 The NAACP later blamed the PTC management for intentionally dragging its feet on the contract that the TWU approved in late June. The NAACP claimed that the PTC management had hoped to undermine the TWU's position with the workers and to possibly oust TWU in favor of the more pliable PRTEU. The PTC was aware that the Smith – Connally Act forbade strikes harming war production and that if, with a contract impasse, TWU itself had initiated a contract strike, the union might have been tossed out. This analysis of the situation was shared later by several historians, particularly by James Wolfinger. Another historian, Alan M. Winkler, also had a largely negative view of the company's role in the conflict and concluded that PTC management, while not overtly conspiring with the strikers, reacted feebly to the strike and tried to opportunistically exploit the situation and the racist attitudes of many white workers for their own purposes.
