Evening star., 1954-05-15
Many fringe
Benefits Urged
For Rail Men
Fact Finders Buck
Awards Amounting tc
$3.50 Million q Yeur
By james Y. Newton

"A pTeSlQ6nClal emergency
board today awarded l million
rail workers a number of fringe"
benefits estimated to cost the
Nations railroads about $3.50
million a year.
The board, acting to settle a
year-old rail dispute, recon-
mended that the workers receive
longer vacations with pay, Ger
tain holidays with pay and a
health and welfare plan to be
paid for both by the railroads
and the employees.
The Improvements in working
conditions were said to be the
equivalent of a 7-to-8-cent-an-
hour wage increase to the
workers.
In the dispute were Is unions,
representing the so-called nom
operating rail workers and the
country'S $50 Class I railroads.
Workers involved were clerks,
repair and maintenance men and
others whose duties are not con-
nected directly with running the
trains
Major Suggestions.
The boards suggestions for
settling the dispute, which has
threatened a strike, were:
/. An additional week-making
a total of three-of paid vaca-
cations after Is years of service.
The rail workers now get up to
two weeks vacation with pay.
2. Pay for seven designated
holidays when any Of such holi-
days fall on a workday of an
assigned workweek.
3. Hospital, medical and sur
gical benefits for employees only.
at the joint expense of the en-
ployes and the carriers.
The Is rail unions had de-
manded four weeks paid vaca-
ton after Is or more years Of
service. with three weeks after
five years of service.
They also dem a n d e d an
employer supported health and
welfare fund, including life in
surance, hospital, medical and
surgical services for the en-
ployes and their immediate
families.
Other Demands.
Another demand which was
not fully satisfied by the board
called for double-time pay for
work performed on holidays and
premium pay for Sunday work.
The board denied a union de-
mand for uniform and full pass
privileges for employees and their
families on American railroads
plus one trip a year on foreign
railroads.
Members of the Presidents
board were Charles Loring. for
mer chief justice of the Mime
sofa Supreme Court, chairman;
Justice Adolphe Wenke of the
Nebraska Supreme Court and
Martin Hall Catherwood, dean of
the New York State School of
Industrial Relations at Cornell
University.
The current dispute did not
involve direct wage issues. The
unions have been free since last
October l to ask for higher wages
and they are expected to do so
when the present dispute is
finally settled.
In early December the rail en-
ployes voted overwhelmingly to
strike if the dispute was not re-
solved in a peaceful way. Later
in the month President Eisen-
hover, acting under the Railway
Labor Act. appointed the emer-
gency board.
Since that time the President,
with consent of the parties, has
granted two extensions of the
board from the normal 30-day
period in which it was expected
to file its report.
Long Hearings Held.
Lengthy hearings were held in
Chicago and the railroads tried
to block two of the unions de-
mandS through court suits which
are still pending.
The railroads held that under
the Railway Labor Act they
could not be compelled to bar
gain on a health and welfare
plan or the extension of pass
privileges to the employees.
There was no immediate COM
ment from the parties in the
dispute on the emergency boards
recommendations. There has not
been a Nationwide strike by the
incorporating rail employees
since 1922.
Inn 0utfnYne Gorilla