treaties with China, by means popularly known as "boycotting," or any other coercive means, no matter in what form, or through what channels applied, are criminal, and all those participating in them must be subject to the very severe penalties denounced by the statute. 1 A conspiracy to acquire a settlement on Indian lands is not indictable.' An agreement to cast away or wreck a vessel comes within the definition of conspiracy.' The act of any one of the conspirators in carrying out the purpose to defraud the government will render all liable for the crime." A conspiracy to interfere with the free exercise of the right to vote at elections for federal officers is punishable. Such an interference with the right of a colored man, accompanied by personal violence is punishable under that section and sections 5508, 5520, when it results from a conspiracy formed to accomplish the prohibited purpose. So a conspiracy to deprive anyone of the equal protection or privilege under the laws is punishable. As to the operation of the law within the State, see Baldwin v. Franks, 120 U. S. 678, 30 L. ed. 766. Section 5440 covers a conspiracy by Indians against the government. ' A board of arbitration between railroads or between other transportation companies engaged in interstate commerce and 'Re Baldwin, 27 Fed. Rep. 193. United States v. Payne, 22 Fed. Rep. 426. U. S. Rev. Stat. § 5364; United States v. Hand, 6 McLean, 274; United States v. Cole, 5 McLean, 513. Rev. Stat. U. S. § 5440; United States v. Britton, 108 U. S. 199, 27 L. ed. 703; United States v. Hirsch, 100 U. S. 33, 25 L. ed. 539; United States v. Hammond, 2 Woods, 197; United States v. Frisbie, 28 Fed. Rep. 808; United States v. Fehrenback, 2 Woods, 175; United States v. Donau, 11 Blatchf. 168; United States v. Dennee, 3 Woods. 47; United States v. Boyden, 1 Low. 266; Re Wolf, 27 Fed. Rep. 606: United States v. Watson, 17 Fed. Rep. 145; United States v. Sanche, 7 Fed. Rep. 715; The Mussel Slough Case, 5 Fed. Rep. 680; United States v. Sacia, 2 Fed. Rep. 754. $Revised Statutes U. S. § 5506; United States v. Reese, 92 U. S. 214, 23 L. ed. 563; Seeley v. Koox, 2 Woods, 368; United States v. Cruikshank, 92 U. S. 542, 23 L. ed. 588. Ex parte Yarbrough, 110 U. S. 651, 28 L. ed. 274. U. S. Rev. Stat. § 5519; United States v. Harris, 106 U. S. 629, 72 Re Wolf, 27 Fed. Rep. 606. their employés, may be agreed upon and power is given such board to compel the attendance of witnesses.' The Alien Contract Labor Law, forbidding the bringing of aliens to this country under labor contract, Acts 1884-85, chap. 164, was amended by chap. 351, Acts 1890-91, and was added to by chap. 220, Acts 1886-87, also added to by chap. 1210, Acts 1887-88.' The incorporation of National Trades Unions is authorized for the purpose of aiding its members to become more skillful workmen, promote their general intelligence, elevate their character, regulate their wages and hours and conditions of labor. The purpose of their organization also includes the protection of their individual rights in the prosecution of their trade, raising funds for the benefit of the sick, disabled and unemployed, and for families of deceased members, and for such other objects for which working people may lawfully combine, having in view their mutual protection or benefit.' It was assumed in Com. v. Sheriff, 15 Phila. 393, that prior to the acts of the Pennsylvania Legislature, it would have been unlawful for workmen to combine, organize and adopt resolutions, having for their object the increase of wages, or the consideration to be paid for labor, if the effect of such combination might be to prejudice the interests of the community and might tend to injure individuals in their business by causing the employed to cease to work for an employer, and thus compel him to submit to a book or standard of prices which had been fixed by workingmen who had combined and organized for that purpose. And it was said that nearly all the law of England, which had been adopted in this country touching organizations and combinations of workingmen to regulate wages, has been swept away by the statute, that it is, therefore, since the statute, no longer unlawful for the representative of a labor society or organization, to demand from a firm of employers an increase of wages for their employés, with notice that refusal will result in a strike of the workmen, followed by such representatives going together to the workshop of the employers and notifying the journeymen that a strike was ordered.* 1 Acts 1887-88, chap. 1063, p. 501, §§ 1-11. 2 Acts 1890-91, chap. 551, p. 1084, § 1-11. Acts of Congress 1885-86, chap. 567, p. 86, §§ 1-5. See also Mayer v. Journeymen Stonecutters' Asso. 47 N. J. Eq. 519. Mr. Gladstone, on December 10, 1891, at the opening of the National Liberal Federation Conference, held in Memorial Hall, Farringdon Street, London, urged the abolition of the common law against conspiracy. This law, he said, had given rise to proceedings that were adverse to the liberties of the people. In the course of his remarks he stated, as part of the Liberal program for future legislation : "We must provide for the rural population of Great Britain as well as for the same class in Ireland. Nothing must be a crime which relates to the prosecution of labor interests, or because it is done by a combination of men, unless it is an offense against the letter and the spirit of the law." This is a correct statement of the tendency of Liberal legis lation proposed in England. CHAPTER XV. CONSPIRACY AT COMMON LAW-CONTINUED. $76. Legislation Affecting Common Law Concerning Combinations among Workmen. 77. Present Condition of the Law Concerning Trade or Labor Combinations, "Picketing," "Boycotting." 78. Indictments for Conspiracy. 79. Evidence in Conspiracy. $76. Legislation Affecting Common Law Concerning Combinations among Workmen. It may well be questioned, whether the legislation referred to in the preceding chapter has materially changed the common law as it existed in this country, regarding labor organizations, and their relations to and influence upon the compensation to be paid for work, and the efforts to give force to this influence by the peaceful withdrawal of employès on their organized demands being refused, and by a strike declared. It is an undoubted rule of the common law, that it is criminal to confederate and combine together, by concerted means, to do that which is unlawful or criminal, to the injury of the public, or parties or classes of the community, or even to the right of an individual. But because a combination of workingmen to raise their wages was deemed in the middle of the fourteenth century unlawful, as prov ing itself to result injuriously to classes of the community in England, it does not follow that it will be equally unlawful here, where we have no class legislation, and where our free institutions invite all, who as citizens stand on a common level-to unite aud associate themselves together for the purpose of bettering their condition in every respect, moral, social or financial: where the highest purpose of self government is to develop and elevate manhood and free it from all trammels of tradition, drawing the line only where freedom is overpowered by license. Indeed the common law precedents, decisions and statutes from the middle of the fourteenth century until 1859, and the succeeding changes in 38 and 39 Victoria, chap. 86, passed in 1879, must be considered in relation to the then existing condition of society and its demands. The principle of the common law was then, as now, that conspiracy consisted in a combination to do a wrongful or unlawful act to the injury of the public or a portion thereof, but what constituted an unlawful act to the injury of the public, then, as now, depended upon social conditions and relations. It would be unreasonable indeed to insist that we must accept such precedents as "applicable to our local situation and circumstances," when in England, with advancing civilization, and the growing recognition of popular rights, legislation has from time to time liberalized the practice there. All the laws of the parent country, whether rules of the common law as illustrated in practice, or early English statutes, which were made for the purpose of regulating the wages of laborers, the settlement of paupers, and making it penal for anyone to use a trade or handicraft to which he had not served a full apprenticeship-not being adapted to the circumstances of our colonial condition, which recognized the equal rights of all as fully before as after the Declaration of Independence, were not adopted, used or approved, and therefore do not come within the description of the laws adopted and confirmed by the constitutions of the various states.' In determining, therefore, what the common law of this country is, as to organizations of workingmen and organizations of employers, whose result is to influence compensation to be paid for labor, we have simply to assume primarily, that all and each of such organizations for mutual benefit and advancement are lawful, and that all means used to promote their objects are lawful, until it is shown that the practical result of the association is, taking the good and evil together, injurious to the public or the parties, or to portions of the community, or to the rights of the individual. It is simply a question of fact, which cannot be determined by English precedents made under different conditions. As evidence upon this question of fact, the express legislation of the great labor states of this country, where the results of experience have been embodied in statutes, and the modern legislation in England, whose present purpose is in harmony with 'Com v. Hunt, 4 Met. 111; State v. Stewart, 4 New Eng. Rep. 378, 59 Vt. |