discarded it. Black charged MacCracken with Contempt of Congress on February 5 and ordered him arrested. During a five-day trial the Senate deemed him a lobbyist not protected by lawyer-client privilege and voted to convict him. Disregarding as Black did the fact that all but two of the existing contracts (the controversial transcontinental mail routes CAM 33 and CAM 34) had been awarded to the low bidder by Postmaster General Harry S. New during the Coolidge Administration, on February 7, 1934, Roosevelt's postmaster general, James A. Farley, announced that he and President Roosevelt were committed to protecting the public interest and that as a result of the investigation, President Roosevelt had ordered the cancellation of all domestic air mail contracts. However, not stated to the public was that the decision had overridden Farley's recommendation that it be delayed until June 1, by which time new bids could have been received and processed for continued civilian mail transport. Use of the Army Air Corps Executive Order 6591 Without consulting either Army Chief of Staff Douglas MacArthur or Chief of the Air Corps Major General Benjamin Foulois, Secretary of War George H. Dern at a cabinet meeting on the morning of February 9, 1934, assured President Roosevelt that the Air Corps could deliver the mail. That same morning, shortly after conclusion of the cabinet meeting, second assistant postmaster general Harllee Branch called Foulois to his office. A conference between members of the Air Corps, the Post Office, and the Aeronautics Branch of the Commerce Department ensued in which Foulois, asked if the Air Corps could deliver the mail in winter, casually assured Branch that the Air Corps could be ready in a week or ten days. At 4 o'clock that afternoon President Roosevelt suspended the airmail contracts effective at midnight February 19. He issued Executive Order 6591 ordering the War Department to place at the disposal of the Postmaster General "such air airplanes, landing fields, pilots and other employees and equipment of the Army of the United States needed or required for the transportation of mail during the present emergency, by air over routes and schedules prescribed by the Postmaster General." Preparation and plans In 1933 the airlines carried several million pounds of mail on 26 routes covering almost of airways. Transported mostly by night, the mail was carried in modern passenger planes equipped with modern flight instruments and radios, using ground-based