Colorado § 8-3-118 - Jurisdiction to issue restraining orders or injunctions.

§ 8-3-118. Jurisdiction to issue restraining orders or injunctions.

(1) Except as otherwise provided in this article, no court has jurisdiction to issue in any case involving or growing out of a labor dispute any restraining order or temporary or permanent injunction which in specific or general terms prohibits any person from doing, whether singly or in concert, any of the following acts:

(a) Ceasing or refusing to perform any work or to remain in any relation of employment, regardless of any promise, undertaking, contract, or agreement to do such work or to remain in such employment;

(b) Becoming or remaining a member of any labor organization or of any employer organization, regardless of any undertaking or promise as is described in section 8-3-119;

(c) Paying or giving to or withholding from any person any strike or unemployment benefits or insurance or other moneys or things of value;

(d) Aiding, by all lawful means, any person who is being proceeded against in, or is prosecuting any action or suit in, any court of this state;

(e) Giving publicity to and obtaining or communicating information regarding the existence of or the facts involved in any dispute, whether by advertising, speaking, without intimidation or coercion, or by any other method not involving fraud, violence, breach of the peace, or threat thereof;

(f) Ceasing as an organization to patronize any person with whom the organization has a labor dispute or requiring it to employ any person;

(g) Assembling peaceably to do or to organize to do any of the acts specified in this section or to promote lawful interests;

(h) Advising or notifying any person of an intention to do any of the acts specified in this section;

(i) Agreeing with other persons to do or not to do any of the acts specified in this section;

(j) Advising, urging, or inducing, without fraud, violence, or threat thereof, others to do the acts specified in this section, regardless of any such undertaking or promise as is described in section 8-3-119;

(k) Doing in concert any acts specified in this section on the ground that the persons engaged therein constitute an unlawful combination or conspiracy.

Source: L. 43: p. 411, § 16. CSA: C. 97, § 94(16). CRS 53: § 80-5-16. C.R.S. 1963: § 80-4-16.

ANNOTATION

I. General Consideration.

II. Federal Preemption.

III. Publicizing Labor Disputes.

I. GENERAL CONSIDERATION.

Law reviews. For article, "Labor Injunctions Under the Colorado Labor Peace Act", see 26 Dicta 63 (1949).

Annotator's note. Since § 8-3-118 is similar to repealed CSA, C. 97, §§ 76-84, relevant cases construing those provisions have been included in the annotations to this section.

This section does not take away any rights from employees and unions, but bestows upon them additional rights in "labor disputes" not theretofore possessed, as it creates a defense in labor disputes against actions for restraining orders and injunctions not permitted in other disputes. Denver Milk Producers, Inc. v. Int'l Bhd. of Teamsters, 116 Colo. 389, 183 P.2d 529 (1947).

And it is only in cases involving labor disputes that a court does not have jurisdiction to grant such orders. Denver Milk Producers, Inc. v. Int'l Bhd. of Teamsters, 116 Colo. 389, 183 P.2d 529 (1947).

For, in the absence of any statute on this subject matter, there is no restriction on the courts in granting restraining orders or injunctions in any case. Denver Milk Producers, Inc. v. Int'l Bhd. of Teamsters, 116 Colo. 389, 183 P.2d 529 (1947).

However, where there is no "labor dispute", as defined in § 8-3-104 (13), between employer and his employees, there is no restraint on the court by virtue of this section to issue an injunction restraining a union's picketing and other acts. Amalgamated Meat Cutters & Butcher Workmen v. Green, 119 Colo. 92, 200 P.2d 924 (1948).

Earlier provision held constitutional. Local 13, Teamsters v. Perry Truck Lines, Inc., 106 Colo. 25, 101 P.2d 436 (1940).

But other section which made picketing unlawful held unconstitutional. People v. Harris, 104 Colo. 386, 91 P.2d 989 (1939).

However, provisions protecting activities that are normal incidents of picketing are contained in this section. City of Golden v. Ford, 141 Colo. 472, 348 P.2d 951 (1960).

II. FEDERAL PREEMPTION.

Law reviews. For article, "The Extent to Which Taft-Hartley Act Has Superseded State Labor Laws", see 28 Dicta 47 (1951).

The state may not enjoin conduct which has been made an unfair labor practice under the federal statutes. UMW v. Golden Cycle Corp., 134 Colo. 140, 300 P.2d 799 (1956); Bldg. Constr. Trades Council v. Am. Bldrs., Inc., 139 Colo. 236, 337 P.2d 953 (1959).

But this rule does not take from the state power to prevent mass picketing, violence, and overt threats of violence, for the dominant interest of the state in preventing violence and property damage cannot be questioned; it is a matter of genuine local concern. UMW v. Golden Cycle Corp., 134 Colo. 140, 300 P.2d 799 (1956).

And such conduct is not subject to the federal board. The state is allowed to enjoin mass picketing, threats of bodily injury and property damage to employees, obstruction of streets and public roads, the blocking of entrance to and egress from a factory, and the picketing of the homes of employees, as such conduct is not subject to the federal board, either by prohibition or protection. UMW v. Golden Cycle Corp., 134 Colo. 140, 300 P.2d 799 (1956).

Therefore, state courts do have jurisdiction to enjoin threats of personal injury and property damage to employees and management. UMW v. Golden Cycle Corp., 134 Colo. 140, 300 P.2d 799 (1956).

III. PUBLICIZING LABOR DISPUTES.

Law reviews. For note, "Colorado's Anti-Picketing Law is Scrapped", see 11 Rocky Mt. L. Rev. 255 (1939).

Courts are free to decide whether to permit or suppress any particular picket line for any reason other than a blanket policy against all picketing. City of Golden v. Ford, 141 Colo. 472, 348 P.2d 951 (1960).

But this section does not provide for issuance of injunctions to restrain peaceful picketing. People ex rel. Shaffer v. Teamsters Local 961, 175 Colo. 187, 486 P.2d 10 (1971).

Freedom of speech in labor disputes is guaranteed by the federal constitution. That a state has ample power to regulate the local problems thrown up by modern industry and to preserve the peace is axiomatic, but not even these essential powers are unfettered by the requirements of the bill of rights; and the scope of the fourteenth amendment is not confined by the notion of the state regarding the wise limits of an injunction in an industrial dispute, whether those limits be defined by statute or by the judicial organ of the state. Consequently, members of a union might, without special statutory authorization by the state, make known the facts of a labor dispute for freedom of speech is guaranteed by the federal constitution. Pueblo Bldg. & Constr. Trades Council v. Harper Constr. Co., 134 Colo. 469, 307 P.2d 468 (1957).

Even though the dispute is not an immediate employer-employee one, peaceful picketing in connection with a labor dispute has its basic roots in the constitutional guaranties of liberty and freedom of speech, and a state may not by its common-law or statutory policy prohibit persuasion, through peaceful picketing, notwithstanding the occasioning labor dispute is not an immediate employer-employee one; inasmuch as a state cannot exclude working men from peacefully exercising the right of free communication by drawing the circle of economic competition between employers and workers so small as to contain only an employer and those directly employed by him, the interdependence of economic interest of all engaged in the same industry has become a commonplace. Pueblo Bldg. & Constr. Trades Council v. Harper Constr. Co., 134 Colo. 469, 307 P.2d 468 (1957).

However, "nonpeaceful" picketing may constitutionally be enjoined. When picketing is not peaceful or where, while peaceful in itself, it is set against a background of acts of violence, injunctive relief may be granted constitutionally. Local 13, Teamsters v. Buckingham Transp. Co., 108 Colo. 419, 118 P.2d 1088 (1941); CF&I Steel, L.P. v. United Steel Workers of Am., 990 P.2d 1124 (Colo. App. 1999), aff'd, 23 P.3d 1197 (Colo. 2001).

As such does not infringe the fourteenth amendment. Where a controversy is attended by peaceful picketing and by acts of violence, and the violence is such that continuation of the picketing will operate coercively by exciting fear that violence will be resumed, an injunction by a state court forbidding the picketing as well as the violence does not infringe the fourteenth amendment. Pueblo Bldg. & Constr. Trades Council v. Harper Constr. Co., 134 Colo. 469, 307 P.2d 468 (1957).

This section must be considered with § 8-3-109 (2). Amalgamated Meat Cutters & Butcher Workmen v. Green, 119 Colo. 92, 200 P.2d 924 (1948).

When so considered and taken together, these sections mean that courts are divested of all jurisdiction to grant restraining orders or injunctions which prohibit any person from doing certain specific things therein mentioned, in any case involving or growing out of a labor dispute. Amalgamated Meat Cutters & Butcher Workmen v. Green, 119 Colo. 92, 200 P.2d 924 (1948).

Subsection (1) of this section, when read together with §§ 8-3-108(2)(a) and 8-3-110(1), confers jurisdiction upon the trial court to enjoin the union and its members from engaging in an unfair labor practice. CF&I Steel, L.P. v. United Steel Workers of Am., 990 P.2d 1124 (Colo. App. 1999), aff'd, 23 P.3d 1197 (Colo. 2001).

A labor union cannot legally be enjoined from peaceful picketing or restrained in their conduct. Local 13, Teamsters v. Perry Truck Lines, Inc., 106 Colo. 25, 101 P.2d 436 (1940).

In "any dispute". Subsection (1)(e) of this section provides that no court may issue an injunction in any case involving a labor dispute to restrain giving publicity to and obtaining or communicating information regarding the existence of, or the facts involved in "any dispute", whether by advertising, speaking, without intimidation or coercion, or by any other method not involving fraud, violence, breach of the peace, or threat thereof. Pueblo Bldg. & Constr. Trades Council v. Harper Constr. Co., 134 Colo. 469, 307 P.2d 468 (1957).