Gompers v. Buck's Stove & Range Co.

Gompers v. Buck's Stove and Range Co.
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued January 27, 30, 1911 Decided May 15, 1911
Full case name	Samuel Gompers, John Mitchell, and Frank Morrison v. Buck's Stove and Range Company
Citations	221 U.S. 418 (more) 31 S. Ct. 492; 55 L. Ed. 797; 1911 U.S. LEXIS 1746
Prior history	On appeal from the Court of Appeals of the District of Columbia
Holding
In part, court of appeals erred in treating contempt action as one for criminal contempt because the proceeding was in equity; case is moot, in part.
Court membership
Chief Justice Edward D. White Associate Justices John M. Harlan · Joseph McKenna Oliver W. Holmes, Jr. · William R. Day Horace H. Lurton · Charles E. Hughes Willis Van Devanter · Joseph R. Lamar
Case opinions
Majority	Lamar, joined by unanimous
Laws applied
Sherman Antitrust Act

Gompers v. Buck's Stove and Range Co., 221 U.S. 418 (1911), was a ruling by the United States Supreme Court involving a case of contempt for violating the terms of an injunction restraining labor union leaders from a boycott or from publishing any statement that there was or had been a boycott.

Facts

In 1906 the metal polishers in the Buck Stove and Range Company in St. Louis, Missouri, struck for a nine-hour day. The American Federation of Labor put the company on their "unfair list", whereupon the company obtained a sweeping injunction forbidding this boycott. For refusal to obey, Samuel Gompers, John Mitchell and Frank Morrison were sentenced to prison for contempt.

Judgment

The Supreme Court dismissed the case, in part, as moot. Buck's Stove president James Van Cleave had died in 1910 and his successor resolved his dispute with the workers. The court also reversed the contempt decision on the grounds that the proceedings should have been instituted by the court rather than the plaintiff (the Buck's Stove company).

In the second contempt trial held in 1912, the defendants were again found guilty and sentenced to prison. The Supreme Court overturned the convictions in Gompers v. U.S., 233 U.S. 604 (1914) because the proceedings had not been instituted within the three-year statute of limitations imposed by the Clayton Antitrust Act.

See also

• History of labor law in the United States
• List of United States Supreme Court cases, volume 221

References

• Adams, James Truslow. Dictionary of American History. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1940.
• Foner, Philip S. History of the Labor Movement in the United States. Vol. 5: The AFL in the Progressive Era, 1910-1915. New York: International Publishers, 1980. Cloth ISBN 0-7178-0570-0; Paperback ISBN 0-7178-0562-X
• Rayback, Joseph G. A History of American Labor. Rev. and exp. ed. New York: MacMillan Publishing Co., 1974. ISBN 1-299-50529-5

External links

• Full text of the decision courtesy of Findlaw.com