Francis J. Reilly Records

Francis J. Reilly worked for the Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago and St. Louis Railway as a brakeman in the Kankakee, Illinois Yard. In 1952, he was dismissed from service for failure to appear for his work assignment on October 6, 1952. Mr. Reilly contended that he had asked for time off because of a personal emergency, and that even though he was not granted the time off, he had no choice but not to appear for work. In an investigation, he was given a deferred thirty-day suspension on his record. Mr. Reilly did not think this was reasonable, and began to seek a way to appeal the decision. When a second hearing regarding his conduct was held, Mr. Reilly neglected to attend. As a result, his employment was terminated. He then filed a petition with the NRAB, which dismissed his case. When the Railway Labor Act was amended in 1966 to allow petitioners to appeal NRAB decisions, Mr. Reilly took the opportunity to appeal his decision. The courts dismissed his claims and his final appeal to the Supreme Court was not granted.

The National Railroad Adjustment Board [NRAB] was created by 45 U.S. Code 153. It is overseen by the National Mediation Board, which was created by the 1934 amendment to Railway Labor Act to oversee the arbitration of labor disputes in the railway and airline industries. The NRAB is tasked with arbitrating minor disputes, i.e. grievance arbitrations, in the railway industry. It has four divisions, each division having jurisdiction over specific classes of employees. The First Division has "jurisdiction over disputes involving train- and yard-service employees of carriers; that is, engineers, firemen, hostlers, and outside hostler helpers, conductors, trainmen, and yard-service employees." It has eight members, four selected by the carriers and four selected by the labor organizations.