Memorandum from Harold Enarson and Milton P. Kayle to John Steelman

May 23, 1952 MEMORANDUM FOR DR. STEELMAN TRUMAN From: H. Enarson and M. P. Kayle ARCHIVES HATIONAL RECORDS ADMIN. I Subjects Future Action in the Steel Case COVERNING The attached draft prepared by Dave Bell, sets forth the tentative line of reasoning which would be followed in a message to the Congress on steel, should the Supreme Court rule adversely. The draft raises the following major questions: 1. Are we justified in requesting statutory seisure authority? The proposed message stresses once again the need for uninterrupted steel production. Yet the fact is that the public has never believed this con- tention, and in the face of recent releases of steel for race tracks and bowling alleys, they are even less likely to believe this now. While we were justified on May 8 to resort to seizure because of the nature of the steel industry and the complexity of the procurement system, the Govern- ment has had ample time to at least attempt to separate out the essential production. Since the entire case for Government intervention rests on the essentiality of steel production, we must once and for all decide whether the continued operation of every steel mill is the only answer. If it is, we must develope much more fully in the message the various reasons why this is 80. If, however, our objective is to maintain only the production relating to immediate military needs and that production can be singled out, we should be working now with Defense on a master list of facilities required to meet Korean requirenents and basic AEC programs, with due consideration to the switching of orders to plants whore settle- ments have already been reached. 2. Should we go to the Congress and ask for injunction authority if we have not triggered the Taft-Hartley Act? The Justice Department has argued that it is questionable whether a Taft-Hartley injunction would be granted by a District Court in face of the delay in stoppages already achieved through union cooperation and the full hearings by the WSB on the steel issues. But if the Supreme Court rejects this argument, it would appear that the Prosident is on very weak grounds to presa an urgent claim for Congressional action without at least triggering the Taft-Hartley pro- cedure. Admittedly the Board of Inquiry might consume a week to ten days, but the President would still have exchausted every possible remedy, and this week to ten days delay would still be attributed to Congressional re- fusal to meet the President is request for special legislation.