• Last updated on November 11, 2022

The Supreme Court, which typically took a conservative, probusiness, antilabor stance while William H. Taft was chief justice, struck down a state law protecting strikers against injunctions.

Chief Justice William H. TaftTaft, William H.;Truax v. Corrigan[Truax v. Corrigan] wrote the opinion for the 5-4 majority, striking down an Arizona law that protected labor union strikers from injunctions although not from suits for damages. Arizona and some other states sought to protect strikers from injunctions issued by conservative, probusiness courts. The Arizona courts upheld the statute in the face of a challenge from a business owner who lost half his customers while being picketed. The Supreme Court struck the Arizona statute on Fourteenth Amendment grounds. Taft held that the statute violated due process in that it deprived the owner of his property and equal protection in that it singled out employer-employee disputes for special treatment. Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes attacked the use of the Fourteenth Amendment to limit state experimentation. Justice Louis D. Brandeis dissented, setting out the legal and historical basis for the statute. Justice Mahlon Pitney was joined in a dissent by Justice John H. Clarke attacking all of the majority’s conclusions.Injunctions and equitable remedies;Truax v. Corrigan[Truax v. Corrigan]Labor;Truax v. Corrigan[Truax v. Corrigan]

Due process, procedural

Due process, substantive

Fourteenth Amendment

Injunctions and equitable remedies

Labor

Categories: History