William Howard Taft

“ To give operation to a statute whereby serious losses inflicted by such unlawful means are in effect made remediless, is, we think, to disregard fundamental rights of liberty and property and to deprive the person suffering the loss of due process of law.
If, however, contrary to the construction which we put on the opinion of the Supreme Court of Arizona, it does not withhold from the plaintiffs all remedy for the wrongs they suffered, but only the equitable relief of injunction, there still remains the question whether they are thus denied the equal protection of the laws. ”

“ I think further that the selection of the class of employers and employees for special treatment, dealing with both sides alike, is beyond criticism on principles often asserted by this court. And especially I think that without legalizing the conduct complained of the extraordinary relief by injunction may be denied to the class. Legislation may begin where an evil begins. If, as many intelligent people believe, there is more danger that the injunction will be abused in labor cases than elsewhere I can fell no doubt of the power of the Legislature to deny it in such cases. ”

“ The ruling of the Supreme Court proceeded, first, on the assumption that the gravamen of the complaint was that the defendants were merely inducing patrons to cease their patronage by making public the fact of the dispute and the attitude of plaintiffs in it; and secondly, on the proposition that, while good will is a valuable factor in business success, 'no man has a vested right in the esteem of the public'-that, while the plaintiff had a clear right to refuse the demand of the union, the union had a right to advertise the cause of the strike. ”

“ The due process clause requires that every man shall have the protection of his day in court, and the benefit of the general law, a law which hears before it condemns, which proceeds not arbitrarily or capriciously, but upon inquiry, and renders judgment only after trial, so that every citizen shall hold his life, liberty, property and immunities under the protection of the general rules which govern society. ”

“ By calling a business 'property' you make it seem like land, and lead up to the conclusion that a statute cannot substantially cut down the advantages of ownership existing before the statute was passed. An established business no doubt may have pecuniary value and commonly is protected by law against various unjustified injuries. ”

“ The broad distinction between one's right to protection against a direct injury to one's fundamental property right by another who has no special relation to him, and one's liability to another with whom he establishes a voluntary relation under a statute is manifest upon its statement. ”

“ The libel of the plaintiffs here was not the cause of the injury; it was only one step or link in a conspiracy unlawfully to influence customers.
It is argued that, while the right to conduct a lawful business is property, the conditions surrounding that business, such as regulations of the state for maintaining peace, good order, protection against disorder, are matters in which no person has a vested right. ”

“ The Fourteenth Amendment, as this court said in Barbier v. Connolly, already ready cited, intended--
'Lot only that there should be no arbitrary deprivation of life or liberty, or arbitrary spoliation of property, but that equal protection and security should be given to all under like circumstances in the enjoyment of their personal and civil rights; that all persons should be equally entitled to pursue their happiness and acquire and enjoy property ”

“ If, as claimed, the Legislature has full discretion to grant or withhold equitable relief in any class of cases, indeed, to take away from its courts all equity jurisdiction and leave those who are wronged to suits at law or to protection by the criminal law, the Legislature has the same power in respect to the declaration of crimes. ”

“ There is nothing that I more deprecate than the use of the Fourteenth Amendment beyond the absolute compulsion of its words to prevent the making of social experiments that an important part of the community desires, in the insulated chambers afforded by the serveral states, even though the experiments may seem futile or even noxious to me and to those whose judgment I most respect. ”

“ To sustain the distinction here between the ex-employees and other tort-feasors in the matter of remedies against them, it is contended that the Legislature may establish a class of such ex-employees for special legislative treatment. In adjusting legislation to the need of the people of a state, the Legislature has a wide discretion, and it may be fully conceded that perfect uniformity of treatment of all persons is neither practical nor desirable, that classification of persons is constantly necessary, and that questions of proper classification are not free from difficulty. ”

“ A secondary boycott of this kind is where many combine to injure one in his business by coercing third persons against their will to cease patronizing him by threats of similar injury. In such a case the many have a legal right to withdraw their trade from the one, they have the legal right to withdraw their trade from third persons, and they have the right to advise third persons of their intention to do so when each act is considered singly. ”

“ It is really a little difficult to say, if such classification can be sustained, why special legislative treatment of assaults upon an employer or his employees by ex-employees may not be sustained with equal reason. It is said the state may deal separately with such disputes because such controversies are a frequent and characteristic outgrowth of disputes over terms and conditions of employment. Violence of ex-employees toward present employees is also a characteristic of such disputes. ”

“ Classification like the one with which we are here dealing is said to be the development of the philosophic thought of the world and is opening the door to legalized experiment. When fundamental rights are thus attempted to be taken away, however, we may well subject such experiment to attentive judgment. The Constitution was intended-its very purpose was-to prevent experimentation with the fundamental rights of the individual. ”

“ The general end of such legislation is that the employer shall become the insurer of the employee against injuries from the employment without regard to the negligence, if any, through which it occurred, leaving to the employer to protect himself by insurance and to compensate himself for the additional cost of production by adding to the prices he charges for his products. ”

“ The plaintiffs in error, who were plaintiffs below, and will be so called, own, maintain and operate, on Main street, in the city of Bisbee, Ariz., a restaurant, known as the 'English Kitchen.' The defendants are cooks and waiters formerly in the employ of the plaintiffs, together with the labor union and the trades assembly of which they were members. All parties are residents of the state of Arizona.
In April, 1916, a dispute arose between the plaintiffs and the defendants' union concerning the terms and conditions of employment of the members of the union. ”

“ Where pending litigation, it shall be made to appear that a party is doing some acts respecting the subject of litigation, or threatens, or is about to do some act, or is procuring or suffering the same to be done, in violation of the rights of the applicant, which act would tend to render the judgment ineffectual. ”

“ The means used are the libelous and abusive attacks on the plaintiffs' reputation, like attacks on their employees and customers, threats of such attacks on would-be customers, picketing and patrolling of the entrance to their place of business, and the consequent obstruction of free access thereto-all with the purpose of depriving the plaintiffs of their business. ”

“ In the first place, the equality clause of the Fourteenth Amendment does not apply to congressional, but only to state, action. In the second place, section 20 of the Clayton Act never has been construed or applied as the Supreme Court of Arizona has construed and applied paragraph 1464 in this case. ”

“ The complaint averred that if the acts were continued, the business would be entirely destroyed, and that the plaintiffs would suffer great and irreparable injury; that for the plaintiffs to seek to recover damages would involve a multiplicity of suits; that all the defendants were insolvent, and would be unable to respond in damages for any injury resulting from their acts, and the plaintiffs were therefore without any adequate remedy at law. ”

“ It was continued in force, by virtue of the new Constitution of Arizona adopted by the people in 1912, which merely changed the name of the court, upon which general equity jurisdiction was conferred, from the district court to the superior court, and which provided that the authority, jurisdiction, practice, and procedure of the district courts should continue in force and apply and govern superior courts until altered or repealed. Arizona came into the Union with this Constitution February 14, 1912. ”

“ By having agents attend at or near the entrance of the restaurant during all business hours and continuously announce in a loud voice, audible for a great distance, that the restaurant was unfair to the labor union.
(3) By characterizing the employees of the plaintiff as scab Mexican labor, and using opprobrious epithets concerning them in handbills continuously distributed in front of the restaurant to would-be customers. ”

“ The method of inducing was set out at length, and included picketing, displaying banners, advertising the strike, denouncing plaintiffs as 'unfair' to the union, and appealing to customers to stay away from the 'English Kitchen,' and the circulation of handbills containing abusive and libelous charges against plaintiffs, their employees, and their patrons, and intimations of injury to future patrons. ”

“ Cas. 957, that--
'It is the peculiar value of a written constitution that it places in unchanging form limitations upon legislative action, and thus gives a permanence and stability to popular government which otherwise would be lacking.'
It is urged that this court has frequently recognized the special classification of the relations of employees and employers as proper and necessary for the welfare of the community and requiring special treatment. This is undoubtedly true, but those cases-the Second Employer's Liability Cases, 223 U.S. 1, 32 Sup. Ct. 169, 56 L. Ed. ”