Is Picketing a Crime?
Reading Time: 2 minutes Summary: Unjust injunctions persecute striking workers in New Jersey. (DDLW #271) The Catholic Worker, Oct 1933, 5.
An immediate example of the evils of company unionism is shown in the strike of the uniform workers in Red Bank, N.J. Two injunctions were issued by a judge in Red Bank, one to the Sigmund Eisner Company (and the head of the company is a volunteer worker for the NRA in his city) and the other to the company union. The strikers under the injunction are not allowed to talk to any worker who may be willing to become employed by the firm, not allowed to address any employe either on the streets, at their homes or in any public place. The strikers are not permitted to tell anyone there is a strike on, nor allowed to display signs, nor to picket.
“Peculiar is this judicial logic,” says the Amalgamated Clothing Workers’ monthly paper. “While these workers were satisfied to work for $2, $3 and $4 per week in this sweat shop, no judge interested himself in their welfare. They could even work sixty to seventy hours a week in an attempt to make seven or eight dollars a week, and labor and factory laws of the state could be ignored and violated daily. But no judge became interested in upholding the majesty of the law. But the moment those sweated workers struck and started to put up a fight under the banner of the Amalgamated Clothing Workers for decent wages and working conditions, the judge suddenly became interested in seeing to it that the letter of every law on the books was lived up to.”
The strikers are continuing their picketing and awaiting a decision from the National Labor Board.
