United States v. Local 807 of International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Chauffeurs Stablemen and Helpers of America Local 807 of International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Chauffeurs Stablemen and Helpers of America v. United States

• Decision Date: 02 March 1942
• Docket Number: Nos. 131,132,s. 131
• Citation: 315 U.S. 521,86 L.Ed. 1004,62 S.Ct. 642
• Parties: UNITED STATES v. LOCAL 807 OF INTERNATIONAL BROTHERHOOD OF TEAMSTERS, CHAUFFEURS, STABLEMEN AND HELPERS OF AMERICA et al. LOCAL 807 OF INTERNATIONAL BROTHERHOOD OF TEAMSTERS, CHAUFFEURS, STABLEMEN AND HELPERS OF AMERICA et al. v. UNITED STATES
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

315 U.S. 521

62 S.Ct. 642

86 L.Ed. 1004

UNITED STATES

v LOCAL 807 OF INTERNATIONAL BROTHERHOOD OF TEAMSTERS,

CHAUFFEURS, STABLEMEN AND HELPERS OF AMERICA et al.

LOCAL 807 OF INTERNATIONAL BROTHERHOOD OF TEAMSTERS,

CHAUFFEURS, STABLEMEN AND HELPERS OF AMERICA et al.

v. UNITED STATES.

Nos. 131, 132.

Argued and Submitted Jan. 7, 1942.

Decided March 2, 1942.

Messrs. Francis Biddle, Atty. Gen., and Thurman Arnold, Asst. Atty. Gen., for the United States.

[Argument of Counsel from pages 522-523 intentionally omitted] Mr. Louis B. Boudin, of New York City, for Local 807 etc., and Michael cahill.

Mr. James D. C. Murray, of New York City, for William Campbell et al.

Mr. Justice BYRNES delivered the opinion of the Court.

This case comes here on cross-petitions for certiorari to review a judgment of the Circuit Court of Appeals reversing the conviction of Local 807 and 26 individuals on charges of conspiracy to violate § 2(a), (b) and (c) of the Anti-Racketeering Act of June 18, 1934.¹ The government asks that the judgments of conviction be reinstated. In their cross-petition the defendants seek dismissal of the indictment. We do not regard this as a correct disposition of the case. Since the correctness of the views concerning the meaning of the statute on which the trial court submitted the case to the jury goes to the root of the convictions and their reversal by the Circuit Court of Appeals, we shall confine our consideration of these cases to that issue. Consequently, we are concerned only with whether the defendants were tried in a manner consistent with the proper meaning and scope of the pertinent provisions of § 2 of the Act, which provide:

'Any person who, in connection with or in relation to any act in any way or in any degree affecting trade or commerce or any article or commodity moving or about to move in trade or commerce—

'(a) Obtains or attempts to obtain, by the use of or attempt to use or threat to use force, violence, or coercion, the payment of money or other valuable considerations, or the purchase or rental of property or protective services, not including, however, the payment of wages by a bonafide employer to a bona-fide employee; or

'(b) Obtains the property of another, with his consent, induced by wrongful use of force or fear, or under color of official right; or '(c) Commits or threatens to commit an act of physical violence or physical injury to a person or property in furtherance of a plan or purpose to violate (sub) sections (a) or (b);'

The proof at the trial showed that the defendant Local 807 includes in its membership nearly all the motor truck drivers and helpers in the city of New York, and that during the period covered by the indictment defendants Campbell and Furey held office in the Local as delegates in charge of the west side of Manhattan and the other de- fendants were members. Large quantities of the merchandise which goes into the city from neighboring states is transported in 'over-the-road' trucks which are usually manned by drivers and helpers who reside in the localities from which the shipments are made and who are consequently not members of Local 807. Prior to the events covered by this indictment, it appears to have been customary for these out-of-state drivers to make deliveries to the warehouses of consignees in New York and then to pick up other merchandise from New York shippers for delivery on the return trip to consignees in the surrounding states.

There was sufficient evidence to warrant a finding that the defendants conspired to use and did use violence and threats to obtain from the owners of these 'over-the-road' trucks $9.42 for each large truck and $8.41 for each small truck entering the city. These amounts were the regular union rates for a day's work of driving and unloading. There was proof that in some cases the out-of-state driver was compelled to drive the truck to a point close to the city limits and there to turn it over to one or more of the defendants. These defendants would then drive the truck to its destination, do the unloading, pick up the merchandise for the return trip and surrender the truck to the out-of-state driver at the point where they had taken it over. In other cases, according to the testimony, the money was demanded and obtained, but the owners or drivers rejected the offers of the defendants to do or help with the driving or unloading. And in several cases the jury could have found that the defendants either failed to offer to work, or refused to work for the money when asked to do so. Eventually many of the owners signed contracts with Local 807 under whose terms the defendants were to do the driving and unloading within the city and to receive regular union rates for the work. No serious question is raised by the evidence as to the ability of the defendants to perform the labor involved in these operations.

The first count of the indictment was based upon § 2(a) of the Act and charged a conspiracy 'to obtain the payment of money * * * (from the owners) by the use of, attempt to use and threat to use, force, violence and coercion.' The second count accused the defendants of conspiring to obtain the property of the owners 'with their consent induced by wrongful use of force and of fear,' in violation of § 2(b). The third and fourth counts alleged a conspiracy to violate § 2(c) in that the defendants agreed 'to commit and threatened to commit acts of physical violence and of physical injury to the persons and property' of their victims in furtherance of the general scheme to violate §§ 2(a) and 2(b). Local 807 and all of the individual defendants were convicted on the first count; the Local and 17 individuals on the second; and the Local and 11 individuals on the third and fourth.

The question in the case concerns that portion of § 2(a) which excepts from punishment any person who 'obtains or attempts to obtain, by the use of or attempt to use or threat to use force, violence, or coercion * * * the payment of wages by a bona-fide employer to a bona-fide employee.'² The Circuit Court of Appeals reversed because it believed that the trial court had failed to instruct the jury properly with respect to this exception.

To ascertain the limits of the exception is a difficult undertaking. Always assuming the presence of violence and threats, as we must in the face of this record, three interpretations of varying restrictive force require consideration: (1) The exception applies only to a defendant who has enjoyed the status of a bona fide employee prior to the time at which he obtains or attempts to obtain the payment of money by the owner. (2) Assuming that this is incorrect and that the exception may affect a defendant who has not been a bona fide employee prior to the time in question, it does not apply if the owner's intention in making the payment is to buy 'protection' and not to buy service, even though the defendant may intend to perform the service or may actually perform it. We understand this to be the position adopted by the government in its brief and argument in this Court. (3) Assuming that both (1) and (2) are incorrect, the exception is not applicable to a defendant who obtains the payment of money if the owner rejects his genuine offer of service. We understand this to be the theory of the dissenting judge below.

Confronted with these various interpretations we turn for guidance to the legislative history of the statute. Pursuant to a Senate Resolution of May 8, 1933,³ a sub-committee of the Senate Committee on Interstate Commerce which became known as the Copeland Committee, undertook an investigation of 'rackets' and 'racketeering' in the United States. After conducting hearings in several large cities, the committee introduced 13 bills, of which S. 2248 was one.⁴ As introduced, as reported by the Senate Judiciary Committee,⁵ and as passed without debate by the Senate,⁶ S. 2248 embodied very general prohibi- tions against violence or coercion in connection with interstate commerce and contained no specific mention of wages or labor. After the bill had passed the Senate, however, representatives of the American Federation of Labor expressed fear that the bill in its then form might result in serious injury to labor,⁷ and the measure was redrafted by officials of the Department of Justice after conferences with the President of the Federation. In the course of this revision, the bill assumed substantially the form in which it was eventually enacted. In particular, the exception concerning 'the payment of wages by a bona fide employer to a bona fide employee' was added, and a proviso preserving 'the rights of bona fide labor organizations' was incorporated in what became § 6 of the Act as finally passed.⁸ In its favorable reports on this revised bill,⁹ the House Committee on the Judiciary set forth without comment a letter from the Attorney General to the Committee, dated May 18, 1934. In this letter the Attorney General informed the Committee that the draft of the substitute bill had been 'definitely approved' by the President of the American Federation of Labor and his counsel. The letter continued:

'We believe that the bill in this form will accomplish the purposes of such legislation and at the same time meet the objections made to the original bill.

'The original bill was susceptible to the objection that it might include within the prohibition the legitimate and bona fide activities of employers and employees. As the purpose of the legislation is not to interfere with such legitimate activities but rather to set up severe penalties for racketeering by violence, extortion, or coercion, which affects interstate commerce, it seems advisable to definitely exclude such legitimate activities.

'As the typical racketeering activities affecting interstate commerce are those in connection with price fixing and economic extortion directed by professional gangsters, we have inserted subparagraphs ...