The Use of Injunctions in Labor Disputes

Report Outline
Development of the Labor Injunction
Laws Limiting Injunctions
The Labor Injunction and the Non-Union Shop
Substitutes for the Injunction
Arguments on Labor Injunctions

The public interest created by the national conference on injunctions, called by the Executive Council of the American Federation of Labor to meet February 7, will be further stimulated by the congressional hearings on the Shipstead-LaGuardia federal anti-injunction bill, which are scheduled to follow immediately thereafter. A vote on this measure before the close of the present session has been promised by the regular Republican leadership to the Senate progressives as a part of the price to be paid for their coöperation in organizing the Senate at the outset of the Seventieth Congress.

State anti-injunction bills, drafted by state federations of labor, are being pressed at the same time before the legislatures of New York and Massachusetts. In New Jersey trade union organizations are engaged in a related campaign to bring about the enactment of a new measure at the present session of the legislature to supplement the law of 1926, which legalized the employment of peaceful methods of persuasion by trade unionists in labor disputes.

Current Labor Injunction Cases

The American Federation of Labor and its state organizations have been spurred on in their present campaign against injunctions by the action of the Interborough Rapid Transit Company of New York City in joining all the officers and members of the Federation as defendants in its pending suit to prohibit all trade unionists from attempting to organize its workers. A preliminary judgment in this case is expected within a fortnight. The losing side will go immediately to the New York Appellate Division.