40 MINIMUM WAGE LEGISLATION IN VARIOUS COUNTRIES
the legislation. The wages for minors have been included in the
efforts for minimum wage, although the arguments against the necessity
of making them self-supporting could also be advanced for that
group of workers.
Massachusetts, with its strong idealistic traditions from Puritan
and abolitionist times, paved the way as to minimum wage legislation
in 1912; California, Colorado, Minnesota, Nebraska, Oregon,
Utah, Washington, and Wisconsin followed the next year; Arkansas,
Kansas, Arizona, Texas, North Dakota, the District of Columbia, and
South Dakota, later. Efforts in Ohio in 1925 were combated by the
employers’ interests* and failed. Generally, however, the adverse
decisions of the courts proved to be the strongest obstacle to further
extension or even maintenance of the laws. The fifth and fourteenth
amendments to the Constitution of the United States, as interpreted
by the courts, prohibit interference with liberty of contract unless
justified by legitimate police power. Proof of furtherance of the
general welfare was sometimes considered sufficient, but at other
times it was necessary to prove tangible dangers to public health or
morals. The question of the unconstitutionality of minimum wage
laws, because of interference with liberty of contract, was first passed
on by the United States Supreme Court in 1917, in regard to the
Oregon law, the decision of oh State court upholding the law being
sustained by an evenly divided court, one judge not voting. In 1923,
however, the Supreme Court held the District of Columbia law unconstitutional
by a 5 to 8 decision, 1 judge not voting, and in 1925
and 1927, on the basis of that decision, held the Arizona and Arkansas
laws, respectively, unconstitutional. The supreme courts of Kan:
sas and Porto Rico decided the same way.
The laws of the District of Columbia, Arizona, Arkansas, Kansas,
and Porto Rico have thereby been eliminated through express court
action. The laws of Texas and Nebraska were repealed, while the
attorney general of Minnesota ruled that the law of that State, except
for females under 18, is not enforceable.® Wisconsin endeavored
in 1925 to meet the constitutional difficulty by passing an “ oppressive
wage” act, and there seems to be no disposition to start a test case
pgainst that law so long as the industrial commission of the State
does not attempt to issue new or higher rates.
One law, that of Massachusetts, is of a recommendatory rather than
a mandatory character and its constitutionality is not questioned. The
situation in the other States is rather ambiguous. Orders frequently
remain in force by tacit agreement of the employers, while real enforcement
is restricted to minors. In order to clarify this twilight
situation the writer has asked the responsible officials of these States
and the departments of economics of their universities to give precise
first-hand information, and has received numerous letters. extracts
of which are given in the following pages.
‘? Quarterly Journal of Hconomics, Boston, May, 1916, p. 411: “ Minimum wages for
women,” by I, W. Tausslg, of Harvard University.
4+ American Labor Legislation Review, New York, June, 1925, p. 114: “ Employers’
agents at work against minimum-wage legislation,” by Amy E. Maher.
5 National Industrial Conference Board. Minimum Wage Legislation in Massachusetts.
New York, 1927, p. 3. .
1) olor of Prof. Jobn R. Commons, of the University of Wisconsin, dated Sept. 27.
