1. How did the labor dispute that led to this litigation arise?
2. What are the issues before the Supreme Court?
3. Does the majority believe that the doctrine of stare decisis bars a reexamination of the Sinclair decision handed down in 1962?
4. What guiding principles adopted by the Court are to be utilized by district courts in determining whether to grant injunctive relief?

[Boys Markets, Inc. (petitioner), had a collective bargaining agreement with the Retail Clerks Union (respondent). A company supervisor and certain other company employees who were not part of the Retail Clerks bargaining unit rearranged merchandise in the frozen food cases of one of the company's supermarkets. A union representative insisted that the merchandise be restocked by union personnel, because the bargaining unit work had been wrongfully taken away from union personnel. When Boys Markets refused to do so, a strike was called, and the union began to picket the market. The company sought an injunction against the strike and an order compelling arbitration of the dispute, as the collective bargaining agreement contained a no-strike clause and a grievance-arbitration procedure to resolve disputes under the agreement. Upon removal from a state court, the U.S. district court ordered the parties to arbitrate the dispute and enjoined the strike. The court of appeals reversed, considering itself bound by the Sinclair decision. The Supreme Court granted certiorari.]

BRENNAN, J.…
At the outset, we are met with respondent's contention that Sinclair ought not to be disturbed because the decision turned on a question of statutory construction which Congress can alter at any time. Since Congress has not modified our conclusions in Sinclair, even though it has been urged to do so, respondent argues that principles of stare decisis should govern the present case.

We do not agree that the doctrine of stare decisis bars a re-examination of Sinclair in the circumstances of this case. We fully recognize that important policy considerations militate in favor of continuity and predictability in the law. Nevertheless, as Mr. Justice Frankfurter wrote for the Court, "[S]tare decisis is a principle of policy and not a mechanical formula of adherence to the latest decision, however recent and questionable, when such adherence involves collision with a prior doctrine more embracing in its scope, intrinsically sounder, and verified by experience." It is precisely because Sinclair stands as a significant departure from our otherwise consistent emphasis upon the congressional policy to promote the peaceful settlement of labor disputes through arbitration and our efforts to accommodate and harmonize this policy with those underlying the anti-injunction provisions of the Norris-LaGuardia Act that we believe Sinclair
should be reconsidered. Furthermore, in light of developments subsequent to Sinclair, in particular our decision in Avco Corp. v. Aero Lodge, 735, 390 U.S. 557 (1968), it has become clear that the Sinclair decision does not further but rather frustrates realization of an important goal of our national policy.

Nor can we agree that conclusive weight should be accorded to the failure of Congress to respond to Sinclair on the theory that congressional silence should be interpreted as acceptance of the decision. The Court has cautioned that "[i]t is at best treacherous to find in congressional silence alone the adoption of a controlling rule of law." Therefore, in the absence of any persuasive circumstances evidencing a clear design that congressional inaction be taken as acceptance of Sinclair, the mere silence of Congress is not a sufficient reason for refusing to reconsider the decision.

We have also determined that the dissenting opinion in Sinclair states the correct principles concerning the accommodation necessary between the seemingly absolute terms of the Norris-LaGuardia Act and the policy considerations underlying Section 301(a). Although we need not repeat all that was there said, a few points should be emphasized at this time.

The literal terms of Section 4 of the Norris LaGuardia Act must be accommodated to the subsequently enacted provisions of Section 301(a) of the Labor-Management Relations Act and the purposes of arbitration. Statutory interpretation requires more than concentration upon isolated words; rather, consideration must be given to the total corpus of the pertinent law and the policies which inspired ostensibly inconsistent provisions.

The Norris-LaGuardia Act was responsive to a situation totally different from that which exists today. In the early part of this century, the federal courts generally were regarded as allies of management in its attempt to prevent the organization and strengthening of labor unions; and in this industrial struggle the injunction became a potent weapon which was wielded against the activities of labor groups. The result was a large number of sweeping decrees, often issued ex parte, drawn on an ad hoc basis without regard to any systematic elaboration of national labor policy.

In 1932 Congress attempted to bring some order out of the industrial chaos that had developed and to correct the abuses which had resulted from the interjection of the federal judiciary into unionmanagement disputes on the behalf of management. See Declaration of Public Policy, Norris-LaGuardia Act, Section 2, 47 Stat. 70 (1932). Congress, therefore, determined initially to limit severely the power of the federal courts to issue injunctions "in any case involving or growing out of any labor dispute…." 47 Stat. 70. Even as initially enacted, however, the prohibition against federal injunctions was by no means absolute. See Norris-LaGuardia Act, Sections 7, 8, 9, 47 Stat. 70 (1932). Shortly thereafter Congress passed the Wagner Act, designed to curb various management activities which tended to discourage employee participation in collective action.

As labor organizations grew in strength and developed toward maturity, congressional emphasis shifted from protection of the nascent labor movement to the encouragement of collective bargaining and administrative techniques for the peaceful resolution of industrial disputes. This shift in emphasis was accomplished, however, without extensive revision of many of the older enactments, including the anti-injunction section of the Norris-LaGuardia Act.
Thus it became the task of the courts to accommodate, to reconcile the older statutes with the more recent ones.