CHAP. 14.—TYPICAL AND ODD FORMS 113

often refused to employ men who had sued their previous employers.
Much hardship ensued. Official inspection might have removed the
difficulty, but public opinion was not ripe for broadening the scope of
the law. In vain the home-work council issued a statement that
maintenance of the law was still needed for female employees who
were insufficiently organized. When, in 1925, the law came before
Parliament for renewal, it was voted down by the upper chamber.
_ The insufficiency of the mere right to bring civil suits in case of
infringement of the law (the principle applied also in France,
although in a broader way), and the greater usefulness of enforcement
 by public authority (the principle applied in all Anglo-Saxon
countries) is confirmed by this Norwegian experience.
There seems also to have been lacking a sufficient impetus to maintain
 a minimum wage law for groups of employees needing it as
much as, but not more than, other branches of industry.
Minimum wage for female employees alone might have been
defended on stronger grounds. But such differential protection of
one sex in wage matters, familiar to the American legislator, is rather
outside of the European tradition.’ The experiment was discontinued.
 :

1 France enacted specific legislation for female home workers, but extended its benefits
to men working under identical conditions. The law referred rather to a predominantly
female section of the imdustrial organization where there were abuses than to particular
protection for one sex.

: y