People's Pilot, Volume 2, Number 42, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 7 April 1893 — SWEEPING DECISIONS. [ARTICLE]

SWEEPING DECISIONS.

They Are Made Against the Locomotive Engineers In the Ann Arbor Cases— Chief Arthur Enjoined from Issuing Orders to Strike— Boycotting Declared to Be Conspiracy. TOLEDO, O., April 4. —The Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers is declared to be a conspiracy against the laws of the country by Judge Tafts, and the temporary injunction prayed for against Chief Arthur in the Ann Arbor boycott case is allowed. The decision was read in the United States circuit court by Judge Ricks at the same time that he rendered his decision in the case of the Lake Shore engineers who, obeying the laws of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers, refused to handle Ann Arbor freight, as there was a strike on that road. In the latter case the court held Engineer James Lennon for contempt because he had been twice ordered to move the cars by the officials of the company and did not do so until ordered to do so by the brotherhood officers after the boycott was raised. The seven other men were discharged. Judge Ricks’ decision in the cases of the eight engineers and firemen arraigned for contempt of court was first delivered, amid breathless attention. It was not as radical as the men feared, and does not assume to compel men to work against their will. Notice of appeal was at once given by Mr. Hurd.

Judge Ricks’ decision in effect compels one railroad to receive freight and passengers from another in conformity with the interstate commerce law, and is as follows: “This suit was instituted by the Ann Arbor Railroad company to compel the Lake Shore and other railroads to handle its business known as interstate freight. The interstate commerce law made it mandatory upon connecting railroads to receive and deliver passengers and freight, and to afford equal facilities for the interchange of traffic. Corporations can act only through their officers, agents and servants, so that the mandatory provisions of the law which apply to the corporation apply with equal force to its officers and employes. The authority of the court to issue such an order has been questioned, but it rests on well established principles. It is said the orders issued in this case are without precedent. Every just order or rule known to equity courts was born of some emergency to meet some new conditions and was therefore in its time without a precedent. If based on sound principles and beneficent results follow their enforcement affording necessary relief to the one party without imposing illegal burdens on the other, new remedies and unprecedented orders are not unwelcome aids to the chancellor to the constantly varying demands for equitable relief. “As hereinbefore intimated, the duties of an employe of a public corporation are such that he cannot always choose his own time for quitting that service. The parties now charged with contempt must be tried on the facts as they have been made to appear; and having fully considered them, I conclude that Engineers Clark, Case, Rutger and Conley, and their firemen as named, quit the service of the Lake Shore & Michigan Southern railroad under circumstances when they had a right to do so and that they are not, therefore, in contempt of court because of sick conduct, and they will be discharged. In reaching this conclusion I have treated these cases as criminal in character, and given the accused the benefit of the reasonable doubt, especially as to the extent to which they had conspired to act concertedly in quitting service in a way to injure their employer and aid in inforcing a boycott. An act when done by an individual in the exercise of a right may be lawful, but when done by a member conspiring to injure or improperly influence another may be unlawful. One or more employes may lawfully quit their employer’s service at will; but a combination of a number of them to do so for the purpose of injuring the public and oppressing employers by unjustly subjecting them thus to the power of the confederates for extortion or for mischief is criminal.

“With these views of my duty, an order will be entered that the accused, James Lennon, stand adjudged as guilty of contempt, and to pay a fine of $50 and the costs of this proceeding, upon payment of which he will be discharged from the further orders of the court. The orders made In this oase as to all the connecting roads and their employes who have continued in the service are still in full force and it is but just to all concerned that the court should say that the laws and orders having now been fully interpreted and made public any violation thereof that may hereafter be made will be dealt with in a spirit and purpose quite different from that which has controlled us in this case.” After Judge Ricks’ decision was rendered in the case of the engineers and firemen, he proceeded to read the decision of the circuit court, composed of himself and Judge Taft, in the motion of the Ann Arbor company asking a temporary injunction against Chief Arthur restraining him from issuing any order which shall require or command any employe of any of the defendant railroad companies to receive, handle or deliver any cars of freight in course of transportation from one state to another from and to the Ann Arbor road and prohibiting him, from in any way, directly or indirectly, endeavoring to persuade or induce any employes of the railway companies whose lines connect with the Ann Arbor not to extend to the said company the same facilities for interchange of interstate traffic as are extended by said companies to other roads. The decision, which was written by Judge Taft, grants the injunction prayed for. and declares that if the members of the brotherhood, in obedience to rule 12, boycotted freight, they “become guilty of criminal conspiracy against their country. ”