GIBSON v. LAWSON.

In this case, in Dec. 1890, a workman named Gibson, a member of a trade union called the National Society of Engineers, was employed as a fitter by Messrs. Palmer & Co. shipbuilders in Northumberland. Another workman, by name Lawson, a shop delegate and a member of another trade union, the Amalgamated Society of Engineers, was employed in a like capacity at Messrs. Palmers. On Dec. 3 the Amalgamated Society of Engineers met and resolved not to work at Messrs. Palmer's after Dec. 6 unless Gibson joined their union. Lawson communicated this resolution to Messrs. Palmer's foreman, who repeated it to Gibson. Gibson there-upon refused to leave his trade union or to join the other, and in consequence, and in order to avoid the threatened strike, Messrs. Palmer's foreman dismissed Gibson from his employment. No violence or threats of violence either to person or to property were used to Gibson, but he swore that he was afraid, in consequence of what Lawson said, that he would lose his work and get no more at any place where the Amalgamated Society predominated numerically over his own society.

Lawson was afterwards prosecuted for having wrongfully and without legal authority intimidated Gibson, under section 7, sub-section (1) of the Statute of 1875. On these facts it was held by a court consisting of five judges that the action of Lawson implied no threat whatever of personal violence, and was not 'intimidation.' It was also observed that the Statute of 1875 expressly legalized strikes, and that a conspiracy, by means of a strike thus legalized, to coerce another's will, notwithstanding certain decisions of Lord Bramwell and Lord Esher, could not be indictable.

Regarding this decision from a purely legal point of view, Edition: current; Page: [283] it is to be observed that in the repealed Act of 1871, which dealt with the same subject as the Statute of 1875, the word 'intimidation' was limited to such intimidation as would justify a magistrate in binding over the intimidator to keep the peace towards the person intimidated. In the Statute of 1875 Parliament enacted the seventh section containing the word 'intimidation' without any such limitation. It has been a matter of surprise to many lawyers that the word 'intimidation' was construed in face of this contrast as if the limitation of the Act of 1871 were still in force. Two reasons only are given in the report for this decision: (1) The changing temper of the times on the subject; (2) That the Statute of 1875 was preceded by a Royal Commission which recommended a relaxation of the law in favour of trade unions. As to (1), it is submitted that though it is quite sound to permit 'the changing opinion of the times' to modify a common law rule, for such a rule is founded on custom, it is quite unsound to extend such reasoning to a statute. For a statute is to be construed according to the intention of those who passed it, and to construe it, not according to that intention as gathered from its tenor, but according to the fluctuating opinions of its readers, seems obviously to introduce confusion and uncertainty.

As to (2), it is not legally permissible to read or even refer in argument to the debates preceding the passage of an Act, still less to the report of a Royal Commission on which it is supposed to be based. It is moreover inaccurate to say that the Royal Commissioners recommended a relaxation of the law as regards intimidation, on the contrary, they advised that no relaxation should here be made.