Cafeteria Employees Union, Local 302 v. Angelos Same v. Tsakires

• Decision Date: 22 November 1943
• Docket Number: 37,Nos. 36,s. 36
• Citation: 320 U.S. 293,64 S.Ct. 126,88 L.Ed. 58
• Parties: CAFETERIA EMPLOYEES UNION, LOCAL 302, et al. v. ANGELOS et al. SAME v. TSAKIRES et al
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

320 U.S. 293

64 S.Ct. 126

88 L.Ed. 58

CAFETERIA EMPLOYEES UNION, LOCAL 302, et al.

v ANGELOS et al.

SAME

v. TSAKIRES et al.

Nos. 36, 37.

Argued and Submitted Nov. 8, 1943.

Decided Nov. 22, 1943.

Mr. Louis B. Boudin, of New York City, for petitioners.

Mr. Abraham Michael Katz, of New York City, for respondents.

Mr. Justice FRANKFURTER delivered the opinion of the Court.

We brought these two cases here to determine whether injunctions sanctioned by the New York Court of Appeals exceeded the bounds within which the Fourteenth Amendment confines state power. 319 U.S. 778, 63 S.Ct. 1432, 87 L.Ed. 1724. They were argued together and, being substantially alike, can be disposed of in a single opinion.

We start with the Court of Appeals' view of the facts. In No. 36, petitioners, a labor union and its president, picketed a cafeteria in an attempt to organize it. The cafeteria was owned by the respondents, who themselves conducted the business without the aid of any employees. Picketing was carried on by a parade of one person at a time in front of the premises. The successive pickets were 'at all times orderly and peaceful'. They carried signs which tended to give the impression that the respondents were 'unfair' to organized labor and that the pickets had been previously employed in the cafeteria. These representations were treated by the court below as knowingly false in that there had been no employees in the cafeteria and the respondents were 'not unfair to organized labor'. It also found that pickets told prospective customers that the cafeteria served bad food, and that by 'patronizing' it 'they were aiding the cause of Fascism'.

The circumstances in No. 37 differ from those in No. 36 only in that pickets were found to have told prospective customers that a strike was in progress and to have 'insulted customers * * * who were about to enter' the cafeteria. Upon a finding that respondents required equitable relief to avoid irreparable damages and that there was no 'labor dispute' under the New York analogue of the Norris-LaGuardia Act, 29 U.S.C.A. § 101 et seq. (§ 876-a of the New York Civil Practice Act), the trial court enjoined petitioners in broad terms from picketing at or near respondents' places of business. The decrees were affirmed by the Appellate Division (264 App.Div. 708, 34 N.Y.S.2d 408), and were finally sustained by the Court of Appeals, its Chief Judge and two Judges dissenting. 289 N.Y. 498, 507, 46 N.E.2d 903.

In Senn v. Tile Layers Union, 301 U.S. 468, 57 S.Ct. 857, 81 L.Ed. 1229, this Court ruled that members of a union might, 'without special statutory authorization by a state, make known the facts of a labor dispute, for freedom of speech is guaranteed by the Federal Constitution.' 301 U.S. at page 478, 57 S.Ct. at page 862, 81 L.Ed. 1229. Later cases applied the Senn doctrine by enforcing the right of workers to state their case and to appeal for public support in an orderly and peaceful manner regardless of the area of immunity as defined by state policy. A.F. of L. v. Swing, 312 U.S. 321, 61 S.Ct. 568, 85 L.Ed. 855; Bakery Drivers Local v. Wohl, 315 U.S. 769, 62 S.Ct. 816, 86 L.Ed. 1178. To be sure the Senn case related to the employment of 'peaceful picketing and truthful publicity'. 301 U.S. at page 482, 57 S.Ct. at page 863, 81 L.Ed. 1229. That the picketing under review was peaceful is not questioned. And to use loose language or undefined slogans that are part of the conventional give-and-take in our economic and political controversies—like 'unfair' or 'fascist'—is not to falsify facts. In a setting like the present, continuing representations unquestionably false and acts of...