The Jailhouse Verdict on the Boycott

Another, and perhaps a greater menace to the liberty of speech and of the press, has arisen. This is the decision of Justice Wright against the American Federation of Labor, and the sentencing of its officers, Samuel Gompers, John Mitchell, and Frank Morrison to jail for disobedience of the court's order in the boycott of the Buck Stove and Range Company. The American Federation of Labor is the chief association of organized labor in this country. It has been of inestimable value in improving the condition of the workingman both within and without labor unions. As the strike has always proved an expensive and wasteful process and one to be resorted to only in emergencies, the boycott has proved a most efficient weapon in enforcing labor's demands, and organized labor has always exercised its prerogative of saying as publicly as it thought necessary that it does not patronize those whose acts have been hostile to its members. If Justice Wright's decision is sustained by the higher court it will mean that the workingman of this country have no right through their organization to retaliate when they have been attacked. It will mean to that extent an abrogation of the right of freedom of speech and of the press. If Justice Wright's opinion is found to be justified by the law, it is high time that such an absurd, autocratic, and un-American law should be stricken from the statutes.