Econlib

The Library

Other Sites

 Front Page arrow Titles (by Subject) arrow § 98.: Police regulation of the labor contract.— - A Treatise on State and Federal Control of Persons and Property in the United States considered from both a Civil and Criminal Standpoint, vol. 1

Return to Title Page for A Treatise on State and Federal Control of Persons and Property in the United States considered from both a Civil and Criminal Standpoint, vol. 1

Search this Title:

Also in the Library:

Subject Area: Law
Topic: The American Revolution and Constitution

§ 98.: Police regulation of the labor contract.— - Christopher G. Tiedeman, A Treatise on State and Federal Control of Persons and Property in the United States considered from both a Civil and Criminal Standpoint, vol. 1 [1900]

Edition used:

A Treatise on State and Federal Control of Persons and Property in the United States considered from both a Civil and Criminal Standpoint (St. Louis: The F.H. Thomas Law Book Co., 1900). Vol. 1.

Part of: A Treatise on State and Federal Control of Persons and Property in the United States considered from both a Civil and Criminal Standpoint, 2 vols.

About Liberty Fund:

Liberty Fund, Inc. is a private, educational foundation established to encourage the study of the ideal of a society of free and responsible individuals.


§ 98.

Police regulation of the labor contract.—

In no phase of human relations is there a more widespread manifestation of legislative determination to interfere with and to restrict the constitutional liberty of contract, than in the contract for labor between employer and employee. If the American declaration of the equality of all men before the law was a reality, and all that was necessary to insure substantial equality was to prevent the government from showing favors and granting privileges to one class to the exclusion of the others, there would be no need of any unusual interference with the liberty of contract between the employer and employee. For, since the employer and employee are equally guaranteed that liberty of contract, which is justly considered the badge of a freeman, each is absolutely free to make whatever contract he sees fit, and to refuse to concede to the terms of contract the other may propose. If the legal equality, which is declared to exist between employer and employee, was a reality, instead of a legal fiction, the laborer would not seek legislative interference in his contractual relations with the employer more actively than does the employer. He would felicitate himself upon the constitutional right to accept or reject the terms of employment which are proposed to him. But there can be no substantial equality between the man, who has not wherewith to provide himself with food and shelter for the current day, and one, whether you call him capitalist or employer, who is able to put the former into a position to earn his food and shelter. The employer occupies a vantage ground which enables him, in a majority of cases, to practically dictate the terms of employment. Liberty of contract, unrestricted, is to the laborer not always an unmixed blessing. He wants the liberty of contract restrained and limited, as to matters which are detrimental to his interests, and to which he must submit under the stress of circumstances, while he is left at liberty to make terms which will be favorable to him, and which he may obtain from the employer. Hence this large crop of legislative interference with the labor contract. But the constitutional guaranty of liberty of contract is intended to operate equally and impartially upon both employer and employee; and we find, therefore, that most of the attempts at legislative interference are pronounced unreasonable, and hence unconstitutional.

The disposition of the courts seems to be to pronounce any regulation of the labor contract unconstitutional which does not have for its object the preservation of the health and safety of the workman, or his protection against fraud, which is concealed and which is difficult for him to detect and guard against by his own unaided efforts.