Executive Order 9553—Creating An Emergency Board to Investigate a Dispute Between the River Terminal Railway Company and Its Employees

WHEREAS a dispute exists between the River Terminal Railway Company, a carrier, and certain of its employees represented by the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and the Brotherhood of Railroad Trainmen, labor organizations; and

WHEREAS this dispute has not heretofore been adjusted under the provisions of the Railway Labor Act, as amended; and

WHEREAS this dispute, in the judgment of the National Mediation Board threatens substantially to interrupt interstate commerce within the state of Ohio to a degree such as to deprive that state of essential transportation services:

NOW, THEREFORE, by virtue of the authority vested in me by section 10 of the Railway Labor Act, as amended (45 U. S. C. 160), I hereby create a board of three members, to be subsequently appointed by me, to investigate the said dispute. No member of the said board shall be pecuniarily or otherwise interested in any organization of railway employees or any carrier.

The board shall report its findings to the President with respect to the said dispute within thirty days from the date of this order.

As provided by section 10 of the Railway Labor Act, as amended, from this date and for thirty days after the board has made its report to the President, no change, except by agreement, shall be made by the River Terminal Railway Company or its employees in the conditions out of which the dispute arose.

Each member of the board shall receive compensation at the rate of seventy-five dollars a day for each day that he is actually engaged in the performance of his duties or in travel in connection therewith.

The compensation and expenses of the board and its employees shall be paid out of the appropriation "Arbitration and Emergency Boards, National Mediation Board, 1945" on the presentation of itemized vouchers properly approved by the chairman of the board.

HARRY S. TRUMAN

THE WHITE HOUSE,

May 22, 1945