The episode was brief but embarrassing. Leaders of the British National Union of Railwaymen last week called a strike against London Regional Transport. LRT runs the city's underground subway system, on which about 2 million passengers daily depend. Most of the transit union's 15,000 members, however, cavalierly dismissed the action, and more than 75% of the city's trains ran on schedule. The strike was abandoned after just eleven hours, a remarkable event in a country where strikes were once as traditional as afternoon tea.
The union's executive committee defied the 1984 Trade Union Act, which requires a rank-and-file vote before leaders...