Employers' Teaming Co. v. Teamsters' Joint Council

141 F. 679, 1905 U.S. App. LEXIS 4922
CourtU.S. Circuit Court for the Northern District of Illnois
DecidedDecember 20, 1905
DocketNo. 27,719
StatusPublished
Cited by5 cases

This text of 141 F. 679 (Employers' Teaming Co. v. Teamsters' Joint Council) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering U.S. Circuit Court for the Northern District of Illnois primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Employers' Teaming Co. v. Teamsters' Joint Council, 141 F. 679, 1905 U.S. App. LEXIS 4922 (circtndil 1905).

Opinion

KOHLSAAT, Circuit Judge.

This cause comes before the court on motion to attach certain persons, not made parties to the original bill .by name, for contempt of court alleged to have been committed by them, respectively, in that they knowingly violated the restraining order issued in said cause. The decree ran against the defendants named therein, “and each and every of the agents and servants of the said defendants, and of each of them, and any and all other persons and associations now or hereafter aiding or abetting or confederating or acting in concert with said defendants, or any or either of them, in committing the acts and grievances or any of them complained of in said bill of complaint.” It directs that its terms be binding upon the defendants named, and “all other persons whomsoever from and after the time they severally have knowledge of the allowance of this order.”

The petition for a rule to show cause sets up the filing of the bill in which it is prayed that the original defendants, and each and every of their agents and servants, and any and all other persons and associations, be restrained from interfering with, hindering, obstructing, or stopping any of the business of complainant, and makes further reference to the prayer of the bill. It then recites the decree for an injunction issued in the language of the bill. It proceeds further .to set out what steps were taken to convey notice to everybody, including persons in the situation of respondents, and charges, upon information- and belief, that respondents had actual knowledge of the decree and its terms. It then sets out the several acts of the several respondents complained of, supporting the same by affidavits, and prays that an order may be entered directing respondents severally to show cause by a short day why they should not severally be attached for contempt for violating “said temporary stay and injunctional order.”

Respondents insist that the court is without power to grant the relief asked for in the petition. It is not an easy matter to deduce a definite rule of law in such cases from the various federal decisions. Section 725 of the Revised Statutes of the United States of 1878 [U. S. Comp. St. 1901,p. 583] reads as follows:

[681]*681“The said courts shall have power to impose and administer all necessary oaths, and to punish, by fine or imprisonment, at the discretion of the court, contempts of their authority: Provided, that such power to punish contempts shall not be construed to extend to any cases except the misbehavior of any person in their presence, or so near thereto as to obstruct the administration of justice, the misbehavior of any of the officers of said court in their official transactions, and the disobedience or resistance by any such officer, or by any party, juror, witness, or other person, to any lawful writ, process, order, rule, decree, or command of the said courts.” „

The language giving the court power, to punish the “disobedience or resistance by any such officer, or by any party, juror, witness or other person, to any lawful writ, process, rule, decree or command of the said courts,” manifestly extends the power of the court to enforce its decrees to persons other than those made parties by name.

Mr. Justice Brown, speaking for the Supreme Court in Re Rennon, 166 U. S. 548, 17 Sup. Ct. 658, 41 L. Ed.'1110, lays down the general rule that:

“To render a person amenable to an injunction, it is neither necessary that he should have been a party to the suit in which the injunction was issued, nor to have been actually served with a copy of it, so long as he appears to have had actual notice”—citing High on Injunctions, § 1444; Mead v. Norris, 21 Wis. 310; Wellesley v. Mornington, 11 Beav. 181.

This has been uniformly followed in the federal courts, and is now the well-settled rule. The respondent in that case was an employe of the defendant, but the decision does not seem to rest at all upon that fact. The language both of the statute and the Rennon Case seems broad enough to embrace the facts at bar. As to this, however, the courts seem to be in doubt.

In the Case of Reese, 107 Fed. 943, 47 C. C. A. 87, the Circuit Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit had under consideration a motion for the issuance of a rule to show cause, which prayed that such rule issue against Reese, who was not a party to the original suit, to show cause why he should not be attached for contempt for violation of the temporary injunction. It was there charged that Reese had come into Kansas at the head of a column of about 300 men, called “strikers,” and had interfered with the men and plant of the party protected by the injunction. The decree ran against the named defendants and “all other persons who have or may combine, confederate, or conspire with said defendants or either of them.” Reese had not been served with the order, but was found by the Circuit Court to have had knowledge thereof, and was adjudged guilty of violating the temporary injunction and of contempt of court, and was sentenced to three months’ imprisonment. Proceedings for habeas corpus were instituted before Thayer, Circuit Judge, and Reese was discharged. From this order the jailer prosecuted an appeal. It does not appear from the motion for the rule, or otherwise, in the record, that Reese had combined or confederated or conspired with the named defendants. Such being the case, the court held that the act complained of was one against the dignity of the court, and an obstruction of, and interference with, the course of justice; that one not a party to the suit by name or adequate representation is not amen[682]*682able to punishment as for contempt for a violation merely of the injunction at the suit of a private litigant for his protection. “There is nothing in the petition, order to show cause, or commitment,” says the court, “remotely suggesting the purpose of the court to punish him for a willful resistence or disregard of the court’s authority, or for interfering with or obstructing the course of justice otherwise than the same is involved in violating an express order of the court, alleged to have been made in the case against him. * * * The petitioner, not being a party defendant in the main case, was not subject to the jurisdiction of the court in that case, and the court had no authority to punish him for the offense as charged against him in the motion for commitment, and a fortiori no authority, on that motion, to punish him for some other offense not therein charged against him.” In support of this position the court cites the English case of Seaward v. Paterson, 76 Law T. (N. S.) 215. In that case the respondent was adjudged in contempt for knowingly aiding and assisting in doing that which the court had prohibited.

In the case of Phillips v. Detroit, 19 Fed. Cas. 512, Case No. 11,101, Judge, now Justice, Brown, cites approvingly the language of the court in the case of Wellesley v. Earl of Mornington, 11 Beav. 180, in which an injunction was issued against the defendant which did not in terms extend to his servants and agents, and says:

“A motion having been made to commit his agent for a breach of the injunction, it was held irregular, but it was afterwards decided that, if he had knowledge of the writ, he might be committed for the contempt, although not for the breach of the injunction.”

The judgment of the court, however, in Phillips v.

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Bluebook (online)
141 F. 679, 1905 U.S. App. LEXIS 4922, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/employers-teaming-co-v-teamsters-joint-council-circtndil-1905.