Felix Frankfurter

“ To find implications in the fact that in the course of the debates it was not explicitly asserted that the district courts could not issue an injunction in a labor controversy even at the behest of the Government is to find the silence of Congress more revealing than the natural meaning of legislation and the history which begot it. The remarks of Mr. LaGuardia and Mr. Michener ought not to be made the equivalent of writing an amendment into the Act. It is one thing to draw on all relevant aids for shedding light on the dark places of a statute. ”

“ The conception of a government by laws dominated the thoughts of those who founded this Nation and designed its Constitution, although they knew as well as the belittlers of the conception that laws have to be made, interpreted and enforced by men. To that end, they set apart a body of men, who were to be the depositories of law, who by their disciplined training and character and by withdrawal from the usual temptations of private interest may reasonably be expected to be 'as free, impartial, and independent as the lot of humanity will admit'. ”

“ There can be no free society without law administered through an independent judiciary. If one man can be allowed to determine for himself what is law, every man can. That means first chaos, then tyranny. ”

“ No one, no matter how exalted his public office or how righteous his private motive, can be judge in his own case. That is what courts are for. And no type of controversy is more peculiarly fit for judicial determination than a controversy that calls into question the power of a court to decide. Controversies over 'jurisdiction' are apt to raise difficult technical problems. ”

“ Never in the country's history have the terms of employment of the millions in Government service been established by collective bargaining. But the conditions of employment-hours, wages holidays, vacations, Health and Welfare Program, etc.-were so fixed for the miners during the period of Government seizure. The proper interpretation of this collective agreement between the Government and the United Mine Workers is precisely what is at the bottom of this controversy. ”

“ In a democracy, power implies responsibility. The greater the power that defies law the less tolerant can this Court be of defiance. As the Nation's ultimate judicial tribunal, this Court, beyond any other organ of society, is the trustee of law and charged with the duty of securing obedience to it.
It only remains to state the basis of my disagreement with the Court's views on the bearing of the Norris-LaGuardia Act, 47 Stat. 70, 29 U.S.C. § 101, 29 U.S.C.A. § 101, and the War Labor Disputes Act, 57 Stat. ”

“ It is surely surprising to conclude that when a long and persistent effort to take the federal courts out of the industrial conflict, insofar as the labor injunction put them into it, found its way to the statute books, the Act failed to meet the grievances that were most dramatic and deepest in the memory of those most concerned with the legislation. ”

“ The analogy of equity receivership is not inapt. In a limited sense, employees of plants in receivership in a federal court may be considered employees of the United States, since the operation of the plant is under the jurisdiction and control of a United States officer. But no one aware of the background of mischief which the Act was intended to remedy could find an intention in Congress to allow injunctions in labor disputes involving plants in receivership. ”

“ If the United States must explicitly be named to be affected, the limitations imposed by the Norris-LaGuardia Act upon the district court's jurisdiction could not deprive the United States of the remedies it therefore had. Accordingly, the courts would not be limited in their jurisdiction when the United States is a party and the Act would not apply in any proceeding in which the United States is complainant. ”

“ It would mean that, in order to protect the public interest, which may be jeopardized just as much whether an essential industry continued under private control or has been temporarily seized by the Government, a court could, at the behest of the Attorney General of the United States, issue an injunction as courts did when they issued the Debs, the Hayes and the Railway Shopmen's injunctions. ”

“ The proposals in each house carried a provision which authorized an injunction to issue for violation of the War Labor Disputes Act. [17] Senator Mead proposed an amendment to delete the provisions for injunctions. [18] In the debates that followed no one suggested that the new proposal was unnecessary, that the jurisdiction proposed to be conferred already existed, or that if granted, as requested by the Attorney General, it would not, as Senator Mead claimed, repeal pro tanto the Norris-LaGuardia Act. ”

“ The United States was granted power to seize and operate defense plants whose production was hampered by labor disputes. Specific remedies were formulated by Congress against interference with the Government's operation. ”