, but useful. Many photos, useful index.
Ely, James. Railroads and American Law. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2001. Covers all aspects of railroad law and the impact the growth of railroads had on American economic and labor history. Briefly discusses railroads during the 1940’s.
Gosnell, Harold F. Truman’s Crises: A Political Biography of Harry S. Truman. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1980. The author is a noted political scientist. The prose is uninspired but well organized. Chapter notes, useful bibliography, good index. Chapter 22 pertains to the railroad strike and its context.
McCullough, David. Truman. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1992. A comprehensive biography of Truman’s life and presidency. Covers both domestic issues, such as the post-World War II U.S. economy, and international issues, including Truman’s decision to use nuclear weapons against Japan to end World War II.
Miller, Merle. Plain Speaking: An Oral Biography of Harry S. Truman. New York: Berkley, 1974. Miller’s observations are acute and affectionate. Much on Truman’s special knowledge of railroads. Good index.
Morris, Maeva. Truman and the Steel Seizure Case: The Limits of Presidential Power. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1994. Studies the legal as well as political consequences of the use of presidential power, whether under the guise of national security threat or not, and what constraints the U.S. Constitution and courts put on such power. Truman’s prior seizure of railroads is discussed as a precedent to understand the government seizure of steel mills.
Truman, Harry S. Year of Decisions. Vol. 1 in Memoirs. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1955. Inimitable Truman, pithy and deceptively straightforward. Good perspectives on the strike wave, the railroad strike, and presidential reactions. Good index. Refreshing and invaluable.