he suffers a detriment. Since jural facts include events as well as acts, it is clear that not all jural facts are based on jural relations. The chief varieties of jural fact are the creative and destructive occurrences in nature (e. g., birth, death); duty acts (the effect of which is to destroy transitory jural relations such as claims for money performance); wrongful acts; lawful 'power' acts (e. g., offer of contract); error; conditions; estoppel acts; prescription; judgments. Two additional points of difficulty for a clear understanding of jural relation must be noticed: The definition turns on a restriction of freedom through claims and powers. It negatives the possibility of conferring liberty. Liberty cannot be conferred. It is a natural fact and outside the scope of the law. Liberty may be exercised, but it cannot be given. It is a contradiction of terms to say that a liberty can be bestowed. When a chattel is abandoned, all persons depending on their natural opportunity and capacity are at liberty to take the chattel, but the act of abandonment did not create the liberty; it simply enriched its objective field, and, with that, the law has nothing to do. The act of abandonment, however, did create something-a contingent power, the contingency being that of prior occupation. The power had no existence anterior to the act of abandonment, but the liberty had a prior existence. In this case, power is a specific legal concept concretely limited, resting upon a general substrate of liberty legally undefined in its content and of no jural significance. Again, when a gift is made (offered and accepted), the donee has acquired not a new liberty, but an enriched freedom to use the object of the gift as he sees fit. But closer examination of the transaction will show that the specific moment where freedom was enriched coincides not with bestowal, but with seizure. No one can be compelled to accept a gift. A gift transaction, therefore, is no more than an ordinary offer and acceptance-the power to offer and power to accept. The presumption of acceptance does not alter the matter. A further illustration will aid in justifying the limitation of the definition to restriction of freedom action. If the owner of a chattel consumes it in use, a jural fact is presented; the owner's claims in the chattel against all other persons, are extinguished. But we do not say that the power to consume or destroy one's own chattel10 involves a (strict type) jural relation simply because the exercise of the power relieves other persons of certain specific duties. 10. In this case, the exercise of liberty and the exercise of power coincide in the same material act which is a liberty regarded from the standpoint of the actor toward himself and which is a power from the standpoint of the actor with respect to others. The jural element here, the 'power' factor, is of such very little importance that it may be disregarded, and the act may be denominated a 'liberty' act. This coincidence would not occur in the exercise of liberty by an owner of his land, since, in legal contemplation, land is a permanent and indestructible object. It may also be pointed out in this connection that liberty cannot be predicated of transitory rights (e. g., claim for payment of money owing by a debtor). The second point to be noticed is that a jural relation (strict sense) implicates the aid of the law, either mediately or immediately. Merely legal consequence is not enough. All jural facts have legal consequences, but not all jural facts are based on (strict type) jural relations. For example, the power in one person to create a power in another by an offer is not based on a (strict type) jural relation. Again, a person who owes a duty has the power of disregarding it. The wrongful act is the exercise of a power, but it is a kind of power in the use of which the law will give no aid to the wrongdoer. ILLINOIS LAW REVIEW Published monthly except July to October, inclusive, by Nathan William MacChesney, President. 33 PER YEAR Frederic B. Crossley, Secretary and Treasurer Subscribers who wish to discontinue their subscriptions at the end of the subscription period should notify the business office of the REVIEW; otherwise it will be assumed that a continuation of the subscription is desired. JAMES J. FORSTALL RICHARD Y. HOFFMAN THEODORE SCHMIDT Ex-Officio, R. Allan Stephens, Secretary, Illinois State Bar Association To promote free expression of view on the part of contributors, the Editorial Board, collectively, assumes no responsibility for any statement in the columns of the REVIEW. Each article or com munication, including editorial notes, comments on cases, and book reviews, is identified by the name or the initials of the writer. COMMENT ON RECENT CASES BOYCOTT-ACTION FOR DAMAGES FOR DISCHARGE OCCASIONED BY REFUSAL TO SUPPLY MATERIAL TO EMPLOYER.-In the case of Carlson v. Carpenter Contractors' Association of Chicago et al. 305 Ill. 331, 137 Ń. E. 222, the Supreme Court of Illinois affirmed a judgment at law for damages which had been recovered by John Carlson in an action which alleged and proved the discharge of the plaintiff from the service of one Simon Hill as a journeyman carpenter. It was also alleged and proved that the discharge was due to an agreement between the material men, who were also made defendants and against whom as well as the members and officers of the contractors' association the judgments were rendered, that no materials should be furnished to the employers of union laborers who had recently been "locked out" by the members of the contractors' association on account of their refusal to abide by a certain award of Judge Kenesaw M. Landis in a voluntary arbitration proceeding in regard to wages and methods of employment. In the same opinion a judgment is also affirmed for damages sustained by one Oscar Carlson who was neither a contractor nor a carpenter, but who on account of his employment of union carpenters had been refused material for the completion of a building which he was erecting for himself. Although no doubt a disappointment to those who favor the so-called "Landis Award" and who have lost all sympathy for those who persist in violating its provisions, and although apparently a victory for organized labor, this decision may prove a boomerang. In principle it clearly reverses the conclusions of the majority of the court in the case of Kemp v. Division No. 241 255 Ill. 213, and re-establishes what we believe to have been the law of this state prior to that decision. (See ILL. LAW REV. VII 320, 323; VIII 126.) If logically followed it paves the way for the assessment of damages, if not the issuance of injunctions, against the members of the labor unions for strikes and boycotts which seek to prevent the open shop, even though peaceably conducted and even though the main purpose is the promotion of the interests of the unions. In the case of Kemp v. Division No. 241 the majority of the court held that: "No contract rights being involved, members of a labor union have the legal right to inform their employer that they will quit his employ, singly or in a body, if certain employees who are objectionable to them are not discharged, and they may authorize the officers of the union to communicate such information to the employer; and the officers in so doing, and in reporting the result of the conference, commit no actionable wrong." And as a result of such premise that even though such employes were discharged as a result of such threats no action at law would lie for damages, it further held that: "Non-union employees cannot maintain a bill to enjoin officers of a labor union from calling a strike in accordance with a previous vote of the members of the union, not bound by contract, who are co-employees of the complainants, even though the purpose of the strike is to compel complainants to join the union or be discharged from their employment, and the bill alleges that complainants will be irreparably injured if discharged, and that the defendants are financially unable to respond in damages." "Every employee," said Mr. Justice Cooke, in speaking for the majority of the court, "has a right to protection in his employment from the wrongful and malicious interference of another resulting in damage to the employee, but if such interference is but the consequence of the exercise of some legal right by another it is not wrongful, and cannot therefore be made the basis for an action to recover the consequent damages. It is the right of every workman, for any reason which may seem sufficient to him, or for no reason, to quit the service of another unless bound by contract. This right cannot be abridged or taken away by any act of the legislature, nor is it subject to control by the courts, it being guaranteed to every person under the jurisdiction of our government by the thirteenth amendment to the federal constitution, which declares that involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime, shall not exist within the United States or any place subject to their jurisdiction. Incident to this constitutional right is the right of every workman to refuse to work with any co-employee who is for any reason objectionable to him, provided his refusal does not violate his contract with his employer. "The members of the union have simply said to their employer that they will not longer work with men who are not members of their organization, and that they will withdraw from their employment and use such proper means as they may to secure employment under the desired conditions it cannot be said that this is not a demand for better conditions and a legitimate object for them to seek to attain by means of a strike. "It is insisted that a strike is lawful only in case of direct competition, and as it cannot be said that the union employees are in any sense competing with the appellees, their acts cannot be justified. It is true, as has been stated, that the proposed strike was not to be called for the direct purpose of securing better wages or shorter hours or to prevent a reduction of wages, anyone of which would have been a proper object. The motive was more remote than that, but it was kindred to it. The purpose was to strengthen and preserve the organization itself. Without organization the workmen would be utterly unable to make a successful effort to maintain or increase their wages or to enforce such demands as have been held to be proper." Even in his special concurring opinion, which sought to base a decision on the right to relief in equity rather than at law, Chief Justice Carter said: "In my judgment union workmen, not bound by contract, who inform their employer that they will strike unless he discharge non-union workmen in the same line of employment should be held merely dictating the terms of their employment; that it is not unlawful for members of a labor union to seek by peaceable methods to induce those engaged in the same occupation to become members of such union, and, as a means to that end to refuse to allow union laborers to work in the same line of employment in a place where non-union laborers are employed. The proposed purpose of the strike not being unlawful it necessarily follows that an injunction should not issue as prayed for in the bill." Whether this decision is in conformity with those before it is not the purpose of this review to discuss, as this question has already been considered in ILL. LAW REV. VII 320, 323 and ILL. LAW REV. VIII 126; it is sufficient to say that prior to the case of Carlson v. Carpenter Contractors' Association the case of Kemp v. Division No. 241 was the last announcement of the Supreme Court of Illinois, and that in it there is announced the doctrine of the closed shop and of the right to a fight to a finish, and not only the right of organization for the purpose of raising immediate wages and bettering conditions but the right to strike and to boycott for the purpose of strengthening the organization, even though not for the immediate betterment of the wages or conditions of the |