Court Opinion

ID: 9544500
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 16:56:18.807743+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:13:06.594493
License: Public Domain

SCHAUER, J.
I dissent. In this suit the trial court, sitting without a jury, rendered judgment in favor of plaintiffs whereby it was “Ordered, Adjudged an!d Decreed that the defendant Milk Drivers and Dairy Employees Union, Local No. 93, and the agents, employees and members of said Union, and the said defendant Paid Jones, be and they are hereby permanently restrained and enjoined from preventing plaintiffs from obtaining milk or milk products from brokers or those who supply and sell such milk and milk products, and from coercing milk brokers from selling to plaintiffs and supplying plaintiffs with such milk and milk products in any manner or by any means. ...” Defendants contend that they have neither done nor threatened to do any act which would entitle plaintiffs to the injunctive relief so granted. I am of the opinion that defendants’ position is well taken.
The material facts are not in dispute. As found by the trial court, upon the pleadings and affidavit evidence, they are as follows: For some seven or eight years prior to the commencement (on December 31, 1941) of this suit plaintiffs had been jointly engaged in the business of distributing milk and milk products in Los Angeles County to retail dealers. Plaintiffs performed all of their own labor, purchasing their milk and milk products from brokers or wholesalers and making delivery to the retail customers in two automotive trucks which plaintiffs owned and individually operated. The appealing defendants are a labor organization known as the Milk Drivers and Dairy Employees Union, Local No. 93, and Paul Jones, its secretary-treasurer. The union membership consists of milk-wagon drivers and helpers and workers generally who are engaged in the milk and dairy business and in the handling of by-products of milk.
Defendant union had entered into union shop contracts with about ninety-five per cent of the milk brokers and wholesalers in Los Angeles County whose business was the selling of milk and milk products to distributors, among whom were plaintiffs. Paragraph 22 of the union shop contracts reads as follows; “Employer agrees that it will not sell dairy *768products .at its platform to any person, firm or corporation licensed by the California Department of Agriculture as a milk distributor unless such distributor observes and causes its employees to observe the same conditions of employment as those observed by employer. ’ ’
Prior to October 23, 1941, the union proposed to plaintiffs that the latter employ members of the union to drive plaintiffs’ trucks. Plaintiffs declined, preferring to continue driving their own trucks, but did apply for admission to membership in defendant union. On October 23, 1941, plaintiffs’ applications were rejected by the union on the ground that “plaintiffs were independent peddler distributors,” and on November 21, 1941, the union sent to each of the milk brokers and wholesalers with whom it had contracts, a letter reading (aside from the date and salutation) as follows:
“For some time Local Union #93 has been confronted with the problem of the independent peddler distributors who have been from time to time taking business from the legitimate wage earners who are members of Local #93.
“Ata regular meeting of Local #93 on October 23rd, there were a number of applications for membership filed by the independent peddler distributors which were discussed at some length by the members present at that meeting, after which they were rejected. ■
“The officers of Local #93 were instructed to see that the employers who held agreements with Local #93 comply with Paragraph 22 of our agreement on or before November 30, 1941.
“As these men are not members of the Union and the membership does not see fit to admit them to Union membership, it seems there is only one way left, and that' is to discontinue selling to these independent peddler distributors.
“Hoping you will cooperate in cleaning up this matter, Very truly yours,
Paul D. Jones, Sec’y Treas.”
The trial court found further ‘ ‘ That by the said notice and by or,al suggestions and statements said Local No. 93 and its officers required and demanded of said brokers that they cease to deliver any milk or milk products to the plaintiffs, among other independent distributors; that the said brokers understood said notice, to mean that in the event they continued to *769supply milk and milk products to the plaintiffs, the said Local No. 93 would apply economic pressure to enforce such request and demand by means of strike, picketing and boycott.
“That as a direct result of said notice and communications all the brokers in Los Angeles County complied with the request and demand of said notice, and after December 14, 1941 refused to sell or furnish or deliver to plaintiffs any milk or milk products, and that since that date the plaintiffs have been prevented from securing any milk or milk products and have been compelled to discontinue their business, to their great and irreparable damage.
“That the purpose of said Local No. 93 and its agents was to prevent the plaintiffs from obtaining any milk or milk products with which to carry on their independent business of milk distributing to their retail customers, and thereby to compel plaintiffs to employ as drivers of their trucks members of said Local No. 93, and to discontinue driving their own trucks and doing their own work of conducting their business with their own hands.
“That said purpose was not related to the establishment of better wages, hours or conditions of employment in plaintiffs’ business, as the plaintiffs had no employees and had no need for any employees; that the real purpose of defendant Local No. 93 and its agents was not reasonably connected with any controversy which affects workers in the milk industry generally, or any workers employed by plaintiffs, nor was it reasonably related to employment or collective bargaining; that such purpose was essentially selfish and unreasonable and outside of and repugnant to the legitimate purposes and activities of labor unions in respect to improving the workers’ condition as such; that such purpose and the results thereof sub-served no public interest and was not for public welfare.
‘ ‘ That unless restrained by the Court the defendant' Union Local No. 93 and its officers and agents will continue by peaceful persuasion and through economic coercion to deprive plaintiffs of their right to purchase milk and milk products from the milk distributing brokers in Los Angeles County, and thereby deprive plaintiffs of their right to work as independent milk distributors for a living for themselves and their families.”
Nevertheless, the right of the union to peacefully induce, or endeavor to persuade, other persons to cease doing business *770with plaintiffs unless plaintiffs complied with not unlawful union demands, has been decisively established by decisions of both this court and the Supreme Court of the United States. See Emde v. San Joaquin County etc. Council (1943), 23 Cal. 2d 146, 155 [143 P.2d. 20, 150 A.L.R. 916]; American Fed. of Labor v. Swing (1941), 312 U.S. 321, 325 [61 S.Ct. 568, 570, 85 L.Ed. 855, 857]; Bakery & P. Drivers Local v. Wohl (1942), 315 U.S. 769, 774-775 [62 S.Ct. 816, 818-819, 86 L.Ed. 1178, 1183] ; Cafeteria Employees Union v. Angelos (1943), 320 U.S. 293 [64 S.Ct. 126, 127, 88 L.Ed. 58].
The so-called finding that the purpose of defendants was “outside of and repugnant to the legitimate purposes and activities of labor unions in respect to improving the workers’ condition as such; that such purpose and the results thereof subserved no public interest and was not for public welfare, ’ ’ is at least in part a conclusion of law rather than of fact. In the Emde case, supra (decided since-this case was tried), this court expressly held (23 Cal.2d at p. 155) that “it may not be denied that . . . the dissatisfaction of organized labor with a system of distributing milk products which avoids minimum wages, and hours, workmen’s compensation and social security benefits, is a legitimate matter of labor dispute. [Citations.] Therefore, the union, and those directly interested in and connected with the labor cause, had the right to urge the public and, of course, the members of organized labor, to refrain from buying the dairy’s products unless the dairy abandoned the system of distribution which it had undertaken and rehired union drivers in accordance with the terms of the existing contract, whether or not the employer-employee relation then existed between the members of the union and the dairy. [Citations.] ”
And in Bakery & P. Drivers Local v. Wohl (1942), supra, 315 U.S. 769 [62 S.Ct. 816, 86 L.Ed. 1178], the Supreme Court of the .United States held that to enjoin a labor union from peacefully picketing independent or “peddler” distributors of bakery products, who performed all their own work and had no employees, for the purpose of securing employment for union members, was to unconstitutionally infringe upon the right of free speech guaranteed by the federal Constitution. The same principle was reaffirmed in Cafeteria Employees Union v. Angelos (1943), supra, 320 U.S. 293 [64 S.Ct. 126, 88 L.Ed. 58].
*771The opinion of Mr. Chief Justice Gibson, although recognizing (pp. 748, 749) that “The right to work, either in employment or independent business ... is subject to many legislative restrictions familiar to all, such as statutory [italics added] limitations on working hours, minimum wages, age limits for employment, licensing acts, safety regulations, and a host of others . . . [and] to peaceful, economic pressure by labor organizations seeking legitimate ends, such as conditions of work, collective rather than individual bargaining, seniority privileges and other methods of advancement, and the union or closed shop,” attempts to justify the injunction on the claim that plaintiffs are being completely deprived (see pp. 751, 752) of an inalienable right to work for themselves and earn a living. Actually the plaintiffs are the operators of an independent business and are simply being subjected to the vicissitous competition of free enterprise. Obviously plaintiffs are not deprived of the right to work or earn their living merely because in conducting their particular business they are faced with the practical alternative of employing union labor, of choosing another business in which to engage, or of continuing in the same line of work but in the employee status of union workers, rather than as independent peddlers. The situation of plaintiffs here is manifestly distinguishable from that of the Negro plaintiff and his coworkers of the same race in James v. Marinship Corp. (1944), ante, p. 721 [155 P.2d 329], In that case the Negro workers were arbitrarily excluded from full union membership because of their color—an inherent attribute which they are powerless to alter, even should they wish to do so, and one which bears no reasonable relevancy to maintenance or advancement of the interests of labor generally—while here plaintiffs were denied union membership on the sole ground that they “were independent peddler distributors,” i. e., were engaged in a type of activity which justifiably may be considered by labor as a whole as inimical to its own economic interests. There is no claim and no suggestion that if plaintiffs had ceased their independent peddling of milk and applied for union membership on the same basis as other members they would not have been admitted and accorded opportunities for both employment and a voice in union affairs equal to those of other members. The union was not arbitrarily or flatly closed to plaintiffs as was done in the James case and in certain other cases therein cited (such as *772Wilson v. Newspaper & Mail Deliverers’ Union (1938), 123 N.J.Eq. 347 [197 A. 720]; Dorrington v. Manning (1939), 135 Pa.Super. 194 [4 A.2d 886]; Carroll v. Local No. 269 (1943), 133 N.J.Eq. 144 [31 A.2d 223, 225], and Cameron v. International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees (1935), 118 N.J.Eq. 11 [176 A. 692, 701, 97 A.L.R. 594]), and certainly it is not for this court to assume to determine the wisdom, either with respect to union labor or with respect to the public as a whole, of the policy here adopted by the union of refusing membership to independent businessmen-workers, or to base its decision in this case upon such a determination. Such businessmen, even if they should prefer as did plaintiffs here to perform their own work so far as able, are at least in the status of capitalist-employers, and therefore the accepted and traditional opponents of labor as a. whole, and we cannot justifiably pronounce that unions must either admit to membership such opponents or else refrain from taking economic measures against them.
In the James case it is stated (p. 736) that “Defendants argue that a union should not be compelled to admit all persons to membership, because some of such persons may have interests inimical to the union and may destroy it from within. The right of the union to reject or expel persons who refuse to abide by any reasonable regulation or lawful policy adopted by the union (Brown v. Lehman (1940), 141 Pa. Super. 467 [15 A.2d 513], supra; see Rest. Torts, comment b to § 810) affords it an effective remedy against such persons.” The general proposition that a union may reject or expel persons who refuse to abide by any reasonable regulation or lawful policy adopted by the union may be conceded. Again, however, it is not for this court to determine that a union regulation or policy that its members must be, or potentially occupy the status of, employees and not independent businessmen is either unreasonable or unlawful. Nor would the authorities relied upon in the above quotation from the James case support such a determination. Brown v. Lehman had to do with the expulsion of a union member for nonpayment of dues, and comment b to section 810 of the Restatement of Torts reads, in its entirety, as follows: “If the union is open to the employee on reasonable terms and he refuses to be a member of it, no cause of action accrues' to him from the loss of his job. Whether the terms are reasonable is a question of fact in each *773ease. They may be unreasonable because they require him to pay an initiation fee which is unduly high in proportion to earnings in the industry, or because the initiation fee is unreasonably higher for him than for others. On the other hand, it is not unreasonable for a labor union to set standards of proficiency for its members and to require applicants for membership to conform to these standards. Nor is it unreasonable for it to refuse to retain as a member one uiho engages in activities antagonistic to it or is a member of a rival organization. Again, it is not unreasonable for the union to distribute available work among its members when it is scarce or to provide that the senior members of the union have a preference in taking jobs as they appear.” (Italics added.) None of the depicted “unreasonable” situations exists here.
The opinion of Chief Justice Gibson (p. 750) asserts that “the decisions of the United States Supreme Court establish the general proposition that the peddler distributor system, if [italics added] deliberately introduced for the purpose of injuring the legitimate interests of organized labor, or if it operates with this effect, may be met with appropriate concerted action by the unions,” and then attempts to distinguish the instant case on the grounds that “First, it is not a case of attempted introduction of the peddler system by employers as a means of lowering the union’s conditions of work, since both plaintiffs entered the business on their own initiative many years ago. Second, it is not a case of the peddler distributor attempting to compete with union workers on unequal terms, either for his own interests or those of the employer. The two plaintiffs sought to join the union, but were refused admission on the sole ground that they were ‘peddlers.’ ” No such limited propositions, general or otherwise, are pronounced by the mentioned decisions. In each of them it was decided merely that upon its particular facts labor had done nothing unlawful and might not be enjoined from continuing its picketing, publishing, etc. And, again, it is not the province of this court to declare that the action taken by the union here was not “appropriate.” Also, as discussed above, the fact, stated in Chief Justice Gibson’s opinion, that the denial of union membership to plaintiffs was on the sole ground that they were “peddlers” patently left the door open to them to join if they would assume the same status as other mem*774bers, namely, that of employees. It seems obvious that the plaintiffs here, by insisting upon continuing their activities as peddlers, were actually competing with union workers on unequal terms and under conditions which the union not unjustifiably considered to be obnoxious to its legitimate objects.
Nor it does it appear that, as suggested by Chief Justice Gibson’s opinion (p. 751), a decision contrary to that reached by such decision will “doom to extinction” all “businessmen-workers, ” including barbers, plumbers, farmers, etc. Such an aim has been neither expressed nor manifested by the unions. The facts involved here, as to character of vocation, are basically different from those of the examples mentioned. A barber and a plumber engage primarily in selling their own personal skilled services; a farmer engages primarily in raising products from his land and selling them. But these plaintiffs are primarily conducting a business, buying and selling goods for a profit. If and when a program of the type suggested by the Chief Justice becomes apparent, it may and should be fully dealt with by the legislative arm of the government—not piecemeal by the courts. If, in the absence of such legislation, a case should arise presenting a problem of that type the occasion will be sufficient unto itself for consideration and determination of the powers and duties of the court in the premises. Moreover, the fact that, as also noted in the opinion of Chief Justice Gibson, the suggested program, if pursued, would place an additional hazard in the path of those union members who may hope to ultimately become independent businessmen, raises primarily a problem of internal union policy, or of outside legislative action; and this court may not with propriety paternally advise unions concerning the policies we may consider might be most advantageous to certain of their members. It would be only in the event of a clear showing of unlawful invasion of private rights or public policy that the courts should interfere.
Chief Justice Gibson’s opinion next declares (p. 753) that although it “may be true . . . [that] the inapplicability of social security and workmen’s compensation laws gives to the peddler a special bargaining advantage with the employer [italics added] by permitting him to work for a lower return . . . the problem thus presented must be solved without entirely eliminating businessmen-workers from the ranks of labor and industry. Insofar as unemployment insur*775anee is concerned, plaintiffs would not come within the provisions of the law even if they were to hire one or two workmen, since the statutes apply only to employers who hire a greater number of employees. [Citations.] If the applicability of unemployment insurance were the criterion, then labor would have the right to use its weapons to force the small merchant, the small barber and the corner grocer out of business because, since their trade does not warrant it, they cannot afford to hire enough employees to come within the terms of the statute. If it seems desirable to bring peddlers and others similarly situated within the purview of the laws relating to unemployment insurance and workmen’s compensation, proposals to accomplish that end must be addressed to the Legislature or the voters. The union may, of course, impose reasonable requirements for membership, and if the regulations adopted are proper the peddler must comply therewith or relinquish his favored position in order to avoid union pressure. If the peddler meets the conditions imposed, the union must accept him for membership or give up its demand for a closed shop. The interests of the peddler member may not be identical with the other union men, but the resultant conflicts and inequalities must be overcome if the legitimate objectives of organized labor are to be achieved and the means of attaining them preserved without arbitrarily depriving the small business man who operates without the aid of employees of the right to work with his hands.”
First, it may be noted that even though unemployment insurance does not apply to employers with less than four employees (Deering’s Gen. Laws, 1937, p. 4125, Act 8780d, § 9), every individual who pays salary to even a single worker within the covered employments of the Federal Insurance Contribution Act (26 U.S.C.A., §§ 1400, 1410, Int. Rev. Code), more popularly known as the Old Age Insurance or Pension Law, is required (as also is the employee by means of withholding by the employer) to contribute to the fund provided by such act a sum now fixed at one per cent of the salary paid. And workmen’s compensation insurance, also, applies to those having only one employee. (Cal. Lab. Code, div. IV.)
Second, it may not properly be said that a “peddler,” otherwise termed an ‘independent businessman-worker,” has an “employer.” He is ordinarily free to secure his merchandise *776from such sources as he may deem most advantageous to himself and to dispose of it where, when, to whom, and at such profit to himself as his good business sense dictates. I am at a loss to understand what “reasonable requirements” a union could adopt to the end that “conflicts and inequalities be overcome” as between “peddlers” and employee union members. Is the union to require of peddlers who seek admission to its rolls that they charge higher prices (thus attempting to enter the price-fixing field), and with their anticipated increased profits purchase for themselves accident insurance, a retirement annuity, and (if available) unemployment insurance (thus to some degree paralleling the advantages of social security and workmen’s compensation) ? Or is it to charge higher dues from peddler members and undertake to itself furnish for them such benefits? A fertile imagination given free play could offer legion suggestions in this field, but by what standard is the union to determine their “reasonableness”? Would not a peddler or independent businessman of whom such requirements were made by the union complain, as did the plaintiff and his eoworkers in the James case, that he was being discriminated against by the union in not being accorded membership on the same basis as other members ? I think that Chief Justice Gibson suggests the answer to these problems and the thought which should control our decision in this case, in the following language: “If it seems desirable to bring peddlers and others similarly situated within the purview of the laws relating to social security and workmen’s compensation, proposals to accomplish that end must be addressed to the Legislature or the voters.” It seems to me that the whole problem presented by this case is one for legislative control, if any, and I fear that the decision set forth in the opinion of Chief Justice Gibson will tend more toward confusion and litigation than otherwise in the meantime.
Still another problem is apparent. If the unions are to be forced to admit to membership independent businessmen, or else refrain from effectively interfering with the latter’s businesses, then the path will be open for the breaking down of the higher wage scale and other advantages for working men which the unions have succeeded in gaining in recent years. During the present war era jobs are plentiful. However, if during periods of less widespread employment, unemployed union members wish to enter the peddler field (or if pressure *777is brought on employed members to force them to enter it, as was done in the Bmde case), by what means could the union, if it is prohibited from expelling them, or else from shutting off their markets or their sources of supply, effectively prevent producers or wholesalers from dealing with such peddlers, and from thus in turn forcing other union members out of employment and into the peddler field with its uncertain and hazardous income levels and its lack of the social benefits enjoyed by regularly employed workers?
Furthermore, for this court to hold that the unions must admit peddlers or independent businessmen (or else take no economic measures against them) without requiring that they give up their independent position or make such other changes in their methods of doing business as the union may reasonably demand, would tacitly amount to holding that although a union may peacefully strive to secure a closed shop, it must, if successful, accept as members the employees of such closed shop at whatever salary or other working conditions such employees may he satisfied to accept, regardless of union standards. Such an explicit holding would, of course, never be suggested.
A further reason for not requiring that unions must as an alternative to invoking economic sanctions against peddlers admit them to membership, lies in the universally accepted and understood purpose and raison d’etre of labor unions: the maintenance and enhancement of favorable conditions (including, of course, wages) for working men as a class. That purpose may also be clearly discerned in the efforts of labor to unionize nonunion shops, even where no dispute exists between employer and employees. (See Best. Torts, comment c to § 788.) In truth, it may be said that to each of its members a Union owes the duty of exerting its best efforts to improve his economic position. But such efforts have in the past been confined at least primarily to the betterment of working conditions of laboring men who were in the status of employees —not of those who operated independent businesses, with or without employees. By Chief Justice Gibson’s opinion this court will impose upon unions the anomalous choice of permitting peddlers to operate their businesses as they wish and thus endanger many benefits to working men which labor has secured only after long and arduous struggles, or else to admit *778to membership these same peddlers, and then as a duty owing to them as members, attempt to improve their lot. The interests of labor on the one hand and of independent businessmen —be they called peddlers, businessmen-workers,' or by any other appellation—on the other, are conflicting and are not to be solved by decree of this court that they must unite in a joint union.
As declared by this court, speaking through Mr. Justice Edmonds, in C. S. Smith Met. Market Co. v. Lyons (1940), 16 Cal.2d 389, 403-404 [106 P.2d 414] : “The fear that they [labor unions] have grown so strong as to endanger vital civil liberties and disrupt the functioning of our economic system is an argument exclusively for the consideration of the legislature. Upon this point Mr. Justice Brandéis aptly stated in one of his dissenting opinions: ‘Because I have come to the conclusion that both the common law of a state and a statute of the United States declare the right of industrial combatants to push their struggle to the limits of the justification of self-interest, I do not wish to be understood as attaching any constitutional or moral sanction to that right. All rights are derived from the purposes of the society in which they exist; above all rights rises duty to the community. The conditions developed in industry may be such that those engaged in it cannot continue their struggle without danger to the community. But it is not for judges to determine whether such conditions exist, nor. is it their function to set the limits of permissible contest and to declare the duties which the new situation demands. This is the function of the legislature, which, while limiting individual and group rights of aggression and defense, may substitute processes of justice for the more primitive method'of trial by combat. ’ (Duplex Printing Press Co. v. Deering (1921), 254 U.S. 443, 448 [41 S.Ct. 172, 65 L.Ed. 349, 16 A.L.R. 196].)”
So far as concerns the methods used by defendants here in their efforts to maintain employment at union standards for members of the union, there appears to be no real distinction between such methods and those commonly used by other peaceful and honest businessmen who seek in a free market to take business away from their competitors.
In Katz v. Kapper (1935), 7 Cal.App.2d 1 [44 P.2d 1060], the District Court of Appeal had before it a question as to the sufficiency of a complaint to state a cause of action for un*779fair competition. The complaint alleged, among other things, that (see p. 3 of 7 Cal.App.2d) “the defendants [fish dealers] maliciously called meetings of the customers of plaintiff, threatened them that they would be driven out of business and ruined if they continued to purchase fish from plaintiff, but promised that if they purchased fish from defendants, they would be given substantial reductions in price, so that they could successfully compete with plaintiff and drive him out of business; that if said customers continued to buy from plaintiff, the defendants would open a retail store and would sell fish to the customers of plaintiff’s customers at such low prices that plaintiff’s customers would be driven out of business. ’ ’ There were further allegations to the effect that defendants opened a store, advertised and sold fish at very low prices, at an actual loss to themselves, and deprived plaintiff of part of his business. The court declared (p. 4): “In deciding whether the conduct of defendants, alleged in the complaint is actionable, it is necessary to apply certain well-settled rules relating to competition in business. These may be generally stated as follows: ‘ Competition in business, though carried to the extent of ruining a rival, is not ordinarily actionable, but every trader is left to conduct his business in his own way, so long as the methods he employs do not involve wrongful conduct such as fraud, misrepresentation, intimidation, coercion, obstruction, or molestation of the rival or his servants or workmen, or the- procurement of the violation of contractual relations. If disturbance or loss comes as the result of competition, or the exercise of like rights by others, as where a merchant undersells or oversells his neighbor, it is damnum absque injuria.’ (15 R.C.L., p. 73, and eases cited.) . . . [P.6] The fact that the methods used were ruthless, or unfair, in a moral sense, does not stamp them as illegal. It has never been regarded as the duty or province of the courts to regulate practices in the business world beyond the point of applying legal or equitable remedies in cases involving acts of oppression or deceit which are unlawful. Any extension of this jurisdiction must come through legislative action.” I am neither approving nor disapproving the holding in the Katz case, but so long as the theory of free enterprise there defined is applied to activities of capital it should equally be applied to those of labor. I am not suggesting that competitive activities of labor organizations may not be subject to *780reasonable control but I am definitely opposed to the application of a double standard which would deny to organizations of one character activities which it condones in the other.
Defendants here are the competitors of plaintiffs in that the defendants are seeking to secure employment for members of the union to do the very work which plaintiffs are how doing, or, in another aspect of the matter, to gain as customers for members of organized labor those persons who now are customers of independent businessmen. However costly some of the attributes of free enterprise may be, it is established in this state that “Competitive freedom ... is of sufficient importance to justify one competitor in inducing a third party to forsake another competitor if no contractual relationship exists between the latter two.” (Imperial Ice Co. v. Rossier (1941), 18 Cal.2d 33, 36 [112 P.2d 631], and cases there cited.) No claim is made by plaintiffs that defendants here induced any customers of the plaintiffs to breach any contract with them or induced any of the milk brokers to breach a contract between plaintiffs and such brokers, and it was for the brokers to determine whether or not they wished to accede to defendants’ peaceful request that they cease selling to plaintiffs. The weapons of labor— strikes, picketing, and boycotts—are means of persuasion, moral and economic, and action induced thereby or in contemplation of the possibility thereof is voluntary. (See Matson Terminals, Inc. v. California Emp. Com. (1944), 24 Cal.2d 695, 703 [151 P.2d 202] ; Bodinson Mfg. Co. v. California Emp. Com. (1941), 17 Cal.2d 321, 327, 328 [109 P.2d 935].)
This case exposes the institution of free enterprise to the test for democratic fairness in its operation and administration. If it is lawful, in the interests of free enterprise, for capital organizations to wield their economic power to gain customers from competitors or to seek to gain control of sources of supply of items of merchandise, even though the practical result may be to force a competitor out of the particular business or to preclude him from handling a certain item, then it should be equally lawful for a labor organization to wield its power to a similar end. That which is considered merely smart business when done by an organization of capital should not give rise to injunctive relief when proposed by an organization of labor. Admittedly the purpose in each ease is a selfish one in the sense that each is seeking *781to promote the welfare of its own members. Certainly there may be a public interest in both cases and the state may prescribe reasonable limitations beyond which the personal interests of the organized groups may not trespass on the public interest and perhaps not on the private interests of each other. But the mere fact that the purpose is selfish does not make it unlawful. In the case of McKay v. Retail Auto. S. L. Union No. 1067 (1940), 16 Cal.2d 311, 323 [106 P.2d 373], in discussing the case of J. F. Parkinson Co. v. Building Trades Council (1908), supra, 154 Cal. 581 [98 P. 1027, 16 Ann.Cas. 1165, 21 L.R.A.N.S. 550], this court declared: “The ultimate motive for their activities was self-interest— ‘to secure employment on more favorable terms for themselves’, and in pursuit of that purpose they could lawfully attempt ‘to secure employment by the plaintiff, to the exclusion of those not associated with them’.” Hence, as to the case at bar, it must rest with the legislative rather than with the judicial branch of government to establish limits which are narrower in compass than the fundamental law itself ordains.
It is argued here, for plaintiffs, that this is not a controversy between an employer and an employee and hence that it is not a legitimate labor controversy. It is a strange and unnatural concept which would limit organized labor to working only in the fields of employers. If organized labor cannot direct its weapons against unorganized workers and non-employer businessmen as well as against employers it will, indeed, be shackled. Such shackles, if they are to be forged at all, should be wrought by the Legislature and not by the courts. If in the Emde case it was true, as declared for this court by Mr. Justice Edmonds (p. 155 of 23 Cal.2d), that “it may not be denied that . . . the dissatisfaction of organized labor with a system of distributing milk products which avoids minimum wages and hours, workmen’s compensation and social security benefits, is a legitimate matter of labor dispute,” then that declaration is equally true here. Certainly the fact that plaintiffs in this case had been engaging for several years—instead of for a few weeks only, as in the Emde case—in ‘ ‘ a system of distributing milk products which avoids minimum wages and hours, workmen’s compensation and social security benefits, ’ ’ should not be expected to lessen organized labor's interest in stopping that system or plaintiffs’ participation in it. Even if we regard the plaintiffs *782as workers it is just as much in the interest of organized labor to have the principle of the Emde ease recognized and respected by workers—and to seek to persuade them to that end —as it is to have such principle accepted by employers.
If organized labor may lawfully picket or boycott an employer because he employs nonunion labor then it may equally lawfully picket or boycott the nonunion worker. In the absence of a valid statute proscribing such practice, if a secondary boycott is lawful in one case it is in the other. That the boycott, either primary or secondary, is a form of economic persuasion which may be employed to accomplish any lawful purpose is firmly established. (McKay v. Retail Auto. S. L. Union No. 1067 (1940), supra, 16 Cal.2d 311, 319; C. S. Smith Met. Market Co. v. Lyons (1940), supra, 16 Cal. 2d 389, 395; Fortenbury v. Superior Court (1940), 16 Cal. 2d 405, 409 [106 P.2d 411].)
One of the arguments advanced for the plaintiffs places the right to operate a private business without employees above the right to operate a similar business with employees. I perceive no reasonable ground for making such distinction. If the business of milk distributing is operated with employees it is admitted (as it must be because of such decisions as Senn v. Tile Layers Protective Union (1937), 301 U. S. 468, 480, 481 [57 S.Ct. 857, 863, 81 L.Ed. 1229, 1237] ; American Fed. of Labor v. Swing (1941), supra, 312 U.S. 321 [61 S.Ct. 568, 85 L.Ed. 855]; Emde v. San Joaquin County etc. Council (1943), supra, 23 Cal.2d 146) that the hours and conditions of work, etc., of those actually distributing the milk as employees are a legitimate subject of labor interest and action. Indeed, in the Emde case Mr. Justice Edmonds says specifically that (p. 155 of 23 Cal.2d) “the union, and those directly interested in and connected with the labor cause [including in the cited case certain other labor organizations, certain of their officers, and a newspaper], had the right to urge the public and, of course, the members of organized labor, to refrain from buying the dairy’s products unless the dairy abandoned the system of distribution which it had undertaken and rehired union drivers in accordance with the terms of the existing contract, whether or not the employer-employee relation then existed between the members of the union and the dairy.” (Italics added.) Surely the interest of organized labor in enforcing the above quoted *783proposition extends to and against nonemployer businessmen and workers in the industry who are not members of the labor organization just as much as to an employer, the public generally, and members of the union. And if the quoted proposition is sound when applied to the rehiring of union workers it should be equally sound in application to inducing original hiring. The “term ‘labor dispute’ is a broad one,'and, in the absence of statutory definition, may be properly applied to any controversy ‘which is reasonably related to employment and to the purposes of collective bargaining’.” (McKay v. Retail Auto. S. L. Union No. 1067 (1940), supra, 16 Cal.2d 311, 324.) A labor organization which contented itself with protecting existing contracts only and which did not seek the establishment of new contracts or the extension of employment for its members would hardly measure up to the scope and standard of action commonly exhibited by labor unions. If the extension of such contracts and the seeking of further employment are lawful and if the means used to attain those purposes are otherwise lawful, then the pressure designed to attain the desired ends can be applied to the nonemployer businessman and to the nonconforming worker just as well as to an employer.
I have endeavored to make it clear that we do not here have before us any question as to the right of the union to arbitrarily refuse membership to the plaintiffs on a basis of equality with its other members or any request by the union for equitable relief in which the question of its refusal of membership might be pertinent as touching on its right to invoke equity. It is not contended by plaintiffs that they sought employment as employees, or membership in the union in the status of employees. They are, and insist upon continuing to be, independent businessmen. They sought membership in the union not to conform to, or to support, its objects and program, but solely to further their own interests as independent businessmen in competition with the interests and objects of the union.
As declared by this court in the McKay case (supra, 16 Cal.2d 311, 320), “It is a fundamental principle that the drastic sanctions of equity may not be invoked without a detailed showing of specific facts justifying such relief.” The defendants here were competing with plaintiffs for the milk distributing business, seeking to get for the defendant union’s *784members as employees the business which plaintiffs were doing as independent peddlers. “And competition for work being an entirely lawful activity, whether the competing groups be unions, or unions and individuals, a court of equity may not interfere by restraining the use of any lawful form of concerted action used in the struggle.” (McKay v. Retail Auto. S. L. Union No. 1067 (1940), supra, p. 322.)
From what has been said it is apparent that the defendants neither sought an unlawful end nor used unlawful means. They had the right to compete with plaintiffs in a free market for employment in the milk distributing business and they had the right to use the pressure of possible boycott to aid their cause. In my opinion the judgment granting the injunctive relief sought by plaintiffs should be reversed.
Carter, J., and Traynor, J., concurred.
Appellants’ petition for a rehearing was denied January 29, 1945. Carter, J., Traynor, J., and Schauer, J., voted for a rehearing.