Court Opinion

ID: 9652646
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 17:29:40.723842+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:08:17.406650
License: Public Domain

CLARK, Circuit Judge
(concurring).
I agree with the opinion and the judgment of reversal; but I think two further points should be noticed against the event of further proceedings or a new trial below. First, I do not see how a conviction can be had against the unincorporated Local 807 under the Anti-Racketeering Act; in other words, “person” in the act does not include such an amorphous group as this association of around 10,000 persons. It is hornbook law that, absent a clear legislative intent, an unincorporated association does not commit crimes, 7 C.J.S., Associations, § 17, p. 43; and Congress has often shown that it knows how to include an association as a person when it so desires, as in the Sherman and Clayton Acts, 15 U.S.C.A. §§ 7, 12, and literally a host of others,1 but not in the general construction law, 1 U.S.C.A. § 1. Even with the express provision of the Sherman Act, convictions of unincorporated bodies for its violation are rare, and seem to rest so far only on dicta of the Supreme Court. Brown v. United States, 276 US. 134, 48 S.Ct. 288, 72 L.Ed. 500; and compare United States v. International Fur Workers Union, 2 Cir., 100 F.2d 541, 547, certiorari denied 306 U.S. 653, 59 S.Ct. 642, 83 L.Ed. 1051; Moffat Tunnel League v. United States, 289 U.S. 113, 118, 53 S.Ct. 543, 77 L.Ed. 1069. Hence the omission here is significant and is rendered more so by the language of § 6, 18 U.S.C.A. § 420d, implying personal, rather than vicarious, participation in the offense interdicted, and carefully excepting, not labor *689organizations themselves, but the impairing or diminishing of labor organization rights.2
Second, if, as the opinion suggests, convictions of certain of the defendants under an adequate charge can be sustained under § 420a(a), then the effect of the proviso to § 420d, just cited and quoted in the note, must be considered. I agree that it is “most obscure,” and also that it “at least shows a vague intention to discriminate between violence in labor disputes and elsewhere.” It may therefore mean in effect that the acts of violence here made a federal crime do not include such acts when occurring in otherwise legitimate activities of bona fide (i.e., non-outlaw) labor organizations. If the word “otherwise” should be omitted from this statement, if the acts of violence themselves render the union activities not legitimate, then the proviso becomes wholly meaningless, since it would then say that union activities are excepted only when they do not violate the act. Yet it was dear legislative history that this and the exceptions of §§ 420a (a) and 420b (b) discussed in the opinion were drafted by or for the great labor organizations, and the original bill was held up in both House and Senate until these provisions satisfactory to labor interests could be prepared and added. 78 Cong.Rec. 5859, 10867, 11402-3, 11482; H. R. 1833, 73d Cong., 2d Sess., 1934. This is not to legitimatize violence; for the legislative issue was whether the federal criminal jurisdiction should be greatly expanded — in ways unknown to the founding fathers or their descendants prior to 1934 — because state processes were ineffective or had broken down. To meet what was thought to be an emergency, there were passed the series of about a dozen acts, among which were this act and the amended kidnapping, the fugitive felon, and the stolen property acts.3 The proviso therefore may simply mean in effect that the emergency did not extend to even violent acts in furthering legitimate union activities; control or punishment of them should still remain with the states, as under N.Y. Penal Law, Consol.Laws, c. 40, §§ 850-852. Perhaps final interpretation should not now be attempted, but as at present advised I think conviction cannot be had where the acts or threats complained of are part of an endeavor of members of bona fide labor organizations to carry out their otherwise legitimate objects.

 2 U.S.C.A. § 241(f); 7 ibid. §§ 2, 72, 92(k), 116(f) (1), 123, 151, 182, 499a(1), 504, 589(1), 1561(a) (2); 15 ibid. §§ 12, 71, 142, 364, 431(e); 18 ibid. § 403; 19 ibid. §§ 172, 1341(c), 1401(d); 21 ibid. §§ 171(d), 321(e); 26 ibid. Int.Rev.Code, § 3228(a); 28 ibid. § 390a; 29 ibid. §§ 53, 113(e), 203(a); 38 ibid. § 592(e); 43 ibid. § 1171; 46 ibid. §§ 316(b), 801; 47 ibid. § 30; 48 ibid. §§ 471a(1), 663(4); 49 ibid. § 401(27); 50 ibid. § 82(a), with which compare 7 U.S.C.A. §§ 62, 242, and 26 ibid. Int.Rev.Code, §§ 145(e), 894(b) (2) (D), 3797(a) (1).

 18 U.S.C.A. § 4203: “Any person charged with violating section 420a of this title may be prosecuted in any district in which any part of the offense has been committed by him or by his actual associates participating with him in the offense or by his fellow conspirators: Provided, That no court of the United States shall construe or apply any of the provisions of sections 420a to 420e of this title in such manner as to impair, diminish, or in any manner affect the rights of bona-fide labor organizations in lawfully carrying out the legitimate objects thereof, as such rights are expressed in existing statutes of the United States. (June 18, 1934, c. 569, § 6, 48 Stat. 980.)”

 Cf. Cummings, Immediate Problems for the Bar, 20 A.B.A.J. 212; Chamberlain, Federal Criminal Statutes, 1934, 20 A.B.A.J. 501; 48 Harv.L.Rev. 489; 1 Law & Contemp.Prob. 399, 445; 21 Va.L.Rev. 568.