Law Department Records

The Western Union Law Department Records consist of Law Committee meetings minutes, April, 1883 to December, 1909, and printed legal documentation, 1868-1979. The Law Committee Meeting Minutes document the committee's work on reviewing and reporting lawyer's bills, claims, and contracts. The bulk of the printed materials date from 1900-1930s. There are local, state, circuit, appeal, district, state supreme and United States Supreme Court publications. The legal cases involve individuals, the United States, the Federal Communications Communication, the Interstate Commerce Commission, railroad companies, and other telegraph companies against Western Union Telegraph Company. The Law Department assigned, in some instances, a number to each case. This number is located in the upper right corner of a publication. This was done to keep various parts of a case together and for accessibility. Some publications are annotated, presumably by Western Union attorneys. Multiple copies of some publications exist, this is noted parenthetically in the container list.