Coercion, Contract, and Free Labor in the Nineteenth Century (Cambridge Historical Studies in American Law and Society)
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Published: February 12, 2001
Language: eng
Format: Hardcover
Number of pages: 342
ISBN-13: 9780521773607
Subjects: American history: c 1800 to c 1900; Labour economics; Labor contract; History - U.S.; United States; Great Britain - History - 19th Century; Labor And Employment Law; History: World; USA; United Kingdom, Great Britain; Labor & Industrial Relations - General; United States - 19th Century; Western Europe - General; History / Great Britain; Labor contract--Great Britain--Criminal provisions--History; Forced labor; Law and legislation; Europe - Great Britain - General; Labor & Employment; Criminal provisions; Great Britain; History
Description: "This book presents a fundamental reassessment of the nature of wage labor in the nineteenth century, focusing on the common use of penal sanctions in England to enforce wage labor agreements. Professor Steinfeld argues that wage workers were not employees at will but were often bound to their employment by enforceable labor agreements, which employers used whenever available to manage their labor costs and supply. In the northern United States, where employers normally could not use penal sanctions, the common law made other contract remedies available, also placing employers in a position to enforce labor agreements. Modern free wage labor only came into being late in the nineteenth century, as a result of reform legislation that restricted the contract remedies employers could legally use."--BOOK JACKET.