WASHINGTON, Oct. 8 — President Bush intervened in the 11-day shutdown of 29 West Coast ports today, successfully seeking a court order today to halt the employers' lockout of 10,500 longshoremen, because the operation of the ports is ÿvital to our economy and to our military.ÿþþJudge William Alsup of Federal District Court in San Francisco issued a temporary injunction tonight that ordered the ports reopened immediately.þþIn seeking to suspend the shutdown for 80 days, Mr. Bush became the first president to successfully invoke the Taft-Hartley Act emergency provisions since President Richard M. Nixon sought to stop a longshoremen's strike in 1971.þþJudge Alsup said he would hold a hearing in a week on whether to grant a full 80-day injunction. If he grants it, the dispute would be pushed past the Nov. 5 election, past the Christmas buying season and, perhaps, past the start of military action against Iraq.þþMr. Bush said he was worried about the movement of military supplies. The Pentagon often uses commercial shipping lines to send supplies and equipment overseas, and those lines would undoubtedly fill that role from the busy West Coast ports if fighting erupted in Iraq or elsewhere in the Middle East.þþThe president sought the court order after Labor Secretary Elaine L. Chao was unable to negotiate a 30-day contract extension to reopen the ports. The International Longshore and Warehouse Union agreed to a 30-day extension. But the employers' group acknowledged that it had rejected an extension, saying it feared that the longshoremen would engage in a work slowdown.þþMr. Bush's aides said he was reluctant to act, but feared that a continuation of the shutdown would undermine a sputtering economic recovery. Some economists estimate that it has already cost the economy more than $10 billion. þþÿThis dispute between management and labor cannot be allowed to further harm the economy and force thousands of working Americans from their jobs,ÿ Mr. Bush said in a hastily called announcement for reporters in the Rose Garden.þþOn Sept. 29, the Pacific Maritime Association, a group of port operators and shipping lines, shut the ports and locked out the longshoremen, accusing the workers of engaging in a slowdown. Union officials said the workers were merely observing safety precautions, because five longshoremen have died on the job this year. The union said the lockout was a management ploy intended to have the president intervene. Unions traditionally oppose back-to-work orders as government interference in contract disputes.þþThe major issue in this dispute is management's proposal to introduce new technologies to speed cargo handling. þþThe union has said it will not accept the new technology unless all new jobs resulting from it are in union jurisdiction.þþFor the White House, the decision today was a difficult political calculation. With union leaders opposed to a cooling-off period, some of Mr. Bush's political advisers feared that the move might mobilize union members against Republican candidates less than a month from the midterm elections.þþSeveral unions that Mr. Bush has courted say such injunctions undercut labor's power in contract disputes. þþÿWe're extremely disappointed,ÿ said Bret Caldwell, a spokesman for the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, the union that Mr. Bush has wooed most vigorously. ÿThe whole strategy of locking out the workers and urging the president to invoke Taft-Hartley was clearly an employer strategy to get around negotiating a contract with these workers. It's a bad precedent. It gives management the upper hand.' þþSome White House officials argued that labor itself was divided on the issue. þþÿWith every passing day, as the harm to economy increased, the president leaned more and more in this direction,ÿ a senior administration official said. ÿIt buys some time. It gets us past Christmas.ÿþþMoreover, there is a chance that Mr. Bush may reap some benefit. Many business groups lobbied for him to seek an injunction, and they have sounded the alarm about the shutdown's potential to damage the economy. þþTracy Mullin, president of the National Retail Federation, said: ÿThe President has shown political courage and leadership. He has put national security and the economy first.ÿþþMr. Bush made his announcement one day after appointing a board of inquiry led by former Labor Secretary Bill Brock to report to him about the damage caused by the shutdown of ports that handle $300 billion in cargo each year. The board gave Mr. Bush a report this morning that said, ÿWe have no confidence that the parties will resolve the West Coast ports dispute within a reasonable time.ÿþþA New York Times/CBS News poll published on Monday reported that voters were increasingly disenchanted with Mr. Bush's handling of the economy. Although the White House has argued that there is little that a president can do to control the business cycle, discussion in the administration grew over the weekend that inaction would only contribute to concerns that Mr. Bush was too remote from economic worries.þþIn his brief Rose Garden statement, Mr. Bush said: ÿThe crisis in our Western ports is hurting the economy. It is hurting the security of our country, and the federal government must act. Americans are working hard every day to bring our economy back from recession. This nation simply cannot afford to have hundreds of billions of dollars a year in potential manufacturing and agricultural trade sitting idle.ÿ þþMany business leaders praised the president for seeking a cooling-off period, noting that the amount of money separating the two sides, $20 million by some estimates, was infinitesimal compared to the damage the dispute done to the economy.þþA spokesman for the National Association of Manufacturers, Darren McKinney, said: ÿWhile the N.A.M. would have preferred the parties' coming together amicably and resolving the issue before governmental intervention became necessary, they failed in that and all the while the economy was being severely damaged. So we support the president's move.ÿþþAdministration, management and union officials said the Labor Department solicitor, Eugene Scalia, contacted the heads of the union and the Pacific Maritime Association, the port operators' group, this morning to propose a 30-day contract extension. Several union leaders praised that approach, because it showed that the administration was seeking to heed union concerns and avoid invoking the Taft-Hartley Act.þþAn official in the talks said that the union agreed to a 30-day extension, but that the companies rejected it. Joseph Miniace, president of the operators' group, based in San Francisco, said in a telephone interview he could not accept such an extension when the longshoremen seemed quite likely to work at a slow pace when they were back on the job.þþÿA 30-day extension, while we believe it would be a good short-term solution, clearly does not answer the questions of what happens in the long term,ÿ Mr. Miniace said. ÿWe have been negotiating for five months without a solution.ÿþþBut when the maritime association ruled out the extension, administration officials decided that they had no option but to seek an injunction. þþOfficials of the union accused the employers' group and the Bush administration of conspiring to order an injunction to weaken the workers' hand, an assertion that the administration and employers denied.þþThe A.F.L.-C.I.O. also denounced the president's move. þþÿWe're absolutely furious,ÿ said Richard Trumka, secretary-treasurer of the A.F.L.-C.I.O. ÿThe P.M.A. locked the workers out, contrived a phony crisis and then gets rescued by the administration. They're getting their way and have the weight of the government behind them.ÿþþHe said it was especially infuriating that the companies had rejected the extension proposed by the administration and then still had the administration do what it wanted, seeking an 80-day cooling off period.þþThe Taft-Hartley Act, passed in 1947, allows presidents to seek injunctions against strikes and lockouts that ÿimperil the national health or safety.ÿ þþThe act calls for a 60-day cooling-off period while mediators continue working with the feuding parties. Then the National Labor Relations Board has 15 days to poll employees to see whether they will accept management's final proposal and an an additional five days to tally the votes. If the workers reject the proposal, they can strike. þþþ
Source: NY Times
