The Future of the Labor Injunction
Levinson, Edward
The Future of the Labor Injunction Aggressive Labor Policies Needed to Make Courts Keep Hands Off New Law By Edward Levinson LABOR has won — or been handed—an outstanding concession in...
...Yellow dog contracts are outlawed as contrary to public policy and are held unenforceable...
...Here the Supreme Court upheld the "yellow dog" contract...
...Two Injunctions enacted by the Federal Courts but which did not come to the Supreme Ourt helped, in 1919, to break a nation-wide coal strike, and, in 1922, to put an end to the strike of the railway shopmen...
...Their votes for the anti-injunction bill were cast with the knowledge that the nine moguls on the other side of Capitol hill would have the final say...
...True the measure was passed by overwhelming votes, and, in final stages, with little debate...
...Courts may no longer issue Injunctions prohibiting workers from striking or threatening to strike, either in a direct strike or in a sympathetic walkout...
...The price of keeping the NorrisLaGuardia bill Intact and effective as a labor Bill of Rights is an aggressive labor movement which expresses itself every day on the industrial and political field...
...They did not fear it when they voted down the La Follette hunger relief measure but two months ago...
...Notwithstanding the administration's lack of enthusiasm for the law, it can be made to prevail and serve the purposes of those who sponsored it...
...The American Railway Union, with Debs at its head, went to the aid of the striking Pullman Company serfs...
...The provisions of the Clayton act brought cheers of victory, which were turned Into bitter protests of defeat when the Supreme Court got through applying its legal stiletto...
...When the Norris-LaGuardia measure is thrown into the Supreme Court—after Election Day, of course—It will come pockmarked with President Hoover's kiss of death...
...The solitary picket permitted in the decision was not "to obstruct an unwilling listener by Importunate following or dogging his steps...
...The bill proposes to end the coercion and industrial slavery of the injunction evil by writing into the Federal statutes the declaration that "Every human being has under the Thirteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States an Inalienable right to the disposal of his labor free from Interference, restraint or coercion by or in behalf of employers of labor...
...Then in 1911 came the Buck Stove and Range Co...
...The Supreme Court In 1920, in the Duplex Co...
...Dooley observed well when he said the Supreme Court follows the election returns...
...The antiinjunction bill will have to go through the same mill...
...It does mark an important milestone in the history of labor legislation...
...No court may henceforth grant an injunction "on the ground that any persons in a labor dispute are engaged In unlawful conspiracy...
...The Future of the Labor Injunction Aggressive Labor Policies Needed to Make Courts Keep Hands Off New Law By Edward Levinson LABOR has won — or been handed—an outstanding concession in the passing of the NorrisLaGuardia anti-injunction bill which became a law on March 23rd when President Hoover attached his signature...
...Mitchell supplied his chief with a commentary on the bill in which he gave the toad to the courts...
...The Injunction Evil Those who have had the responsibility of guiding the fortunes of the labor movement know well the vicious record of the labor Injunction...
...This may be attributed to the fact that those who saw the bill through to victory were the senatorial progressives, representative of middle and farming opinion rather than of the labor movement...
...But there are disquieting factors...
...The ant Un Junction bin" Is nevertheless comprehensive, and carefully worded...
...Including the right to associate with other human being for the protection and advancement of their common interests as workers, and In such association to negotiate through representatives of their own choosing concerning the terms of employment and conditions of labor, and to take concerted action for their own protection In labor disputes...
...The slogans of a strong, insistent and progressive labor movement will carry more weight than musty antecedents...
...to strikers in any legal form...
...Not that the fearless Great Humanitarian In the White House haa let out a public peep against i t He signed the measure in an atmosphere of ominous alienee...
...Picketing was given a knockout blow by the omnipotent justices In 1921 In the case of the American Steel Foundries vs...
...Lawyers • are not agreed on what Mitchell means, but they know he was sought, with Hoover's support, to torpedo the new Bill Qf Labor's Rights...
...But his Attorney General spoke bis master's thoughts...
...This last injunction was composed by that eminent soldier in the cause of Illinois big business, Judge Wilkerson, whom President Hoover seeks to promote with his left hand while his right hand signs the anti-injunction measure...
...operators, or steel manufacturers, tr ask for anti-picketing injunctions in order to prevent "outlawing" their products by picketing and by rail strikes or other peaceful methods...
...1 Trl-City Council...
...Should a labor injunction be granted, violations of It and charges for contempt of court shall be triad by a jury Instead of the judge except in charges of contempt in the presence of the court or alleged Interference with Its operations...
...In contempt of court proceedings for alleged violation of labor Injunctions the parties to the dispute are to have the right to demand withdrawal of the Federal judge If the cause given is an attack on his character and conduct...
...I The augujMuatices of the high court came to the aid of the employing class again in 1921 in the case of Truax vs...
...Millions of workers goaded into strikes have felt the lash of the injunction as it wound its course from a document Of legal phraseology, through hurried court hearings and into its final stage which placed the hungry bodies of embattled workers against the steel of city, state and federal guardians of "law and order...
...What the BUI Decrees The American Federation of Labor haa termed the Norrls-LaGuardia measure, "Labor's Bill of Rights...
...Their votes may be explained by the closeness of a national election, except that they have never feared th§ labor vote In the past...
...The law then considers the rights which courts have deprived workers of and proceeds to give them the status of legality...
...The Federal injunctions stand out most prominently...
...Organization efforts of the United Mine Workers were enjoined because, the court held, the company had the right to require a yellow dog contract and had a pecuniary interest, which was to be safeguarded by the courts, In workers continuing on the job...
...Here the court upheld an Injunction against picketing and struck out the modifying clause, "in a threatening or intimidating manner" on the contention that picketing contains a "necessary element of Intimidation...
...Upon filing the demand, the judge may go no further in the contempt case...
...Thi Reed Rmoots, the Simeon Fesses, and the Senator Binghams, all unashamed and open enemies of jrganized labor, joined with the Congressmen Blatons and Ham Fishes in passing this labor measure with a whoop...
...It la Inconceivable" ate said...
...Two federal enactments against child labor wer° likewise tossed Jnto the merciful hands of the venerable Supreme Court justices—and two legislative corpses emerged...
...case in which Samuel Gompers and the entire labor movement was enjoined against printing and circulating a list of unfair employers...
...If allowed to operate, the law will substantially erase an evil from which organized labor has suffered continually since the Federal courts loosed a campaign of legal violence and repression against the Pullman strike of 1894...
...For the Immediate future, the best safeguard for the perpetuation of the law and its honest application would be 2,000,000 Socialist votes in the coming election...
...The Department of Justice had the federal district attorney in Chicago secure Federal Injunctions and in their trail a whirlwind of violence and repression...
...The Hitchman case, in 1917, was another flagrant example of the process...
...First there was the Debs case...
...An aroused fighting spirit in the labor movement will make the Supreme Court justices„ wary when they come to thumb-dusty, hair-splitting tomes of precedent to decide whether the law is to live or not...
...that Congress could have Intended to protect racketeering and extortion under the guise of labor organization activity, and the antitrust dlvlalon of the Department, having carefully considered the measure, haa concluded that it does not prevent injunction* In such cases, and that it does not prevent the maintenance by the United States of suits to enjoin unlawful conspiracies or combinations under the anti-trust laws to outlaw legitimate articles of Interstate commerce...
...Labor once before had won a "Bill of Rights," >'A Charter of Freedom...
...Deerlng case, declared illegal a sympathetic strike being conducted by the maehinlsts union...
...The passing of this legislation after some twoscore years of intermittent battle for it has not attracted the general interest which might have been expected...
...There is something suspicious about these new-won "friends" of the trade union movement...
...No injunction may be issued prohibiting the paying of strike or unemployment benefits, giving publicity to labor disputes, or against sympathetic aid...
...They voted .down the LaFollette bill because there was no prospect that It would be voided by the Supreme Court...
...Mitchell thus encourages coa...
...Corrigan when it ruled that publicity advertising the existence of a strike was "plainly a conspiracy" to deprive a struck restaurant keeper of bis property without due process of law...
...That these progressives should have won paasage of the bill when the labor movement la less strong than it was at other periods during the agitation for the measure, has given many the impression of a favor handed down from above...
...As recently as 1927, in the Bedford Cut Stone case, the court declared the interests of free interstate commerce made illegal the refusal of union workers to use non-union materials...
...Officers and members of unions are relieved of any responsibility for the unlawful acts of Individual members...
...The Senate approved it 75 to 5, while the House stamped its approval with 363 votes against 13...
...On the face value of the law's provisions, the battle against the labor injunction is largely won...
...The only situation in which an Injunction may be issued is in the commission of unlawful acta which will continue and cause substantial and irreparable damage to the property of the complainant who has no other legal recourse but the injunction...
Vol. 13 • April 1932 • No. 14
