West Coast Hotel v. Parrish

Question 1

Facts

Answer 1

• Elsie Parrish worked as a maid at the West Coast Hotel in Wenatchee, Washington
• Paid less than the minimum wage specified by state law and sued

14thAmendment Due Process Clause
•“No state shall… deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law”
•Lochner emphasized a particular kind of liberty
•West Coast Hotel will emphasize a particular notion of due process of law as a constraint on liberty

Question 2

Issue

Answer 2

Whether a minimum wage law for women abridges liberty of contract in violation of the 14thAmendment Due Process Clause

Question 3

Holding

Answer 3

5-4, NO (Hughes writing): that liberty of contract cannot undermine the reasonable exercise of a state’s police powers

Question 4

Hughes’ reasoning

Answer 4

Absolute versus ordered liberty
•“The Constitution…prohibits the deprivation of liberty without due process of law. In prohibiting that deprivation, the Constitution does not recognize an absolute and uncontrollable liberty…The liberty safeguarded is liberty in a social organization, which requires the protection of law against the evils which menace the health, safety, morals, and welfare of the people. ”

Chain of argument

1. Absolute liberty degrades society
2. Without society, liberty is meaningless (i.e., Into the Wild guy)
3. To protect liberty, government should eliminate problems

Question 5

The Death of Liberty of Contract

Answer 5

What is the limit of a state’s police powers? Anything that seems reasonable for a state to do, they can do

• anything it seems reasonable for a state to do they can do
• does not say life, liberty, and happiness cannot be taken away → but we cannot execute anyone in this country until they’ve exhausted all their appeals

The Due Process Clause does not say life, liberty and property can NEVER be taken away, nor can the government ALWAYS take them away without any good reason

Question 6

How is Hughes’s argument similar to Holmes’s dissent

Answer 6

This power under the Constitution to restrict freedom of contract has had many illustrations…”

•“Statutes have been sustained limiting employment in underground mines and smelters to eight hours a day;…in prohibiting contracts limiting liability for injuries to employees; in limiting hours of work of employees in manufacturing establishments; and in maintaining workmen’s compensation laws.”

Question 7

How is Hughes’s argument similar to Harlan’s dissent

Answer 7

“In dealing with the relation of employer and employed, the Legislature has necessarily a wide field of discretion in order that there may be suitable protection of health and safety, and that peace and good order may be promotedthrough regulations designed to insure wholesome conditions of work and freedom from oppression….”

•Not about doing anything a majority wants (Holmes), doing what a community needs (Harlan)

Question 8

Is liberty of contract really dead?

Answer 8

Or is it dead with respect to women because they are deserving of special protection?

•“It is manifest that this established principle is peculiarly applicable in relation to the employment of women in whose protection the state has a special interest.”

Or is it only dead during times of economic crisis?
•“[T]he economic conditions which have supervened…make it not only appropriate, but we think imperative, that in deciding the present case the subject should receive fresh consideration.”

Question 9

Unequal bargaining power gets its due

Answer 9

One more lesson from the Depression –> The fact that owners abuse their bargaining power creates a problems that affects the whole community

The fact that owners abuse their bargaining power → does not mean that gov is meant to stay neutral and not help

Question 10

New take on government neutrality

Answer 10

Old way of thinking
•When two groups are competing, government must stay neutral. Cannot pick one side over the other.•West Coast Hotel

West Coast Hotel way of thinking
•This is NOT about favoring one group (employees) at the expense of another (owners). It’s about solving a community problem.
•It implies that government staying neutral is actually a form of favoritism because it tolerates one group abusing another

Question 11

Sutherlands Dissent

Answer 11

• accuses majority of writing/reinterpreting the constitution in light of economic conditions and technological events
• thinks it needs to be originalism → no living constitution → the document is alive because we look to it to solve problems that would never occur to the founders
  
  • you want to change the meaning of a constitution → amended it, it should not be at the whim of 5 judges
  • the document is not dead, it’s alive in that we expect it to be meaningful to us