Century Airlines pilots' strike
[1] Political agitation in the form of congressional hearings and public condemnations eventually forced Cord to relent and sell Century Airlines on April 2 to the Aviation Corporation (AVCO), parent company of American Airways.
[6][1] In 1925 the Kelly Act was passed giving the postmaster general the authority to allocate air mail routes to potential bidders and thus, the floodgates were opened for investment in the new industry of commercial aviation.
In response to an amendment to the bill which would limit this particular power, then postmaster general Walter Folger Brown, "was very much opposed to the measure and explained what in his opinion would happen should it become law.
"[9] E.L. Cord was particularly determined to change the system, striving to demonstrate that he could offer the cheapest service, even going so far as to say that he could carry mail for 30 cents a mile, roughly half the standard for existing routes.
[17] After initially agreeing to defer the decision by ten days in order to give the pilots and the ALPA a chance for arbitration, Cord decided on the 9th to refuse any further negotiations and immediately put into action the new wage scale.
Representative Fiorello La Guardia of New York first raised the issue in Congress on February 18 when he condemned Cord and his practices and furthermore spoke about the need for Department of Commerce inspectors to keep and publish records of the replacement pilots, “because you can readily see the danger of putting inexperienced men in charge of passenger planes, not alone for the passengers but for the people on the ground below.”[25] Several more congressmen vocalized their displeasure with Cord’s conduct including Representative William Larson from Georgia as well as Melvin Maas of Minnesota who asked the Secretaries of War and Navy to discourage military pilots on leave from flying Century planes, while two more representatives contacted the Mayor of Chicago to ask him to investigate the business affairs of Cord in Chicago.
[26] Hearings in the United States House of Representatives heard testimony from ALPA president David Behncke and from Dean Bourford, one of the striking Century Air Lines pilots.
[27] The whole affair had left Cord in an even weaker position with regard to bidding for routes, with postmaster general Brown expressing his allegiance to the striking pilots.
Under the weight of the political pressure from both national and local government, Cord was first forced to reduce flight services before he relented on April 2, selling Century Airlines to AVCO, in turn ending the strike.
The “Century Airlines Scab List” was printed on the front page of the first issue of the union's journal, Air Line Pilot, in April.
[33] Robert Van der Linden too underscores the political pressure Cord was facing during the strike and also during the months leading up to it as his attempts to curry favor for deregulation had been met with antagonism.
