Court Opinion

ID: 9418474
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 22:26:43.105775+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:22:03.451937
License: Public Domain

*354Mr. Justice Brandeis,
dissenting.
, The first legislature of the State of Arizona adopted in 1913 a Civil Code. By Title 6, c. III, it sets forth conditions and. circumstances under which the courts of the State may or may not grant injunctions. Paragraph 1464 contains, among other things, a prohibition against interfering by injunction between employers and employees, in any case growing out of a dispute concerning terms or conditions of employment, unless interposition by injunction is necessary to protect property from injury through violence. Its main purpose was doubtless to prohibit the courts from enjoining peaceful picketing and the boycott. With the wisdom of the statute we have no concern. Whether Arizona in enacting this statute transgressed limitations imposed upon the power of the States by the Fourteenth Amendment is the question presented for decision.
The employer has, of course, a legal right to carry on his business for profit; and incidentally the subsidiary rights to secure and retain customers, to fix such prices for his product as he deems proper, and to buy merchandise and labor at such prices as he chooses to pay. This right to carry on business — be it called liberty or property — has value; and, he who-interferes with the right without cause renders himself liable. ' But for cause the right may be interfered with and even be destroyed. Such cause exists when, in the pursuit of an equal right to further their several interests, his competitors make inroads upon his trade, or when suppliers of merchandise or of labor make inroads upon his profits. .'What methods and means-are permissible in this struggle of contending forces is determined in part by decisions of the courts, in part by acts of the legislatures. The rules governing the contest necessarily change from time to time. For conditions change; and, furthermore, the rules evolved, being merely experi*355meats in government, must be discarded when they prove to be failures.
Practically every change in the law governing the relation of employer and employee must abridge, in some respect, the liberty or property of one of the parties — if liberty and property be measured by the standard of the law theretofore prevailing. If such changes are made by acts of the legislature, we call the modification an exercise of the police power. And, although the change may involve interference with existing liberty or property of individuals, the statute will not be declared a violation of the due process clause, unless the court finds that the interference .is arbitrary or unreasonable or that, considered as a means, the measure has no real'or substantial relation of cause to a permissible end.1 Nor will such changes in the law governing contests between employer and employee be held to be violative of the equal protection clause, merely because the liberty or property of individuals in' other relations to each other (for instance, as competitors in trade or as vendor and purchaser) would not, under similar circumstances, be subject to like abridgement. New laws are of universal application. It is of the nature of our law that it has dealt not with man in general, but with him in relationships. That a peculiar relationship of individuals may furnish legal basis for the classification which satisfies the requirement of the Fourteenth Amendment2 is clear. That the relation o'f em*356ployer and employee affords a constitutional basis for legislation applicable only to persons standing in that relation has been repeatedly held by this court.3 The questions submitted are whether this statutory prohibition of the remedy by injunction is in itself arbitrary and so unreasonable as to deprive the employer of liberty or property without due process of law; — and whether limitation of this prohibition to controversies involving employment denies him equal protection of the laws.
Whether a law enacted in the exercise of the police power is justly subject to the charge of being unreasonable or arbitrary, can ordinarily be determined only by a consideration of the contemporary conditions, social, industrial and political, of the community to be affected thereby. Resort' to such facts is necessary, among other things, in order to appreciate the evils sought to be *357remedied and the possible effects of the remedy proposed. Nearly all legislation involves a weighing of public needs as against private desires; and likewise a weighing of relative social values. Since government is not an exact science, prevailing public opinion concerning the evils and the remedy is among the important facts deserving consideration; particularly, when the public conviction is both deep-seated and widespread and has been reached after deliberation.4 What, at any particular time, is the paramount public need.is, necessarily, largely a matter of judgment. Hence, in passing upon the validity of a law challenged as being unreasonable, aid may be derived from the experience of other countries and of the several States of our Union in which the common law and its conceptions of liberty and of property prevail. The history of the rules governing contests between employer and employed in the several English-speaking countries illustrates both the susceptibility of such rules to change and the variety of contemporary opinion as to what rules will best serve the public interest. The divergence of opinion in this difficult field of governmental action should admonish us not to declare a rule arbitrary and unreasonable merely because we are convinced that it is fraught with danger to the public weal, and thus to close the door to experiment within the law.
In England a workingman struggling to improve his condition, even when acting singly, was confronted until 1813 with laws limiting the amount of wages which he might demand.5 Until 1824 he was punishable as a criminal if he combined with his fellow workmen to raise wages or shorten hours or to affect the business in any *358way, even if there was no resort to a strike.6 Until 1871 members of a union who joined in persuading employees to leave work were liable criminally, although the employees were not under contract and the persuasion was both peaceful and unattended by picketing.7 Until 1871 threatening a strike, whatever the .causé, was also a criminal act.8 Not until 1875 was the right of workers to combine in order to attain their ends conceded fully. In that year Parliament declared that workmen combining in furtherance of a trade dispute should not be indictable for criminal conspiracy unless the act if done by one person would be indictable as a crime.9 After that statute a combination of workmen to effect the ordinary objects of a strike was no longer a criminal offense. But picketing, though peaceful, in aid of a strike, remained illegal;10 and likewise the boycott.11 Not until 1906 was the ban on *359peaceful picketing and the bringing of pressure upon an employer by means of a secondary strike or a boycott removed.12 In 1906, also, the act of inducing workers to break their contract of employment (previously held an actionable wrong)13 was expressly declared legal.14 In England improvement of the condition of workingmen *360and their emancipation appear to have been deemed recently the paramount public need.
In the British Dominions the rules governing the struggle between employer and employed were likewise subjected to many modifications; but the trend of social experiment took a direction very different from that followed in the mother country. Instead of enabling the worker to pursue such methods as he might .deem effective in the contest, statutes were enacted in some of the Dominions which forbade the boycott, peaceful picketing, and even the simple strike and the lockout;15 use of the injunction to enforce compliance with these prohibitions was expressly santioned;16 and violation of the statute *361was also made punishable by criminal proceedings.17 These prohibitions were the concomitants of prescribed industrial'arbitration through administrative tribunals by which the right of both employer and employee to liberty and property were seriously abridged in the public interest. Australia18 and New Zealand19 made compulsory both arbitration and compliance with the award.20 Canada limited the compulsion to a postponement of the right to strike until the dispute should have been officially investigated and reported upon.21 In these Dominions the uninterrupted pursuit of industry and the prevention of the arbitrary use of power appear to be deemed the paramount public needs.
In the United States the rules of the common law governing the struggle between employer and employee have likewise been subjected to modifications. These have *362been made mainly through judicial decisions. The legal right of workingmen to combine and to strike in order to secure for themselves higher wages, shorter hours and better working conditions received early general recognition.22 But there developed great diversity of opinion as to the means by which,23 and also as to the persons through whom,24 and upon whom25 pressure might permissibly be *363exerted in order to induce the employer'to yield to the demands of the workingmen. Courts were required, in the absence of legislation, to determine what the public welfare demanded; — whether it would not be best sub-served by leaving the contestants free to resort to any means not involving a breach of the peace or injury to tangible property; whether it was consistent with the public interest that the contestants should be permitted to invoke the aid of others not directly interested in the matter in controversy; and to what extent incidental in-, jury to persons not parties to the controversy should be held justifiable.
The earliest reported American decision on peaceful picketing appears to have been rendered in 1888 26; the earliest on boycotting in 1886.27 By no great majority the prevailing judicial opinion in America declares the boy*364cott as commonly practiced an illegal means28 (see Duplex Printing Press Co. v. Deering, 254 U. S. 443), while it in*365clines towards the legality of peaceful picketing.29 See American Steel Foundries v. Tri-City Central Trades Council, ante, 184. But in some of the States, notably New York, both peaceful picketing and the boycott are declared permissible.30 Judges, being thus called upon to exercise a quasi-legislative function and weigh relative social values, naturally differed in their conclusions on such questions.31
*366In England, observance of the rules of the contest has been enforced by the courts almost wholly through the criminal law or through actions at law for compensation. An injunction was granted in a labor dispute as early as 1868.32 But in England resort to the injunction has not been frequent and it has played no appreciable part there in the conflict between capital and labor. In America the injunction did not secure recognition as a possible remedy until 1888.33 When a few years later its use became extensive and conspicuous, the controversy over the remedy overshadowed in bitterness the question of the relative substantive rights of the parties. In the storms of protest against this use many thoughtful lawyers joined.34 The equitable remedy, although applied in accordance with established practice, involved incidents which, it was asserted, endangered the personal liberty of wage-earners. The acts enjoined were frequently, perhaps usually, acts which were already crimes at common law or had been made so by statutes. The issues in litigation arising out of trade disputes related largely to questions of fact. But in equity issues of fact as of law were tried by a single judge, sitting without a jury. Charges of violating an *367injunction were often heard on affidavits merely, without the opportunity of confronting or cross-examining witnesses.35 Men found guilty of contempt were committed in the judge’s discretion, without either a statutory limit upon the length of the imprisonment, or the opportunity of effective review on appeal, or the right to release on bail pending possible revisory proceedings.36 The effect of the proceeding upon the individual was substantially the same as if he had been successfully prosecuted for a crime; but he was denied, in the course of the equity proceedings, those rights which by the Constitution are commonly secured to persons charged with a crime.
It was asserted that in these proceedings an alleged danger to property, always incidental and at times insignificant, was often laid hold of to enable the penalties of the criminal law to be enforced expeditiously without that protection to the liberty of the individual which the Bill of Rights was designed to afford; that through such proceedings a single judge often usurped the functions not only of the jury but of the police department; that, in prescribing the conditions under which strikes were per*368missible and how they might be carried out, he usurped also the powers of the legislature; and that incidentally he abridged the constitutional rights of individuals to free speech, to a free press and to peaceful assembly.
It was urged that the real motive in seeking the injunction was not ordinarily to prevent property from being injured nor to protect the owner in its use, but to endow property with active, militant power which would make it dominant over men. In other, words, that, under the guise of protecting property rights, the employer was seeking sovereign power. And many disinterested men, solicitous only for the public welfare, believed that the law of property was not appropriate for dealing with the forces beneath social unrest; that in this vast struggle it was unwise to throw the power of the State on one side or the other according to principles deduced from that law; that the problem of the control and conduct of industry demanded a solution of its own; and that, pending the, ascertainment of new principles to govern industry, it was wiser for the State not to interfere in industrial struggles by the issuance of an injunction.37
After the constitutionality and the propriety of the use of the injunction in labor disputes was established judicially, those who opposed the practice sought the aid of Congress and of state legislatures. The bills introduced varied in character and in scope. Many dealt merely with rights; and, of these, some declared, in effect, that no act done in furtherance of a labor dispute by a combination of workingmen should be held illegal, unless it,would *369have been so if done by a single individual; while others purported to legalize specific practices, like boycotting or picketing. Other bills dealt merely with the remedy; and of these, some undertook practically to abolish the use of the injunction in labor disputes, while' some merely limited its use either by prohibiting its issue under certain conditions or by denying power to restrain certain acts. Some bills undertook to modify both rights and remedies.38 These legislative proposals occupied the attention of Congress during every session but one in the twenty years between 1894 and 1914.39 Reports recommending such legis*370lation were repeatedly made by the Judiciary Committee of the House or that, of the Senate; and at some sessions by both.40 Prior to 1914, legislation of this character had at several sessions passed the House;41 and in that year Congress passed and the President approved the Clayton Act, § 20 of which is substantially the same as Paragraph 1464 of the Arizona Civil Code. Act of October 15, 1914, c. 323, 38 Stat. 730, 738.
Such was the diversity of view concerning peaceful picketing and the boycott expressed in judicial decisions and legislation in English-speaking countries when in 1913 the new State of Arizona, in establishing its judicial system, limited the use of the injunction and when in 1918 its Supreme Court was called upon to declare for the first time the law of Arizona on these subjects. The case of Truax v. Bisbee Local No. 380, 19 Ariz. 379, presented facts identical with those of the case at bar.42 In that case the Supreme Court made its decision on four controverted points of law. In the first place, it held that the officials of the union were not outsiders with no justification for their acts (19 Ariz. 379, 390).43 In the second place, rejecting the view held by the federal courts and the majority of the state courts on the illegality of the boycott, it *371specifically accepted the law of New York, Montana and California, citing tho decisions of those States (19 Ariz. 379, 388, 390).44 In the third place, it rejected the law of New Jersey, Minnesota and Pennsylvania that it is illegal to circularize an employer’s customers, and again adopted the rule declared in the decisions of the courts óf New York, Montana, California and Connecticut (19 Ariz. 379, 389).45 In deciding these three points the Supreme Court of Arizona made a choice between well-established precedents laid down on either side by some of the strongest courts in the country. Can this court' say that thereby it deprived the plaintiff of his property without due process of law?"
The fourth question requiring decision was whether peaceful picketing should be deemed legal. Here, too, each of the opposing views had the support of decisions of strong courts.46 If the Arizona court had decided that by the common law of the. State the defendants might peacefully picket the plaintiffs, its decision, like those of the courts of Ohio, Minnesota, Montana, New York, Oklahoma and New Hampshire, would surely not have been open to objection under the Federal Constitution; for this court has recently held that peaceful picketing is not unlawful. American Steel Foundries v. Tri-City Central Trades Council, supra. The Supreme Court of Arizona found it unnecessary to determine what was the common law of the State oh that subject, because it construed Paragraph 1464 of the Civil Code as declaring peaceful picketing to be legal. In the ease at bar, commenting on the earlier case, the court said: “The statute adopts the view of a number of courts which have held ‘ picketing,’ *372if peaceably carried on for a lawful purpose, to be no violation of any legal right of the party whose place of business is ‘ picketed,’ and whether as a fact the picketing is carried on by peaceful meáns, as against the other view, taken by the federal courts and many of the state courts, that picketing is per se unlawful.” Shortly before that decision the Criminal Court of Appeals of Oklahoma had placed a similar construction upon a statute of that State, declaring that “ the doctrine [that picketing is not per se unlawful] represents the trend of legal thought of modern times, and is specifically reflected in the statute above construed.” Ex parte Sweitzer, 13 Okl. Cr. 154, 160. See St. Louis v. Gloner, 210 Mo. 502. A State,, which despite the Fourteenth Amendment possesses the power to impose on employers without fault unlimited liability for injuries suffered by employees,47 and to limit the freedom of contract of some employers and not of others,48 surely does not lack the power to select for its citizens that one of conflicting views on boycott by peaceful picketing which its legislature and. highest court consider will best meet its conditions and secure the public welfare.
The Supreme Court of Arizona, having held as a rule of' substantive law that thé boycott as here practiced was legal at common law; and that the picketing was peaceful and, hence, legal under the statute (whether or not it was legal at common law), necessarily denied the injunction, since, in its opinion, the defendants had committed no legal wrong and were threatening none. But even if this court should hold that an employer has a constitutional right to be free from interference by such a boycott or that the picketing practiced was not in fact peaceful, it does not follow that Arizona would lack the pow.er to refuse to protect that right by injunction. For it is clear that the..refusal of an equitable remedy for a tort is not *373necessarily a denial of due process of law. And it seems to be equally clear that such refusal is not necessarily arbitrary and unreasonable when applied to incidents of the relation of employer and employee. The considerations which show that the refusal is not arbitrary or unreasonable show likewise that such refusal does not necessarily constitute a denial of equal protection of the laws merely because some, or even the same, property rights which are excluded by this statute from protection by injunction, receive such protection under other circumstances, or between persons standing in different relations. The acknowledged legislative discretion exerted in classification, so frequently applied in defining rights,'extends equally to the grant of remedies.49 It is for the legislature to say— within the broad limits of the discretion which it possesses — whether or not the remedy for a wrong shall be both criminal and civil and whether or not it shall be both at law and in equity.
A State is free since the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment, as it was before, riot only to determine what system, of law shall prevail in it, brit, also, by what processes legal rights may be asserted, and in what courts they may be enforced. Missouri v. Lewis, 101 U. S. 22, 31; Iowa *374Central Ry. Co. v. Iowa, 160 U. S. 389. As a State may adopt or reject trial by jury, Walker v. Sauvinet, 92 U. S. 90; or adopting it may retain or discard its customary incidents, Hayes v. Missouri, 120 U. S. 68; Brown v. New Jersey, 175 U. S. 172; Maxwell v. Dow, 176 U. S. 581; as a State may grant or withhold review of a decision by appeal, Reetz v. Michigan, 188 U. S. 505; so it may determine for itself, from time to time, whether the-protection which it affords to property rights through its courts shall be given by means of the preventive remedy or exclusively by an action at law for compensation.
Nor is a State obliged to protect all property rights by injunction merely because it protects some, even if the attending circumstances are in some respects similar. The restraining power of equity might conceivably be applied to every intended violation of a legal right. On grounds of expediency its application is commonly denied in cases where there is a remedy at law which is deemed legally adequate.. But an injunction has been, denied on grounds of expediency in many cases where the remedy at law is confessedly not adequate. This occurs whenever a dominant public interest is deemed to require that the preventive remedy, otherwise available for the protection of private rights, be refused and the injured party left to such remedy as courts of law may afford. Thus, courts ordinarily refuse, perhaps in the interest of free speech, to restrain actionable libels. Boston Diatite Co. v. Florence Manufacturing Co., 114 Mass. 69; Prudential Assurance Co. v. Knott, L. R. 10 Ch. App. 142. In the interest of personal liberty they ordinarily refuse to enforce specifically, by mandatory injunction or otherwise, obligations involving personal service. Arthur v. Oakes, 63 Fed. 310, 318; Davis v. Foreman, [1894] 3 Ch. 654, 657; Gossard v. Crosby, 132 Ia. 155, 163, 164. In the desire to preserve the separation of governmental powers they have declined, to’protect by injunction mere political rights, Giles v. *375Harris, 189 U. S. 475; and have refused to interfere with the operations of the police department. Davis v. American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, 75 N. Y. 362; Delaney v. Flood, 183 N. Y. 323; compare Bisbee v. Arizona Insurance Agency, 14 Ariz. 313. Instances are numerous where protection to property by way of injunction has been refused solely on the ground that serious public inconvenience.would result from restraining the act complained of. Such, for example, was the case where a neighboring land owner sought to restrain a smelter from polluting the air, but that relief, if granted, would have necessitated shutting down the plant and this would have destroyed the business and impaired the means of livelihood of a large community.50 There are also numerous instances where the circumstances would, according to general equity practice, have justified the issue of an injunction, but-it was refused solely because the right sought to be enforced was created by statute, and the courts, applying a familiár rule, held that the remedy provided by the statute was exclusive.51
Such limitations upon the use of the injunction for the protection of private rights have ordinarily been imposed in the interest of the public by the court acting in the exercise of its broad discretion. But, in some instances, the *376denial of the preventive'remedy because of a public interest deemed paramount, has been expressly commanded by statute. Thus, the courts of the United States have been prohibited from staying proceedings in any court of . a State, Judicial Code, § 265; and also from enjoining the illegal assessment and collection of taxes. Revised Statutes, § 3224; Snyder v. Marks, 109 U. S. 189; Dodge v. Osborn, 240 U. S. 118. What Congress can do in curtailing the equity power of'the federal courts, state legislatures may do in curtailing equity powers of the state courts; unless prevented by the constitution of the State. In other words States are free since the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment as they were before, either to expand or to contract their equity jurisdiction. The denial of the more adequate equitable remedy for private wrongs is in essence an exercise of the police power, by which, in the interest of the public and in order to preserve the liberty and the property of the great majority of the citizens of a State, rights of property and the liberty of the individual must be remoulded, from time to time, to meet the changing needs of society.
For these reasons, as well as for others stated by Mr. Justice Holmes and Mr. Justice Pitney, [ante, 342, 344,] in which I concur, the judgment of the Supreme Court of Arizona should, in my opinion, be affirmed: — first, because in permitting damage to be inflicted by means of boycott and peaceful picketing Arizona did not deprive the plaintiffs of property without due process of law or deny them equal protection of the laws; and secondly, because, if Arizona was constitutionally prohibited from adopting this rule of substantive law, it was still free to restrict the extraordinary remedies of equity where it considered their exercise to be detrimental to the public welfare, since such Restriction was not a denial to the employer either of due process of law or of equal protection of the laws.

 Muller v. Oregon, 208 U. S. 412; Dominion Hotel v. Arizona, 249 U. S. 265.

 “The rule, therefore, is not a substitute for municipal law; it only prescribes that that law have the attribute of equality of operation, and equality of operation does not mean indiscriminate operation on persons merely as such, but on persons according to their relations.” Mr. Justice McKenna in Magoun v. Illinois Trust & Savings Bank, 170 U. S. 283, 293.
In Fidelity Mutual Life Association v. Mettler, 185 U. S. 308, and Northwestern National Life Insurance Co. v. Riggs, 203 U. S. 243, *356the relation of insurer and insured was made the subject of regulation; in Western Union Telegraph Co. v. Commercial Milling Co., 218 U. S. 406; Seaboard Air Line Ry. v. Seegers, 207 U. S. 73; Yazoo & Mississippi Valley R. R. Co. v. Jackson Vinegar Co., 226 U. S. 217, that of public utility and patron; in Noble State Bank v. Haskell, 219 U. S. 104, that of banker and depositor; in St. Louis & San Francisco Ry. Co. v. Mathews, 165 U. S. 1; Missouri, Kansas & Texas Ry. Co. v. May, 194 U. S. 267; and Minneapolis & St. Louis Ry. Co. v. Emmons, 149 U. S. 364, that of railway and .adjoining landowner.

 Holden v. Hardy, 169 U. S. 366; St. Louis, Iron Mountain & St. Paul Ry. Co. v. Paul, 173 U. S. 404; Tullis v. Lake Erie & Western R. R. Co., 175 U. S. 348; Knoxville Iron Co. v. Harbison, 183 U. S. 13; Atkin v. Kansas, 191 U. S. 207; Great Southern Hotel Co. v. Jones, 193 U. S. 532; Minnesota Iron Co. v. Kline, 199 U. S. 593; Wilmington Star Mining Co. v. Fulton, 205 U. S. 60; Muller v. Oregon, 208 U. S. 412; McLean v. Arkansas, 211 U. S. 539; Louisville & Nashville R. R. Co. v. Melton, 218 U. S. 36; Mobile, Jackson & Kansas City R. R. Co. v. Turnipseed, 219 U. S. 35; Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific Ry. Co. v. Arkansas, 219 U. S. 453; Arizona Employers’ Liability Cases, 250 U. S. 400. Compare Second Employers’ Liability Cases, 223 U. S. 1.

 Muller v. Oregon, 208 U. S. 412, 420.

 53 Geo. 3, c. 40. For the earlier law see, for instance, 23 Edw. 3, c. 1-8; 25 Edw. 3, c. 1-7, The Statutes of Laborers; 5 Eliz., c. 4; 1 Jac. 1, c. 6.

 5 Geo. 4, c. 95, (replaced by 6 Geo. 4, c. 129). For the earlier law see, for instance, 34 Edw. 3, c. 9; The King v. Journeymen Tailors of Cambridge, 8 Modern, 10; Wright, The Law of Criminal Conspiracies.

 Criminal Law Amendment Act (1871), 34 & 35 Vic., c. 32, § 1, last paragraph. For the earlier law see Regina v. Rowlands, 2 Den. 363.

 Criminal Law Amendment Act (1871), 34 & 35 Vic., c. 32, § 1, sub-sec. 2. For the earlier law see Walsby v. Anley, 3 E. & E. 516; Skinner v. Kitch, 10 Cox C. C. 493; L. R. 2 Q. B. 393 (1867).

 The Conspiracy and Protection of Property Act (1875), 38 & 39 Vic., c. 86, § 3. But see Rigby v. Connol, L. R. 14 Ch. D. 482, 491.

 38 & 39 Vic., c. 86, § 7; Regina v. Bauld, 13 Cox C. C. 282; Lyons v. Wilkins, [1896] 1 Ch. 811, 826, 831; [1899] 1 Ch. 255; Taff Vale Ry. Co. v. Amalgamated Society of Railway Servants, [1901] A. C. 426.

 Temperton v. Russell [1893] 1 Q. B. 715; Quinn v. Leathem, [1901] A. C. 495. But compare with these cases Boots v. Grundy, 82 L. T. R. 769; Scottish Co-operative Society v. Glasgow Fleshers, 35 Scottish L. R. 645; Bulcock v. St. Anne’s Master Builders’ Federation, 19 T. L. R. 27; a distinction between these and the two former is pointed out in Quinn v. Leathem, supra, p. 539. The Royal Com*359mission on Trade Disputes and Trade Combinations, whose recommendations were the.basis of the Trade Disputes Act, 1906, 6 Edw. 7, c. 47, recommended, Report, p. 16, “ that an act should be passed for the following objects:— ... (2) To declare strikes from whatever motive or for whatever purposes (including sympathetic or secondary strikes), apart from crime or breach of contract, legal . . .” It is probable that §§ 1 and 3 of the Act of 1906 make the secondary strike or boycott in the course of a trade dispute legal. But see note 14, par. 2.

 The Trade Disputes Act (1906), 6 Edw. 7, c. 47, § 2.

 Read v. Friendly Society of Stonemasons, [1902] 2 K. B. 88; id., 732; South Wales Miners’ Federation v. Glamorgan Coal Co., [1905] A. C. 239.

 6 Edw. 7, c. 47, § 3, “An act done by a person in contemplation or furtherance of a trade dispute shall not be actionable on the ground only that it induces some other person to break a contract of employment or that it is an interference with the trade, business, or employment of some- other person, or with the right of some other person to dispose of his capital or his labour as he wills.” But the employee who breaks his contract remains .personally liable . in damages.
The law of England still prohibits certain practices which might prove effective in the struggle between employer and employee. Thus the Trade Disputes Act, supra, does not sanction some threats or coercion, Conway v. Wade, [1909] A. C. 506, 511. It does not permit a strike to force the discharge of a member of the union who has not paid a fine, Conway v. Wade, supra. Nor does it permit inducing an employer’s men to break their contracts in order to force him to join an employers’ association, since this is not a trade dispute within the meaning of the act, Larkin v. Long, [1915] A. C. 814. The judges are by no means agreed as to what constitutes coercion. Compare: Hodges v. Webb, [1920] 2 Ch. 70; Valentine v. Hyde, [1919] 2 Ch. 129; Pratt v. British Medical Association, [1919] 1 K. B. 244; and Davies v. Thomas, [1920] 1 Ch. 217.

 Australia: Commonwealth Conciliation and Arbitration Act, 1904-15, §§ 6-9; New South Wales, Industrial Arbitration Act, 1912-1918, §§ 48D and 48E; compare Queensland, Industrial Arbitration Act, 1916, § 65. New Zealand: Industrial Conciliation and Arbitration Act, 1908, § 108; Industrial Conciliation and Arbitration Amendment Act, 1908, Part I.

 The Industrial Disputes Act of New South Wales, 1908, '§ 60, made strikes and lockouts illegal and the Industrial Arbitration Act, 1912, which replaced it, continued their outlawry, §§ 44-48, and expressly provided that they might be enjoined by the Court of Industrial Arbitration; but by the Act of 1918, §■ 15, §§ 45 to 48 inclusive of the earlier act, dealing with strikes, were amended:
“45. The following strikes and no others shall be illegal :r—
“(a) Any strike by employees of the crown, etc.
“(b) Any strike by the employees in an industry the conditions of which are for the time being wholly or partially regulated by an award or by an industrial agreement: etc.
“(c) Any strike which has been commenced prior to the expiry of fourteen clear days notice in writing of intention to commence the same or of the existence of such conditions as would be likely to lead to the same given the Minister, etc.
“ 46. In the event of an illegal strike occurring in any industry, the court may order any trade union, whose executive or. members are taking part in or aiding or abetting the Strike, to pay a penalty not exceeding five hundred pounds.”
The Commonwealth Conciliation and Arbitration Act, 1904, § 38(e), provides that the Court of Arbitration and Conciliation *361shall have power “to enjoin any organization or person from committing or continuing any contravention of this Act.”

 See note 15, supra.

 The Commonwealth Conciliation and Arbitration Act, 1904-1915, §§ 19-31. (Printed as Appendix A to Commonwealth Acts 1914-1915.) See Henry B. Higgins, “A New Province for Law and Order,” 29 Harv. Law Rev. 13; 32 Harv. Law Rev. 189; 34 Harv. Law Rev. 105.

 Industrial Conciliation and Arbitration Act, 1908, supra, §§ 53-104, as amended by Acts 1908, No. 239, Part II; Acts 1911, No. 33; Acts 1913, No. 7.

 Compare Kansas act creating a court of industrial relations, Laws 1920, c. 29. State v. Howat, 107 Kan. 423; State v. Howat, 109 Kan. 376; Court of Industrial Relations v. Charles Wolff Packing Co., 109 Kan. 629.

 Industrial Disputes Investigation Act, 1907, 6-7 Edw. 7, c. 20, §§ 56, 57. Rex v. McGuire, 16 O. L. R. 522. 9-10 Edw. 7, c. 29. 8-9 Geo. 5, c. 27. 10-11 Geo. 5, c. 29.
Picketing is illegal. Criminal Code, Canada, § 501; Krug Furniture Co. v. Union of Woodworkers, 5 O. L. R. 463; Cotter v. Osborne, 18 Man. 471; Vulcan Iron Works v. Winnipeg Lodge, 21 Man. 473; Le Roi Mining Co. v. Rossland Miners Union, 8 B. C. 370. But see Rev. Stats., B. C., c. 228.

 Commonwealth v. Hunt, 4 Met. 111; for earlier common law and statutory provisions see Carew v. Rutherford, 106 Mass. 1, 14; 1 Weeden, Economic and Social History of New England, pp. 173, 334. Freund, Police Power, § 331; Commons, History of Labor in the United States, vol. 1, c. 5.

 For the boycott see note 28, infra, p. 364; and for peaceful picketing, note 29, infra, p. 365.
In some jurisdictions the strike was considered an unlawful means of procuring the unionization of the shop,—see Plant v. Woods, 176 Mass. 492; Pickett v. Walsh, 192 Mass. 572, 585; Lucke v. Clothing Cutters’ Assembly, 77 Md. 396; Erdman v. Mitchell, 207 Pa. St. 79; Freund, Police Power, § 331;—while in others it was regarded as permissible,—National Protective Association v. Cumming, 170 N. Y. 315; Kemp v. Division No. 241, 255 Ill. 213; Grant Construction Co. v. St. Paul Building Trades Council, 136 Minn. 167; State v. Van Pelt, 136 N. Car. 633; Jetton-Dekle Lumber Co. v. Mather, 53 Fla. 969; Cohn & Roth Electric Co. v. Bricklayers Union, 92 Conn. 161.

 In some jurisdictions the officers of the national union, not being employees, are regarded as outsiders with no justification for their acts,—Booth v. Burgess, 72 N. J. Eq. 181; Jonas Glass Co. v. Glass Bottle Blowers’ Association, 72 N. J. Eq. 653; 77 N. J. Eq. 219. In other jurisdictions it is held that they are furthering a legitimate, interest,—see Allen v. Flood, [1898] A. C. 1; Jose v. Metallic Roofing Co., [1908] A. C. 514, reversing 14 O. L. R. 156; Gill Engraving Co. v. Doerr, 214 Fed. 111; Lindsay & Co. v. Montana Federation of Labor, 37 Mont. 264. See American Steel Foundries v. Tri-City Central Trades Council, ante, 184.

 In some jurisdictions the courts seek to localize the conflict by making it illegal to bring in any party beyond those between whom the original dispute arose,—Burnham v. Dowd, 217 Mass. 351; Booth v. Burgess, 72 N. J. Eq. 181; Purvis v. United Brotherhood, 214 Pa. St. 348;—in other jurisdictions it is considered that anyone having business relations with either party which bear on the matter in con*363troversy has violated his neutrality and is subject to reprisal from the union which is carrying on the struggle,—Bossert v. Dhuy, 221 N. Y. 342; Master Builders’ Association v. Domascio, 16 Colo. App. 25; Pierce v. Stablemen’s Union, 156 Cal. 70, 76; Cohn & Roth Electric Co. v. Bricklayers Union, 92 Conn. 161; Gill Engraving Co. v. Doerr, 214 Fed. 111; Grant Construction Co. v. St. Paul Building Trades Council, 136 Minn. 167. See 31 Harv. Law Rev. 482, and Auburn Draying Co. v. Wardell, 227 N. Y. 1, for limitations.
Again, in some States it is unlawful to resort to the method of notifying persons that a strike will occur if a non-union employer or his product is- employed,—Booth v. Burgess, 72 N. J. Eq. 181; Gray v. Building Trades Council, 91 Minn. 171;—while in other States it is lawful,—Cohn & Roth Electric Co. v. Bricklayers Union, 92 Conn. 161, 167; Bossert v. Dhuy, 221 N. Y. 342.

 Sherry v. Perkins, 147 Mass. 212; but the doctrine was not established until eight years later, Vegelahn v. Guntner, 167 Mass. 92.

 The earliest Reported cases seem to be People v. Wilzig, 4 N. Y. Crim, 403; and People v. Kostka, 4 N. Y. Crim. 429, both of which occurred in June, 1886; the leading case of State v. Glidden, 55 Conn. 46, came the next year. Laidler, however, speaks of an unreported case in 1840; see Laidler, Boycotts and the Labor Struggle, p. 70; see also Commons, History of Labor in the United States, vol. 2, pp. 267, 317, 364.

 Some of the difference of opinion results from a difference in definition. A boycott is sometimes defined so as to entail violence or malicious oppression, State v. Glidden, 55 Conn. 46; while in other cases it is simply pressure exerted by abstention from business relations, Mills v. United States Printing Co., 99 App. Div. 605, affd. 199 N. Y. 76. The terms primary and secondary as describing the boycott are also of uncertain content. Only a boycott that is free of violence or malevolence is anywhere held to-be lawful. This peaceful boycott in support of a bona fide industrial conflict, however, is not everywhere held lawful, and its lawfulness often is held to depend on whether it is used against the industrial antagonist directly (primary boycott) or against an outsider because of his influence on or connection .with the industrial antagonist (secondary boycott). Holding the boycott, primary and secondary, illegal: Wilson v. Hey, 232 Ill. 389; Beck v. Railway Teamsters’ Union, 118 Mich. 497; Gray v. Building Trades Council, 91 Minn. 171; Booth v. Burgess, 72 N. J, Eq. 181; Purvis v. United Brotherhood, 214 Pa. St. 348; Patch Manufacturing Co. v. Protection Lodge, 77 Vt. 294; State v. Glidden, 55 Conn. 46; Crump v. Commonwealth, 84 Va. 927, 939; Jensen v. Cooks’, etc. Union, 39 Wash. 531; Webb v. Cooks’, etc. Union, 205 S. W. (Tex.) 465; Seubert v. Reiff, 164 N. Y. S. 522; American Federation of Labor v. Buck’s Stove & Range Co., 33 App. D. C. 83; Burnham v. Dowd, 217 Mass. 351; My Maryland Lodge v. Adt, 100 Md. 238.
Holding primary boycott legal: Foster v. Retail Clerks’ Association, 78 N. Y. S. 860, 867; Butterick Publishing Co. v. Typographical Union, 100 N. Y. S. 292; Gill-Engraving Co. v. Doerr, 214 Fed. 111; Empire Theatre Co. v. Cloke, 53 Mont. 183; Steffes v. Motion Picture Union, 136 Minn. 200; Stoner v. Robert, 43 Wash. (D. C.) L. Rep. 437; Guethler v. Altman, 26 Ind. App. 587; Pierce v. Stablemen’s Union, 156 Cal. 70; Riggs v. Cincinnati Waiters, 5 Ohio Nisi Prius, 386; McCormick v. Local Union, 13 Ohio Cir. Ct. (N. S.) 545; Ex parte Sweitzer, 13 Okl. Cr. 154. See Laws of Utah, 1917, c. 68; Root v. Anderson, 207 S. W. (Mo.) 255.
Holding secondary boycott legal: Bossert v. Dhuy, 221 N. Y. 342-though compare Auburn Draying Co. v. Wardell, 227 N. Y. 1; Stoner v. Robert, 43 Wash. (D. C.) L. Rep. 437; Lindsay & Co. v. Montana Federation of Labor, 37 Mont. 264; Pierce v. Stablemen’s Union, 156 Cal. 70, 76; Parkinson Co. v. Building Trades Council, 154 Cal. 581; see Marx & Haas Jeans Clothing Co. v. Watson, 168 Mo. 133.

 Holding picketing in itself illegal:—Vegelahn v. Guntner, 167 Mass. 92; Pierce v. Stablemen’s Union, 156 Cal. 70; Barnes & Co. v. Chicago Typographical Union, 232 Ill. 424; Lyon & Healy v. Piano, etc. Workers’ Union, 289 Ill. 176; Beck v. Railway Teamsters’ Union, 118 Mich. 497; Clarage v. Luphringer, 202 Mich. 612; Baldwin Lumber Co. v. Brotherhood of Teamsters, etc., 91 N. J. Eq. 240; Baasch v. Cooks Union, 99 Wash. 378; Webb v. Cooks’, etc., Union, 205 S. W. (Tex.) 465; the Washington Act, 1915, c. 181, declaring picketing to be unlawful, was defeated on referendum in 1916; Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Ry. Co. v. Gee, 139 Fed. 582.
Stating that peaceful picketing is lawful:—Riggs v. Cincinnati Waiters, 5 Ohio Nisi Prius, 386; McCormick v. Local Union, 13 Ohio Cir. Ct. (N. S.) 545; Jones v. Van Winkle Machine Works, 131 Ga. 336, 340; Karges Furniture Co. v. Amalgamated, etc., Union, 165 Ind. 421, 430, 431; Everett Waddey Co. v. Richmond Typographical Union, 105 Va. 188, 197; Steffes v. Motion Picture Union, 136 Minn. 200,—see also Laws 1917, c. 493; Stoner v. Robert, 43 Wash. (D. C.) L. Rep. 437; Empire Theatre Co. v. Cloke, 53 Mont. 183; Mills v. United States Printing Co., 99 App. Div. 605, affd. 199 N. Y. 76; Ex parte Sweitzer, 13 Okl. Cr. 154; White Mountain Freezer Co. v. Murphy, 78 N. H. 398; see Utah, Laws of 1917, c. 68; American Engineering Co. v. International Moulders Union, 25 Pa. Dist. 564; Iron Molders’ Union v. Allis-Chalmers Co., 166 Fed. 45; St. Louis v. Gloner, 210 Mo. 502.

 Mills v. United States Printing Co., 99 App. Div. 605, affd. 199 N. Y. 76; see also cases in note 29, supra, from Ohio, Minnesota, Montana, and Oklahoma.

 Compare:—Plant v. Woods, 176 Mass. 492, 502, last paragraph, with Cohn & Roth Electric Co. v. Bricklayers Union, 92 Conn. 161, 167, and, Bossert v. Dhuy, 221 N. Y. 342, 359. See Geldart, The Present Law of Trade Unions and Trade Disputes, p. 24; Hoxie, Trade Unionism in the United States, p. 231; “Strikes and Boycotts”, 34 Harv. Law Rev. 880.

 Springhead Spinning Co. v. Riley, L. R. 6 Eq. 551.

 The earliest case of importance was Sherry v. Perkins, 147 Mass. 212 (1888). But injunctions were granted four or five years earlier. Commons, History of Labor in the United States, vol. 2, p. 504.

 “ Government by Injunction ” by W. H. Dunbar, 13 Law Quarterly Review, 347; “ Government by Injunction ”, by Charles Noble Gregory, 11 Harv. Law Rev. 487; “Injunction and Organized Labor”, by Charles C. Allen, 28 Am. Law Rev: 828; “The Modern Use of Injunctions”, by F. J. Stimson, 10 Pol. Sci. Quarterly, 189; “ Strikes and Courts of Equity ”, by William Draper Lewis, 46 Am. Law Reg. 1; “ Government by Injunction ”, by Percy L. Edwards, 57 Albany Law Journal, 8; “The Abuses of Injunction”, by Samuel Seabury, 29 Arena, 561; “ Government by Injunction ”, by Cornelius H. Fauntleroy, 69 Cent. Law Journal, 129; “ Government by Injunction ”, by Thomas F. Hargis, 4 Amer. Fed. 227. See Report of U. S. Industrial Commission (1901). vol. XVII, p. 611.

 In Long v. Bricklayers, etc. Union, 17 Pa. Dist. 984, the judge prefaced his'opinion as follows, “Hardly anything of greater private or public gravity is ever presented to the court, and yet these matters are constantly receiving adjudication'without a single witness brought before the judge. It is a bad practice. I confess my inability to determine with any satisfaction from an inspection of inanimate manuscript, questions of veracity. In disposing of the present rule, I am compelled to find, as best I may from perusing two hundred and thirty-five lifeless typewritten pages of conflicting evidence, the facts which must determine respondent’s guilt or innocence on the quasi-criminal charge of contempt.”

 Hake v. People, 230 Ill. 174, 196, discretion of judge; Tinsley v. Anderson, 171 U. S. 101, 107-108, unlimited commitment; State v. Erickson, 66 Wash. 639, 641; State v. Chouteau County Court, 51 Mont. 337, 342; Scoric v. United States, 217 Fed. 871, scope of review; People v. Tefft, 3 Cow. (N. Y.) 340, Matter of Vanderbilt, 4 Johns. Ch. (N. Y.) 57, admission to bail within discretion of judge.

 See Final Report of the (U. S.) Industrial Commission (1902); Final Report of the (U. S.) Commission on Industrial Relations (1915), (Sen. Doc. 415, 64th Cong., 1st sess.), vol. 1, pp. 52-53, 90-92, vol. 11, testimony of Mr. Gilbert E. Roe, p. 10477; testimony of Mr. Arthur Woods, p. 10550; testimony of Dr. Frank Goodnow, p. 10599. American Federationist, vol. 7, p. 350; vol. 9, p. 685; vol. 15, p. 976.

 53rd Congress: S. 1563, S. 1898, S. 2253, H. R. 7362, H. R. 7363; 54th Congress: S. 237, S. 1750, S. 2984, H. R. 319; 56th Congress: S. 4233, H. R. 8917; 57th Congress: S. 1118,S. 4553, H. R. 9678, H. R. 11060; 58th Congress: H. R. 89, H. R. 1234, H. R. 4063, H. R. 6782, H. R. 8136, H. R. 18327; 59th Congress: S. 2829, H. R. 4445, H. R. 9328, H. R. 17976, H. R. 18171, H. R. 18446, H. R. 18752; 60th Congress: S. 4533, S. 4727, S. 5888, H. R. 69, H. R. 94, H. R. 17137, H. R. 21358, H. R. 21359, H. R. 21454, H. R. 21489, H. R. 21539, H. R. 21629, H. R. 21991, H. R. 22010, H. R. 22032, H. R. 22298, H. R. 26300, H. R. 24781, H. R. 36609; 61st Congress: S. 3291, S. 4481, H. R. 3058, H. R. 9766, H. R. 10890, H. R. 16026, H. R. 18410, H. R. 20486, H. R. 20680, H. R. 20827, H. R. 21334, H. R. 22566; 62nd Congress: S. 6266, H. R. 4015, H. R. 4651, H. R. 5328, H. R. 5606, H. R. 9435, H. R. 11032, H. R. 23189, H. R. 21486, H. R. 21595, H. R. 22208, H. R. 22349, H. R. 22354, H. R. 22355, H. R. 23635; 63rd Congress: S. 927, H. R. 1873, H. R. 4659, H. R. 5484, H. R. 15657 — which became the Clayton Act.

 See note 38, supra. Also 53rd Congress: resolutions to investigate the use of the injunction in certain cases, 26 Cong. Rec. 2466; 56th Congress: debate, 34 Cong. Rec. 2589; 60th Congress: hearings, Sen. Doc. 525; special message of the President, Sen. Doc. 213, 42 Cong. Rec. 1347; papers relating to injunctions in labor cases, Sen. Docs. 504 and 524; 61st Congress: debate, 45 Cong. Rec. 343; 62nd Congress: debate, 48 Cong. Rec. 6415-6470; hearings, Sen. Doc. 944; petitions, Sen. Doc. 440; hearings before the House Committee on the Judiciary, Jan. 11, 17-19, February 8, 14, 1912; hearings before a subcommittee of Senate Committee on the Judiciary, 62nd Congress, 2nd sess.; 63rd Congress, see debates on H. R. 15657 (the Clayton Act).

 54th Congress, House Report No. 2471; 56th Congress, House Report No. 1987, 2007; 57th Congress, Senate Report No. 1650, House Report No. 1522; 62nd Congress, House Report No. 612; 63rd Congress, Senate Report No. 698, House Report No. 627, Conference Report, Senate Document 585.

 In the 57th Congress, H. R. 11060 passed the House, 35 Cong. Rec. 4995. In the 62nd Congress, H. R. 23635 passed the House, 48 Cong. Rec. 6470, 6471;

 In this case the Supreme Court of Arizona said: “ This action is founded upon the identical facts upon which the case of Truax v. Bisbee Local No. 380, 19 Ariz. 379, was founded : . . The questions presented in this record were necessarily decided by this court in the former hearing of the matter.” Truax v. Corrigan, 20 Ariz. 7, 8.

 See note 24, p. 362, supra.

 See note 28, p. 364, supra.

 See note 25, p. 362, supra, 2nd paragraph; also Lindsay & Co. v. Montana Federation of Labor, 37 Mont. 264; Parkinson Co. v. Building Trades Council, 154 Cal. 581.

 See note 29, p. 365, supra.

 Arizona Employers’ Liability Cases, 250 U. S. 400.

 Dominion Hotel v. Arizona, 249 U. S. 265.

 In Gooch v. Stephenson, 1 Shepley (Me.) 371 (1836), the plaintiff attacked as unconstitutional a statute declaring that no action of trespass should be brought against an owner of cattle breaking through an insufficient fence. The court, inter alia, said:
“ It has been insisted that justice and the security of rights is best promoted by maintaining the remedy as it before existed; but that is an argument which addresses itself to the legislative power, and not to the judicial. ... It was for the legislature to determine what protection should be thrown around this species of property; ... and where he [the owner] might invoke the aid of courts of justice. They have no power to take away vested rights; but they may regulate their enjoyment.”
In this case the public importance of good fences was held to justify the denial of an existing remedy for injuries to_ property or a curtailment of the right.

 See McCarthy v. Bunker Hill & Sullivan Mining Co., 164 Fed. 927; Bliss v. Anaconda Copper Mining Co., 167 Fed. 342; 186 Fed 789; Cameron Furnace Co. v. Pennsylvania Canal Co., 2 Pearson (Pa.) 208; Johnson v. United Railways Co., 227 Mo. 423, 450; Conger v. New York, W. S. & B. R. R. Co., 120 N. Y. 29; Wilkins v. Diven, 106 Kan. 283; Marconi Wireless Telegraph Co. v. Simon, 227 Fed. 906; 231 Fed. 1021.

 Dimmick v. Delaware, Lackawanna & Western R. R. Co., 180 Pa. St. 468; Curran v. Delano, 235 Pa. St. 478; Janney v. Buell, 55 Ala. 408; the mechanics’ lien, for instance, is not protected by equitable remedies but only by statutory provisions, Chandler v. Hanna, 73 Ala. 390; Walker v. Daimwood, 80 Ala. 245; Phillips on Mechanics Liens, §§ 307, 308.