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Both courses were exceedingly unattractive to Kennedy, as they would be to any President. Seizure would inflict an injustice upon the companies, which had gone along with virtually every Government verdict, recommendation and request put forward during the four years of the dispute. Furthermore, seizure would not really resolve the dispute: either the U.S. Government would have to impose the new rules while operating the railroads or the issues would drag on unresolved. Compulsory arbitration would settle the dispute all right —almost certainly resulting in an affirmation of management's right to impose its planned revisions—but would anger organized labor, a prospect that few politicians can regard without anxiety.
Congress desperately, prayerfully hoped to avoid both alternatives. Last week Congress was in a state of dismay about the threat of a strike. Many a Congressman feared that a recorded vote on a compulsory-arbitration bill might cost him his seat, whether he voted for it and outraged the unions or voted against it and outraged the public. "I just pray it won't come up here," fretted a Democratic Congressman. "I don't want to touch this thing with a ten-foot pole."
Loyalty, Loyalty, Loyalty. But the hopes and fears of Congress, like those of the President and the public, could not exorcise the threat of a rail strike. The companies were determined, after many delays, to put revised work rules into effect. Ed Gilbert was determined to fight, and if necessary, to strike. He held that the members of his union expected him to postpone defeat as long as he could. Says an official of the union: "What the Brotherhood requires of its president, and what it gets from Ed Gilbert, is loyalty above all. Loyalty, loyalty, loyalty. And that means he doesn't sell us out." In Gilbert's session at the White House, President Kennedy argued that he had already gone "beyond the last mile" with the Brotherhood. But Gilbert wanted to go a few miles more.
Sooner or later, however, Gilbert is going to lose his battle. A total rail strike would hit the economy of the nation and the lives of its citizens with a devastating wallop. On the first day, roads leading into big cities would be clogged with monumental traffic jams as millions of suburban rail commuters tried to get to work in automobiles. After ten days, serious food shortages would show up in metropolitan areas, and not long afterward many factories, including all major automobile plants, would shut down for lack of materials. Within a month, many millions of breadwinners all over the U.S. would be laid off, most defense production would cease, and the nation's stricken economy would be sinking into paralysis. President Kennedy has said that a nationwide railroad strike would be "intolerable," and few of his fellow citizens who do not belong to railroad unions would be likely to disagree with him.