Evening star., 1941-02-04
A Novel Decision

Labor unions have been given what
amounts to a judicial license to en-
gage in jurisdictiorfal strikes and
similar abuses by the majority de-
ciSiOn OF the Supreme Court in the
AnheuSer Busch case ruling
which was described by Chief Justice
| Hughes and Associate Justice Rob-
| ertS as a seeming ''usurpatiOn by the
! courts of the function of the Con-
greSS not only novel but fraught, as
well, with the most serious dangers
| to our constitutional system of d.
vision of powers"
The case turned on a dispute be-
tween the International Brotherhood
of Carpenters and JoinerS of Amer
lea and the International Association
| of MachiniStS, both members of
the American Federation of Labor,
as to which should perform
| certain class of work for AnheuSer-
! Busch. AnheuSer-BuSCh had had
agreements with both organizations
} NlICLCDy JllC Illd(lllIllSJO W6IC slNSI
the disputed jobs and the carpenters
agreed to submit all disputes to arbi-
tration. In 1889, however, officials of
the carpenters union insisted on
having the jobs, went on strike and
instituted a boycott after refusing to
submit the demand to arbitration.
This resulted in a situation in
which an employer who was not ac-
/ cuSed of any anti-union activity, and,
/ indirectly, the general public, be-
came the victims of family quarrel
between two unions, and on this basis
| Thurman Arnold. head of the Justice
! Departments antitrust division,
sought and obtained an indictment
charging a criminal violation by the
carpenters union officials of the
/ Sherman Antitrust Act
| In declaring this indictment to be
invalid, the majority of the court,
. speaking through Associate Justice
Frankfurter, said in substance that
the Clayton Act and the NorriS-La
Guardia Act serve jointly as a shield
to protect labor unions engaging
peaCeably in juriSdictiOnal strikes
/ from any punitive or restraining ac-
ton through the courts 80 long as
a union acts in its self-interest," ,"
Justice Frankfurter said, ."and does
not combine with non-labor groups,
the licit and the illicit (under the
Clayton Act are not to be diStin-
guished by any judgment regarding
the wisdom or unwiSdom, the right
ness or wrongness, the selfishneSs or
unSeliShness of the end of which the
particular union activities are the
means In other words, in. the Su-
preme Courts preSess, >eW of the
law labor unions are in a specially
/ privileged class, and, so long as they
refrain from joining forces with any
non-union group, such as an organi-
zation of employers, are free to en-
gage in a wide range of abuses with
out fear of restraint or punishment,
no matter how adversely the public
interest may be affected.
Congress, in passing the Clayton
and Norris-La Guardia Acts, sought
only to restrict the use of injunctions
against labor unions. Despite deter
mined efforts by labor over a long
period of years to secure complete
exemption from the antitrust laws,
there has never been any legislative
curb imposed on criminal proceed
ingS under the statutes, although the
possibility Of such action being
initiated hardly could have been
overlooked by Congress. In arriving
at his conclusion, however, Justice
Frankfurter Summarily disposed of
this question of congressional intent.
The Clayton and Norris-La Guardia
Acts, he said, must not be read in
a spirit of mutilating narrowness,"
and, taking broad view of the Ian
guage of the statutes, the justice held
that because Congress had curbed
the use of injunctions it also in
tended, on a given set of facts, to
ban resort by the Government to
criminal proceedings
Describing this reasoning as "a
process of construction never, as I
think, heretofore indulged by this
court" Justice Roberts, in the strong
ly worded dissent, added: Il venture
to say that no court has ever under
taken so radically to legislate where
Congress has refused so to do" In
that comment there is suggestion
Of unintended irony, reminiscent as
it is Of the New Dealers complaint
at the time of the fight over the
Presidents court bill-that the "old
court" was guilty of judicial law
making.
German bombs may be doing Brit
ain favor in that they will succeed,
| uhara oil othar onethode foi1ed in