Citations
- 229 S.W.2d 912
Full opinion text
LUMPICIN, Justice.
, This is an appeal from a temporary injunction issued by the 44th District Court of Dallas County, Texas. .The suit was filed by the appellee, Best Motor Lines, against the appellants, International Broth- , erhood of Teamsters, Chauffeurs,- Ware- ' housemen and Helpers of America, .Local No. 745, A.F. of L.; four union officials; and seven of appellee’s employees, George Prda, George Franklin, J. C. Crouch, D. J. Green, Alma Davenport, Audra Torrance and Betty Ruth Messenger. The suit also named as defendants several motor carriers. The purpose of the suit was to enjoin the appellants from picketing ap-pellee’s Dallas terminal and to recover damages. Defendant Green and the five defendant motor carriers failed to- file answers. They are not parties to this appeal.
The appellee maintains its general office at Dallas. It' is a common carrier of freight engaged in both intrastate and interstate commerce. Its entire office force at Dallas consisted of abount twenty-five persons who worked as clerks, stenographers and machine operators. Only seven persons, however, comprised the clerical force- of appellee’s Dallas office. At the time this controversy arose, the appellee had a contract with the appellant union covering its city drivers, truck drivers, dockmen and helpers, checkers and extra men in the same classification; but the contract did not include the clerical workers in either the general or the local offices. It was stipulated in the contract that it would not be considered a violation of the agreement for an employee to refuse to cross a legal picket line.
On December 17, 1948, Betty Ruth .Messenger and Audra-..Torrance, two of the women employed by appellee at the Dallas office, invited five of, their fellow employees to a meeting at their apartment. Several union representatives were present. Union applications and authorization blanks were distributed, and a sample contract was read and discussed. The wages paid under the proposed contract- were higher than those paid by the appellee to its office employees. While it appears that appellee’s officials had received reports concerning efforts being made to organize the office employees, they had received no information as to how the various employees had voted on the question of authorizing the union to represent them. No complaint as to wages or working condi-lions had been made to the appellee by any of the clerks. However, on Christmas Eve, 1948, Guthrie, appellee’s local agent, .asked the seven employees not to join the union, and on December 30 he discharged the two women who had called the meeting .at their apartment. A third woman employee was also discharged. Inefficiency ■was the reason given for terminating the ■employment of' the three women.
On the following day, December 31, two' ■of the union officials met with Frank Web■er, appellee’s general manager, and asked •that the three women be reinstated and requested that appellee sign a contract, which the union representatives produced, ■with appellant union, recognizing it as the exclusive bargaining agent of the local office employees. It appears that the union representatives had written applications for membership from six of the seven employees. On the grounds that the appellant union had not been certified by the National Labor Relations Board as the bargaining agent for the local office em-ployees, the general manager challenged .the authority of the union and refused to ireinstate the three women.
Thereafter, on January 3, 1949, without the knowledge of any of the employees other than Betty Messenger and Audra 'Torrance, a picket line was established about the appellee’s premises. However,' ■when they learned about the picket line, 'five of the employees at the. office assisted in maintaining it. The signs carried by the pickets stated that appellee had discharged three of its employees. According to the testimony of appellants Franklin, Messenger, Torrance and Crouch the purpose of the strike and the picket line was ■to secure recognition for the union as their bargaining agent and through the efforts