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(2) 306 U.S. 238; 83 Law. Ed. 627.

would not have enjoyed had they remained at work." It was also held that " the Congress was intent upon ,.protection of employees' right to self-organisation and to the selection of representatives of their own choosing for collective bargaining without restraint or coercion. " On the facts the conclusion of the majority was that the strike was illegal in its inception and prosecution. This was really not the exercise of the right to strike to which the Act referred. It was an illegal seizure of the building in order to prevent their use by the employer in a lawful manner, and thus by acts of force and violence compel the employer to submit. The conclusion, therfore, was that to provide for the reinstatement or re-employment of employees guilty of the acts which even according to the Board had been committed would not only not effectuate any policy of the Act but would directly tend to make abortive its plan for peaceable procedure. Mr. Justice Reed, who delivered a dissenting judgment thought that both labour and management had erred grievously in their respective conduct and so it would not be unreasonable to restore both to their former status. That is why he was not prepared to reverse the order of reinstatement passed by the Board. The Bank naturally relies upon the majority decision in support of its contention that its employees who participated in the pen-down strike are not entitled to reinstatement. In considering the question as to whether the principle underlying the majority decision should be, applied to a pen-down strike in India it is necessary to remember that the pen-down strike properly so-called is recognised as a strike under s. 2(q) of the Act and so it would not be safe to extend the principles of American decisions bearing on this question without a careful scrutiny of the relevant provisions of the American statute and the facts on which the said decisions are based. Let us then consider the facts on which the majority decision was based. It appears that an acrimonious dispute had been going on between the Corporation and its employees for some time before February 17,1937 when the pen-down strike commenced. The Corporation was not prepared to recognise the outside union and had employed a labor spy to engage in espionage within the union and continued the employment of the said spy. It also appears that the, super intendant of the Corporation when requested to meet the deputation of the union required that the deputation should consist only of employees of five years' standing. Subsequently the superintendent' refused to confer with the committee in which the outside Organisation had been included; and as a punitive measure he required the president of the union to work in a room adjoining his office with the purpose of keeping him away from the other workers. It was in this background of bitter relationship that the strike commenced. In the afternoon of February 17 the union committee decided upon a sit-down strike by taking over and holding two of the respondent's key buildings. These were then occupied by about 95 employees, as a result of which work in the plant stopped. In the evening the superintendent accompanied by police officials went to each of the building and demanded that the men leave. They, however, refused whereupon the respondent's counsel who had accompanied the superintendent announced in loud tone that all the men in the plant were discharged for the seizure and detention of the buildings. Even so the men continued to occupy the buildings until February 26. Their fellow members brought them food, blankets, stoves, cigarettes and other supplies. Meanwhile on February 18, the respondent obtained from the state court an injunction requiring the men to surrender the premises. The men refused to obey the order and a writ of attachment for contempt was served on them on February 19. When the men refused to submit a pitched battle ensued and the men successfully resisted the attempt by the sheriff to evict and arrest them. Efforts at mediation failed. Ultimately on February 26, the sheriff with An increased force of deputies made a further attempt and this time, after another battle, the men were ousted and placed under arrest. They were subsequently prosecuted and most of them were fined and given jail sentence for violating the injunctions. A bare statement of these facts would clearly bring out the true character of the strike with which the Supreme Court was dealing. It was not merely an illegal but violent strike, ; it was a strike which began with the wrongful seizure of the employer's property and his exclusion from it; a strike accompanied by violence which led to pitched battles between the strikers and the sheriff's men; a strike continued by the strikers even after they were formally discharged from the employment and against an order of injunction by a competent court. It is difficult to accede to the argument that the majority decision in that case can be extended to the facts before us. As Teller has observed " the strike in question can be more accurately defined as a strike in the traditional sense to which is added the element of trespass of the strikers upon the property of the employer ". (1) Therefore, in our opinion, this decision does not assist the Bank in support of its case that mere-participation in the illegal strike in the present case can by itself defeat the claim of the employees for reinstatement.