Case ID: ohio-st_108/html/0061-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Allen, J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

The La France Electrical Construction & Supply Co. v. International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local No. 8, et al.
    
      Strikes—Injunction does not lie, when—Peaceful picketing, discussion and persuasion.
    
    Picketing the plant of an employer by strikers during a strike, and peaceful discussion with and persuasion of employes to leave their employment, which under the terms of their contract is terminable at will, and peaceable persuasion of men applying for employment not to work for that particular employer, if unaccompanied by physical violence, abuse, intimidation, or any form of coercion or duress, direct or indirect, are not unlawful and cannot be enjoined.
    (No. 17732
    Decided May 29, 1923.)
    Error to the Court of Appeals of Lucas county.
    This case was brought as an injunction suit in the court of common pleas of Lucas county. Plaintiff prayed for an injunction against certain alleged unlawful acts of the defendants, done in pursuance of an alleged conspiracy to interfere with and destroy plaintiff’s business, in order to compel plaintiff against its will to operate its business as a closed union shop. The court of common pleas allowed a temporary injunction against acts of violence and intimidation, and later granted a second temporary injunction against picketing and inducing plaintiff’s employes to leave their employment. The second temporary injunction was later vacated by the court of common pleas, so as to permit peaceful picketing and peaceful persuasion of employes to leave their work. Plaintiff appealed from the order vacating parts of the second temporary injunction to the Court of Appeals of Lucas county, which decided the appeal adversely to the plaintiff.
    The cause then came on for hearing before the court of common pleas upon its merits, and a decree was entered therein separately stating the findings of fact and conclusions of law, and the injunction was granted. The injunction allowed by the court of common pleas restrained the defendants from uttering threats or doing acts of violence and intimidation, and specifically restrained certain four of the defendants from going to the plaintiff’s shop, or to any place in which plaintiff’s employes might be engaged in work, or to the vicinity thereof, for the purpose of speaking to, interviewing, persuading, following, or in any manner communicating with, any person in the plaintiff’s employ. The findings of fact made by the trial court upon final hearing were as follows:
    “Findings of Fact.
    “The plaintiff is an Ohio corporation, having its principal place of business in the city of Toledo, Lucas county, Ohio. The defendant, International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local No. 8, is a voluntary unincorporated association of electrical workers, of which the defendant Chris McCullough is president, and the defendant Oliver Myers is business agent; the defendants Boss Kettle and Jim Mahr (whose true name appears by the evidence to be James Maher) are members of said local union. The defendant Plasterers’ Local Union No. 7 is a voluntary unincorporated association of plasterers, of which the defendant Charles G-. Thornton is business agent, and the defendant Lathers’ Union, Local No. 24, is a voluntary unincorporated association of lathers, of which August Meyerhofer is business agent. The plaintiff was, at the times of the filing of the petition and answer, engaged in electrical construction work upon Inverness Club, on Dorr street, in Lucas county, Ohio.
    “Plaintiff’s business is electrical construction work, and it is engaged in that business in and about the city of Toledo, Lucas county, Ohio, and it has on hand about 25 contracts for electrical construction. Among the contracts on hand at the time of the bringing of this action was one for doing the electrical work upon Inverness Club, which is located upon Dorr street, in Lucas county, Ohio, and said contract for work upon Inverness Club, and other contracts of the plaintiff, were and are made upon a lump sum basis for the work to be done, and in making the same the plaintiff contemplated and expected to go ahead and complete its work without delay, and the figures given to the Inverness Club and other persons contracting with the plaintiff for its services were based upon a continuous and uninterrupted performance of the work.
    “The defendant Richard Fisher is a member and financial secretary of International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local No. 8, and A. Doeller, Henry E. McGinnis, James Maher (sued herein as Jim Mahr), Ross Kettle, and Edwin Gorrell are members of the executive committee of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local No. 8, and as such committee they, acting with the business agent of the Local, had charge of all matters of interest to the Local between meeting dates, in-eluding industrial controversies. Thomas Orahan is a member of said Local, and Raymond Cleary is a representative of International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, who came to Toledo to assist Local No. 8 in making agreements with electrical contractors, after notice from the Local, given in March, 1920, that industrial difficulties were pending in the city of Toledo. Crahan, Doeller, McGinnis, Maher, Cleary, Myers and McCullough acted as a committee of the Local which had some negotiations prior to May 1,1920, for an agreement with certain electrical contractors of the city of Toledo, among them the plaintiff, relative to working conditions in said city for the period from May 1,1920, to Majr 1, 1921.
    “During the period from May 1, 1919, to and including April 30,1920, there was in effect in the city of Toledo, Ohio, an agreement between Local No. 8 and certain electrical contractors of the city of Toledo, of which the plaintiff corporation was one, governing wages, overtime pay, working conditions and providing that so long as the Local No. 8 could furnish union men, or so-called ‘permit men/ no nonunion men should be hired by said contractors, and that, in the event any such nonunion men were hired at any time, Local No. 8 should have to ‘organize’ said men; that is, induce them to become members or permit men of said Local. During the month of April, 1920, a number of conferences were had between a group of electrical contractors of this city, of which plaintiff was one, and a committee of Local No. 8, with members as above stated, relative to the situation which would arise following the expiration, on April 30, 1920, of the agreement then in effect. Some negotiations were had and certain suggestions made on both sides, but no agreement was reached, and there has been no agreement of any sort in effect between the parties hereto since April 30, 1920.
    “Some time before May 1, 1920, the plaintiff determined upon a policy of employment by which it should conduct an open shop, employing union and nonunion men without discrimination, and without being bound by any agreement with the union, and on Thursday, April 29, 1920, the plaintiff paid off all of its workmen and terminated its existing contracts of employment with them.
    “Upon plaintiff’s former employes and other applicants for work reporting to it on Monday, May 3d, there was handed to each of them to be signed a written agreement in the following form:
    “ ‘Agreement of Employment.
    “ ‘Toledo, Ohio, ............, 1920.
    “ ‘It is hereby agreed between................, as employer, and the undersigned, as employee, in consideration of the mutual obligations of the parties, hereunder, that said employee, from and after the date hereof, is employed by said employer upon the following terms and conditions.
    “ ‘1. As a............in the employ of the employer at a minimum wage of............cents per hour, eight hours to constitute a day’s work, and forty-four hours to constitute a week’s work, with time and a half for overtime over said number of hours per day between the hours of 6 a. m. and 6 p. m., and with double time for all work done between the hours of 6 p. m. and 6 a. m., on Sunday, and on the following named holidays, to-wit, New Year’s Day, Memorial 'Day, Fourth of July, Labor Day, Thanksgiving Day, and Christmas Day. Said minimum of............cents per hour may be increased, any such increase leaving the remaining provisions of this agreement unaffected.
    “ ‘2. The employment of said employee under this agreement shall continue until either the employee or the employer shall have given the other two days ’ written notice of his intention to terminate it, except in the case of misbehavior or incompetency of the employee which shall be ground for an immediate termination of the employment by the employer. In case of any termination of employment or cessation of work by the employee for any reason, said employee agrees that he will not then or thereafter, in any manner, at any place, annoy, molest, or interfere with the business, customers, or employees, or prospective customers or employees, of said employer, or with the members of the families of any such customers, employees, or prospective customers or employees, and that he will not attempt to persuade or coerce others in refusing to work for or deal with said employer.
    “ ‘3. The employer shall, and hereby agrees to, maintain an open shop, employing union or nonunion employees without discrimination, during the continuance of said employee’s employment under this agreement, and the undersigned employee shall, and hereby agrees that he will, take no action at any time designed or tending in any way to unionize the employer’s employees, or to make its shop a closed union shop, or any of its jobs closed union jobs.
    “ ‘4. The rules and regulations of the employer, not in conflict herewith, as posted upon its bulletin board from time to time, shall become and are hereby made a part of this agreement.
    “ ‘By ....................,
    “ ‘Employee.’
    “Some employees signed these agreements at that time; but, while some were not signed, the defendant Myers came upon the scene and ordered all members of the defendant Local No. 8 to refrain from signing said agreement, whereupon all of said members of Local No. 8 did refuse to sign the same and to accept employment with the plaintiff under the conditions laid down by it.
    “On May 3,1920, and thereafter the plaintiff employed certain workmen, some of whom had, and some of whom had not, formerly been in its employ, each workman employed by plaintiff signing an agreement in the form set forth in the amended petition herein, with the date, his name, his job, and his rate of pay filled in, of which fact defendants had notice. Prior to May 14, 1920, some 12 workmen were in the employ of plaintiff under such agreements, of which the defendants had notice, and on May 14,1920, and May 17,1920, certain of these workmen so employed by the plaintiff were engaged in work for the plaintiff at Inverness Club, on Dorr Street, Lucas county, Ohio.
    “Some time prior to May 14, 1920, the defendant International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local No. 8, the individuals .defendants named (except the defendant Meyerhoffer) and the members generally of International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local No. 8, conspired and agreed among themselves, as the court finds, wrongfully, that plaintiff would not be allowed to complete any job which it had taken under contract, and that it would not be allowed to proceed on any such job, unless and until it would enter into an agreement, either written or oral, with the defendant Local No. 8, by which it would operate a closed union shop under substantially the same conditions as those of the 1919-1920 agreement, with certain increases in rate of pay and overtime pay, and unless and until it would quit requiring its employees, as a condition of employment, to sign agreements in the form above set forth, and unless and until it should discharge such employees unless they become members or permit men of Local No. 8, and agreed to use the means and do the acts hereinafter set forth to accomplish said ends.
    “In pursuance of this agreement and conspiracy, said defendant International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local No. 8, voted a fund of $1,000 to be furnished the executive committee of said defendant for the carrying out of said agreement and conspiracy, and selected two members, the defendants Boss Kettle and James Maher (sued herein as Jim Mahr), to assist the business agent in the carrying out of said agreement and conspiracy, they to be paid as regular journeymen electrician’s wages from the funds of the Local. Other funds were supplied by said defendant Local No. 8 to the extent of several hundred dollars more, and while at the time of the first hearing in this case the $1,000 fund authorized by the Local had not been turned over to the executive committee, yet after the evidence which was introduced upon that hearing and the developments of violence and threats hereafter described appeared, the treasurer of the union announced in open court that said fund was still available to the committee and would be transferred to it by him upon request. Two additional members of the Local, Messrs. Charles Potts and Donald Kidd, were appointed members of the executive committee, and strike assessments were levied and collected to pay expenses in carrying out the agreements above set forth.
    ‘ ‘ Further, in pursuance of the agreement and conspiracy of the defendants above set forth, the defendants Myers, Kettle, Maher (sued herein as Mahr), and other members of defendant Local No. 8, and defendant Thornton, said defendants Myers, Kettle, Mahr, and other members of Local No. 8 acting for and on behalf of said defendant Local No. 8 as its regularly constituted and appointed officers and representatives, did the acts of violence, intimidation, and persuasion hereinafter described.
    “On May 14, 1920, the defendants Myers, Kettle, and Maher (sued herein as Mahr) went to the grounds upon which Inverness Club is located, and entered upon said grounds where plaintiff’s employees were at work, without authority from any one connected with said club, or from the plaintiff or any of its officers, and there abused by vile language and conduct plaintiff’s employees who were working therein, and threatened said employees with death or serious injury if they persisted in working for the plaintiff, and warned said employees to immediately desist from said work. Thereupon one of plaintiff’s employees immediately left his work, broke his contract, and left the city of Toledo.
    
      “On May 17, 1920, the defendants Myers, Kettle, Maher (herein sned as Mahr), and Thornton, together with a large number of other men, went to Inverness Club grounds and entered the clubhouse, and there the defendant Myers and others made a violent assault upon one Robert Jones, an employee of the plaintiff, and carried him bodily away from his work, and made numerous threats against him and others of plaintiff’s employees to send them to the hospitals for weeks or to kill them, if they did not immediately cease working for plaintiff. Said threats and violence were accompanied by foul and abusive language on the part of defendant Myers and others, which is of such nature that it should not be repeated in this finding. Plaintiff’s employees were forced to, and did, as a result of said violence and threats remove their tools from Inverness Club and cease working for plaintiff..
    “On other occasions defendants Myers and others used vile language toward other employees of the plaintiff, and threatened them with injury and death unless they ceased working for plaintiff, and as a result of said violence and threats certain of said employees were forced to and did leave the employ of plaintiff, and defendants. Myers, Kettle, Maher (herein sued as Mahr), and other members of defendant Local No. 8 accosted plaintiff’s employees and urged them to quit working for plaintiff, and to join defendants’ union, and to terminate their aforesaid employment contracts with plaintiff,
    “It is necessary to the conducting of plaintiff’s business that it employ skilled electrical workmen, and skilled electrical workmen who are not members of International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers are few in number, 95 per cent, of all skilled electrical workers being union men. Defendant Local No. 8 and defendant Myers have ordered all members of International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, including the members of Local No. 8, not to work for plaintiff, and in consequence of said order many of said members have refused and do still refuse to work for plaintiff, and it has been and is difficult, and unless defendants are restrained and enjoined by order of this court from acts of the character hereinbefore found to have been committed by them, and from other acts in pursuance of its conspiracy aforesaid, it will be impossible to obtain skilled electrical workers in sufficient numbers for plaintiff’s needs, and plaintiff’s present employees will be driven from its employ, and plaintiff’s contracts with them will be destroyed, and plaintiff’s rights thereunder lost, all contrary to the wishes of plaintiff and its said employees.
    “In further pursuance of said conspiracy, certain members of defendant Local No. 8, who continued to work for the plaintiff in pursuance of their respective contracts, were fined $1,000 each by Local Union No. 8, and their names were ordered to be published, as having violated their union obligations, in a periodical issued by the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, and they were considered by the members of Local No. 8 to be automatically suspended from membership in the union.
    “Prom May 18,1920, to May 26,1920, the defendants herein were restrained and enjoined by order of this court, as shown by the temporary injunction issued herein May 18, 1920, and since May 26, 1920, continuously down to the present time the defendants herein, except Plasterers’ Local Union No. 7, Lathers’ Union No. 24, and August Meyerhoffer, have been enjoined and restrained by order of this court, as shown by the order of temporary injunction entered herein May 26,1920.
    “It is conceded by counsel for all parties herein, and the court further finds, that there has been no agreement between plaintiff and defendants as to the terms upon which electrical work shall be carried on in Toledo or by the plaintiff, since April 30, 1920, and that the plaintiff has continued to the present time its policy of conducting an open shop, employing union and nonunion men without discrimination, and has continued to make it a condition of employment with it that contracts in the form described in the petition shall be signed by its employees, and the court finds further that the defendants International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local No. 8, Myers, McCullough, Fisher, Kettle, Maher (sued herein as Mahr), Thornton, and the members of Local No. 8 still intend to, and will, in pursuance of the conspiracy aforesaid, persuade plaintiff’s employees to quit their employment with plaintiff, and to become members or permit men of Local No. 8, and to violate their employment contracts, and that they intend to, and will, unless restrained by this court, call on plaintiff’s employees from time to time at their places of work and elsewhere, and induce and persuade them, if possible, to become members or permit men of Local No. 8 and to cease working for plaintiff, and that they intend to and will, by such persuasion and by picketing plaintiff’s place of business and places where its employees are engaged in work, prevent it from competing or proceeding with any of its jobs, and prevent it from obtaining any employees, and from retaining those it has, unless plaintiff will agree to conduct a closed union shop and desist from its policy of hiring union and nonunion men without discrimination, and from its policy of requiring the execution of contracts as hereinbefore described as a prerequisite of employment with it.
    “The defendants Myers and Thornton, individually and in their official capacities as business agents, and Kettle and Maher (sued herein as Mahr), as members of the executive committee of Local No. 8, have manifested by their actions a malevolent and malicious purpose to commit acts of violence and to use threats and vile language toward plaintiff and plaintiff’s workmen, to accomplish the purposes and in pursuance of the conspiracy aforesaid, and the special injunction hereinafter allowed against said defendants is necessary to prevent breaches of the peace. The assembling or congregating of defendants and members of defendant Local No. 8 in numbers in excess of three, to accost or interview persons in the employ of plaintiff, and the accosting or interviewing of plaintiff’s employees by said defendants and members while assembled or congregated in numbers in excess of three, under the situation appearing herein, has a direct tendency to incite breaches of the peace, and the special injunction hereinafter set forth in respect to such assembling, congregating, and interviewing is necessary to prevent breaches of the peace.
    “The initiation fee required of all workmen who become members of Local No. 8 is $100; the dues of said members are $1.50 per month, which are increased by nonattendance at meetings, and the fees required of permit men who are granted temporary permission to work with union men are $1 per week; and said permit men are only permitted to continue as such for a short time, until they can arrange to become members of the Local Union.
    “The constitution of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, with which association defendant Local No. 8 is affiliated, and by which constitution defendant Local No. 8 and its members arc bound under the terms of its affiliation, contains, among other provisions, the following (the initials ‘I. B. E. W.’ appearing therein meaning ‘International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers,’ the initials ‘L. U.’ meaning ‘Local Union,’ and the initials ‘I. P.’ meaning ‘International President’), viz.:
    “ ‘Article 2. Objects. Section 1. The objects of the I. B. E. W., are, namely: To organize all electrical workers into local unions. * * * ’
    “ ‘Article 14. * '* * Section 4. No L. U. shall allow its members to work for a contractor or employer in difficulty with any L. U. of the I. B. E. W., provided the I. P. [International President] has recognized said difficulty.’
    “ ‘Article 18. Duties of Members. Section 1. No member of this I. B. E. W. shall be allowed to injure the interests of another by undermining him in the scale of wages or any other wilful act by which the situation of any member may be placed in jeopardy. ’
    “ ‘Section 5. When working on shop work, no L. U. shall accept a price that conflicts with anotner L. U., when the members of the two L. U.’s are employed by the same employer or corporation.’
    “ ‘Article 23. Section 7. No member shall be allowed to work in the jurisdiction of another local union until he deposits his traveling card in the L. U. and receives a working card or permit, except in eases where L. U.’s of like conditions in close proximity may by mutual agreement have free exchange of cards.’
    “ ‘Section 12. Any member working within the jurisdiction of any local union in violation of the working rules of that local union shall be subject to punishment by the local union in whose jurisdiction the violation occurs.’
    “ ‘Article 25. Section 5. Any member going to work for any companies or individuals declared in difficulty, in accordance with the laws of this I. B. E. W., shall be assessed such sum as his L. U. may decide.’
    “The plaintiff has been declared in difficulty in accordance with the laws of International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, because it has no agreement with the union and employs nonunion men; and it is under Article 25, Section 5, of the Constitution above quoted, that one of plaintiff’s employees was fined $1,000 for working for the plaintiff.
    “The ritual of International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local No. 8, contains, among other provisions, the following rule with reference to the admission of persons into said Local:
    “ ‘If any objection is stated, the president shall appoint a committee of three to investigate the objection and report in writing at the following meeting. If the report is unfavorable and sustained by a majority of the members present upon an open vote, the candidate shall be rejected.’
    ‘ ‘ The by-laws and working rules of the defendant International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local No. 8, contain, among other provisions, the following:
    “ ‘Article 7. Fines. Section 1. Any member who refuses to stop work on any job or in any shop, on being notified by the business agent (or any other person authorized to act for the Local) that the job or shop is unfair to the Local, shall on conviction be assessed twenty-five dollars for the first offense, fifty dollars for the second offense, and shall be subject to expulsion for an additional offense.
    “ ‘Section 2. Any member failing to report in violation of the agreement or who works with a nonunion man (except permit men) shall on conviction be assessed such sum as the executive board may decide, subject to the approval of the Local, not to exceed ten dollars for the first offense. This assessment shall not be remitted except by a two-thirds vote of the Local.
    “ ‘Section 3. Any member who fails to parade with the Local on Labor Day shall be assessed ten dollars. This assessment cannot be remitted unless the member has been excused by the executive board, subject to the approval of the Local, or is or has been working one hundred miles out of the city three days prior to Labor Day.
    “ ‘Section 4. Any member, on being convicted of working for less than the scale of wages as provided for in the agreement, shall be assessed the prevailing wages for each day worked. * * *
    
      “ ‘Section 11. No member while in the employ of a contractor, or while employed on maintenance or shop work, or who has not been unemployed for at least three days, and who has not reported to the business agent, shall do any electrical work except for the contractor by whom employed. Any member found guilty of violating this rule shall be assessed twenty-five dollars for the first ofíense, fifty dollars for the second ofíense, and shall be subject to expulsion from the Local for the third offense.’
    “The constitution and by-laws of the Building' Trades Council of Toledo and vicinity, an unincorporated association with which the defendant Internatioiml Brotherhood of Electrical "Workers, Local No. 8, is affiliated, contain, among other provisions, the following:
    “ ‘Nonunion Conditions. Section 33. Under no circumstances will any organization affiliated permit its members to work with nonunion men or with members of a dual or hostile union to any trade represented, nor allow its members or delegates to sit in any central body or board of delegates with others than the members or delegates of unions represented in this Toledo Building Trades Council.
    “ ‘Section 34. (a) Wherever or whenever nonunion men are found working, action shall be taken by the business agents to enforce union conditions. ’ “In view of the provisions of the several constitutions and by-laws which bind all persons becoming members of defendant Local Union No. 8, none of plaintiff’s employees can become members thereof without taking an obligation inconsistent with their employment contracts with plaintiff, and hence requiring them to violate or terminate said contracts.
    “None of the individual defendants, and none of the individual members of Local No. 8 named herein, have ever been employees of the plaintiff.
    “No action warranting the exercise of the powers of this court has been taken by defendants Plasterers’ Local Union No. 7, Lathers’ Union No. 24, or August Meyerhoffer.”
    In its full terms, the permanent injunction issued in the court of common pleas did not restrain the strikers from peaceful picketing, nor from peacefully persuading employes of the La Prance Company to leave their work, nor from peacefully persuading applicants for work not to accept employment with the plaintiff company.
    The plaintiff in error prosecutes this proceeding in error for the purpose of reversing the judgment of the Court of Appeals, which affirmed the court of common pleas in refusing to enjoin the defendants from the use of peaceful picketing and peaceful persuasion both of employes to leave their work and of applicants for work not to accept employment from the plaintiff company.
    
      Messrs. Tracy, Chapman & Welles, for plaintiff in error.
    
      Messrs. Hackett é Lynch, for defendants in error.
   Allen, J.

The injunction granted by the trial court in this case reads in full as follows:

“1. The defendant International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local No. 8, and each and all of the members of said Local No. 8, and the defendants Chris. McCullough, individually and as president of International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local No. 8, Oliver Myers, individually and as business agent of International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local No. 8, Richard Fisher, individually and as financial secretary of International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local No, 8, Ross Kettle, James J. Maher (sued herein as Jim Mahr), and Charles Gr. Thornton, individually and as business agent of Plasterers’ Local Union No. 7, and all other persons whomsoever to whom notice of this order shall be given, are hereby permanently enjoined and restrained from doing or saying any of the following acts and things, to-wit:

“(a) From inducing, by intimidation, threats, abuse, or violence, or thereby attempting to induce, any person who is now or who may hereafter become, an employee of plaintiff, to leave plaintiff’s employ, and from preventing, by intimidation, threats, abuse, or violence, or by said means attempting to prevent, any person from entering plaintiff’s employ.

“(b) From calling plaintiff’s employees rats, scabs, snakes, or any other epithets, and from using any vile, indecent, or insulting language to, or towards, or of, plaintiff’s employees, in their presence or hearing, or to, or towards, or of, persons entering or leaving plaintiff’s premises, or persons entering or leaving premises upon which plaintiff’s employees are engaged in work, in the presence or hearing of such persons, and from threatening, intimidating, insulting, attacking, beating, wounding, or injuring any employee of plaintiff, or any person entering or leaving plaintiff’s premises, or any person entering or leaving premises upon which plaintiff’s employees are engaged in work.

“(c) From approaching, accosting, or following, with intent to injure or intimidate, any person in the employ of plaintiff, or any person entering or leaving plaintiff’s premises, or any person entering or leaving premises upon which plaintiff’s employees are engaged in work.

“(d) From loitering at or in the vicinity of plaintiff’s shop, or at or in the vicinity of any place at which plaintiff’s employees may be engaged in work, or on the streets used by plaintiff’s employees in going to or from their work, or in the vicinity of the home of any of plaintiff’s employees.

“(e) From assembling or congregating, in numbers in excess of three, for the purpose of accosting or interviewing persons in the employ of plaintiff, or being assembled or congregated in numbers in excess of three, from accosting or interviewing any of plaintiff’s employees while so assembled and congregated at any place whatsoever, and if the defendant International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local No. 8, shall appoint or designate or authorize any person or persons on defendants’ behalf to accost or interview or approach persons in plaintiff’s employ, or contemplating entering plaintiff’s employ, the defendant Chris. McCullough, as president of the defendant International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local No. 8, is hereby ordered and required to keep a record of the persons who shall be so appointed or designated.

“(f) From approaching, accosting, interviewing, or following any person in the employ of plaintiff, against the will of such person.

“(g) From taking any steps whatsoever, except by peaceful persuasion of plaintiff’s employees or prospective employees, either to leave its employ or to refuse to enter its employ, and join said defendant Local No. 8, maliciously designed to compel plaintiff, against its will, to resume relationship and dealings with International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local No. 8, or with any officer, representative, or member of such union, or to compel plaintiff against its will to operate its shop as a closed union shop.

“(h) From assaulting, injuring, or attempting to injure, and from threatening, intimidating, or following, with intent to injure or intimidate, any member of the family of any person employed by plaintiff.

“2. The defendant Oliver Myers, individually and as business agent of International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local Union No. 8, and the following named persons, individually and as members of the executive board or executive committee of said International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local No. 8, to-wit, the defendant James J. Maher (sued herein as Jim Mahr), and the defendant Boss Kettle, and the defendant Charles GL Thornton, individually and as business agent of Plasterers’ Local Union No. 7, are, and each of them is, hereby permanently enjoined and restrained from doing any of the acts specified in paragraphs (a), (b), (c), (d), (e), (f), (g), and_(h) of section 1 of this order, and are further enjoined and restrained, from going to plaintiff’s shop, or the vicinity thereof, or to any place upon which plaintiff’s employees may be engaged in work, or the vicinity thereof, for the purpose of speaking to, interviewing, persuading, following, or in any manner communicating with any person in plaintiff’s employ.

“Each defendant, except Plasterers’ Local Union No. 7, Lathers’ Union No. 24, and August Meyer-b offer, excepts to the granting of said order and each and every part thereof, and plaintiff excepts to the refusal of the court to restrain the individual defendants and the defendant Local Union No. 8, and its members, officers, and agents, from persuading plaintiff’s employees to break or terminate their employment contracts, from persuading prospective employees to refuse to enter plaintiff’s, employ, and from picketing plaintiff’s plant and jobs, and from taking any further steps of any kind in pursuance of the wrongful conspiracy found by the court to exist among them.

“This order of injunction is conditional upon plaintiff’s giving bond in accordance with law, in the amount of $500, and said bond having been given by the plaintiff, and having been duly approved, it is ordered that said injunction become effective forthwith.”

As the parties here stand in the same relation as in the trial court, the plaintiff in error will be called the plaintiff and the defendants in error the defendants throughout this opinion.

It will be observed that the injunction very fully restrained the use of any possible violence by the electrical workers, either as individuals or as a union. It also restrained four of the individual defendants, who the court found had used abuse, violence, and coercion in prosecuting the strike, from going to plaintiff’s establishment, or the vicinity thereof, or to any place where plaintiff’s employes were engaged at work, or the vicinity thereof, for the purpose of communicating in any manner with any person in plaintiff’s employ. The court refused, however, to enjoin peaceable picketing by the strikers in general at or near the establishment of their former employer, and refused to enjoin peaceable persuasion; that is, the use of peaceable argument to dissuade workmen from remaining in the employ of the plaintiff company, or to dissuade men who had not been working at the plant from entering that particular employment. That is to say, the question before us for decision is this: May men who have left their employment temporarily, for the purpose of bringing pressure to bear in the interest of changing the conditions under which they labor, peaceably picket and persuade men. who are in their former employer’s service to cease their work, and may they also, without the use of violence, persuade men who contemplate entering their former employer’s service not to do so; or are such acts, even though done in pursuance of the strike purpose, illegal and subject to injunction?

In this connection the employer urges that there is no legitimate trade dispute in this case, for the reason that employer and employes had completely ended their connection before this suit was begun. This fact is technically true upon the record. The time limit of the contract of employment had expired, and immediately at the conclusion of that period the plaintiff endeavored to employ some of the same workmen, members of the defendant union, who were in the employ of the plaintiff immediately before the contract period had expired, and to induce each of them to sign a so-called individual contract providing for the open shop. These individual contracts the company sought to secure, not merely from men who had never worked for it before, but also from old employes, and it was this demand which brought about the strike.

Upon the record with regard to this point there can be little doubt that a legitimate trade dispute existed in this case, in which former employes of the plaintiff company were seeking to secure the right to work with the company under terms of employment different from those which their' employer was at the time requiring. That being the case, the methods open to use in a legitimate trade dispute were open to the strikers here. The direct question facing us is whether these methods rightly include peaceful picketing and peaceful persuasion of workers to cease their work and not to accept employment with the plaintiff company.

Peaceful picketing has frequently been held lawful in Ohio. A long line of authority in the lower tribunals, which includes decisions of outstanding judges in the nisi prius courts in this state, holds that in the prosecution of a strike, that is, a refusal of employes to work owing to a legitimate trade dispute with their employers, workingmen may legally place pickets or patrols within a reasonable distance of the employer’s place of business for the purpose of observing the progress of the strike. These decisions have been acquiesced in in this state for almost 25 years, the period during which industrial strife has become most prominent. It is also generally held by the same Ohio lower courts that striking workmen may peaceably persuade men and women still working under their former employer to abstain from working for the employer during the continuance of such strike, and may peaceably persuade new workmen not to accept employment. This court, however, has never passed upon the specific questions here presented, except in an affirmance without opinion of a nisi prius case.

The rule above given obtains in other state jurisdictions of consequence, and also in the federal courts. (24 Cyc., 835, notes 76 and 77, and cases cited; American Steel Foundries v. Tri-City Central Trades Council, 257 U. S., 184, 42 Sup. Ct., 72, 66 L. Ed., 189.) That last case, it is true, construed Section 20 of the Clayton Act (Section 1243d, U. S. Comp. Stat.; Section 1035, Barnes’ Fed. Code), which provides that no restraining order or injunction shall prohibit any person or persons from “attending at any place where any such person or persons may lawfully be, for the purpose of peaceably obtaining or communicating information, or from peacefully persuading any person to work or to abstain from working.” Chief Justice Taft, in discussing this provision of the Clayton Act, called specific attention (257 U. S., 203, 42 Sup. Ct., at page 76, 66 L. Ed., 189) to the fact that these provisions simply declare the rule which had heretofore been laid down in equity jurisprudence:

“It is clear,” he says, “that Congress wished to forbid the use by the federal courts of their equity arm to prevent peaceable persuasion by employees, discharged or expectant, in promotion of their side of the dispute, and to secure them against judicial restraint in obtaining or communicating information in any place where they might lawfully be. This introduces no new principle into the equity jurisprudence of those courts. It is merely declaratory of what was the best practice always. Congress thought it wise to stabilize this rule of action tnd render it uniform.

“The object and problem of Congress in Section 20, and indeed of courts of equity before its enactment, was to reconcile the rights of the employer in his business and in the access of his employees to his place of business and egress therefrom without intimidation or obstruction, on the one hand, and the right of the employees, recent or expectant, to use peaceable and lawful means to induce present employees and would-be employees to join their ranks, on the other.”

What peaceable picketing is under the law in this state depends upon the circumstances of the case. The number of pickets is not conclusive, nor can any special rule be laid down in detail to define peaceable picketing. This much is established. Picketing in such numbers as to prevent free access to the plant of the employer, or in itself to constitute a threat of physical force, is unlawful. Acts or threats, direct or indirect, made by pickets to workmen employed by their former employers, or to their families, which tend to amount to coercion or duress, or tend to substitute the will of the strikers for the will of those whom they approach in persuading employes to leave their work or in inducing others not to seek employment with the strikers’ former employer, are unlawful and subject to injunction.

The injunction of the court in this case prohibits all forms of picketing, except peaceful picketing, prohibits all violence, abuse, congregation in numbers in excess of three, and actually restrains certain defendants from acting as pickets under any circumstances. This court finds no error in the judgment of the court of common pleas upon this branch of the case.

The second alleged ground of error upon which the plaintiff relies is that the court below failed to enjoin peaceful persuasion of employes to leave their work and peaceful persuasion of men applying for work not to accept employment with the plaintiff company. Plaintiff urges that it has property rights in its contracts with its employes; that these property rights were destroyed when the union men induced the workmen of the company to leave their employment; and that such persuasion should therefore have been enjoined whether or not the persuasion was peaceable.

The plaintiff cites various United States decisions of importance in support of its contention, many of which deal with infringement of contract rights by the legislative branch of the government. If the Legislature must maintain the obligation of contracts, plaintiff argues, the judiciary likewise must maintain the obligation of contracts, by restraining strikers from inducing men to sever their employment by means unpeaceful or peaceful.

Before proceeding to examine the merits of this proposition, let us inquire into the nature of the employment which existed between the workmen and the company in this case. The court of common pleas in its findings determined the following facts: That an agreement was in effect between the plaintiff and Local No, 8 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers up to April 30, 1920; that upon Thursday, April 29, 1920, the plaintiff paid all of its workmen and terminated all existing contracts of employment with them; that when plaintiff’s former employes and other applicants for work reported at the plant on Monday, May 3d, there was handed to each of them to be signed a written agreement in which, among other terms, the following was provided:

“The employment of said employee under this agreement shall continue until either the employee or the employer shall have given the other two days’ written notice of his intention to terminate it, except in the case of misbehavior or incompetency of the employee, which shall be ground for an immediate termination of the employment by the employer.”

That is to say, whenever either the employer or the employe gave the other party two days’ written notice of his intention to terminate the relation under the contract, such party had a right to terminate the employment after the two days were concluded. The employment, then, was not an employment for a specified term. It was an employment which might be for a month, a year, several years, or for any time, depending upon the will of the parties; and it was a contract which could be terminated, not merely by mutual consent, but at the wish of either one of the parties. The two days’ period did not establish a term for the duration of the contract, but merely a period of convenient notice. The employment was, in other words, an employment at will.

The specific question here raised, then, from the standpoint of inducing workmen to terminate their contracts, is whether peaceably persuading employes who are employed at will to terminate their employment is illegal and may be enjoined. That peaceable persuasion in itself is not illegal, that discussions and arguments with employes tending toward the breaking of contracts of employment, that discussion with men applying for work which ends in their not accepting employment with the particular employer in question, which are unaccompanied by any form of abuse or violence, are not illegal in and of themselves, has been repeatedly held in this state. The doctrine upon that point may be found in a number of Ohio nisi prius decisions. That peaceable persuasion is not illegal under the federal rule is also pointed out in American Steel Foundries v. Tri-City Central Trades Council, supra.

Plaintiff does not so urgently resist this doctrine as to persuading new workmen not to accept employment, but strenuously insists that any persuasion to break a contract, whether for a term or at will, is illegal and enjoinable, citing the cases of Hitchman Coal & Coke Co. v. Mitchell, 245 U. S., 229, 38 Sup. Ct., 65, 62 L. Ed., 260, L. R. A., 1918C, 497, Ann. Cas., 1918B, 461; Truax v. Raich, 239 U. S., 33, 38, 36 Sup. Ct., 7, 60 L. Ed., 131, L. R. A., 1916D, 545, Ann. Cas., 1917B, 283; and Duplex Printing Press Co. v. Deering, 254 U. S., 443, 41 Sup. Ct., 172, 65 L. Ed., 349, 16 A. L. R., 196. These decisions do, upon a superficial view, seem to support plaintiff’s contention.

The Hitchman Coal Company case, for instance, holds that the employer is entitled to the good will of his employes irrespective of the fact that they are employed at will and that the relation is terminable by either at any time, that the employer is entitled to the benefit of the probability that by properly treating his employes he will be able to keep them, in his employ, and that it is unlawful for another party to interfere with this relation without just cause or excuse.

Truax v. Raich, supra, holds that to induce a third person to leave employment is actionable, if done maliciously and without just cause, although such persons are free to leave at their own will. The following is the language of Judge Hughes upon this point in Truax v. Raich, 239 U. S., at page 38, 36 Sup. Ct., 9, 60 L. Ed., 131, L. R. A., 1916D, 545, Ann. Cas., 1917B, 283:

“It is said that the bill does not show an employment for a term, and that under an employment at will the complainant could be discharged at any time for any reason, or for no reason, the motive of the employer being immaterial. The conclusion, however, that is sought to be drawn, is too broad. The fact that the employment is, at the will of the parties, respectively, does not make it one at the will of others. The employe has manifest interest in the freedom of the employer to exercise his judgment without illegal interference or compulsion, and by the weight of authority the unjustified interference of third persons is actionable, although the employment is at will.”

On the facts, however, neither the Hitchman case nor the Truax case controls the decision of this question. In the Hitchman case the members of a coal miners’ union had notice that the employes of a certain mine were under contract with their employer not to remain in his employment after joining the union. They sought to induce the employes to join the union and to remain at work until enough new members could be obtained to bring about a strike, thus uniting with the union in a plan to subvert the system of employment upon which they had voluntarily agreed with the employer. There were no such facts in the present case. No effort was made to induce the employes still in the employ of the La France Electrical Construction & Supply Company to join the union and remain in the company. The effort was made to have them leave their employment, which was at will.

Chief Justice Taft points out the distinction between the Hitchman case and the ordinary strike case in the Tri-City Central Trades Council opinion, supra:

“The plan thus projected was carried out in the case of the complainant company by the use of deception and misrepresentation with its nonunion employees, by seeking to induce such employees to become members of the union contrary to the express term of the contract of employment that they would not remain in complainant’s employ if union men, and after enough such employees had been secretly secured, suddenly to declare a strike against complainant and to leave it in a helpless situation, in which it would have to consent to be unionized. This court held that the purpose was not lawful, and that the means were not lawful, and that the defendants were thus engaged in an unlawful conspiracy, which should be enjoined. The unlawful and deceitful means used were quite enough to sustain the decision of the court, without more.”

In the case of Truax v. Raich, supra, an Arizona statute was under scrutiny. This statute required any employer of the kind involved in the suit to hire at least four-fifths of its employes from among workmen who were native-born. Penalties were provided for the violation of the act, which constituted a misdemeanor. The action was brought by Raich, who was a native of Austria, against Truax, his employer, to enjoin his discharge, alleging that Truax had notified him that he was to be discharged in accordance with the statute.

It is difficult to see how this Truax case can be considered authority for the proposition that in the case at bar an injunction should have issued against the peaceful persuasion of workmen to terminate an employment at will. In the Truax case there was no peaceful persuasion involved. It was a question entirely of legal compulsion. The Arizona statute compelled the employer to discharge his foreign-born workmen. No one was endeavoring peaceably to persuade Truax to discharge his alien employes. He was forced to do so under the law. The situation would have been more comparable to this case, if some one had persuaded Truax it was better to hire Americans than it was to hire foreigners; that he would receive more intelligent service and the community would be better suited if he employed Americans. If as a result of such conversation Truax had discharged Raich, and Raich had brought a bill in equity to enjoin the third person from suggesting to Truax that he employ native-born men, and the court had held that the fact that the employment was at will made no difference in the case, then the Truax case would have been an authority in the situation which meets us here. Upon the facts, the Truax holding is an authority for the proposition that a statute compelling an employer to terminate a contract, whether for a term or at will, is unconstitutional, and that its enforcement will be enjoined. That doctrine has no relation to the problem before us, which is one as to discussion, argument, and persuasion, by wholly peaceful means, to terminate a contract which under its terms may be ended at any time by the employe.

The Duplex Printing Press Co. v. Deering case was a case of boycott. There the International Association of Machinists, an association with a membership of more than 60,000, united to compel the employer to unionize its factory, enforce the closed shop, the eight-hour day, and the union scale of wages by boycotting the company’s interstate trade. The association conducted in the city of New York a widespread campaign of coercion. It threatened the customers of the Duplex Printing Press Company, the trucking companies that carried its presses, and those who usually set up such presses, with injury in their business if they continued to deal with the Duplex Company. It was a secondary boycott; that is, the International Association of Machinists tried by. coercion to use persons having-nothing to do with the controversy, and having no interest in it, to injure the Duplex Company in its interstate trade. This was held, following the case of Loewe v. Lawlor, 208 U. S., 274, 28 Sup. Ct., 301, 52 L. Ed., 488, 13 Ann. Cas., 815, to be an unlawful combination in restraint of interstate trade. This case, also, does not apply to the facts before us here.

It is difficult upon principle to see how persuading a man. to do a thing, which he may do with perfect legality, can be illegal. If it is legal for a workman to leave his employment at any time, how can it be illegal for a person to suggest to the workman or discuss with him the advisability of his leaving his employment at any time? It would not be legal for a workman, if he had agreed to continue in employment for a year, to break that contract and terminate it without justification after six months. It would, therefore, in the absence of some special justification, not be legal for another person to persuade the workman to leave his employment before the year was over, because he would be persuading the workman to do an illegal thing. But how can the persuasion of one to do a legal thing be in itself illegal? Surely there is nothing in the nature of persuasion per se which makes the use of it illegal.

If in the case here the workmen who struck persuaded or induced the employes of the plaintiff company to terminate their contract immediately, without forty-eight hours notice, as required by the contract, that might under some circumstances be illegal. If the strikers persuaded the employes to give forty-eight hours notice and terminate the employment after the 2 days, that obviously was not illegal, because they were advising the employes to do what they might with perfect right do for themselves.

The findings of fact by the court of common pleas show that four individual defendants did in this case induce employes of the plaintiff company to terminate their contracts immediately. The court enjoined those four individual defendants from going to plaintiff’s shop, or the vicinity thereof, or to any place where plaintiff’s employes might be engaged in work, for the purpose of speaking to, interviewing, persuading, following, or in any manner communicating with any person in plaintiff’s employ. With the exception of the solicitation by these particular defendants, the evidence does not show that the solicitation was to cease work immediately, before giving the proper notice. The denial of the injunction prayed for, against peaceful persuasion, did not therefore constitute error.

Equality of justice demands that in any controversy the rights of all parties be scrupulously maintained. The right of workmen to be employed, irrespective of union membership, must be maintained ; the right of the employer to conduct his business without illegal interference must be upheld; and legal means employed by strikers must not be curtailed. Among the latter are the right of peaceful picketing, the peaceful persuasion of employes to terminate contracts at will, and the peaceful persuasion of expectant employes not to accept work with the employer in question.

For these reasons the judgment of the Court of Appeals is affirmed.

Judgment affirmed.

Marshall, C. J., Wanamaker, Robinson, Jones, Matthias and Day, JJ., concur.