HEARINGS

BEFORE

THE COMMITTEE ON

INTERSTATE AND FOREIGN COMMERCE
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

SIXTY-NINTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

ON

H. R. 7180 [Later H.R. 9463]

A BILL TO PROVIDE FOR THE PROMPT DISPOSITION
OF DISPUTES BETWEEN CARRIERS AND THEIR
EMPLOYEES AND FOR OTHER PURPOSES

JANUARY 26, 27, 28, 29, FEBRUARY 2, 3, 4, 5, 9, AND 10, 1926.

RAILROAD LABOR DISPUTES

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,

COMMITTEE ON INTERSTATE AND FOREIGN COMMERCE,

Tuesday, January 26, 1926.

The committee met at 10.30 o'clock a. m., Hon. James S. Parker (chairman) presiding.

The CHAIRMAN. The committee will come to order. We have under consideration bill 7180, which reads as follows:

[H. R. 7180, Sixty-ninth Congress, first session]

A BILL To provide for the prompt disposition of disputes between carriers and their employees, and for other purposes

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Represenattives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,

DEFINITIONS

SECTION 1. When used in this act and for the purposes of this act: First. The term "carrier" includes any express company, sleeping-car company, and any carrier by railroad subject to the interstate commerce act, except a street, interurban, or suburban electric railway not operating as a part of a general railroad system of transportation, including all floating equipment, such as boats, barges, tugs, bridges, and ferries, and other transportation facilities used by or operated in connection with any such carrier by railroad, and any receiver or any other individual or body, judicial or otherwise, when in the possession of the business of employers or carriers covered by this act;

Second. The term "adjustment board" means one of the boards of adjustment provided for in this act;

Third. The term "board of mediation means the board of mediation created by this act;

Fourth. The term 'commerce" means commerce among the several States or between any State, Territory, or the District of Columbia and any foreign nation, or between any Territory or the District of Columbia and any State, or between any Territory and any other Territory, or between any Territory and the District of Columbia, or within any Territory or the District of Columbia, or between points in the same State but through any other State or any Territory or the District of Columbia or any foreign nation;

Fifth. The term "employee" as used herein includes every person in the service of a carrier (subject to its continuing authority to supervise and direct the manner of rendition of his service) who performs any work defined as that of an employee or subordinate official in the orders of the Interstate Commerce Commission now in effect, and as the same may be amended or interpreted by orders hereafter entered by the commission pursuant to the authority which is hereby conferred upon it to enter orders amending or interpreting such existing orders: Provided, however, That no occupational classification made by order of the Interstate Commerce Commission shall be construed to define the crafts according to which railway employees may be organized by their voluntary action, nor shall the jurisdiction or powers of such employee organizations be regarded as in any way limited or defined by the provisions of this act or by the orders of the commission.

This act may be cited as the railway labor act.

1