Remember that kid back in grade school who could look you straight in the eye, raise his right hand and swear he would never break the promise he just made? Then later you learned he had his left hand behind his back with his fingers crossed, so when he broke the promise he just shrugged his shoulders and said “Hey, it didn’t count!”

In a labor contract, a moratorium is a solemn promise. It is a covenant and a bond between the parties on which hangs their integrity, their honor and their credibility. In the early 1980’s America’s railroads and the unions representing their employees reached Crew Consist Agreements that brought unprecedented productivity gains to our industry, and gave the railroads new opportunity for growth and profitability like never before. When those negotiations were completed the parties pledged to one another (via a moratorium provision in the contract) that neither side would serve notice seeking to force changes in the terms and conditions of those Agreements as long as there was a protected employee working.

Apparently the involved railroad officers had their fingers crossed behind their backs.

Less than a decade later, the Carriers served the very notice they swore they would not serve, and then used their considerable economic and political muscle to bully their employees into further changes in Crew Consist agreements. At the behest of the railroads, the federal government put a gun to our heads and we re-negotiated Crew Consist. After getting the changes they sought, the railroads gave us a written guarantee that they were once again absolutely committed to the original moratorium provision of our Crew Consist Agreements.

Now we know that their fingers were still crossed.

While serving yet another formal Section 6 Notice, attempting to force yet another re-negotiation of Crew Consist, BNSF says all it really wants is voluntary negotiations. But something about that story smells really fishy. Railroad Labor Relations officers live and breathe the Railway Labor Act. They know it inside out, upside down, forward and backward. Every one of them knows full well that Section 6 of the Act has absolutely nothing to do with voluntary negotiations. Indeed, Section 6 of the Act is the absolute antithesis of voluntary negotiations. Under Section 6, conference is mandatory, and there are strict time limits for such conference, followed by a virtual smorgasbord of dispute resolution processes, none of which are even remotely akin to voluntary negotiations.

I should point out that truly voluntary negotiations on crew consist issues can and do occur. In the years following our original 1980 Crew Consist Agreement, this Committee negotiated modifications to various Crew Consist provisions, eliminating train length restrictions, expanding access to “blankable” positions, modifying rules governing Personal Leave Days, etc. And we did so without a Section 6 Notice, a Presidential Emergency Board or any other threat or ultimatum. No one here is confused about how voluntary negotiations take place.

Even if the Carriers’ Labor Relations officers are dim-witted enough to think that a Section 6 Notice is an appropriate route to voluntary negotiations on crew consist, surely they must know that any voluntary negotiations must take place with the General Chairmen who own exclusive jurisdiction over Crew Consist issues. But the Carriers did not serve their Section 6 Notice on those General Chairmen; they served the Notice on International President Thompson.

One of two things must be true. Either the top Labor Relations officers of America’s largest railroads have gone completely brain dead, or they must have a plan in mind for something entirely different from voluntary negotiations.

In recent days the BNSF Labor Relations Department has enlisted its first line supervisors and utilized its electronic crew management system in a propaganda blitz straight out of a Wal-Mart management manual. The basic message is that those company bosses pulling down multi-million dollar salaries are your fast friends, good times lie ahead for all, and a union just gets in the way. Big promises are being made; early retirement, enhanced benefits, unprecedented protection. One Local Chairman said it’s much like an army dropping leaflets out of the air on the enemy’s front line. However, before we all go giddy over those big promises, perhaps we should stop and consider who is making them, and whether or not they still have their fingers crossed.