OSBORNE CASE.

Evening Post, Volume LXXXI, Issue 48, 27 February 1911, Page 7

OSBORNE CASE.

I A DECISION OVERRULED. -By Telegraph.— Pre£g Association.— Copyright. ■ LONDON, 25th February. The Court of Appeal has overruledMr. Justice Warrington's decision, which justified the action of the Amalgamated 1 Society of Railwayman in expelling Mr. W. Osborne, the porter who originated the litigation resulting in the House of Lords' judgment that the funds of trades unions cannot be applied to political' purposes. [Mr. Osborne sought a, declaration that the reGolution passed by the Executive Committee of the Amalgamated Societyof Railwaymen, expelling him from the society, was ultra vires, void, illegal, unconstitutional, and against public policy, and that so much of the resolution as related 1 to the dissolving of the Walthamstow branch, of which he was a member, was ultra vires and void. He asked for an injunction restraining the defendants from acting upon or enforcing the resolution. The defendantstook the preliminary point that the •action could not be maintained because, at -common law the Amalgamated Society of Railway Servants was an illegal organisation, inasmuch as its rules contemplated the performance of acts against public policy and interest, such as strikes and restraint of trade, and because the courts could not interfere with respect to the expulsion of a member where only status and not property was involved. Mr. Justice Warrington, ■giving judgment, said he had anxiously considered -whether he was compelled to give effect to the preliminary objection taken by the defendants, and he thought that he was. Rule 14 of the society authorised the expulsion of a member found guilty of attempting to injure the society on that fact being proved to the satisfaction of the Executive Committee. In his Lordship's opinion, the agreement entered into by joining the society was one which was illegal at common law on account of its b&ing in restraint of trade. The preliminary objection, therefore, succeeded, and , as a decision on that must necessarily dispose of the whole action, he must give judgment for the defendants, with costs.]