Norwich bulletin., 1915-01-26
Decision a BIOWtO
 Organized Labor
MAY REQUIRE WORK
 MEN TO WITHDRAW FROM UNION
SUPREME COURT FINDS
Invaiidates Labor Law of Connecticut and f2 Other States-Three Justices Dissent in Kansas Decision.

Washington. Jan. 25.-The constitr- tional right of employers to require employees to renounce their union af hliatioDS as a condition of employment was sustained today by the supreme court in a decision. far-reaching to or ganized labor in which the Kansas so- called coercion statute was declared unconstitutional Associate Justice Day, joining a dissenting opinion with Justices Hughes and Holmes, declared that he believed similar laws iu thir- teen other states and in Porto Rico fell by the decision.
 Kansas Case in Question.
 Under the Kansas statute it was un- lawful for any individual or corpora tiOn to coerce or influence any person to enter into an agreement not to join or remain a member of a labor organ ization as a condition of securing or continuing employment. The case to- day arose from the conviction of T. E. Coppage, a division superintendent of the St. Louis and San Francisco rail- way system, for threatening 4. R. Hedge. a sWitchman, with dismissal if he did not withdraw from the Switch mems union of North America.
 Substance of Opinion.
 The substance of the opinion of the majority of the court was in this para graph:
 uSL SlS ietBOI UT SdltiZdLiOIls5 nave lll6 inherent and constitutional right to deny membership to any man who will not agree that, during such member Shlp. he will not accept or retain en- ploymenL in company with non union men; and just as a, union man has the constitutional right to decline proffer- ed employment unless the employer will agree not to employ any non union mar; so the employer has the constitutional right to insist that the
 
 with the union during the term of en- pioyment.'
 Contention of Dissenting Justices.
 The contention of the dissenting jus tices is expressed, in the main, in this paragraph of their opinion:
 Could an employer not be forbid den from demanding agreements that an employe should not join the nR- ti0nal guard? Could not the state strike down agreements not to join a certain political party2 Why not la bor unions. whatever members of this court may think of these unions?"
 Connecticut Law invalidated.
 Other laws which. according to Jus tice Day, are invalidated by todays opinion, are those of California, Col OradO, Connecticut, Indiana, Massachu- sets, Minnesota. New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York. Oklahoma, Or egon, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin and Porto Rico.
 Justice Pitney, in announcing the maJority's opinion, made it clear that he did not consider actual coercion" as beyond the power of the states to prohibit. He declared that the de- cision was not only based on reason but was supported by the decision of the court several years ago in the Adair case, in which the federal act of 1898, prohibiting an interstate rail road from disChargiug an empIoye be- cause he belonGed to a union, was an nulled as unconstitutional.
 Justices Day and Hughes held there was an element of coercion in the sWitChman's case which distinguished these two cases, while Justice Holmes was in favor of overruling the Adair decision.