United Electrical, R. & M. Workers v. Baldwin

• Decision Date: 02 August 1946
• Docket Number: No. 1798.,1798.
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Connecticut
• Parties: UNITED ELECTRICAL, RADIO & MACHINE WORKERS OF AMERICA, CIO, et al., v. BALDWIN et al.

67 F. Supp. 235

UNITED ELECTRICAL, RADIO & MACHINE WORKERS OF AMERICA, CIO, et al., v. BALDWIN et al.

No. 1798.

District Court, D. Connecticut.

August 2, 1946.

COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED

David Scribner and Seymour Linfield, both of New York City, and Samuel Gruber, of Stamford, Conn., for plaintiffs.

William S. Gordon, Jr., of Hartford, Conn., for Connecticut Federation of Labor, amicus curiae.

William L. Hadden, Atty. Gen., of Connecticut and Bernard Kosicki, Asst. Atty. Gen., of Connecticut, for defendant State Officials & State Police, named in complaint.

Albert S. Bill, DeLancey Pelgrift and Pelgrift, Blumenfeld & Nair, all of Hartford, Conn., for defendants Officials of Town of West Hartford, and West Hartford Police Officers, named in complaint.

SMITH, District Judge.

Plaintiffs, an international union, a local union, and individual members thereof, on strike over a wage dispute, seek a temporary injunction to restrain acts of the defendants, Connecticut state and municipal officials, claimed to violate the plaintiffs' rights under the federal Constitution, the National Labor Relations Act, 29 U.S.C.A. § 151 et seq., and the Federal Civil Rights Act, 8 U.S.C.A. § 41 et seq. The rights involve home picketing, picketing at the plant entrances, picketing on a public highway adjacent to the plant, distribution of leaflets on another public highway near the main entrance to the plant, parking on the streets in an area near strike headquarters during the day of a scheduled public meeting.

The facts in the case may be outlined briefly as follows: in the course of a controversy over wages, a strike was called, by the plaintiff local union, of the production workers at the machine-tool plant of Pratt & Whitney Division, Niles-Bement-Pond Company, in West Hartford, Connecticut. When the strike had been in progress about two months, during which peaceful picketing had been carried on by members of the union outside the plant gates, the company announced a back-to-work movement for May 13. The union officials thereupon determined to prevent entrance of returning workers to the plant on that day. On May 13, pickets by crowding around the gates, pushing and pulling, hindered entrance to the plant. The West Hartford police, unable to open and hold open by physical strength the way into the gates, called for help from the state police, who came, assisted in opening a way through the pickets, and, together with West Hartford police, made twenty-two arrests for breach of the peace.

The Commissioner of State Police announced that pickets immediately before each gate would be limited to fifteen, in motion. This announcement was understood by police and strikers to be in force and was obeyed until the Commissioner at the time of the trial of this case on June 24 modified it by indicating that thereafter it did not apply but that a limitation of numbers of pickets would be placed by him at any time conditions made it, in his opinion, necessary to preserve order. There has been no further attempt by the union members to block entrance to the plant gates since May 13.

Charter Oak Boulevard, a public street running westerly from Oakwood Avenue some 1484 feet into the plant grounds, in front of the plant office buildings, was closed off at Oakwood Avenue by a fence gate maintained since some time during the war for plant protection. Pickets were not allowed by West Hartford or state police to enter the street beyond the gate for the declared reason of easier protection of workers' cars parked on or near the closed-off street. This restriction was abandoned during the trial.

On May 14, two pickets standing near the curb in the road on Jefferson Avenue, one block from the plant on a bus route to the plant, were ordered to move from there by the Chief of the West Hartford police, who was accompanied by state and West Hartford police. They complied. The purpose of the pickets was to pass out literature to passengers alighting from the buses. The declared purpose of the police was to prevent interference with the movement of traffic.

On May 20, the Governor and Commissioner of State Police issued a statement that the picketing of homes was illegal and must be stopped. Thereafter, arrests were made of pickets on the public sidewalks in front of houses of a plant official and of a non-striking worker, in the Town of West Hartford two and one-half miles and one mile from the plant. Both arrests were made by state and West Hartford police acting together. In one case there was a single picket carrying signs announcing the strike. In the other case eight pickets were walking on the sidewalk, some of them carrying signs referring to the house occupant as a "scab" and a "dog". In neither case were there crowds, noise, or disorder. Those arrested were promptly charged with breach of the peace and released on bail. On trial in the Town Court of West Hartford they were, in each instance, found guilty of breach of the peace, fined $250, and sentenced to imprisonment for six months, with execution of the sentence of imprisonment suspended. Appeal has been taken to the Superior Court for Hartford County and each accused released on bail pending appeal.

Following announcement that about five thousand people were expected at a meeting scheduled for May 21 of strikers and others interested, at the strike headquarters across the street from the main gate of the plant, police (early in the morning, of May 21), posted signs prohibiting parking during the day on the streets bounding the plant which extend about one-half mile each on the north and south sides and a slightly shorter distance each on the east and west sides, and on the streets in all directions within some three blocks of the place of the scheduled meeting.

The interference with plaintiffs' activities in each of these respects is claimed to be a deprivation of civil rights, and also part of a conspiracy to deny civil rights to the plaintiffs.

1. Jurisdiction.

The Court has jurisdiction to entertain the action. The rights of free speech and assembly under the First Amendment are privileges of citizens of the United States, guaranteed against state infringement by the Fourteenth Amendment. The rights to due process of law and equal protection of the laws are guaranteed not only to citizens but to any person. Remedy for deprivation of these rights is provided by the Civil Rights Act, Title 8 U.S.C.A. § 43, jurisdiction over the enforcement of which is given the District Courts by Section 24(14) of the Judicial Code, Title 28 U.S.C.A. § 41(14). Snowden v. Hughes, 1944, 321 U.S. 1, 64 S.Ct. 397, 88 L.Ed. 497; Hague v. C. I. O., 3 Cir., 1939, 101 F.2d 774, 790; Douglas v. City of Jeannette, 1943, 319 U.S. 157, 63 S.Ct. 877, 87 L.Ed. 1324; Burt v. City of New York, 2 Cir., 156 F.2d 791.

The individual plaintiffs as citizens of the United States are proper parties. The plaintiff unions, voluntary associations of individuals, are also proper parties to conduct the suit in a representative capacity in the interest of their members. Rule 17(b), Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, 28 U.S.C.A. following section 723c; Hague v. C. I. O., supra; International News Service v. Associated Press, 1918, 248 U.S. 215, 39 S.Ct. 68, 63 L.Ed. 211, 2 A.L.R. 293.

A conspiracy to discourage collective bargaining is a deprivation of the rights secured by the Wagner Act, and therefore also a basis of suit under the Civil Rights Act and Section 24(14) of the Judicial Code referred to above. Suit to restrain such a conspiracy also falls within the jurisdiction of the Court under 24(8) of the Judicial Code, as a suit under a law regulating commerce, under the reasoning of American Federation of Labor v. Watson, 66 S.Ct. 761.

2. The Propriety of the Intervention of Equity.

The plaintiffs seek an injunction restraining the defendants from interfering directly or indirectly with rights which the plaintiffs claim are secured to them by the Constitution and laws of the United States. The defendants claim that each restriction has resulted from an attempt on their part to enforce the law of Connecticut as they understand it.

The general policy of the federal courts against interfering with a state's enforcement of its own laws is well recognized. American Federation of Labor v. Watson, 66 S.Ct. 761; Chicago v. Fieldcrest Dairies, 1942, 316 U.S. 168, 62 S.Ct. 986, 86 L.Ed. 1355; Watson v. Buck, 1941, 313 U.S. 387, 61 S.Ct. 962, 85 L.Ed. 1416; Beal v. Missouri Pacific R. Corp., 1941, 312 U.S. 45, 61 S.Ct. 418, 85 L.Ed. 577; Railroad Commission v. Pullman Co., 1941, 312 U.S. 496, 61 S.Ct. 643, 85 L.Ed. 971; Di Giovanni v. Camden Fire Ins. Association, 1935, 296 U.S. 64, 73, 56 S.Ct. 1, 80 L. Ed. 47; Spielman Motor Co. v. Dodge, 1935, 295 U.S. 89, 55 S.Ct. 678, 79 L.Ed. 1322. And especially are they reluctant to interfere with the enforcement of criminal laws, American Federation of Labor v. Watson, supra; Douglas v. City of Jeannette, 1943, 319 U.S. 157, 63 S.Ct. 877, 87 L.Ed. 1324; Spence v. Cole, 4 Cir., 1943, 137 F.2d 71; Whisler v. City of West Plains, 8 Cir., 1943, 137 F.2d 938;—even in cases where there is a prosecution under an invalid ordinance, Douglas v. City of Jeannette, supra.

Although this court is not asked to enjoin a prosecution, it is asked to interfere with the activities of law enforcement officers, and a similar reluctance to do so seems in order, especially when it is not clear just what the state law is. Cf. Hawks v. Hamill, 1933, 288 U.S. 52, 60, 61, 53 S. Ct. 240, 77 L.Ed. 610. "It is particularly desirable to decline to exercise equity jurisdiction when the result is to permit a State court to have an opportunity to determine questions of State law which may prevent the necessity of decision on a constitutional question, Chicago v. Fieldcrest Dairies, 316 U.S. 168, 173, 62 S.Ct. 986, 988, 86 L.Ed. 1355." Burford v. Sun Oil Co., 1943, 319 U.S. 315, 333 n. 29, 63 S.Ct. 1098, 1107,...