The order of the Circuit Court finding the petitioner guilty of
contempt and sentencing them to imprisonment was not a final
judgment or decree. The government of the United States has
jurisdiction over every foot of soil within its territory, and acts
directly upon each citizen.
While it is a government of enumerated powers, it has full
attributes of sovereignty within the limits of those powers, among
which are the
Page 158 U. S. 565
power over interstate commerce and the power over the
transmission of the mails.
The powers thus conferred are not dormant, but have been assumed
and put into practical exercise by Congressional legislation.
In the exercise of those powers, the United States may remove
everything put upon highways, natural or artificial, to obstruct
the passage of interstate commerce, or the carrying of the
mails.
While it may be competent for the government, through the
executive branch and in the use of the entire executive power of
the Nation, to forcibly remove all such obstructions, it is equally
within its competency to appeal to the civil courts for an inquiry
and determination as to the existence and the character of any of
them, and if such are found to exist or threaten to occur, to
invoke the powers of those courts to remove or restrain them, the
jurisdiction of courts to interfere in such matters by injunction
being recognized from ancient times and by indubitable
authority.
Such jurisdiction is not ousted by the fact that the
obstructions are accompanied by or consist of acts in themselves
violations of the criminal law, or by the fact that the proceeding
by injunction is of a civil character, and may be enforced by
proceedings in contempt; as the penalty for a violation of such
injunction is no substitute for, and no defence to, a prosecution
for criminal offences committed in the course of such
violation.
The complaint filed in this case clearly shows an existing
obstruction of artificial highways for the passage of interstate
commerce and the transmission of the mails, not only temporarily
existing, but threatening to continue, and under it, the Circuit
Court had power to issue its process of injunction.
Such an injunction having been issued and served upon the
defendants, the Circuit Court had authority to inquire whether its
orders had been disobeyed, and, when it found that they had been
disobeyed, to proceed under Rev.Stat. § 725 and to enter the
order of punishment complained of.
The Circuit Court having full jurisdiction in the premises, its
findings as to the act of disobedience are not open to review on
habeas corpus in this or any other court.
The court enters into no examination of the act of July 2, 1890,
c. 647, 26 Stat. 209, on which the Circuit Court mainly relied to
sustain its jurisdiction, but it must not be understood that it
dissents from the conclusions of that court in reference to the
scope of that act, but simply that it prefers to rest its judgment
on the broader ground discussed in its opinion, believing it
important that the principles underlying it should be fully stated
and fully affirmed.
On July 2, 1894, the United States, by Thomas E. Milchrist,
district attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, under the
direction of Richard Olney, Attorney General, filed their
Page 158 U. S. 566
bill of complaint in the Circuit Court of the United States for
the Northern District of Illinois against these petitioners and
others. This bill set forth, among other things, the following
facts: it named twenty-two railroad companies, and it alleged that
they were engaged in the business of interstate commerce and
subject to the provisions of the act of Congress of February 4,
1887, known as "the Interstate Commerce Act," and all other laws of
the United States relating to interstate transportation of
passengers and freight; that the number of passengers annually
carried by them into the city of Chicago from other States than
Illinois, and out of Chicago into other States than Illinois, was
more than twelve millions, and in like manner that the freight so
carried into and out of the city of Chicago, from and into other
States than Illinois, amounted to many millions of tons; that each
of the roads was under contract to carry, and in fact carrying, the
mails of the United States; that all were by statute declared post
roads of the government; that many were by special acts of Congress
required at any and all times to carry the troops and military
forces of the United States, and provisions, munitions, and general
supplies therefor; and that two of them were in the hands of
receivers appointed by the courts of the United States. It stated
at some length the necessity of the continued and uninterrupted
running of such interstate railroads for the bringing into the city
of Chicago supplies for its citizens and for the carrying on of the
varied industries of that city.
The bill further averred that four of the defendants, naming
them, were officers of an association known as the American Railway
Union; that, in the month of May, 1894, there arose a difference or
dispute between the Pullman Palace Car Company and its employees,
as the result of which a considerable portion of the latter left
the service of the car company; that thereafter, the four officers
of the railway union combined together, and with others, to compel
an adjustment of such dispute, by creating a boycott against the
cars of the car company; that, to make such boycott effective, they
had already prevented certain of the railroads running out of
Chicago from operating their trains, and were combining to
extend
Page 158 U. S. 567
such boycott against Pullman sleeping cars by causing strikes
among employees of all railroads attempting to haul the same. It
charged knowledge on the part of the defendants of the necessity of
the use of sleeping cars in the operation of the business of the
railroads as common carriers, of the contracts for such use between
the railroad companies and the car company, of the contracts, laws,
and regulations binding the railway companies and the receivers to
the carrying of the mails; also of the fact that sleeping cars were
and of necessity must be carried upon the trains of said carriers
with cars containing the mails; that with this knowledge, they
entered into a combination and conspiracy to prevent the railroad
companies and the receivers, and each of them, from performing
their duties as common carriers of interstate commerce, and, in
carrying into execution that conspiracy, did induce various
employees of the railway companies to leave the service of the
companies, and prevent such companies and the receivers from
securing other persons to take their places; that they issued
orders, notifications, etc., to the members of the railway union to
leave the service of the companies and receivers, and to prevent
the companies and receivers from operating their trains; that they
had asserted that they could and would tie up, paralyze, and break
down any and every of said railway companies and receivers which
did not accede to their demands; that, in pursuance of the
instructions, commands, and requests of said officers, large
numbers of the employees of the railway companies and receivers
left their service.
Then followed these allegations:
"And your orator further charges that said defendants aimed and
intended, and do now aim and intend, in and by the said conspiracy
and combination, to secure unto themselves the entire control of
the interstate, industrial, and commercial business in which the
population of the city of Chicago and of the other communities
along the lines of road of said railways are engaged with each
other, and to restrain any and all other persons from any
independent control or management of such interstate, industrial,
or commercial enterprises save according to the will and with the
consent of the defendants. "
Page 158 U. S. 568
"Your orator further avers that, in pursuance of said
combination and conspiracy and to accomplish the purpose thereof as
hereinbefore set forth, the said defendants Debs, Howard, Rogers,
Keliher and others, officers of said American Railway Union, issued
or caused to be issued the orders and directions as above set
forth, and that, in obedience of such orders and in pursuance of
said conspiracy and combination, numerous employees of said
railroad companies and receivers unitedly refused to obey the
orders of said employers or to perform the usual duties of such
service, and many others of such employees quit such service with
the common purpose, and with the result, of preventing said
railroad companies and receivers from operating their said
railroads and from transporting the United States mails, and from
carrying on or conducting their duties as common carriers of
interstate traffic."
"Your orator further avers that, pursuant to said combination
and conspiracy, and under the direction as aforesaid of said
officers and directors of said American Railway Union, said other
defendants and other persons, whose names are to your orator
unknown, proceeded by collecting together in large numbers, by
threats, intimidation, force and violence at the station grounds,
yards and right of way of said railroad companies, respectively, in
the State of Illinois, to prevent said railroad companies from
employing other persons to fill the vacancies aforesaid; to compel
others still employees of said railroad companies to quit such
employment and to refuse to perform the duties of their service,
and to prevent the persons remaining in such service and ready and
willing to perform the duties of the same from doing so."
"Your orator further avers that said defendants, in pursuance of
said combination and conspiracy, acting under the direction of said
officers and directors of said American Railway Union, did with
force and violence at divers times and places within said State of
Illinois and elsewhere, stop, obstruct and derail and wreck the
engines and trains of said railroad companies, both passenger and
freight, then and there engaged in interstate commerce and in
transporting United States mails, by locking the switches of the
railroad of said
Page 158 U. S. 569
railroad companies by removing the spikes and rails from the
track thereof, by turning switches and displacing and destroying
signals, by assaulting and interfering with and disabling the
switchmen and other employs of said railroad companies having
charge of the signals, switches, and tracks of said companies and
the movement of trains thereon, and in other manners by force and
violence, depriving the employees of said railroad companies in
charge of such trains of the control and management of the same,
and, by these and other unlawful means, attempted to obtain and
exercise absolute control and domination over the entire operations
of said railroads."
The bill further set forth that there had become established in
the city of Chicago a business conducted under the name of the
Union Stock Yards, at which, for many years, immense numbers of
livestock from States and Territories beyond the State of Illinois
had been received, slaughtered, and converted into food products
and distributed to all quarters of the globe, and that all the
large centres of population in the United States were in a great
degree dependent upon those stockyards for their food supply of
that character; that, for the purpose of handling such livestock
and the product thereof, the company conducting such business
operated certain railroad tracks, and that, in pursuance of the
combination and conspiracy aforesaid, the four defendants, officers
of the railway union, issued orders directing all the employs
handling such railroad tracks to abandon such service.
To this was added the following:
"And your orator further alleges that, in pursuance of the like
combination and unlawful conspiracy, the said defendants and others
combining and conspiring with them for the purpose of still further
restraining and preventing the conduct of such business, have, by
menaces, threats, and intimidation, prevented the employment of
other persons to take the place of the employees quitting the
service of said company so operating said Union Stock Yards."
"And your orator further charges that, by reason of said
unlawful combination and conspiracy and the acts and doings
aforesaid thereunder, the supply of coal and fuel for
consumption
Page 158 U. S. 570
throughout the different States of the Union and of grain,
breadstuffs, vegetables, fruits, meats and other necessaries of
life, has been cut off, interrupted, and interfered with, and the
market therefor made largely unavailable, and dealers in all of
said various products and the consumers thereof have been greatly
injured, and trade and commerce therein among the States has been
restrained, obstructed, and largely destroyed."
The bill alleged that the defendants threatened and declared
that they would continue to restrain, obstruct, and interfere with
interstate commerce, as above set forth, and that they
"will, if necessary to carry out the said unlawful combination
and conspiracy above set forth, tie up and paralyze the operations
of every railway in the United States, and the in and industries
dependent thereon."
Following these allegations was a prayer for an injunction. The
bill was verified.
On presentation of it to the court, an injunction was ordered
commanding the defendants
"and all persons combining and conspiring with them, and all
other persons whomsoever, absolutely to desist and refrain from in
any way or manner interfering with, hindering, obstructing or
stopping any of the business of any of the following named
railroads,"
(specifically naming the various roads named in the bill)
"as common carriers of passengers and freight between or among
any States of the United States, and from in any way or manner
interfering with, hindering, obstructing or stopping any mail
trains, express trains or other trains, whether freight or
passenger, engaged in interstate commerce, or carrying passengers
or freight between or among the States; and from in any manner
interfering with, hindering or stopping any trains carrying the
mail; and from in any manner interfering with, hindering,
obstructing or stopping any engines, cars or rolling stock of any
of said companies engaged in interstate commerce, or in connection
with the carriage of passengers or freight between or among the
States; and from in any manner interfering with, injuring or
destroying any of the property of any of said railroads engaged in
or for the purpose of, or in connection with, interstate commerce
or the carriage of
Page 158 U. S. 571
the mails of the United States or the transportation of
passengers or freight between or among the States; and from
entering upon the grounds or premises of any of said railroads for
the purpose of interfering with, hindering, obstructing, or
stopping any of said mail trains, passenger or freight trains
engaged in interstate commerce, or in the transportation of
passengers or freight between or among the States, or for the
purpose of interfering with, injuring, or destroying any of said
property so engaged in or used in connection with interstate
commerce or the transportation of passengers or property between or
among the States; and from injuring or destroying any part of the
tracks, roadbed, or road, or permanent structures of said
railroads; and from injuring, destroying, or in any way interfering
with any of the signals or switches of any of said railroads; and
from displacing or extinguishing any of the signals of any of said
railroads, and from spiking, locking, or in any manner fastening
any of the switches of any of said railroads, and from uncoupling
or in any way hampering or obstructing the control by any of said
railroads of any of the cars, engines, or parts of trains of any of
said railroads engaged in interstate commerce or in the
transportation of passengers or freight between or among the
States, or engaged in carrying any of the mails of the United
States; and from compelling or inducing or attempting to compel or
induce, by threats, intimidation, persuasion, force, or violence,
any of the employs of any of said railroads to refuse or fail to
perform any of their duties as employees of any of said railroads
in connection with the interstate business or commerce of such
railroads or the carriage of the United States mail by such
railroads, or the transportation of passengers or property between
or among the States; and from compelling or inducing or attempting
to compel or induce by threats, intimidation, force, or violence
any of the employees of any said railroads who are employed by such
railroads, and engaged in its service in the conduct of interstate
business or in the operation of any of its trains carrying the mail
of the United States, or doing interstate business, or the
transportation of passengers and freight between and among the
States,
Page 158 U. S. 572
to leave the service of such railroads; and from preventing any
person whatever, by threats, intimidation, force, or violence from
entering the service of any of said railroads and doing the work
thereof, in the carrying of the mails of the United States or the
transportation of passengers and freight between or among the
States; and from doing any act whatever in furtherance of any
conspiracy or combination to restrain either of said railroad
companies or receivers in the free and unhindered control and
handling of interstate commerce over the lines of said railroads,
and of transportation of persons and freight between and among the
States; and from ordering, directing, aiding, assisting, or
abetting in any manner whatever any person or persons to commit any
or either of the acts aforesaid."
"And it is further ordered that the aforesaid injunction and
writ of injunction shall be in force and binding upon such of said
defendants as are named in said bill from and after the service
upon them severally of said writ by delivering to them severally a
copy of said writ or by reading the same to them and the service
upon them respectively of the writ of subpoena herein, and shall be
binding upon said defendants, whose names are alleged to be
unknown, from and after the service of such writ upon them
respectively by the reading of the same to them or by the
publication thereof by posting or printing, and after service of
subpoena upon any of said defendants named herein shall be binding
upon said defendants and upon all other persons whatsoever who are
not named herein from and after the time when they shall severally
have knowledge of the entry of such order and the existence of said
injunction."
This injunction was served upon the defendants -- at least upon
those who are here as petitioners. On July 17, the district
attorney filed in the office of the clerk of said court an
information for an attachment against the four defendants, officers
of the railway union, and, on August 1, a similar information
against the other petitioners. A hearing was had before the Circuit
Court, and, on December 14, these petitioners were found guilty of
contempt, and sentenced to
Page 158 U. S. 573
imprisonment in the county jail for terms varying from three to
six months. 64 Fed.Rep. 724. Having been committed to jail in
pursuance of this order, they, on January 14, 1895, applied to this
court for a writ of error and also one of habeas corpus. The former
was, on January 17, denied, on the ground that the order of the
Circuit Court was not a final judgment or decree. The latter is now
to be considered.
Page 158 U. S. 577
MR. JUSTICE BREWER, after stating the case, delivered the
opinion of the court.
The case presented by the bill is this: the United States,
finding that the interstate transportation of persons and property,
as well as the carriage of the mails, is forcibly obstructed, and
that a combination and conspiracy exists to subject the control of
such transportation to the will of the conspirators, applied to one
of their courts, sitting as a court of equity, for an injunction to
restrain such obstruction and prevent carrying into effect such
conspiracy. Two questions of importance are presented: First. Are
the relations of the general government to interstate commerce and
the transportation of the mails such as authorize a direct
interference to prevent a forcible obstruction thereof. Second. If
authority exists, as authority in governmental affairs implies both
power and duty, has a court of equity jurisdiction to issue an
injunction in aid of the performance of such duty.
Page 158 U. S. 578
First. What are the relations of the general government to
interstate commerce and the transportation of the mails? They are
those of direct supervision, control, and management. While, under
the dual system which prevails with us, the powers of government
are distributed between the State and the Nation, and while the
latter is properly styled a government of enumerated powers, yet
within the limits of such enumeration, it has all the attributes of
sovereignty, and, in the exercise of those enumerated powers, acts
directly upon the citizen, and not through the intermediate agency
of the State.
"The government of the Union, then, is, emphatically and truly a
government of the people. In form and in substance, it emanates
from them. Its powers are granted by them, and are to be exercised
directly on them, and for their benefit."
"No trace is to be found in the Constitution of an intention to
create a dependence of the government of the Union on those of the
States for the execution of the great powers assigned to it. Its
means are adequate to its ends, and on those means alone was it
expected to rely for the accomplishment of its ends. To impose on
it the necessity of resorting to means which it cannot control,
which another government may furnish or withhold, would render its
course precarious, the result of its measures uncertain, and create
a dependence on other governments which might disappoint its most
important designs and is incompatible with the language of the
Constitution."
Chief Justice Marshall in
McCulloch v.
Maryland, 4 Wheat. 316,
17 U. S. 405,
17 U. S.
424.
"Both the States and the United States existed before the
Constitution. The people, through that instrument, established a
more perfect union by substituting a national government, acting,
with ample power, directly upon the citizens, instead of the
confederate government, which acted with powers, greatly
restricted, only upon the States."
Chief Justice Chase in
Lane County v.
Oregon, 7 Wall. 71,
74 U. S. 76.
"We hold it to be an incontrovertible principle that the
government of the United States may, by means of physical force,
exercised through its official agents, execute on every foot of
American soil the powers and functions that belong to
Page 158 U. S. 579
it. This necessarily involves the power to command obedience to
its laws, and hence the power to keep the peace to that
extent."
"This power to enforce its laws and to execute its functions in
all places does not derogate from the power of the State to execute
its laws at the same time and in the same places. The one does not
exclude the other, except where both cannot be executed at the same
time. In that case, the words of the Constitution itself show which
is to yield. 'This Constitution, and all laws which shall be made
in pursuance thereof, shall be the supreme law of the land.'"
Mr. Justice Bradley in
Ex parte Siebold, 100 U.
S. 371,
100 U. S. 395.
See also Schooner Exchange v.
McFadden, 7 Cranch 116,
11 U. S. 136;
Cohens v.
Virginia, 6 Wheat. 264,
19 U. S. 413;
Legal Tender
Cases, 12 Wall. 457,
79 U. S. 555;
Tennessee v. Davis, 100 U. S. 57;
The Chinese Exclusion Case, 130 U.
S. 581;
In re Neagle, 135 U. S.
1;
Logan v. United States, 144 U.
S. 263;
Fong Yue Ting v. United States,
149 U. S. 698;
In re Quarles, ante, 158 U. S. 532.
Among the powers expressly given to the national government are
the control of interstate commerce and the creation and management
of a post office system for the nation. Article I, section 8, of
the Constitution provides that
"the Congress shall have power . . . Third, to regulate commerce
with foreign nations and among the several States, and with the
Indian tribes. . . . Seventh, to establish post offices and post
roads."
Congress has exercised the power granted in respect to
interstate commerce in a variety of legislative acts. Passing by
for the present all that legislation in respect to commerce by
water, and considering only that which bears upon railroad
interstate transportation (for this is the specific matter involved
in this case), these acts may be noticed: first, that of June 15,
1866, c. 124, 14 Stat. 66, carried into the Revised Statutes as
section 5258, which provides:
"Whereas the Constitution of the United States confers upon
Congress, in express terms, the power to regulate commerce among
the several States, to establish post roads, and to raise and
support armies: Therefore,
Be it enacted by the
Page 158 U. S. 580
Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of
America in Congress assembled, That every railroad company in
the United States whose road is operated by steam, its successors
and assigns, be, and is hereby, authorized to carry upon and over
its road, boats, bridges, and ferries all passengers, troops,
government supplies, mails, freight, and property on their way from
any State to another State, and to receive compensation therefor,
and to connect with roads of other States so as to form continuous
lines for the transportation of the same to the place of
destination."
Second. That of March 8, 1873, c. 22, 17 Stat. 84, Rev.Stat.
§ 4386 to 4389, which regulates the transportation of
livestock over interstate railroads. Third. That of May 29, 1884,
c. 60, § 6, 23 Stat. 31, 32, prohibiting interstate
transportation by railroads of livestock affected with any
contagious or infectious disease. Fourth. That of February 4, 1887,
c. 104, 94 Stat. 39, with its amendments of March 2, 1889, c. 382,
25 Stat. 855, and February 10, 1891, c. 128, 26 Stat. 743, known as
the "interstate commerce act," by which a commission was created
with large powers of regulation and control of interstate commerce
by railroads, and the sixteenth section of which act gives to the
courts of the United States power to enforce the orders of the
commission. Fifth. That of October 1, 18881, c. 1063, 25 Stat. 501,
providing for arbitration between railroad interstate companies and
their employees; and, Sixth, the act of March 2, 1893, c. 196, 27
Stat. 531, requiring the use of automatic couplers on interstate
trains and empowering the Interstate Commerce Commission to enforce
its provisions.
Under the power vested in Congress to establish post offices and
post roads, Congress has, by a mass of legislation, established the
great post office system of the country, with all its detail of
organization, its machinery for the transaction of business,
defining what shall be carried and what not, and the prices of
carriage, and also prescribing penalties for all offences against
it.
Obviously these powers given to the national government over
interstate commerce and in respect to the transportation
Page 158 U. S. 581
of the mails were not dormant and unused. Congress had taken
hold of these two matters, and, by various and specific acts, had
assumed and exercised the powers given to it, and was in the full
discharge of its duty to regulate interstate commerce and carry the
mails. The validity of such exercise and the exclusiveness of its
control had been again and again presented to this court for
consideration. It is curious to note the fact that, in a large
proportion of the cases in respect to interstate commerce brought
to this court, the question presented was of the validity of state
legislation in its bearings upon interstate commerce, and the
uniform course of decision has been to declare that it is not
within the competency of a State to legislate in such a manner as
to obstruct interstate commerce. If a State, with its recognized
powers of sovereignty, is impotent to obstruct interstate commerce,
can it be that any mere voluntary association of individuals within
the limits of that State has a power which the State itself does
not possess?
As, under the Constitution, power over interstate commerce and
the transportation of the mails is vested in the national
government, and Congress, by virtue of such grant, has assumed
actual and direct control, it follows that the national government
may prevent any unlawful and forcible interference therewith. But
how shall this be accomplished? Doubtless it is within the
competency of Congress to prescribe by legislation that any
interference with these matters shall be offences against the
United States, and prosecuted and punished by indictment in the
proper courts. But is that the only remedy? Have the vast interests
of the nation in interstate commerce and in the transportation of
the mails no other protection than lies in the possible punishment
of those who interfere with it? To ask the question is to answer
it. By article 3, section 2, clause 3, of the Federal Constitution,
it is provided:
"The trial of all crimes except in cases of impeachment shall be
by jury; and such trial shall be held in the State where the said
crime shall have been committed."
If all the inhabitants of a State, or even a great body of them,
should combine to obstruct interstate commerce or the
transportation
Page 158 U. S. 582
of the mails, prosecutions for such offences had in such a
community would be doomed in advance to failure. And if the
certainty of such failure was known, and the national government
had no other way to enforce the freedom of interstate commerce and
the transportation of the mails than by prosecution and punishment
for interference therewith, the whole interests of the nation in
these respects would be at the absolute mercy of a portion of the
inhabitants of that single State.
But there is no such impotency in the national government. The
entire strength of the nation may be used to enforce in any part of
the land the full and free exercise of all national powers and the
security of all rights entrusted by the Constitution to its care.
The strong arm of the national government may be put forth to brush
away all obstructions to the freedom of interstate commerce or the
transportation of the mails. If the emergency arises, the army of
the Nation, and all its militia, are at the service of the Nation
to compel obedience to its laws.
But, passing to the second question, is there no other
alternative than the use of force on the part of the executive
authorities whenever obstructions arise to the freedom of
interstate commerce or the transportation of the mails? Is the army
the only instrument by which rights of the public can be enforced
and the peace of the nation preserved? Grant that any public
nuisance may be forcibly abated either at the instance of the
authorities or by any individual suffering private damage
therefrom, the existence of this right of forcible abatement is not
inconsistent with, nor does it destroy, the right of appeal in an
orderly way to the courts for a judicial determination, and an
exercise of their powers by writ of injunction and otherwise to
accomplish the same result. In
Stamford v. Stamford Horse
Railroad Co., 56 Connecticut 381, an injunction was asked by
the borough to restrain the company from laying down its track in a
street of the borough. The right of the borough to forcibly remove
the track was insisted upon as a ground for questioning the
jurisdiction of a court of equity, but the court sustained the
injunction, adding:
"And none the less so because of its right to remove
Page 158 U. S. 583
the track by force. As a rule, injunctions are denied to those
who have adequate remedy at law. Where the choice is between the
ordinary and the extraordinary processes of law, and the former are
sufficient, the rule will not permit the use of the latter. In some
cases of nuisance and in some cases of trespass, the law permits an
individual to abate the one and prevent the other by force, because
such permission is necessary to the complete protection of property
and person. When the choice is between redress or prevention of
injury by force and by peaceful process, the law is well pleased if
the individual will consent to waive his right to the use of force
and await its action. Therefore, as between force and the
extraordinary writ of injunction, the rule will permit the
latter."
So, in the case before us, the right to use force does not
exclude the right of appeal to the courts for a judicial
determination and for the exercise of all their powers of
prevention. Indeed, it is more to the praise than to the blame of
the government that, instead of determining for itself questions of
right and wrong on the part of these petitioners and their
associates and enforcing that determination by the club of the
policeman and the bayonet of the soldier, it submitted all those
questions to the peaceful determination of judicial tribunals, and
involved their consideration and judgment as to the measure of its
rights and powers and the correlative obligations of those against
whom it made complaint. And it is equally to the credit of the
latter that the judgment of those tribunals was by the great body
of them respected, and the trouble which threatened so much
disaster terminated.
Neither can it be doubted that the government has such an
interest in the subject matter as enables it to appear as party
plaintiff in this suit. It is said that equity only interferes for
the protection of property, and that the government has no property
interest. A sufficient reply is that the United States have a
property in the mails, the protection of which was one of the
purposes of this bill.
Searight v.
Stokes, 3 How. 151,
44 U. S. 169,
arose upon a compact between the United States and the State of
Pennsylvania in respect to the Cumberland Road, which provided,
among other things,
"that no toll shall be
Page 158 U. S. 584
received or collected for the passage of any wagon or carriage
laden with the property of the United States;"
the question being whether a carriage employed in transporting
the mails of the United States was one "laden with the property of
the United States," and it was held that it was, the court, by
Chief Justice Taney, saying:
"The United States have unquestionably a property in the mails.
They are not mere common carriers, but a government, performing a
high official duty in holding and guarding its own property as well
as that of its citizens committed to its care; for a very large
portion of the letters and packages conveyed on this road,
especially during the session of Congress, consists of
communications to or from the officers of the executive
departments, or members of the legislature, on public service, or
in relation to matters of public concern. . . . We think that a
carriage, whenever it is carrying the mail, is laden with the
property of the United States within the true meaning of the
compact."
We do not care to place our decision upon this ground alone.
Every government, entrusted, by the very terms of its being, with
powers and duties to be exercised and discharged for the general
welfare, has a right to apply to its own courts for any proper
assistance in the exercise of the one and the discharge of the
other, and it is no sufficient answer to its appeal to one of those
courts that it has no pecuniary interest in the matter. The
obligations which it is under to promote the interest of all, and
to prevent the wrongdoing of one resulting in injury to the general
welfare, is often, of itself, sufficient to give it a standing in
court. This proposition in some of its relations has heretofore
received the sanction of this court. In
United States v. San
Jacinto Tin Co., 125 U. S. 273,
125 U. S. 285,
was presented an application of the United States to cancel and
annul a patent for land on the ground that it was obtained by fraud
or mistake. The right of the United States to maintain such a suit
was affirmed, though it was held that, if the controversy was
really one only between individuals in respect to their claims to
property, the government ought not to be permitted to interfere,
the court saying:
"If it be a question of property, a case must be made in which
the court can afford a remedy in
Page 158 U. S. 585
regard to that property; if it be a question of fraud which
would render the instrument void, the fraud must operate to the
prejudice of the United States; and if it is apparent that the suit
is brought for the benefit of some third party, and that the United
States has no pecuniary interest in the remedy sought, and is under
no obligation to the party who will be benefited to sustain an
action for his use; in short, if there does not appear any
obligation on the part of the United States to the public or to any
individual, or any interest of its own, it can no more sustain such
an action than any private person could under similar
circumstances."
This language was relied upon in the subsequent case of
United States v. Bell Telephone Company, 128 U.
S. 315,
128 U. S. 367,
which was a suit brought by the United States to set aside a patent
for an invention on the ground that it had been obtained by fraud
or mistake, and it was claimed that the United States, having no
pecuniary interest in the subject matter of the suit, could not be
heard to question the validity of the patent. But this contention
was overruled, the court saying, in response to this argument,
after quoting the foregoing language from the
San Jacinto
case:
"This language is construed by counsel for the appellee in this
case to limit the relief granted at the instance of the United
States to cases in which it has a direct pecuniary interest. But it
is not susceptible of such construction. It was evidently in the
mind of the court that the case before it was one where the
property right to the land in controversy was the matter of
importance, but it was careful to say that the cases in which the
instrumentality of the court cannot thus be used are those where
the United States has no pecuniary interest in the remedy sought,
and is also under no obligation to the party who will be benefited
to sustain an action for his use, and also where it does not appear
that any obligation existed on the part of the United States to the
public or to any individual. The essence of the right of the United
States to interfere in the present case is its obligation to
protect the public from the monopoly of the patent which was
procured by fraud, and it would be difficult to find language more
aptly used to include this in the class of cases which are not
excluded
Page 158 U. S. 586
from the jurisdiction of the court by want of interest in the
government of the United States."
It is obvious from these decisions that, while it is not the
province of the government to interfere in any mere matter of
private controversy between individuals, or to use its great powers
to enforce the rights of one against another, yet, whenever the
wrongs complained of are such as affect the public at large, and
are in respect of matters which by the Constitution are entrusted
to the care of the Nation and concerning which the Nation owes the
duty to all the citizens of securing to them their common rights,
then the mere fact that the government has no pecuniary interest in
the controversy is not sufficient to exclude it from the courts or
prevent it from taking measures therein to fully discharge those
constitutional duties.
The national government, given by the constitution power to
regulate interstate commerce, has, by express statute, assumed
jurisdiction over such commerce when carried upon railroads. It is
charged, therefore, with the duty of keeping those highways of
interstate commerce free from obstruction, for it has always been
recognized as one of the powers and duties of a government to
remove obstructions from the highways under its control.
As said in
Gilman v.
Philadelphia, 3 Wall. 713,
70 U. S.
724:
"The power to regulate commerce comprehends the control for that
purpose, and to the extent necessary, of all the navigable waters
of the United States which are accessible from a State other than
those in which they lie. For this purpose, they are the public
property of the nation, and subject to all the requisite
legislation by Congress. This necessarily includes the power to
keep them open and free from any obstruction to their navigation,
interposed by the States or otherwise; to remove such obstructions
when they exist, and to provide, by such sanctions as they may deem
proper, against the occurrence of the evil and for the punishment
of offenders. For these purposes, Congress possesses all the powers
which existed in the States before the adoption of the national
Constitution, and which have always existed in the Parliament in
England."
See also the following authorities in which, at the
instance of
Page 158 U. S. 587
the State or of some municipality thereof within whose limits
the obstructed highway existed, a like power was asserted:
Stamford v. Stamford Horse Railroad Co., 56 Connecticut
381;
People v. Vanderbilt, 28 N.Y. 396;
State v.
Dayton & Southeastern Railroad, 36 Ohio St. 434;
Springfield v. Connecticut River Railroad, 4 Cush. 63;
Attorney General v. Woods, 108 Mass. 436;
Eaton and
Amboy Railroad Co. v. Greenwich, 25 N.J.Eq. 565;
Stearns
County v. St. Cloud, Mankato and Austin Railroad, 36 Minnesota
425;
Rio Grande Railroad Co. v. Brownsville, 45 Texas 88;
Philadelphia v. 13th & 15th Street Passenger Railway
Co., 8 Phil. 648. Indeed, the obstruction of a highway is a
public nuisance, 4 Bl.Com. 167*, and a public nuisance has always
been held subject to abatement at the instance of the government.
Attorney General v. Tudor Ice Co., 104 Mass. 239, 244;
Attorney General v. Jamaica Pond Aqueduct Corporation, 133
Mass. 361;
Village of Pine City v. Munch, 42 Minnesota
342;
State v. Goodnight, 70 Texas 682.
It may not be amiss to notice a few of the leading cases.
City of Georgetown v.
Alexandria Canal Co., 12 Pet. 91,
37 U. S. 98, was
a bill filed by the plaintiff to restrain the construction of an
aqueduct across the Potomac River. While, under the facts of that
case, the relief prayed for was denied, yet, the jurisdiction of
the court was sustained. After referring to the right to maintain
an action at law for damages, it was said:
"Besides this remedy at law, it is now settled that a court of
equity may take jurisdiction in cases of public nuisance, by an
information filed by the Attorney General. This jurisdiction seems
to have been acted on with great caution and hesitancy. . . . Yet
the jurisdiction has been finally sustained upon the principle that
equity can give more adequate and complete relief than can be
obtained at law. Whilst,therefore it is admitted by all that it is
confessedly one of delicacy, and accordingly the instances of its
exercise are rare, yet it may be exercised in those cases in which
there is imminent danger of irreparable mischief before the
tardiness of the law could reach it. "
Page 158 U. S. 588
State of Pennsylvania v.
Wheeling Bridge Co., 13 How. 518, was a bill filed
by the State of Pennsylvania to enjoin the erection of a bridge
over the Ohio River within the limits of the State of Virginia. A s
the alleged obstruction was not within the State of Pennsylvania,
its right to relief was only that of an individual in case of a
private nuisance, and it was said, on page
54 U. S.
564:
"The injury makes the obstruction a private nuisance to the
injured party; and the doctrine of nuisance applies to the case
where the jurisdiction is made out, the same as in a public
prosecution. If the obstruction be unlawful, and the injury
irreparable by a suit at common law, the injured party may claim
the extraordinary protection of a court of chancery."
"Such a proceeding is as common and as free from difficulty as
an ordinary injunction bill, against a proceeding at law, or to
stay waste or trespass. The powers of a court of chancery are as
well adapted, and as effectual for relief in the case of a private
nuisance, as in either of the cases named. And, in regard to the
exercise of these powers, it is of no importance whether the
eastern channel, over which the bridge is thrown, is wholly within
the limits of the State of Virginia. The Ohio being a navigable
stream, subject to the commercial power of Congress, and over which
that power has been exerted, if the river be within the State of
Virginia, the commerce upon it, which extends to other States, is
not within its jurisdiction; consequently, if the act of Virginia
authorized the structure of the bridge so as to obstruct
navigation, it could afford no justification to the bridge
company."
Coosaw Mining Co. v. South Carolina, 144 U.
S. 550, was a bill filed by the State in one of its own
courts to enjoin the digging, mining, and removing phosphate rock
and deposits in the bed of a navigable river within its
territories. The case was removed by the defendant to the Federal
court, and, in that court, the relief prayed for was granted. The
decree of the Circuit Court was sustained by this court, and, in
the opinion by Mr. Justice Harlan, the matter of equity
jurisdiction is discussed at some length, and several cases cited,
among them
Attorney General v. Richards, 2 Anstr. 604;
Attorney
Page 158 U. S. 589
General v. Forbes, 2 My. & Cr. 123;
Gibson v.
Smith, 2 Atk. 182;
Attorney General v. Jamaica Pond
Aqueduct Corporation, 133 Mass. 361. From
Attorney General
v. Forbes was quoted this declaration of the Lord
Chancellor:
"Many cases might have been produced in which the court has
interfered to prevent nuisances to public rivers and to public
harbors; and the Court of Exchequer, as well as this court, acting
as a court of equity, has a well established jurisdiction, upon a
proceeding by way of information, to prevent nuisances to public
harbors and public roads, and, in short, generally to prevent
public nuisances."
And from
Attorney General v. Jamaica Pond Aqueduct,
these words of the Supreme Court of the State of Massachusetts:
"There is another ground upon which, in our opinion, this
information can be maintained, though perhaps it belongs to the
same general head of equity jurisdiction of restraining and
preventing nuisances. The great ponds of the Commonwealth belong to
the public, and, like the tidewaters and navigable streams, are
under the control and care of the Commonwealth. The rights of
fishing, boating, bathing, and other like rights which pertain to
the public are regarded as valuable rights, entitled to the
protection of the government. . . . If a corporation or an
individual is found to be doing acts without right, the necessary
effect of which is to destroy or impair these rights and
privileges, it furnishes a proper case for an information by the
Attorney General to restrain and prevent the mischief."
An additional case, not noticed in that opinion, may also be
referred to,
Attorney General v. Terry, L.R. 9 Ch. 423, in
which an injunction as granted against extending a wharf a few feet
out into the navigable part of a river, Mellish, L.J., saying: "If
this is an indictable nuisance, there must be a remedy in the Court
of Chancery, and that remedy is by injunction," and James, L.J.,
adding:
"I entirely concur. Where a public body is entrusted with the
duty of being conservators of a river, it is their duty to take
proceedings for the protection of those who use the river."
It is said that the jurisdiction heretofore exercised by the
national government over highways has been in respect to
Page 158 U. S. 590
waterways -- the natural highways of the country -- and not over
artificial highways such as railroads; but the occasion for the
exercise by Congress of its jurisdiction over the latter is of
recent date. Perhaps the first act in the course of such
legislation is that heretofore referred to, of June 14, 1866, but
the basis upon which rests its jurisdiction over artificial
highways is the same as that which supports it over the natural
highways. Both spring from the power to regulate commerce. The
national government has no separate dominion over a river within
the limits of a State; its jurisdiction there is like that over
land within the same State. Its control over the river is simply by
virtue of the fact that it is one of the highways of interstate and
international commerce. The great case of
Gibbons v.
Ogden, 9 Wheat. 1,
22 U. S. 197, in
which the control of Congress over inland waters was asserted,
rested that control on the grant of the power to regulate commerce.
The argument of the Chief Justice was that commerce includes
navigation, "and a power to regulate navigation is as expressly
granted as if that term had been added to the word
commerce.'"
In order to fully regulate commerce with foreign nations, it is
essential that the power of Congress does not stop at the borders
of the nation, and equally so as to commerce among the
States:
"The power of Congress, then, comprehends navigation within the
limits of every State in the Union, so far as that navigation may
be, in any manner, connected with 'commerce with foreign nations,
or among the several States, or with the Indian tribes.' It may, of
consequence, pass the jurisdictional line of New York, and act upon
the very waters to which the prohibition now under consideration
applies."
See also Gilman v.
Philadelphia, 3 Wall. 713,
76 U. S. 725,
in which it was said:
"Wherever 'commerce among the States' goes, the power of the
nation, as represented in this court, goes with it to protect and
enforce its rights."
Up to a recent date, commerce, both interstate and
international, was mainly by water, and it is not strange that both
the legislation of Congress and the cases in the courts have been
principally concerned therewith. The fact that, in recent
Page 158 U. S. 591
years, interstate commerce has come mainly to be carried on by
railroads and over artificial highways has in no manner narrowed
the scope of the constitutional provision or abridged the power of
Congress over such commerce. On the contrary, the same fullness of
control exists in the one case as in the other, and the same power
to remove obstruction from the one as from the other.
Constitutional provisions do not change, but their operation
extends to new matters as the modes of business and the habits of
life of the people vary with each succeeding generation. The law of
the common carrier is the same today as when transportation on land
was by coach and wagon, and on water by canal boat and sailing
vessel, yet, in its actual operation, it touches and regulates
transportation by modes then unknown, the railroad train and the
steamship. Just so is it with the grant to the national government
of power over interstate commerce. The Constitution has not
changed. The power is the same. But it operates today upon modes of
interstate commerce unknown to the fathers, and it will operate
with equal force upon any new modes of such commerce which the
future may develop. It is said that seldom have the courts assumed
jurisdiction to restrain by injunction in suits brought by the
government, either state or national, obstructions to highways,
either artificial or natural. This is undoubtedly true, but the
reason is that the necessity for such interference has only been
occasional. Ordinarily, the local authorities have taken full
control over the matter, and by indictment for misdemeanor, or in
some kindred way, have secured the removal of the obstruction and
the cessation of the nuisance. As said in
Attorney General v.
Brown, 24 N.J.Eq. (9 C.E. Green) 89, 91:
"The jurisdiction of courts of equity to redress the grievance
of public nuisances by injunction is undoubted, and clearly
established; but it is well settled that, as a general rule, equity
will not interfere where the object sought can be as well attained
in the ordinary tribunals.
Attorney General v. New Jersey
Railroad, 2 C.E. Green (17 N.J.Eq.) 136;
Jersey City v.
City of Hudson, 2 Beasley, (13 N.J.Eq.) 420, 426;
Attorney
Page 158 U. S. 592
General v. Heishon, 3 C.E.Green (18 N.J.Eq.) 410;
Morris & Essex Railroad v. Prudden 5 C.E.Green (20
N.J.Eq.) 530, 532; High on Injunctions § 521. And because the
remedy by indictment is so efficacious, courts of equity entertain
jurisdiction in such cases with great reluctance, whether their
intervention is invoked at the instance of the attorney general or
of a private individual who suffers some injury therefrom distinct
from that of the public, and they will only do so where there
appears to be a necessity for their interference.
Rowe v. The
Granite Bridge Corporation, 21 Pick. 340, 347;
Morris
& Essex Railroad v. Prudden, supra. The jurisdiction of
the court of chancery with regard to public nuisances is founded on
the irreparable damage to individuals, or the great public injury
which is likely to ensue. 3 Daniell's Ch.Pr. 3d ed. Perkins',
1740."
Indeed, it may be affirmed that in no well considered case has
the power of a court of equity to interfere by injunction in cases
of public nuisance been denied, the only denial ever being that of
a necessity for the exercise of that jurisdiction under the
circumstances of the particular case. Story's Eq.Jur. §§
921, 923, 924; Pomeroy's Eq.Jur. § 1349; High on Injunctions
§§ 74 and 1554; 2 Daniell's Ch.Pl. and Pr. 4th ed. p.
1636.
That the bill filed in this case alleged special facts calling
for the exercise of all the powers of the court is not open to
question. The picture drawn in it of the vast interests involved,
not merely of the city of Chicago and the State of Illinois, but of
all the States, and the general confusion into which the interstate
commerce of the country was thrown; the forcible interference with
that commerce; the attempted exercise by individuals of powers
belonging only to government, and the threatened continuance of
such invasions of public right, presented a condition of affairs
which called for the fullest exercise of all the powers of the
courts. If ever there was a special exigency, one which demanded
that the court should do all that courts can do, it was disclosed
by this bill, and we need not turn to the public history of the
day, which only reaffirms with clearest emphasis all its
allegations.
The difference between a public nuisance and a private
nuisance
Page 158 U. S. 593
is that the one affects the people at large, and the other
simply the individual. The quality of the wrong is the same, and
the jurisdiction of the courts over them rests upon the same
principles and goes to the same extent. Of course, circumstances
may exist in one case, which do not in another, to induce the court
to interfere or to refuse to interfere by injunction, but the
jurisdiction, the power to interfere, exists in all cases of
nuisance. True, many more suits are brought by individuals than by
the public to enjoin nuisances, but there are two reasons for this.
First, the instances are more numerous of private than of public
nuisances; and, second, often that which is in fact a public
nuisance is restrained at the suit of a private individual, whose
right to relief arises because of a special injury resulting
therefrom.
Again, it is objected that it is outside of the jurisdiction of
a court of equity to enjoin the commission of crimes. This, as a
general proposition, is unquestioned. A chancellor has no criminal
jurisdiction. Something more than the threatened commission of an
offence against the laws of the land is necessary to call into
exercise the injunctive powers of the court. There must be some
interferences, actual or threatened, with property or rights of a
pecuniary nature, but when such interferences appear, the
jurisdiction of a court of equity arises, and is not destroyed by
the fact that they are accompanied by, or are themselves,
violations of the criminal law. Thus, in
Cranford v.
Tyrrell, 128 N.Y. 341, an injunction to restrain the defendant
from keeping a house of ill fame was sustained, the court saying,
on page 344:
"That the perpetrator of the nuisance is amenable to the
provisions and penalties of the criminal law is not an answer to an
action against him by a private person to recover for injury
sustained, and for an injunction against the continued use of his
premises in such a manner."
And in
Mobile v. Louisville & Nashville Railroad,
84 Alabama 115, 126, is a similar declaration in these words:
"The mere fact that an act is criminal does not divest the
jurisdiction of equity to prevent it by injunction, if it be also a
violation of property rights, and the party aggrieved has no other
adequate remedy for the prevention of the irreparable
Page 158 U. S. 594
injury which will result from the failure or inability of a
court of law to redress such rights."
The law is full of instances in which the same act may give rise
to a civil action and a criminal prosecution. An assault with
intent to kill may be punished criminally under an indictment
therefor, or will support a civil action for damages, and the same
is true of all other offences which cause injury to person or
property. In such cases, the jurisdiction of the civil court is
invoked not to enforce the criminal law and punish the wrongdoer,
but to compensate the injured party for the damages which he or his
property has suffered, and it is no defence to the civil action
that the same act by the defendant exposes him also to indictment
and punishment in a court of criminal jurisdiction. So here the
acts of the defendants may or may not have been violations of the
criminal law. If they were, that matter is for inquiry in other
proceedings. The complaint made against them in this is of
disobedience to an order of a civil court, made for the protection
of property and the security of rights. If any criminal prosecution
be brought against them for the criminal offences alleged in the
bill of complaint, of derailing and wrecking engines and trains,
assaulting and disabling employes of the railroad companies, it
will be no defence to such prosecution that they disobeyed the
orders of injunction served upon them and have been punished for
such disobedience.
Nor is there in this any invasion of the constitutional right of
trial by jury. We fully agree with counsel that "it matters not
what form the attempt to deny constitutional right may take. It is
vain and ineffectual, and must be so declared by the courts," and
we reaffirm the declaration made for the court by Mr. Justice
Bradley in
Boyd v. United States, 116 U.
S. 616,
116 U. S. 635,
that
"it is the duty of courts to be watchful for the constitutional
rights of the citizen, and against any stealthy encroachments
thereon. Their motto should be
obsta principiis."
But the power of a court to make an order carries with it the
equal power to punish for a disobedience of that order, and the
inquiry as to the question of disobedience has been from time
immemorial the special function of the court. And
Page 158 U. S. 595
this is no technical rule. In order that a court may compel
obedience to its orders, it must have the right to inquire whether
there has been any disobedience thereof. To submit the question of
disobedience to another tribunal, be it a jury or another court,
would operate to deprive the proceeding of half its efficiency. In
the
Case of Yates, 4 Johns. 314, 369, Chancellor Kent,
then Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the State of New York,
said:
"In the
Case of the Earl of Shaftesbury, 2 St.Trials,
61;
S.C.1 Mod. 144, who was imprisoned by the House of
Lords for 'high contempts committed against it' and brought into
the King's Bench, the court held that they had no authority to
judge of the contempt, and remanded the prisoner. The court in that
case seem to have laid down a principle from which they never have
departed, and which is essential to the due administration of
justice. This principle that every court, at least of the superior
kind, in which great confidence is placed, must be the sole judge,
in the last resort, of contempts arising therein, is more
explicitly defined and more emphatically enforced in the two
subsequent cases of the
Queen v. Paty and others, and of
the
King v. Crosby."
And again, on page 371,
"Mr. Justice Blackstone pursued the same train of observation,
and declared that all courts, by which he meant to include the two
houses of Parliament and the courts of Westminster Hall, could have
no control in matters of contempt. That the sole adjudication of
contempts, and the punishments thereof, belonged exclusively, and
without interfering, to each respective court."
In
Watson v. Williams, 36 Mississippi 331, 341, it was
said:
"The power to fine and imprison for contempt, from the earliest
history of jurisprudence, has been regarded as a necessary incident
and attribute of a court, without which it could no more exist than
without a judge. It is a power inherent in all courts of record,
and coexisting with them by the wise provisions of the common law.
A court without the power effectually to protect itself against the
assaults of the lawless, or to enforce its orders, judgments, or
decrees against the recusant parties before it, would be a disgrace
to the legislation, and a stigma upon the age which invented
it."
In
Cartwright's
Page 158 U. S. 596
Case, 114 Mass. 230, 238, we find this language:
"The summary power to commit and punish for contempts tending to
obstruct or degrade the administration of justice is inherent in
courts of chancery and other superior courts, as essential to the
execution of their powers and to the maintenance of their
authority, and is part of the law of the land within the meaning of
Magna Charta and of the twelfth article of our Declaration of
Rights."
See also United State v.
Hudson, 7 Cranch 32;
Anderson
v. Dunn, 6 Wheat. 204;
Ex parte
Robinson, 19 Wall. 505 ;
Mugler v. Kansas,
123 U. S. 623,
123 U. S. 672;
Ex parte Terry, 128 U. S. 289;
Eilenbecker v. Plymouth County, 134 U. S.
31,
134 U. S. 36 in
which Mr. Justice Miller observed:
"If it has ever been understood that proceedings according to
the common law for contempt of court have been subject to the right
of trial by jury, we have been unable to find any instance of
it;"
Interstate Commerce Commission v. Brimson, 154 U.
S. 447,
154 U. S. 488.
In this last case, it was said,
"surely it cannot be supposed that the question of contempt of
the authority of a court of the United States, committed by a
disobedience of its orders, is triable of right by a jury."
In brief, a court, enforcing obedience to its orders by
proceedings for contempt, is not executing the criminal laws of the
land, but only securing to suitors the rights which it has adjudged
them entitled to. Further, it is said by counsel in their
brief:
"No case can be cited where such a bill in behalf of the
sovereign has been entertained against riot and mob violence,
though occurring on the highway. It is not such fitful and
temporary obstruction that constitutes a nuisance. The strong hand
of executive power is required to deal with such lawless
demonstrations."
"The courts should stand aloof from them, and not invade
executive prerogative, nor even at the behest or request of the
executive travel out of the beaten path of well settled judicial
authority. A mob cannot be suppressed by injunction, nor can its
leaders be tried, convicted, and sentenced in equity."
"It is too great a strain upon the judicial branch of the
Page 158 U. S. 597
government to impose this essentially executive and military
power upon courts of chancery."
We do not perceive that this argument questions the jurisdiction
of the court, but only the expediency of the action of the
government in applying for its process. It surely cannot be
seriously contended that the court has jurisdiction to enjoin the
obstruction of a highway by one person, but that its jurisdiction
ceases when the obstruction is by a hundred persons. It may be
true, as suggested, that, in the excitement of passion, a mob will
pay little heed to processes issued from the courts, and it may be,
as aid by counsel in argument, that it would savor somewhat of the
puerile and ridiculous to have read a writ of injunction to Lee's
army during the late civil war. It is doubtless true that
inter
arma leges silent, and in the throes of rebellion or
revolution, the processes of civil courts are of little avail, for
the power of the courts rests on the general support of the people
and their recognition of the fact that peaceful remedies are the
true resort for the correction of wrongs. But does not counsel's
argument imply too much? Is it to be assumed that these defendants
were conducting a rebellion or inaugurating a revolution, and that
they and their associates were thus placing themselves beyond the
reach of the civil process of the courts? We find in the opinion of
the Circuit Court a quotation from the testimony given by one of
the defendants before the United States Strike Commission, which is
sufficient answer to this suggestion:
"As soon as the employees found that we were arrested, and taken
from the scene of action, they became demoralized, and that ended
the strike. It was not the soldiers that ended the strike. It was
not the old brotherhoods that ended the strike. It was simply the
United States courts that ended the strike. Our men were in a
position that never would have been shaken, under any
circumstances, if we had been permitted to remain upon the field
among them. Once we were taken from the scene of action, and
restrained from sending telegrams or issuing orders or answering
question, then the minions of the corporations would be put to
work. . . .
Page 158 U. S. 598
Our headquarters were temporarily demoralized and abandoned, and
we could not answer any messages. The men went back to work, and
the ranks were broken, and the strike was broken up, . . . not by
the army, and not by any other power, but simply and solely by the
action of the United States courts in restraining us from
discharging our duties as officers and representatives of our
employees."
Whatever any single individual may have thought or planned, the
great body of those who were engaged in these transactions
contemplated neither rebellion nor revolution, and when, in the due
order of legal proceedings, the question of right and wrong was
submitted to the courts, and by them decided, they unhesitatingly
yielded to their decisions. The outcome, by the very testimony of
the defendants, attests the wisdom of the course pursued by the
government, and that it was well not to oppose force simply by
force, but to invoke the jurisdiction and judgment of those
tribunals to whom, by the Constitution and in accordance with the
settled conviction of all citizens, is committed the determination
of questions of right and wrong between individuals, masses, and
States.
It must be borne in mind that this bill was not simply to enjoin
a mob and mob violence. It was not a bill to command a keeping of
the peace; much less was its purport to restrain the defendants
from abandoning whatever employment they were engaged in. The right
of any laborer, or any number of laborers, to quit work was not
challenged. The scope and purpose of the bill was only to restrain
forcible obstructions of the highways along which interstate
commerce travels and the mails are carried. And the facts set forth
at length are only those facts which tended to show that the
defendants were engaged in such obstructions.
A most earnest and eloquent appeal was made to us in eulogy of
the heroic spirit of those who threw up their employment, and gave
up their means of earning a livelihood, not in defence of their own
rights, but in sympathy or and to assist others whom they believed
to be wronged. We yield to none in our admiration of any act of
heroism or self-sacrifice, but we may be permitted to add that it
is a lesson
Page 158 U. S. 599
which cannot be learn too soon or too thoroughly that, under
this government of and by the people, the means of redress of all
wrongs are through the courts and at the ballot box, and that no
wrong, real or fancied, carries with it legal warrant to invite as
a means of redress the cooperation of a mob, with its accompanying
acts of violence.
We have given to this case the most careful and anxious
attention, for we realize that it touches closely questions of
supreme importance to the people of this country. Summing up our
conclusions, we hold that the government of the United States is
one having jurisdiction over every foot of soil within its
territory, and acting directly upon each citizen; that, while it is
a government of enumerated powers, it has within the limits of
those powers all the attributes of sovereignty; that to it is
committed power over interstate commerce and the transmission of
the mail; that the powers thus conferred upon the national
government are not dormant, but have been assumed and put into
practical exercise by the legislation of Congress; that, in the
exercise of those powers, it is competent for the nation to remove
all obstructions upon highways, natural or artificial, to the
passage of interstate commerce or the carrying of the mail; that
while it may be competent for the government (through the executive
branch and in the use of the entire executive power of the nation)
to forcibly remove all such obstructions, it is equally within its
competency to appeal to the civil courts for an inquiry and
determination as to the existence and character of any alleged
obstructions, and, if such are found to exist, or threaten to
occur, to invoke the powers of those courts to remove or restrain
such obstructions; that the jurisdiction of courts to interfere in
such matter by injunction is one recognized from ancient times and
by indubitable authority; that such jurisdiction is not ousted by
the fact that the obstructions are accompanied by or consist of
acts in themselves violations of the criminal law; that the
proceeding by injunction is of a civil character, and may be
enforced by proceedings in contempt; that such proceedings are not
in execution of the criminal laws of the land; that the penalty for
a violation of
Page 158 U. S. 600
injunction is no substitute for, and no defence to, a
prosecution for any criminal offences committed in the course of
such violation; that the complaint filed in this case clearly
showed an existing obstruction of artificial highways for the
passage of interstate commerce and the transmission of the mail --
an obstruction not only temporarily existing, but threatening to
continue; that, under such complaint, the Circuit Court had power
to issue its process of injunction; that, it having been issued and
served on these defendants, the Circuit Court had authority to
inquire whether its orders had been disobeyed, and, when it found
that they had been, then to proceed under section 725, Revised
Statutes, which grants power
"to punish, by fine or imprisonment, . . . disobedience, . . .
by any party . . . or other person, to any lawful writ, process,
order, rule, decree or command,"
and enter the order of punishment complained of; and, finally,
that, the Circuit Court, having full jurisdiction in the premises,
its finding of the fact of disobedience is not open to review on
habeas corpus in this or any other court.
Ex parte
Watkins, 3 Pet. 193;
Ex parte Yarbrough,
110 U. S. 651;
Ex parte Terry, 128 U. S. 289,
128 U. S. 305;
In re Swan, 150 U. S. 637;
United States v. Pridgeon, 153 U. S.
48.
We enter into no examination of the act of July 2, 1890, c. 647,
26 Stat. 209, upon which the Circuit Court relied mainly to sustain
its jurisdiction. It must not be understood from this that we
dissent from the conclusions of that court in reference to the
scope of the act, but simply that we prefer to rest our judgment on
the broader ground which has been discussed in this opinion,
believing it of importance that the principles underlying it should
be fully stated and affirmed.
The petition for a writ of habeas corpus is
Denied.
