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To All ALPA Members - 3                            July 22, 1948

June 21, followed by the company.  They both finished on June 25.  The IAM and the company made their final arguments on June 30, and ALPA and the company made their final arguments on the following day, July 1.  The Board rendered its decision on July 9, 8 days later.  The total elapsed time from the first to the last part of these hearings, from May 25 to July 9, was one month and 15 days.

In any serious management-labor trouble, there is always a great deal of conjecture about who is responsible for strike action.  This question is always rendered difficult because of the frenzied efforts of the opposition's lawyers and unfriendly papers and magazines to confuse the issue and to submerge the real facts.

ALPA's final summation brief, which was prepared by Headquarters of which all chairmen and officers have a copy, sets forth all of the efforts of ALPA in chain-like sequence, backed by documentary evidence in the form of 112 wires, letters, and other written material, clearly highlighting what the Association did over a period of 2 years, 4 months and 21 days to try to settle the trouble with National Airlines by following religiously the proper steps in the Railway Labor Act and in many other ways to avoid strike action, and what the company did, which can be described in one word - nothing.

What has transpired since July 9 when the Presidential Emergency Board made its recommendations is clearly reflected in the exchange of wires quoted in the forepart of this letter.  A brief reading of wires quoted in the forepart of this letter.  A brief reading of these communications will reflect quickly that Baker is still playing the same old game -- delay and procrastinate while he hopes for miracles to happen to happen to rescue him from the whirlpool of his own mistakes which is rapidly submerging him.

The next action in this case will be before the Civil Aeronautics Board.  On March 24, 1948, the Association filed an action with this Board under the labor provisions of the Civil Aeronautics Act, Section 401 (1), petitioning the revocation of Baker's certificate of convenience and necessity.  Baker's lawyers, following religiously his common pattern of stalling and procrastinating, filed an action with the Civil Aeronautics Board seeking to set aside the air line pilots' petition for the revocation of Baker's license and, believe it or not, challenging the jurisdiction of the Civil Aeronautics Board to decide labor disputes involving violations of the Civil Aeronautics Board to decide labor disputes involving violations of the Civil Aeronautics Act of 1938 and the Railway Labor Act, such two laws being interrelated by paragraph 4, Section 401 (1), which I quote:
"(4) It shall be a condition upon the holding of a certificate by any air carrier that such carrier shall comply with Tittle II of the Railway Labor Act, as amended."

The hearing on this National Airlines spawned final effort to delay matters will be held before the Civil Aeronautics Board on July 29.  When this hearing has been concluded, a date will be set on the Air Line Pilots Associations' petition of March 24, 1948, asking for the revocation of Baker's certificate of convenience and necessity.  The pilots' petition charges that Baker violated the Railway Labor Act and names a number of other causes of action.  The Presidential Emergency Board, and there cannot be any board with any higher status than a President's Board, has in its recommendations found, after lengthy hearings and deliberations, that Baker not only violated the Railway Labor Act once but several times and that he is responsible for the strike.  (See page 1 of this letter.)

Present indications are that Baker will not accept the Presidential Emergency Board's recommendations and that this matter will have to go all the way through the revocation proceedings before the Civil Aeronautics Board, unless the air line, in the interim, is absorbed by another air line company by reason of a merger or purchase and a suitable arrangement is arrived at to resolve the National strike difficulties.