Loewe v. California State Federation of Labor

139 F. 71, 1905 U.S. App. LEXIS 4669
CourtU.S. Circuit Court for the District of Northern California
DecidedJuly 1, 1905
StatusPublished
Cited by12 cases

This text of 139 F. 71 (Loewe v. California State Federation of Labor) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering U.S. Circuit Court for the District of Northern California primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Loewe v. California State Federation of Labor, 139 F. 71, 1905 U.S. App. LEXIS 4669 (circtndca 1905).

Opinion

MORROW, Circuit Judge.

This is an order to show cause why an injunction pendente lite, should not issue, restraining the defendants from in any manner conspiring together to destroy the trade and business of complainants; from boycotting the complainants’ business or the product of their factory; from publishing or otherwise circulating statements or representations calling the attention of complainants’ customers or of dealers or of tradesmen or of the public to any boycott or strike against the complainants; from threatening or intimidating the customers of complainants [72]*72or the public or persons buying from complainants, or persons buying the products of complainants’ factory from any other person, firm, or corporation, by any means alleged in the bill of complaint. A hearing has been had upon the bill of complaint, and affidavits in support thereof, and affidavits on the part of the defendants. An answer to the bill has not yet been filed.

The bill alleges that the complainants are domiciled in, and are citizens of, the state of Connecticut, and are copartners, located and doing business as manufacturers and sellers of hats, under the firm name and style of D. F. Eoewe & Co., at Danbury, Conn.; that the defendants California State Federation of Labor, San Francisco Labor Council, and Building Trades Council of San Francisco are voluntary unincorporated associations, composed of persons voluntarily combined and associated together for their common benefit, and governed by officers and agents selected by the members of said associations, and that all the defendants and all the members of said associations are citizens of the state of California; that complainants during all the times mentioned in the bill of complaint have had a factory at Danbury for the making of hats for sale by them in the various states of the Union, and have for many years employed at said factory a large number of men in the manufacture and sale of hats, and have invested in that branch of their business a large amount of capital; that complainants, in their business of selling the product of said factory and filling orders for hats, had in the year 1902 built up and established a large trade, employing more than 230 persons, making and selling annually hats of a value exceeding $400,000, and that at the time of filing the bill of complaint complainants employed about 200 persons in the hat manufacturing business, and that said business was then of the value of about $250,000 annually; that complainants have for many years been engaged in trade and commerce among the several states of the Union, in selling and shipping the product of their factory by common carriers from Danbury, in the state of Connecticut, to wholesale dealers doing business in each of the states of Maine, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, Ohio, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, Missouri, Nebraska, Arkansas, and other states, to the amount of many hundred thousands of dollars, and in sending agents with samples from Danbmy into and through each of the said states to visit the wholesale dealers at their places of business in each of the several states, and to solicit and procure from them orders for hats to be manufactured by complainants at Danbury, Conn., and shipped by complainants by common carriers to said wholesale dealers, to be by them paid for after the delivery thereof at their several places of business; that complainants are almost wholly dependent upon the sale and shipment of hats to the dealers in states other than Connecticut to keep their factory running and dispose of its product, and to keep their capital in said business profitably employed, and the restraint, curtailment, and destruction of their trade and commerce with their customers in said states by the combination, conspiracy, and acts [73]*73of the defendants, as set forth in the bill of complaint, has been and was at the time of the filing of the bill of complaint of serious damage to the property and business of the complainants, as set forth in the bill.

It is alleged that the Building Trades Council of San Francisco, the San Francisco Labor Council, and the California State Federation of Labor, their officers and members, bind and tie together all the local unions and their members by consent and agreement for united and concerted action in all matters affecting their common interest, including the ordering, prosecution, and furtherance of strikes and boycotts, and including also the acts charged in the bill of complaint against the defendants; that these acts are enforced against their own members, and also against members of local unions, by the defendants, their officers and executive bodies, and by said local unions and their officers, by means of fines, expulsions, and other penalties, and by threats and coercion, and against tradesmen in particular, and the public generally, by means emanating from the same sources — of strikes, boycotts, threats, coercion, and intimidation. It is further alleged that there is in nearly every state of the Union, and in every state and place where complainants do business, and sell or trade in or manufacture hats, a complete organization of labor into local unions, similar to those within the state of California, which in turn are bound together by central labor bodies, and said central labor bodies in California and in each of the other states of the Union are, by their rules, customs, and regulations, bound in obedience to a great central body or chief combination, known as and called the American Federation of Labor, having jurisdiction over all classes of labor throughout the United States, and having in the neighborhood of 2,000,000 members, of which all the individual defendants in this case, and all the members of the local unions, the California State Federation of Labor, the Building Trades Council of San Francisco, the San Francisco Labor Council, and all of said local and state central bodies or combinations, are members; that this combination is subdivided into subordinate groups and combinations, comprising 110 national and international unions or combinations, of which the combination of persons styling themselves the United Hatters of North America is one, and of which others are the California State Federation of Labor, the Building Trades Council of San Francisco, and the San Francisco Labor Council and others, composed of 12,000 local unions, 28 state federations or combinations, more than 500 central labor unions or combinations, and more than 2,000 local unions or combinations. The bill alleges in detail the method adopted by the combination the United Hatters of North America, the American Federation of Labor, and the San Francisco Labor Council in the publication of newspapers and the employment of agents for the purpose of enforcing boycotts, and to force all manufacturers of fur hats in the United States, including complainants, to unionize their factories, by restraining and destroying their interstate trade and commerce. It is further alleged in the bill that said combination [74]*74owns and absolutely controls the use of a certain label or distinguishing mark which it styles the “Union Label of the United Hatters of North America,” which mark, when so used by them, affords to them a ready and effective instrument and means of boycotting’ the hats of any manufacturer against whom they may desire to use it for that purpose.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
139 F. 71, 1905 U.S. App. LEXIS 4669, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/loewe-v-california-state-federation-of-labor-circtndca-1905.