The Fight Over the 'Injunction' Weapon
Andrew Furuseth, leader of the International Seamen’s Union, argues that courts are misusing injunctions to break strikes and dismantle the rights of workers.
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There is no individual, be he student, lawyer, or philosopher, who is better equipped to discuss the abuse of the injunctive power than Andrew Furuseth. Furuseth, president of the International Seamen’s Union, testified before the House Judiciary Committee that labor does not seek to destroy the injunction where it rightly applies to property, but protests the perversion of equity power in labor disputes. He argued that the injunction, once used by the Roman tribunes to protect the plebeians, has been adopted into our system in a way that treats human labor as property. Furuseth noted that employers often seek to enjoin workers from picketing or striking by claiming their business operations are property, a doctrine he warns would re-establish a feudal system if followed to its logical conclusion.
“The firm has no property right in labor, because that is inherent in the laborer and would mean property right in the laborer.”
Furuseth’s critique of how corporations used the 'equity power' of the courts to stifle collective action mirrors modern debates over the use of SLAPP suits and labor injunctions against unionizing workers. The fundamental tension between property rights and the right to organize remains a live wire in Washington’s industrial landscape.
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