The morning journal-courier., 1908-04-23
MIR. CLARK ON TAFT
Hartford Editor Has Interest," ing Story in the Inde-
 pendent.
HIS LABOR DECISIONS
Famous Boycott Case and Other Cases of Importance Decided by
  Mir. Taft.

In recent number of the Independ- ent Charles Hopkins Clark, editor of the Hartford Courant, has an interest," ing story in the series of Presidential Possibilities which the magazine Is running, William Howard Taft being the subject of MT. Clark's article. Es- pecially interesting Is that portion of the article bearing upon the record Of Mir Taft as member of the supreme court and his decisions in important labor matters as follows
 On the bench he decided many lm- portant questions, not a few of which proved leading cases and established the law in such matters. Among these his decisions in cases growing out of the relation of employer anu employe, labor cases so-called have been of- tenest referred to, not only because of their importance to society, but also because of the attempt in some quar- ters to create prejudice against him on account of them. No one can retain any such prejudice who reads the able article by Dr. Frederick x. Judson. of St. Louis, published in the Review of Reviews for August. 1907 This points out that q judge does not make law. but declares and applies its principles, and 1t explains several of the Taft de- cisions oftenest referred to. In the su- perior court in Cincinnati in 1890 he sustained the decision of lower court, which, in the case of Moore Brothers vs, the Brcklayers' union. had award ed damages against the union for a secondary boycott; that is, for boycott ting a firm with whom there was no quarrel because 1t sold goods to the cm- ployer with whom there was dispute. This became leading case on the law of boycott--one undertaken against stranger to a pending dispute-has practically been abandoned, as It should be. At the same time the judge stated plainly that labor unions had their rights and privileges within which they could not be disturbed by the law. Later, in 1891, when he was on the fed- eral bench, his decision in the Phelan contempt case, while f. punished the leader who, in face Of an injunction, called out employees of an unoffending road which was being conducted by the United States courts through a receiv CT, nevertheless laid down so clearly the principles of the law relating to disputes between railroads and the men working for them that at later period Dr. Judson. as counsel for the Brother hood AC Dail-na1 fTrntntpnt, upl Eiro. men in their strike against the Wabash railroad, succeeded through that detis- ion in having an injunction against them dissolved. The railroad then set, tied the controversy What helped the employer in one instance helped the employe in another. No better test of fairness could he asked. And a careful study of MT Tafts judicial acts will not only remove any prejudice that may exist but, more than that, will ex cite admiration for the sanity and fair ness of his decisions.
 Leaving the bench, for which his tastes and training peculiarly fitted him, Judge Taft. in 1900, took up the larger work which has made him known all over the world The highest ambition of any lawyer must be to ac- quire a position on the bench of the supreme court of the United States, and twice Judge Taft felt compelled to decline this coveted honor because his high sense of duty convinced him that he could not leave the work on which he was engaged.