Court Opinion

ID: 9421300
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 22:57:47.279954+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:22:29.588618
License: Public Domain

Mr. Justice Douglas,
with whom The Chief Justice and Mr. Justice Black concur,
dissenting.
There are instances where we have sustained identical regulations of the same act by both a State and the Federal Government. California v. Zook, 336 U. S. 725, is an example. But the instances are few and far between.
Of course, where the States and the Federal Government regulate the same act, but each with a different sanction, both often survive. United Workers v. Laburnum Corp., 347 U. S. 656, is a recent example. We there allowed a common-law tort action for damages to be enforced in a state court for the same acts that could have been the basis for administrative relief under the federal Act. But the present case is not that case. Here the State has prescribed an administrative remedy that duplicates the administrative remedy prescribed by Congress. Each reaches the same identical conduct. We disallowed that duplication of remedy in Garner v. Teamsters Union, 346 U. S. 485. In that case we held that a state court could not enjoin action which was subject to an unfair labor proceeding under the federal Act. And see Weber v. Anheuser-Busch, Inc., 348 U. S. 468. Today we depart from Garner and allow a state board to enjoin action *276which is subject to an unfair labor proceeding before the federal board. We sanction a precise duplication of remedies which is pregnant with potentialities of clashes and conflicts.*
Of course the States may control violence. They may make arrests and invoke their criminal law to the hilt. They transgress only when they allow their administrative agencies or their courts to enjoin the conduct that Congress has authorized the federal agency to enjoin. We retreat from Garner and open the door to unseemly conflicts between state and federal agencies when we sustain what Wisconsin has done here.

Allen-Bradley Local v. Wisconsin Board, 315 U. S. 740, is not in point because the federal Act at that time made no provision for enjoining union activities.