Baldwin Lumber Co. v. Local No. 560

• Decision Date: 27 February 1920
• Citation: 109 A. 147
• Parties: BALDWIN LUMBER CO. et al. v. LOCAL NO. 560, INTERNATIONAL BROTHERHOOD OF TEAMSTERS, CHAUFFEURS, STABLEMEN AND HELPERS OF AMERICA et al.
• Court: New Jersey Court of Chancery

109 A. 147

BALDWIN LUMBER CO. et al.

v. LOCAL NO. 560, INTERNATIONAL BROTHERHOOD OF TEAMSTERS, CHAUFFEURS, STABLEMEN AND HELPERS OF AMERICA et al.

Court of Chancery of New Jersey.

Feb. 27, 1920.

Controversy between the Baldwin Lumber Company and others and Local No. 560, International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Chauffeurs, Stablemen and Helpers of America, and others. Preliminary injunction granted.

Application for a preliminary injunction on return of rule to show cause.

Charles E. Hendrickson, Jr., of Jersey City, and Merritt Lane, of Newark, for complainants.

Marshall Van Winkle, of Jersey City, Robert H. McCarter, of Newark, and Alfred Brenner, of Bayonne, for defendants.

FOSTER, V. C. This is a strike case in which complainants, fifteen in number, who are associated only for the purpose of this action, and who comprise practically all the dealers in lumber and mason materials in Hudson county, seek injunctive relief against the defendants, who are four local labor unions, the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, etc., the Hudson County Building Trades Council, the Coal Drivers Union, and Messrs. Buckley, Brandle, Bart, and Mueller alleged to represent one or more of the other defendants.

This relief is sought on the grounds that defendants acting jointly have caused a strike of the men employed in the several yards of complainants, and that they have employed and are resorting to picketing, intimidation, and other coercive measures to make the strike a success, and that such measures unlawfully interrupt, interfere with, and irreparably damage the business and property rights of each of the complainants.

From the averments of the bill and from the facts established by the affidavits used on the hearing, it appears that the strike was called because the parties could not, among other things, agree on the terms of wages, hours, and working conditions that should affect the employes of the several yards from January 1, 1920. Shortly before this date, defendants jointly submitted to complainants the draft of an agreement embodying the terms under which their employes should work. This draft was substantially similar to joint agreements that had been in force between the parties for the past four years, except for an increase in wages of $10 a week, and making the working day one of nine instead of ten hours. Complainants expressed their willingness to sign the agreement presented if the increase in wages was limited to $3, and defendants modified their demands to an increase of $7, which was unacceptable to complainants, and thereupon by the vote of the members of the unions, cast in joint meeting, the strike was called. Complainants then filed their bill, and in addition to the usual averments with respect to the injury suffered by them from unlawful picketing, intimidation, and coercion of their former and prospective employes and customers, they alleged that the defendants combined and conspired and called this strike not only to compel them to accede to defendants' terms on wages, hours, and working conditions, but also compel them to accept certain provisions of the contract which requires them to make their several yards closed shops to all except union labor, by requiring them to compel all new men employed by them to join the union; by compelling them to hire only carmen who enploy members of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, etc., and who pay the prevailing rate of wages; and by obligating them to join in a secondary boycott by refusing to deliver materials to any building on which a strike has been ordered; and that for refusing to sign the agreement, each of the complainants "shall be deemed as being an unfair firm."

Although these provisions are now objected to, they were in the contracts which complainants, or some of them, jointly made with defendants for the government of their relations during the past four years.

It appears from the moving papers and complainants' supplemental affidavits that the strike was called on January 10th, last, and that, in obedience to defendants' orders, the drivers and yardmen employed by complainants quit work, and since then these former employes have engaged, with strangers, in picketing the front and rear entrances and the immediate neighborhood of the yards where they were employed, or the yard of some other of the complainants; that this picketing has resulted in the interruption and finally in the stoppage of all business in complainants' yards; in the interference with and intimidation of the customers of complainants or some of them; in preventing some of their employes who desired to do so from remaining at or returning to work; in an assault, in one instance, by throwing stones at other men employed by one of the complainants; in the intimidation of the carmen employed by another yard; in preventing the unloading of materials from boats and cars, and has completely stopped the delivery and attempted delivery of materials for much needed work on buildings, lifeboats, etc., and in at least one instance caused the refusal of a stationary engineer to handle material delivered from the yard of one of the complainants by an independent carman.

It appears that three or four of the yards were not picketed in the beginning of the strike; since the rule to show cause was issued, however, and because of the conduct of the pickets and the results to other yards from this picketing, the owners of these yards have felt compelled to close the same, and all the complainants have ceased doing business.

Defendants by their affidavits specifically deny the charges of interference, intimidation, and coercion. They admit that some of the former employes of complainants may have engaged in peaceful picketing, but they insist that complainants' proof is wholly lacking in identifying any of their former employes as the men who interfered with or intimidated any of their customers or employes; and, while it is true that such identification is largely absent from the proof, it does appear in some instances that some of complainants' former employes were present when others, not identified, interfered with and used threats or intimidation to some of complainants' customers or employes. And it also significantly appears that some of the employes of complainants having made affidavit to the effect that they had no grievance and did not desire to strike, later joined the strike and by other affidavits retracted all they had previously sworn to. And while the affidavits of defendants deny, on the part of many of the former employes of complainant, some of the matters charged in the bill and affidavits, they do not dispute or deny the interference and intimidation which complainants' proof establishes has actually occurred at some of the yards, and to some of the carmen hired by one or more of the complainants, and there are many of complainants' former employes who do not join in defendants' denial, leaving the doubt, if any, about their participation in such coercive acts, in favor of the complainants.

On this branch of the case, the proofs are satisfying that the business and property rights of complainants, except the three hereinafter mentioned, have been and are being seriously interfered with and are threatened with irreparable injury by the picketing, intimidation, and coercion indulged in by their former employes, and others associated and acting in concert with them, under the direction, or with the sanction of the defendants or some of them. But the proofs are not satisfying that this threatened irreparable injury is impending over the yards of three of the complainants, for it appears that at the time of filing the bill there was no picketing or interference with the yards of the following named complainants: O'Neill's Lumber Company, Jersey City Lumber Company, Chas. H. Engler Lumber Company, Oakland Lumber Company, Gardner & Meeks and Conlon & Company—immediately upon the service of the rule to show cause picketing and interference with employes and customers of the O'Neill, Jersey City, and Oakland yards was instituted. No such conduct is alleged or established against the yards of Engler, Gardner & Meeks or Conlon. These three complainants state, however, that they have ceased business and have closed their yards through the fear that their employes and their customers will be interfered with and intimidated if they reopen their yards and attempt to do business without the protection afforded by injunction. It may be that their fears are well grounded, and, while it is true that the remedy of injunction is preventative and not punative, it is also true that this remedy should not be granted on a preliminary hearing except in a case where the facts clearly establish that the acts...