NOTES OF RECENT CASES national banks, by virtue of the congressional permission to tax such shares, or upon shares of state corporations by virtue of the power inherent in the state to tax the shares of such corporations. Such tax assessed to shareholders may be required to be paid in the first instance by the corporations themselves, as the debt and in behalf of the shareholders, leaving to the corpora tion the right to reimbursement, but the court holds that there is nothing in the line of the cases upholding this rule which justifies the tax assessed directly to the banks on its stock. A tax levied on a corpora* on measured by the value of the hares in it, is not equivalent to a tax upon the shareholders in respect to their shares. The two kinds of taxes are not equivalent in law. That the tax is eventually paid by the shareholders the court considers of no moment. It says that the question is one of power, not of economics. If the state has not the power to levy this tax the court will not inquire whether another tax which it might lawfully impose would have the same ultimate incidence. As supporting this proposi tion is cited Owensboro Nat. Bank v. Owensboro, 173 U. S. 664, 43 L. Ed. 850, 19 Sup. Ct. 539. There it appeared that a tax on the intangible property of a national bank had been levied on under the name of a franchise tax. Such a tax upon one of the agencies of the national govern ment is beyond the power of the state, but it was contended that though the tax was not in form upon shares in the hands of shareholders (a tax lawful by the permission Congress has given), it was the equivalent of such a tax. The correctness of this contention was, however, denied by the court. TORTS (Boycotts). N. J. — In awarding an injunction against a boycott, Vice-Chancellor Stevenson, in Booth & Bro. v. Burgess, 65 At. Rep. 226, notes that there are three rights, the violation of each of which is a distinct tort, which must be fully recognized and carefully distinguished: First, we have the right in a contract. When a third party intentionally by the use of any kind of means causes a breach of the contract involv ing damage, he is prima facie guilty of a tort. Second, we have the right to contract, or to refrain from contracting. The common instance of the violation or attempted violation of this right is where the state intervenes and under takes arbitrarily to penalize the exercise of this right in certain particular cases. Third, we have the right to a free market. The tort exhibited by the violation of the right to a free market consists in coercing the market, i'., interfering with the right of a particular dealer to enjoy the advantages of freedom to deal with him on the
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part of all who may voluntarily desire to deal with him. A fourth right, or a wide extension of the right above defined as the right to a free market, has undoubtedly been involved in, if not expressly recognized by, the decisions of some courts in strike and boycott cases. This wider right con cedes to every man not only a free market, but a market where transactions occur naturally according to the ordinary laws of trade and com merce, unaffected not only by coercion, but also by persuasions or noncoercive inducements from out side parties, applied by them with intent and with the effect to interfere with his dealings and thereby to cause him damage. The full recognition of the fundamental right to probable expectancy in business relations is most necessary if there is to be scientific development in the common law to meet present exigencies. Such cases as this with such insistent iteration are still necessary, for no doctrine is valuable until it can be stated in such a way as to command general acceptation. B. W. TORTS (Strikes, Picketing). U. S. C. C, Wis. — The right of the members of a labor union out on a strike to maintain " peaceful picketing" about the works of their employer is upheld in Allis-Chalmers Co. v. Iron Molders' Union No. 125, 150 Fed. 155. But the court remarks that "peaceful picketing " is very much of an illusion. In upholding the right of striking employees to maintain pickets, the court lays down the rule that indirect interference by a labor union with the employer's business, not amounting to coer cion, by preventing him from getting workmen to carry on his shop, is not unlawful so long as the combination is merely taking measures to secure its own legitimate advantage or economic advance ment, although harm may incidentally result to the employer. So long as the betterment of labor conditions is the main object sought, even though the strikers may succeed in persuading all the available laborers to join their union and support the strike, and having thus secured a monopoly of the labor market, compel the em ployer, after long struggle and great loss of profit, to yield to the demands or go out of business, yet such injuries cannot be regarded as malicious, or such acts as criminal or unlawful, either at com mon law or under the Wisconsin statute. Wabash R. Co. v. Hannahan, 121 Fed. 563. But in this connection the court also holds that the action of pickets established by strikers may amount to coercion and intimidation, and a violation of an injunction against the use of such means, though no act is done which would be unlawful if done by a single individual, where the mere number of
