and the legislature to-morrow makes those acts a crime punishable by indictment and fine, or imprisonment, can it be said that the court can no longer enjoin against them?

Nor can it be claimed that the proper exercise of this power violates the constitutional provision securing trial by jury to persons charged with crime.

The power to enforce an injunction order by punishment for violation is a part of the power to make the order.

When this power is exercised it is as much an exercise of civil jurisdiction as the issue of the subpoena or the hearing and judgment of the cause. A person bound by an injunction order, either as a party to the suit, or as holding a subordinate relation to a party to the suit, has no right under the constitution to a trial by jury of the question whether he has disobeyed the order. And no such right ought to be given to him by statute.

If the court had no power to make the order, a party who disobeys it can be discharged from any proceedings against him upon habeas corpus.

If the court had power to make the order, it has and ought to have full power to enforce it.

To take that power from courts of equity, or to permit it to be exercised only upon trial by jury and ultimate judgment of another court, would practically destroy equity jurisdiction. It is at least questionable whether this can be done as to courts which are established by the constitution, like the supreme court of the United States, the supreme judicial court of Massachusetts, "The Chancellor." of Delaware, and others.1

But if the independence and usefulness of the judiciary is to be preserved, the power ought to be so exercised that it will not be taken away in any case.

The courts have gone too far. It is impossible for them to go on in the course they have taken and retain the confidence of the people or preserve their own powers.

1 Rapalje on Contempts, s. 11. Arnold v. Commonwealth, 80 Ky. 300.

The courts have said in these cases that "the combination of employés for the purpose of preventing others from being employed, or for the purpose of stopping the business of employers by leaving their employment in a body at a time when others cannot be employed to take their places, inflicts irreparable injury upon the business, i. e., upon the property of the employer, and therefore to prevent this irreparable injury to the property of the employer they may enjoin employés from preventing others from being employed or from leaving the service of the employer at a time or in a manner which would endanger or destroy his business, or from refusing, while they remain in the service of the employer, to perform all the duties of their employment."

But where is this to stop? If one man, or a thousand men, either by force, threats, intimidation, or merely by argument and persuasion, prevent others from working for the employer for whom they otherwise would work, and thereby his business is injured or destroyed, the employer has suffered an irreparable injury. If one man, or a thousand men, leave their employment at a time when the business of the employer will thereby be stopped and his property injured beyond repair in damages, the employer suffers an irreparable injury. If one man, or any number of men, in the employ of another, refuse to perform all the duties of their employment, the employer may thereby suffer irreparable injury. If a farmer's hired man quits his service when his crop is partly gathered and will be destroyed by the storm if it is not properly garnered, the farmer may suffer an irreparable injury. If the hired man remains in the service of the farmer and refuses to harvest a particular crop, to cart the hay to the barn before the storm, or cut the corn before the frost, while he is willing to perform all other farm labor, the farmer may suffer an irreparable injury. If a waiter in a restaurant quits the service of his employer just before lunch time, and thereby the employer

cannot serve the lunch which has been prepared, the employer suffers an irreparable injury. And this may be the case whether it is one waiter who leaves or fifty.

The damage caused to the keeper of a small restaurant by the leaving of one waiter may be more serious to him than the damage caused to the keeper of a large restaurant by the leaving of twenty-five waiters. In like manner, the damage caused to the farmer who has but one laborer, by that laborer's leaving when the crop should be harvested, or refusing to harvest crops or any particular crop while he remains, may be as serious and irreparable an injury to the farmer who has but one laborer as similar conduct on the part of fifty laborers may be to a farmer who has fifty laborers upon a large farm. It is only a question of degree. The principle is the same in all these cases.

But can it be claimed that a court of equity should intervene by injunction to command the farmer's man not to leave the service, or, if he remains, to command him to harvest the crop, cart the hay, or cut the corn; or to command a restaurant keeper's waiters not to leave his service, or, if they remain, to serve all customers? Suppose, at the Christmas season, when the proprietor of a large dry goods store or shop has purchased a stock of goods, salable only at that season, and which if not sold will be largely reduced in value, his salesmen or saleswomen are about to quit his service and render it impossible for him to sell his goods, as was said by Judge Ricks, with regard to the laborers on the Lake Shore Railroad: "They are skilled employés, whose places cannot be readily supplied." But would a court of equity interfere by injunction, and command them not to quit the service? Or, suppose they remain in the service, and announce to their employer their intention of not selling a certain line of goods, or of not selling any line of goods to white people, and it appears that the sale of that line of goods, and the sale of all goods to all customers, is essential to the Christmas business, so that, if

they are not then sold, the employer will, practically, lose the value of his goods that ought to be sold, will the court interfere by injunction, and command the salesmen or saleswomen, if they remain in the service, to sell that line of goods, or to sell goods to white people as well as to colored people?

Take another illustration: Suppose, at a season like "Merchants' week," or Christmas, the owner of a large city store has in his employment a thousand persons, skilled in the handling and sale of goods at that season, whose places cannot be readily supplied if they vacate them, and the owners of two or more very large establishments, for the purpose of preventing the owner from selling those goods, and to get the trade themselves, advise all the employés of the owner to quit his service, or, by an offer of higher wages, induce them all to quit that service, whereby the owner of the store is about to suffer irreparable injury, as he undoubtedly would; should a court of equity enjoin those employés from leaving the service of the owner, or enjoin the owners of the other establishments from hiring them, or from advising them to quit?

Or, suppose, instead of advising them to quit, or hiring them to do so, those other employers advise them not to handle a certain important line of goods which the owner of the store has to sell, and do this for the purpose of themselves selling that line of goods which they likewise have to sell. That an irreparable injury to the owner would follow, if this advice were acted upon, is apparent; but would a court of equity enjoin the employés, by a mandatory injunction, to handle this line of goods, or enjoin these other employers from advising them not to do so? Suppose such a combination on the part of the employers to be a criminal conspiracy, would that alone give jurisdiction in equity, which would not otherwise exist?

Where are the courts to stop, if they once set out in this direction? In view of the decision by which the employés

of the Lake Shore Railroad, and of the Northern Pacific Railroad, were enjoined from leaving the service of those roads at a time when traffic would be thereby stopped, and were commanded, if they did remain in the service, to handle interstate freight as well as state freight, what answer could a federal court have to the application of a farmer to restrain his hired man from leaving his employment, when a crop would be lost if he did leave, or to command the hired man, if he remained, to harvest a particular crop, which would be lost if he did not harvest it? Upon what principle could relief be denied the farmer, which had been granted to the railroad company?

Suppose a case in court, where several lawyers have been engaged in its preparation, and are required for its trial by the plaintiff, or the defendant, and one or more of the lawyers is about to quit the preparation of the case, and to refuse to proceed in its trial, the irreparable injury that might arise to their clients in such a case is obvious; but can a court, because it finds that such irreparable injury would ensue, enjoin them, and issue an injunction forbiding the lawyers to leave the service of their clients, or command them, if they remain, to perform a certain portion of the service in the preparation and trial of the case, which they refuse to perform? Benton has lost his reason

Suppose a professional nurse in attendance, or a surgeon or physician in attendance upon a patient is about to leave the service, and no other physician or nurse can be obtained; the irreparable injury that would result to the patient is obvious; but would the court interfere by injunction, and compel the physician or the nurse to remain? And yet, if the ground upon which these injunctions in the railroad cases have been issued is sound, the court ought to interfere in every case of this kind.

Turn it about. Suppose two or more railroad corporations, mining companies, or manufacturing companies, or two or more merchants or farmers, combine and discharge