WHEREAS disputes exist between the carriers represented by the National Railway Labor Conference, designated in List A attached hereto and made a part hereof, and certain of their employees represented by the Brotherhood of Railroad Signalmen, a labor organization; and WHEREAS these disputes have not heretofore been adjusted under the provisions of the Railway Labor Act, as amended; and WHEREAS these disputes, in the judgment of the National Mediation Board, threaten substantially to interrupt interstate commerce to a degree such as to deprive the country of essential transportation service: 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 appointed by me, to investigate these disputes. No member of the board shall be pecuniarily or otherwise interested in any organization of railroad employees or any carrier. The board shall report its findings to the President with respect to the disputes 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 carriers represented by the National Railway Labor Conference, or by their employees, in the conditions out of which the disputes arose. LYNDON B. JOHNSON The White House January 13, 1969 LIST A EASTERN RAILROADS Akron, Canton & Youngstown Railroad Company Ann Arbor Railroad Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company Baltimore and Ohio Chicago Terminal Railroad Company Bangor and Aroostook Railroad Company Bessemer and Lake Erie Railroad Company Boston and Maine Corporation Boston Terminal Corporation Canadian National Railway Company, St. Lawrence Region, Lines in the United States Canadian Pacific Railway Central Railroad Company of New Jersey New York and Long Branch Railroad Central Vermont Railway, Inc. Cincinnati Union Terminal Company Cleveland Union Terminals Company Dayton Union Railway Delaware and Hudson Railroad Corporation Detroit and Toledo Shore Line Railroad Company Detroit Terminal Railroad Detroit, Toledo and Ironton Railroad Erie Lackawanna Railroad Grand Trunk Western Railroad Indiana Harbor Belt Railroad Indianapolis Union Railway Company Lehigh & Hudson River Railway Company Lehigh and New England Railway Company Lehigh Valley Railroad Long Island Rail Road Maine Central Railroad Company Portland Terminal Company Monongahela Railway Monon Railroad New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad New York, Susquehanna and Western Railroad Norfolk and Western Railway Company (Lines of Former New York, Chicago and St. Louis Railroad and Lines of Former Pittsburgh and West Virginia Railway) Penn Central Company Former Pennsylvania Railroad Company Former New York Central Railroad Company Pennsylvania-Reading Seashore Lines Reading Company Staten Island Rapid Transit Railway Company Washington Terminal Company Western Maryland Railway Company WESTERN RAILROADS Alton and Southern Railroad Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway Company Belt Railway Company of Chicago Camas Prairie Railroad Chicago & Eastern Illinois Railroad Chicago & Illinois Midland Railway Company Chicago and North Western Railway Company (Includes former Chicago Great Western) Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Railroad Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railroad Company Colorado and Southern Railway Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad Company Denver Union Terminal Railway Company Duluth, Winnipeg and Pacific Railway Elgin, Joliet and Eastern Railway Company Fort Worth and Denver Railway Company Galveston, Houston and Henderson Railroad Company Great Northern Railway Company Green Bay and Western Railroad Company Kewaunee, Green Bay and Western Railroad Company Houston Belt & Terminal Railway Company Illinois Central Railroad Joint Texas Division of CRI&P–FtW&D Railway Company Kansas City Southern Railway Company Louisiana and Arkansas Railway Company Kansas City Terminal Railway Company Missouri-Kansas-Texas Railroad Company Missouri Pacific Railroad Company New Orleans Union Passenger Terminal Norfolk and Western Railway (Lines formerly operated by the Wabash Railroad Company) Northern Pacific Railway Paducah and Illinois Railroad Peoria and Pekin Union Railway Company St. Louis-San Francisco Railway Company St. Louis Southwestern Railway Company Soo Line Railroad Southern Pacific Company Pacific Lines Texas and Louisiana Lines Spokane, Portland and Seattle Railway Company (System Lines) Terminal Railroad Association of St. Louis Texas and Pacific Railway Company Texas Pacific-Missouri Pacific Terminal Railroad of New Orleans Toledo, Peoria and Western Railroad Company Union Pacific Railroad Company Union Terminal Company (Dallas) Western Pacific Railroad Company SOUTHEASTERN RAILROADS Atlanta and West Point Rail Road Western Railway of Alabama Atlanta Joint Terminals Central of Georgia Railway Chesapeake and Ohio Railway Clinchfield Railroad Georgia Railroad Gulf, Mobile and Ohio Railroad Jacksonville Terminal Company Kentucky & Indiana Terminal Company Louisville and Nashville Railroad New Orleans Public Belt Railroad Norfolk and Western Railway (Atlantic and Pocahontas Regions) Richmond, Fredericksburg and Potomac Railroad (Including Potomac Yard) Seaboard Coast Line Railroad Southern Railway Alabama Great Southern Railroad Cincinnati, New Orleans and Texas Pacific Railway Georgia Southern and Florida Railway Harriman and Northeastern Railroad New Orleans and Northeastern Railroad New Orleans Terminal Company St. Johns River Terminal Company
Executive Order 11445 ⚖️✨ Zone 2: Zone of Twilight Constitutional Neutral (+0.02)
📜 Art. II §1: Executive Discretion & Internal Operations
Executive Order 11445—Creating an Emergency Board to Investigate Disputes Between the Carriers Represented by the National Railway Labor Conference and Certain of Their Employees
Executive Brief • At a Glance
⏱️ 4 min read (817 words) •
● In Effect
🎯 Primary Mandate
I hereby create a board of three members, to be appointed by me, to investigate these disputes.
⚖️ Constitutional Footing
⚖️✨ Zone 2: Zone of Twilight
Concurrent Authority / Congressional Silence
📜 Art. II §1: Executive Discretion & Internal Operations
🏛️ Scope & Affected Sectors
Private Citizens & Property Owners
Plain-English Translation & Framers' Constitutional Analysis
Early Statesman synthesis distilling legal jargon into practical meaning, statutory anchors, and structural constitutional impacts.
Signed by President Lyndon B. Johnson on January 13, 1969, this order concerns Creating an Emergency Board to Investigate Disputes Between the Carriers Represented by the National Railway Labor Conference and Certain of Their Employees. I hereby create a board of three members, to be appointed by me, to investigate these disputes. No member of the board shall be pecuniarily or otherwise interested in any organization of railroad employees or any carrier. The board shall report its findings to the President with respect to the disputes within thirty days from the date of this order.
Constitutional Assessment: This action represents an orderly exercise of Article II administrative discretion, managing the internal machinery and personnel of the executive branch without abridging the ancient liberties of the people.
Key Directives & Operative Actions
▪
I hereby create a board of three members, to be appointed by me, to investigate these disputes.
▪
The board shall report its findings to the President with respect to the disputes 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 carriers represented by the National Railway Labor Conference, or by their employees, in the conditions out of which the disputes arose.
Constitutional & Societal Entities Impacted
🏛️ Private Citizens & Property Owners
Policy Areas & Topics
🏛️
The Framers' Constitutional Council
1787 PrismEvaluating this order against the constitutional debates of 1787 and the limits of Article II executive power.
⚖️✨ Zone 2 (Zone of Twilight)
§
"When the President acts in absence of either a congressional grant or denial of authority, he can only rely upon his own independent powers, but there is a zone of twilight in which he and Congress may have concurrent authority."
— Justice Robert H. Jackson, Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer (1952) Concurrent Authority / Congressional Silence
JM
James Madison
Separation of Powers & Legislative Primacy
"Power is of an encroaching nature, and it ought to be effectually restrained from passing the limits assigned to it." — Federalist No. 48 (1788)
Madison would view this order with watchful scrutiny. Operating in the 'Zone of Twilight' where Congress is silent, each such directive establishes an administrative precedent that steadily expands the executive perimeter at the expense of legislative primacy.
Madisonian Stance: Vigilant / Cautionary
AH
Alexander Hamilton
The Energetic Executive & Unified Command
"A feeble Executive implies a feeble execution of the government; and a government ill executed, whatever it may be in theory, must be, in practice, a bad government." — Federalist No. 70 (1788)
Hamilton would view this directive as the natural and indispensable functioning of administrative leadership. Without the power to coordinate agencies, manage personnel, and resolve operational ambiguities, the modern presidency would be reduced to an impotent figurehead.
Hamiltonian Stance: Defends Vigor & Dispatch
GM
George Mason
Bill of Rights, Due Process & 10th Amendment
"The president will be surrounded by flatterers and sycophants... and the great powers of the executive will gradually absorb the liberties of the people." — Cato IV (Anti-Federalist, 1787)
The Anti-Federalist prism advises continuous democratic vigilance. Even routine administrative directives aggregate centralized federal power away from town halls and state assemblies toward a distant executive apparatus.
Anti-Federalist Stance: Eternal Vigilance Required
📐
Five Measurable "Constitutional Friction" Dimensions
An objective audit measuring potential separation-of-powers tension against the United States Constitution and established Supreme Court doctrine.
⚖️ Discretionary Twilight Zone
30 / 100 friction index
Dimension 1 • Art. I, §1 & §8
Low Friction
Legislative Encroachment & Purse
Operates within delegated statutory execution without modifying legislative appropriations or taxing powers.
Benchmark: Power of the purse, taxes/tariffs, and rule of law reserved to Congress.
Dimension 2 • Art. II, §1 & §3
Low Friction
Executive Scope & Faithfulness
Exercises standard supervisory executive authority to faithfully execute existing statutes.
Benchmark: Faithfully execute laws enacted by Congress vs. unilateral decree.
Dimension 3 • 10th Amendment
Moderate Friction
Federalism & State Sovereignty
Engages state and local partners in cooperative federalism programs.
Benchmark: Police powers and un-delegated responsibilities reserved to the States.
Dimension 4 • 5th & 14th Amendments
Low Friction
Due Process & Individual Rights
Focuses on internal governmental operations with no direct impairment of private rights or property.
Benchmark: Protection of private property, contracts, liberty, and procedural justice.
Dimension 5 • Separation of Powers
Moderate Friction
Youngstown Jacksonian Tier
The order relies on inherent Article II executive discretion, civil service management, or foreign diplomacy where Congress has neither expressly approved nor prohibited action.
Benchmark: Concurrent Authority / Congressional Silence
⚖️
Audit Synthesis
This order operates within Justice Jackson’s Zone of Twilight, resting upon concurrent presidential authority or congressional silence.
Weighted composite: Art. I (25%), Art. II (25%), Federalism (15%), Due Process (15%), Youngstown (20%).
ℹ️
How to read these dimensions: Executive power expands whenever an administration acts without explicit statutory authorization from Congress (Article I), touches upon police powers historically reserved to the states (Tenth Amendment), or limits private rights and property without judicial process. A low friction score indicates strict concordance with enacted law; a high friction score highlights orders testing the limits of presidential discretion.
Total Words
817
5,724 characters
Estimated Read Time
4 min
@ 200 words / min
Flesch-Kincaid
30.5
Post-Graduate Legal
Text size:
Related Executive Orders
Other executive actions signed by Lyndon B. Johnson around this period.
EO 11444 Jan 13, 1969
🏛️✅ Zone 1 (Maximum Authority) Constitutional Neutral
Executive Order 11444—Creating an Emergency Board to Investigate Disputes Between the Carriers Represented by the National Railway Labor Conference and Certain of Their Employees
📜 10th Amend: Intergovernmental Federalism Cooperation
I hereby create a board of three members, to be appointed by me, to investigate these disputes. No member of the board shall be pecuniarily or otherwise interested in any organization of railroad employees or any carrier.
Lyndon B. Johnson Post-Graduate Legal • 4m
EO 11443 Jan 13, 1969
⚖️✨ Zone 2 (Zone of Twilight) Constitutional Neutral
Executive Order 11443—Creating an Emergency Board to Investigate Disputes Between the Carriers Represented by the National Railway Labor Conference and Certain of Their Employees
📜 Art. II §1: Executive Discretion & Internal Operations
I hereby create a board of three members, to be appointed by me, to investigate these disputes. No member of the Board shall be pecuniarily or otherwise interested in any organization of railroad employees or any carrier.
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EO 11448 Amended Jan 16, 1969
⚖️✨ Zone 2 (Zone of Twilight) Constitutional Neutral
Executive Order 11448—Establishing the Meritorious Service Medal
📜 Art. II §2: Commander-in-Chief Supervisory Authority
There is hereby established a Meritorious Service Medal, with accompanying ribbons and appurtenances, for award by the Secretary of a military department or the Secretary of Transportation with regard to the Coast Guard when not operating as a service in the Navy, or by such…
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EO 11447 Jan 16, 1969
⚖️✨ Zone 2 (Zone of Twilight) Constitutional Neutral
Executive Order 11447—Interagency Advisory Committee on Compensation for Motor Vehicle Accident Losses
📜 Art. II §2: Commander-in-Chief Supervisory Authority
The following are hereby appointed to the Interagency Advisory Committee on Compensation for Motor Vehicle Losses: Secretary of Transportation, Chairman Secretary of Commerce Secretary of Defense Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare Secretary of Housing and Urban…
Lyndon B. Johnson Post-Graduate Legal • 1m
EO 11446 Amended Jan 16, 1969
⚖️✨ Zone 2 (Zone of Twilight) Constitutional Neutral
Executive Order 11446—Authorizing the Acceptance of Service Medals and Ribbons From Multilateral Organizations Other Than the United Nations
📜 Art. II §2: Commander-in-Chief Supervisory Authority
I hereby authorize the Secretary of Defense, with respect to members of the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marine Corps, and the Secretary of Transportation, with respect to members of the Coast Guard when it is not operating as a service in the Navy, to prescribe regulations for…
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EO 11449 Jan 17, 1969
🏛️✅ Zone 1 (Maximum Authority) Constitutional Neutral
Executive Order 11449—Participation in the International Coffee Organization
📜 Art. I §8: Delegated Tariff & Commerce Execution
Secretary of State. Subject to the provisions of this order, the powers of the President involved in the participation of the United States of America in the Agreement, including so much of the functions conferred upon the President by the Act as is neither reserved nor…
Lyndon B. Johnson College Level • 2m
📜
Scholarly & Legal Citations
Exec. Order No. 11,445 (Jan. 13, 1969), https://executiveordersarchive.org/orders/app-executive-order-11445-creating-emergency-board-investigate-disputes-between-the-carriers.
