Williams v. Great Southern Lumber Co, 252
| Decision Date | 16 April 1928 |
| Docket Number | No. 252,252 |
| Parties | WILLIAMS v. GREAT SOUTHERN LUMBER CO |
| Court | U.S. Supreme Court |
Messrs. W. J. Waguespack and A. T. Higgins, both of New Orleans, La., for petitioner.
[Argument of Counsel from page 20 intentionally omitted] Mr. H. Generes Dufour, of New Orleans, La., for respondent.
This suit was brought in the federal court for eastern Louisiana by Lena A. Williams, widow of L. E. Williams, in her own behalf and as tutrix of their minor child, against the Great Southern Lumber Company, to recover damages for the alleged unlawful killing of her husband. She had a verdict and judgment. (D. C.) 13 F.(2d) 246. The Circuit Court of Appeals reversed the judgment, and remanded the case for a new trial. 17 F.(2d) 468.
The Lumber Company operated a sawmill in the city of Bogalusa, Louisiana, in which it employed about 2,500 men, white and colored. The sawmill was conducted as an 'open shop,' and although union laborers were employed individually, the Company did not deal with the union itself. Williams was president of the local union.
The complaint alleged that a conspiracy had been formed between the Company, its officers, agents and others to kill Williams and destroy organized labor in the city, and that he was killed without just cause by a mob composed largely of officers, agents and employees of the Company acting within the scope of their employment. The Company denied this, and alleged that he was killed by a posse of peace officers of the city while he was unlawfully resisting them in attempting to serve warrants issued for the arrest of certain other persons.
The Circuit Court of Appeals, while stating that there was no direct evidence of the alleged conspiracy, did not pass upon the question whether the trial court had erred in denying the Company's request for a directed verdict, but reversed the judgment on the grounds of error in de- clining to permit the introduction of certain evidence offered by the Company, and in admitting certain evidence of the plaintiff.
The petitioner contends that these rulings of the trial court were correct; and that, even if erroneous, they were technical errors which did not affect the substantial rights of the Company or constitute grounds of reversal.
For the purpose of determining these contentions it suffices to say that there was substantial evidence showing or tending to show the following facts: For some time there had been much disturbance in the city, arising apparently out of friction between the labor union and the Company as to its open shop policy, and an effort to unionize the colored laborers. One one occasion millwrights brought to the city to repair broken machinery which had caused the mill to shut down, had been forced to re-enter the train and leave the city. On another, certain laborers had been put in jail and a crowd of their sympathizers, some of whom were armed, had threatened a jail delivery. On another, the light and water plant, supplied by power from the Company's plant, had been forced to shut down temporarily. And frequently there had been disorders at meetings of the city commission. The general condition finally became so threatening to the public peace and safety that a number of business and professional men organized a League-to which no union members or persons connected with the Company were admitted-for the purpose of assisting the city authorities in maintaining law and order, and offered their services to the city as volunteer police to serve when occasion might require. On the advice of the city judge and attorney and the State district judge, this offer was accepted, and many members of the League were sworn in as such special police. The Commissioner of Public Safety and the Chief of Police also arranged with the manager of the Company that when so requested a siren whistle at the mill, which had been customarily used as a fire alarm, should be sounded to summon the volunteer police. And on the occasion of the threatened jail delivery the volunteer police had been thus summoned and had caused the dispersal of the mob.
For some weeks immediately prior to the killing of Williams there had been a shutdown of the mill due to the breakage of machinery and conditions in the city had quieted.
In this state of affairs, on the day before Williams was killed, a city warrant was issued, on the complaint of a merchant who was a member of the volunteer police, against one Dacus, a colored man, on the charge of being a dangerous and suspicious character. Just what had been the connection of Dacus, if any, with the labor troubles does not clearly appear. On that day Dacus could not be found, and was not arrested. On the next day,...
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