Bedford Cut Stone Co. v. Journeymen Stone Cutters' Ass'n

Mr. Justice Sanford,

concurring.

I concur in this result upon the controlling authority of Duplex Company v. Deering, 254 U. S. 443, 478, which, as applied to the ultimate question in this case, I am unable to distinguish.

Thé separate opinion of

Mr. Justice Stone.

As an original proposition, I should have doubted whether the Sherman Act prohibited a labor union from peaceably refusing to work upon material produced by non-union labor or by a rival union, even though inter*56state commerce were affected. In the light of the policy adopted by Congress in the Clayton Act, with respect to organized labor, and in the light of Standard Oil Co. v. United States, 221 U. S. 1; United States v. American Tobacco Co., 221 U. S. 106, 178-180, I should not have thought that such action as is now complained of was to be regarded as an unreasonable and therefore prohibited restraint of trade. But in Duplex Printing Press Co. v. Deering, 254 U. S. 443, these views were rejected-by a majority of the court and a decree was authorized restraining in precise terms any agreement not to work or refusal to work, such as is involved here. Whatever additional facts there may have been in that case, the decree enjoined the defendants from using “even persuasion with the object or having the effect of causing any person or persons to decline employment, cease employment, or not seek employment, or to refrain from work or cease working under any person, firm, or corporation being a purchaser or prospective purchaser of any printing press or presses from complainant, . . .” (p. 478). These views, which I should not have hesitated to apply here, have now been rejected again largely on the authority of the Duplex case. For that reason alone, I concur with the majority.