As Best to Subserve Their Own Interests”

Lemuel Shaw, Labor Conspiracy, and Fellow Servants

Bibliographic Data

ID12072251
AuthorsAlfred S Konefsky (University at Buffalo, State University of New York, corresponding author)
Year1989
Volume7
Issue1
Pages219-239
Publication date1989-01-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueLaw and History Review (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0738-2480 • E-ISSN: 1939-9022
PublisherCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.2307/743781
OpenAlexW2022097870
LanguageEN
References cited9

Over thirty years ago, Leonard Levy, building explicitly on suggestions first offered by Walter Nelles, and implicitly on observations made by Roscoe Pound, commented on the unusual conjunction of two decisions announced within weeks of each other in 1842 by Lemuel Shaw, Chief Justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court. The cases, Farwell v. Boston & Worcester Railroad which helped create the fellow servant rule in the United States, and Commonwealth v. Hunt , which involved a prosecution for criminal conspiracy for organizing a labor union as a closed shop, seemed at odds. Hunt appeared to expand worker rights to collective action, while Farwell appeared to restrict worker rights to compensation from workplace injuries. Shaw's apparent protection of a worker's right to organize, “a pro-worker stance,” seemed to conflict with his refusal to recognize a worker's right to recover for an industrial accident in particular circumstances, “an anti-worker stance.” The question is obvious—how can these decisions be made compatible, or does their incompatibility have to be accepted with a shrug of the shoulders and a nod toward the evolutionary progress of the common law

Commonwealth · Economic Justice · Political science · Servant · Sociology · Supreme court · Labor Movements and Unions · Law

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