Macauley v. Tierney

• Decision Date: 28 October 1895
• Citation: 19 R.I. 255,33 A. 1
• Parties: MACAULEY et al. v. TIERNEY et al.
• Court: Rhode Island Supreme Court

33 A. 1

19 R.I. 255

MACAULEY et al.

v. TIERNEY et al.

Supreme Court of Rhode Island.

Oct. 28, 1895.

Bill by Macauley Bros, against Patrick Tierney and others to enjoin respondents from doing certain acts to the detriment of complainants' business. Bill dismissed.

Edward L. Gannon, for complainants.

James, Wm. R. & Theodore F. Tillinghast, for respondents.

MATTESON, C. J. The complainants are master plumbers, engaged in the business of plumbing. In the transaction of their business, they have been accustomed, and are obliged, to purchase from time to time materials from wholesale dealers in Rhode Island and other parts of the United States, and, among others, from L. H. Tillinghast & Co., of Providence, who, with the New England Supply Company, are the only wholesale dealers in plumbing materials in this state. The respondents are also master plumbers, and officers and members of the Providence Master Plumbers' Association, a voluntary association, affiliated with the National Association of Master Plumbers of the United States of America. The latter association, on June 26, 1894, at Baltimore, in convention assembled, adopted resolutions that they would withdraw their patronage from any firm manufacturing or dealing in plumbing material selling to others than master plumbers; that the masters should demand of manufacturers and wholesale dealers in plumbing material to sell goods to none but master plumbers; that the association should keep a record of all journeymen and plumbers who place in buildings plumbing material bought by consumers of manufacturers or dealers; that a committee be appointed by the association in every state and county for the purpose of reporting to the proper officers, at its head office in the state, any violations of these resolutions; that the convention urge upon the association to perfect and adopt a uniform system of protection for the trade over their entire jurisdiction. Subsequently, a resolution of amendment was adopted, at St. Louis, that the interpretation of the resolutions be left in the hands of the executive committee with power. Still later, a resolution was adopted, at Washington, "that it is the sense of this convention that in the future the interpretation of the term of 'master plumber,' as set forth in the above resolutions, to entitle him to purchase plumbing material, be construed to mean master plumbers that have qualified under state or local enactments where such exist."

It is alleged by the complainants that the interpretation put by the executive committee of the National Association on these resolutions is that those only are to be regarded as master plumbers who are members of the National Association, or members of the several local associations affiliated with the National Association; that the complainants have been informed by various wholesale dealers in plumbing materials in the United States outside of this state that they will not sell them supplies unless they shall join the Providence Master Plumbers' Association, and that these dealers are forced to refuse to sell them supplies because of the resolutions referred to and the interpretation put upon them by the executive committee of the National Association, and because of the action of the Providence Master Plumbers' Association in causing such dealers to be notified not to sell to the complainants, under the penalty, in case of their continuing to do so, of not selling to any member of the association; that the Providence Master Plumbers' Association, acting through the respondents, has issued notice to L. H. Tillinghast & Co. and the New England Supply Company to sell supplies to none but members of the association; and that, in consequence of these notices, these wholesale dealers have notified the complainants and other master plumbers that they will not sell plumbing materials to plumbers not members of the Master Plumbers' Assotions in the places in which they do a plumbing business, or members of the National Association; and that, since the date limited in the notices, these dealers have refused to sell to the complainants; and that they have been unable to purchase supplies from them and from other wholesale dealers in the United States, because they are not members of the Providence Master Plumbers' Association. The bill charges that the Providence Master Plumbers' Association and the National Association have conspired together to prevent the complainants from buying supplies anywhere in the United States, and to utterly ruin their business, unless they will submit to the conditions of membership in and become members of the Providence Master Plumbers' Association; avers that the business of the complainants will be irremediably ruined unless the respondents are enjoined from further action, and are compelled to rescind the action which they have already taken; and prays that the respondents may be directed to rescind the notices given, and all orders and requests, both oral and written, to any and all dealers in plumbers' supplies, not to trade with such dealers, unless they shall refuse to sell supplies to any but members of such associations, and to rescind and withdraw any and all orders and requests to the National Association to prevent wholesale dealers outside of the state of Rhode Island from selling supplies to the complainant's; and that the respondents may be enjoined from all further interference with the complainants by notifying such dealers not to sell to them, or by further requests to said National Association to prevent them from buying supplies anywhere in the United States. Testimony has been submitted by the complainants tending to prove the allegations of the bill.

Assuming that the allegations are fully sustained by the proof, have the complainants made a case entitling them to relief? We think not. The complainants proceed on the theory that they are entitled to protection in the legitimate exercise of their business; that the sending of the notices to wholesale dealers not to sell supplies to plumbers not members of the association, under the penalty, expressed in some instances and implied in others, of the withdrawal of the patronage of the members of the associations in case of a failure to comply, was unlawful, because it was intended to injuriously affect the plumbers not members of the association in the conduct of their business, and must necessarily have that effect. It is doubtless true, speaking generally, that no one has a right intentionally to do an act with the intent to injure another in his business. Injury, however, in its legal sense, means damage resulting from a violation of a legal right. It is this violation of a legal right which renders the act wrongful in the eye of the law, and makes it actionable. If, therefore, there is a legal excuse for the act, it is not wrongful, even though damage may result from its performance. The cause and excuse for the sending of the notices, it is evident, was a selfish desire on the part of the members of the association to rid themselves of the competition of those not members, with a view to increasing the profits of their own business. The question, then, resolves itself into this: Was the desire to free themselves from competition a sufficient excuse, in legal contemplation, for the sending of the notices? We think the question must receive an affirmative answer. Competition, it has been said, is the life of trade. Every act done by a trader for the purpose of diverting trade from a rival, and attracting it to himself, is an act intentionally done, and, in so far as it is successful, to the injury of the rival in his business, since to that extent it lessens his gains and profits. To hold such an act wrongful and illegal would be to stifle competition. Trade should be free and unrestricted; and hence every trader is left to conduct his business in his own way, and cannot be held accountable to a rival who suffers a loss of profits by anything he may do, so long as the methods he employs are not of the class of which fraud, misrepresentation, intimidation, coercion, obstruction, or molestation of the rival or his servants or workmen, and the...