The great question of the legality or illegality of picketing
was set at rest on Wednesday. The master tailors tried it by indicting the leading members of the Operative Tailors' Associa- tion, and under circumstances which brought out the question at issue in a very clear form. There was no attempt to prove direct violence, and no denial of the fact of picketing. Baron Bramwell, in a charge which we have commented on elsewhere, laid down the principle that picketing was an infringement of individual liberty, and distinctly illegal, and the jury found all the prisoners guilty, adding a recommendation to mercy. As the object of the trial was to ascertain the law, and the tailors agreed henceforth to abandon the practice, the judge only bound them to appear and receive judgment when called upon. One man, who had beaten another, however, receive] a sentence of three months, and we trust that the result of the trial will be to teach workmen_every- where that there is but one quarrel between them and the public. They are in the right on most points, but they must abandon intimidation.
