The Connecticut labor press., 1920-05-15
COURT DECISIONS
 AFFECTING LABOR
 UPSET SOME ACTS
Federal Child Labor Law Among Those Held to Be
 Wrong.

It would seem almost as if the en- actment of a law proposing to protect the rights of one party immediately raised the question as to whether the rights of another had not been uncon- additionally infringed. The Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U. $. Depart ment of Labor has just issued it's an- nual compilation of decisions of courts affecting labor (Bu1letin No. 258) and of the 180 odd cases included therein more than score involved the power of the legislature to enact the law un- der which suit was brought, the objector being III ever case a person claiming to be lnJuriously affected by the act.
 Sometimes the court decides adverse ly to the legislature. as in the case of the Federal Child Labor Law by which Congress undertook to exclude from irl- terstate commerce the. products of child labor in the various states. It was held ditions covered by the law was i'll ex- cess of the federal authority, being merely within the control of the state, so that the law could not be enforced j; so also of a law of Louisiana, dec1ar- ing a special liability of public service corporations for injuries to any of their employees, the court holding the act un- constitutional because it placed in one class Workmen engaged i'll non-haZard- ous and in hazardous occupations.
 Another instance in which the action of the lawmakers was held to exceed its constitutional powers involved tipping law of California Thas acr did not actually prohibit the giving of tips, but forbade the employer to require en- p1oyes to turn their tips over to him. This was said to be unwarranted in terference with the right of employers and employees to contract.
 In many cases, however, the 1egis1a- lures have been vindicated, as by the supreme court of Massachusetts and Washington, upholding the minimum wage laws of the respective states; that of Pennsylvania sustaining a law for bidding night work by children under l6 years of age; and those of New Jersey and New York upho1ding pro- gressive legislation on the subject of workmen'sN compensation. The New York case involved the creation of special fund to compensate second in juries, contributions to be made to it by employers of workingmen fatally in Jured and leaving no beneficiary under the act.
 The Clayton Act, amending the fed eral antitrust law, was held by United States district court of appeals to have set aside some of the judicial restric- tions on the right of labor unions to maintain boycotts against objectionable products of manufacture. The Ma. chinists' Union of New York had black listed printing press manufactured in Michigan, under open snop conditions Boycotts and threats of strikes pre- vented drayage, installation, or repair of these presses; and 1t was held by majority of the court that, though the very thing attempted by the unions had been pronounced unlawful i'll the fam ous Danbury Matters" case, the Clayton Act rendered it legal at the present time. There was a strong dissent to this opinion, the statement being made that what would have been unlawful in this case before the passage of the Clayton Act was not made lawful by the act.