Daily Arizona silver belt., 1907-09-07
TWO VIEWS OF THE INJUNCTION

While President Gompers of the
 American Federation of Labor, was ar guing against the use of the injunction
 in labor disputes before the committee on labor laws of the Massachusetts leg islature, Secretary Taft was defending the injunction in Oklahoma. The con trast between the view of the statesman and jurist and that of the labor leader is instructive. 'Employers who think they are going to stop strikes by in. functions are living in fools para dise," declared Mir Gompers to the Massachusetts legislators. He went on to this effect:
 "Injunctions have grown from lit tie, inoffensive thing to the present day blanket affair, which enjoins the labor man from doing almost everything but breathing. Doubtless, if our opponents heard some of the prayers we would be enjoined for that.
 "Nothing the employer can do arouses the latent bitterness between classes so much as these injunctions Laborers feel that these injunctions are issued to shackle them during dispute between them and their employers.
 On the other hand, Mir. Taft, in his Oklahoma City speech, defended the writ of injunction as protective of the rights of both rich and poor. He up- held the use of the injunction to pro- tect a man s business from the Claw less acts of men who interfere with it, and denied that the injunction deprived the workingman of the right of trial by jury No such right, he said, ex- isted in equity cases. Though the sec retary knew of no ease in which the finding of the court as to the violation of an injunction against members of labor unions was unjust, yet he admit ted that there was injustice in granting an injunction at the application of at torneys for an employer on ex parte evidence, which evidence subsequently, turned out to be untrue. He appeared to favor the legislation recommended by President Roosevelt, providing that no ex parte injunction be issued in any case-a provision that was, in fact, in the federal statutes some years ago, | but was repealed Mir. Taft then went on to show how the injunction might be | applied to restrain the interruptions acts of labor unions. Admitting the | legality of labor organizations, and the | right to strike, MT. Taft said:
 "There are temptations to lawless violations and to illegal boycotts that become exceedingly dangerous because az the immense power of these trades unions if they choose to adopt such means. And then these abuses are to be compared exactly with the abuses of the combinations of capital, which are exceedingly useful if they only econo- mize the cost of production and reduce it and divide the benefit of that reduc- tion with the public; but if they mon- opolize the market and shove up the price, and at the same time lower the cost of production, then the law steps in and they have got to be restrained. Now, then, in every new law that you have for the suppression of unlawful combinations of capital you will find the provision that the writ of injunction shall issue against those charged with violation of law, and why2 Because it is the most effective remedy that can be used. Now, on the other side, if these evils which I have described as growing out of the interruptions use of the power of the trades unions are to be suppressed, the injunction is also a formidable weapon in the hands of the court, and ought to be maintained" "
 It will be remembered that MT. Taft, when judge of the United States circuit court, made use of this fashionable wea- pon in two notable cases where strikes of railroad employees threatened to in terfere with interstate commerce. In both cases Mir. Taft upheld the right of workers to organize and to strike, but restrained their organizations from ac- tions collateral to strikes, but not di- rectly involving the questions of wages or other terms of employment. His de- cisions in these cases have become clas. sic, but it is plain that Mir. Gompers accepts neither their law nor Mir. Taft s method of enforcing them.
 
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