Justice Douglas authored a dissenting opinion and said the following:[2] The Union brought this action under § 301 of the Labor Management Relations Act, and the District Court issued an order compelling petitioner to arbitrate.

I believe that the principles of successorship laid down in John Wiley & Sons v. Livingston, 376 U. S. 543, and NLRB v. Burns International Security Services, 406 U. S. 272, require affirmance, and thus I dissent.

We pointed out that the duty to arbitrate will not in every case survive a change of ownership, as when the lack of any substantial continuity of identity in the business enterprise before and after a change would make a duty to arbitrate something imposed from without, not reasonably to be found in the particular bargaining agreement and the acts of the parties involved.Wiley, supra, at 376 U. S. 551.

Under its franchise agreement, Howard Johnson had substantial control over the Grissoms' operation of the business;[4] it was no stranger to the enterprise it took over.

The business continued without interruption at the same location, offering the same products and services to the same public, under the same name and in the same manner, with almost the same number of employees.

As a matter of federal labor law, when Howard Johnson took over the operation that had been conducted by its franchisee, it seems clear that it also took over the duty to arbitrate under the collective bargaining agreements which expressly bound the Grissoms' successors.

The majority, by making the number of prior employees retained by the successor the sole determinative factor, accepts petitioner's bootstrap argument.

I cannot accept such a rule, especially when, as here, all of the other factors point so compellingly to the conclusion that petitioner is a successor employer who should be bound by the arbitration agreement.