Conrad Black: If a Rail Strike Occurs, It Should Be Rapidly Nipped in the Bud

There is ample precedent for how to deal with a railway strike, which it seems may occur in this country in the next few days. It is well settled by many previous occurrences of general strikes in that critical industry in Canada and the United States that no such action may be permitted to continue for long.
President Harding attempted to impose a settlement midway between the claims of the two sides, but this broke down under his protection of strikebreakers as permanent employees with “the same indisputable right to work as others have to decline work.” The U.S. National Guard was called out in a number of states, and the attorney general, Harry M. Daugherty, outrageously asserted that the strikers were conducting “a conspiracy worthy of Lenin and Zinoviev” and sent large numbers of U.S. marshals into the field to aid the railroads.
The Harding administration was itself divided, and commerce secretary and future president Herbert Hoover urged a negotiated end to the strike. Harding agreed, but the railway companies rejected the president’s fair proposal and won from a federal judge, two months into the strike, an injunction against striking, picketing, and other obstructive activities. It was an extremely one-sided decision and violated the constitutional guarantees of freedom of speech and of assembly. There were many sympathy strikes and a great public outcry, but the strikers were unable to continue to resist the employers, buttressed as they now were by the full authority of the federal government. The strike lasted two months and approximately 10 people died while several hundred were injured.
Considerable labour agitation continued, however, including a threatened railway strike in 1949 and a strike in the steel industry. President Truman, well disposed to organized labour though he was, ordered the army to take over the operation of the nation’s railways, which it substantially did, though with the cooperation of many workers. The United States had just committed forces to Korea, the Red Scare was high, and public opinion was suspicious of union leaders. It was against this backdrop that the railway strike in Canada of 1950 was declared and a resolution process was legislated just nine days later.
It is clear from all this history that a railway strike cannot be permitted to go on for more than a few days, even though the economic importance of railways has declined somewhat. If such a strike occurs, the federal government must legislate an end to it at once, but with a fair resolution process. The act of St. Laurent’s government and his labour minister, Milton Gregg, in 1949 could be adopted almost without alteration. The alternative is a disaster that neither Canada nor the United States has ever consented to endure. This is no time for a change of course.