Ex Parte George

Background

American Oil Company and one of its subsidiaries were involved in a labor dispute with the National Maritime Union, which represented unlicensed crew members. The subsidiary operated a refinery that had a separate collective bargaining agreement with another union. The subsidiary obtained a temporary injunction from a Texas district court that expressly bound a union official who nevertheless picketed the refinery after saying he thought the court lacked power to issue the injunction. That official was held in contempt, and the central habeas question before the Texas courts was whether the district court had the power to issue and enforce that injunction.

Reasoning

The Supreme Court addressed whether the state court could punish the official for picketing when federal labor law might protect the activity. The Court explained that when the National Labor Relations Board has not clearly determined that activity is neither protected nor forbidden, state courts should generally not decide the matter. The Texas Supreme Court had concluded the picketing was neither arguably protected nor arguably prohibited, but the Supreme Court disagreed. Relying on the district court’s finding that the parent company wholly owned and controlled the subsidiary, the Court held the picketing was at least arguably protected by Section 7 of the federal labor law, and therefore the state court could not properly punish the official for contempt on that basis.

Real world impact

The Court vacated the Texas Supreme Court’s judgment and sent the case back for further proceedings consistent with this opinion. The ruling narrows when state courts may punish peaceful union picketing, especially where a parent company controls a subsidiary, and the decision is not a final merits ruling on all federal-law questions.