Max Ams Mach. Co. v. Int'l Ass'n of Machinists

• Decision Date: 15 December 1917
• Citation: 92 Conn. 297,102 A. 706
• Court: Connecticut Supreme Court
• Parties: MAX AMS MACH. CO. v. INTERNATIONAL ASS'N OF MACHINISTS. BRIDGEPORT LODGE, NO. 30, et al.

102 A. 706

92 Conn. 297

MAX AMS MACH. CO.

v. INTERNATIONAL ASS'N OF MACHINISTS. BRIDGEPORT LODGE, NO. 30, et al.

Supreme Court of Errors of Connecticut.

Dec. 15, 1917.

Appeal from Superior Court, Fairfield County; Edwin B. Gager and William L. Bennett, Judges.

Suit by the Max Ams Machine Company against the International Association of Machinists, Bridgeport Lodge, No. 30, and others, to restrain defendants from interfering with the business of plaintiff by patrolling, picketing, or loitering upon or near the streets or paths leading to plaintiff's manufacturing plant, for the purpose of preventing, by threats, intimidation, or otherwise, persons from entering into plaintiff's employment or from continuing therein, and for damages. A temporary injunction was granted, and later, by an agreement, a permanent injunction. The claim for damages was afterward tried to a jury, resulting in a verdict and judgment for plaintiff for $5,000. Defendants appeal for alleged errors in rulings and charge of the court. Error and new trial ordered.

The plaintiff is a manufacturing corporation operating its plant in Fairfield, just outside of the limits of Bridgeport. The defendants arc a labor union and three individuals, one being the business agent of the union and the other two its members. The complaint alleges that the defendants conspired to do, and in the prosecution of the conspiracy did, various unlawful and harmful acts to it and concerning the conduct of its business, in order that it might be compelled, against its will and in compliance with their demands, to discharge one of its employes and reinstate another who had previously been employed by it. The unlawful and harmful acts complained of were incidental to and the attendants of a strike which the defendant union had declared, and was participated in by its members, including the individual defendants. Among the persons so participating were all of the plaintiff's employes who were members of the union. Their acts included, as alleged, the picketing of the plaintiff's plant and its approaches, threatening, following, and systematically annoying with approbrious epithets and insulting remarks and in other ways, even to the extent of using personal violence, seeking to intimidate its employes who refused to go out, members of their families and persons seeking employment. These acts, it is alleged, were done for the purpose of preventing the plaintiff from procuring and retaining workmen, interfering with the efficient conduct of its business, and, through the harm and damage thus caused, coercing it to accede to the demands made upon it. These acts, it was alleged, resulted in great damage to the plaintiff in the loss of business and business profits, the cost of advertising for workmen to enable it to operate its plant efficiently, and the expense incurred in the hiring of special officers, watchmen, and guards for the protection of its property and employes. Both equitable and legal relief were asked for; the first by way of both a temporary and permanent injunction restraining the unlawful acts, and the second by the award of damages.

An order to show cause why a temporary injunction should not issue having been made after the return of the case, a hearing was had thereon. The court found that the acts complained of, save only those involving actual personal violence, had been and were being committed by the defendants as and for the purpose charged in the complaint, and issued a temporary injunction forbidding the further picketing of the plaintiff's premises and the further doing of the several acts complained of. Later, counsel filed a stipulation that a permanent injunction might issue in form to be determined by the court after argument. Following such argument, the temporary injunction was made permanent. The case was then claimed for trial upon the claim for legal relief. This was had to the jury. The questions here presented all grow out of that trial.

Lawrence S. Finkelstone and Hugh J. Lavery, both of Bridgeport, for appellants.

Ralph O. Wells, of Hartford, for appellee.

PRENTICE, C. J. (after stating the facts as above). The plaintiff, under the instructions of the court, was permitted to recover for the expenditures incurred by it in the employment of special officers, watchmen, and guards, from the time the picketing began down to a time about four months after the action was commenced, and two months after the temporary injunction was issued, when that employment ceased. It is apparent that this was irregular, in so tar as the period subsequent to the beginning of the ac- tion was concerned. But the course pursued was taken without objection on the part of defendants' counsel, whether in the course of the admission of testimony or otherwise, that there could be no recovery in the action for expenditures so incurred after its commencement, and it is not complained of either in the reasons of appeal or in the brief or argument before us.

The first reason of appeal indeed does assert that the court erred in admitting evidence of payments made for the services of the officers and guards subsequent to the issuance of the temporary injunction. This claim, however, as clearly appears in the brief and argument of counsel, is not one based upon the fact that the right of action for them had not accrued when the action was begun, but upon the broader and more fundamental proposition that there could be no recovery in any event for expense incurred for protective purposes after the restraining order was issued, in the absence of proof that the plaintiff was justified in charging the same to the defendants by reason of...