Corning Glass Works v. Brennan 1974

AuthorDaniel Brannen, Richard Hanes, Elizabeth Shaw
Pages1035-1039

Page 1035

Petitioner: Corning Glass Works

Respondent: Peter J. Brennan, U.S. Secretary of Labor

Petitioner's Claim: That the Court of Appeals erred by ruling that Corning violated the Equal Pay Act.

Chief Lawyer for Petitioner: Scott F. Zimmerman

Chief Lawyer for Respondent: Allan Abbot Tuttle

Justices for the Court: William J. Brennan, Jr., William O. Douglas, Thurgood Marshall (writing for the Court), Lewis F. Powell, Jr., Byron R. White

Justices Dissenting: Harry A. Blackmun, Warren E. Burger, William H. Rehnquist (Potter Stewart did not participate)

Date of Decision: June 3, 1974

Decision: The Supreme Court said Corning violated the Equal Pay Act by paying male nightshift inspection workers higher wages than female dayshift inspection workers.

Significance: With Corning, the Supreme Court reinforced the policy of "equal pay for equal work."

Corning Glass Works was a company with production plants in Corning, New York, and Wellsboro, Pennsylvania. Prior to 1925, Corning operated its Wellsboro plant only during the day. The employees who inspected finished products were all female.

Page 1036

Between 1925 and 1930, Corning began to use automatic production equipment, which made finished products faster than people made them. It became necessary for Corning to hire nightshift inspectors to keep up with the increased production. Corning, however, had two problems. Under New York and Pennsylvania law, women were not allowed to work at night. In addition, men thought inspection work was inferior work for women. Men would not do inspection work unless they got more money than female inspectors received. Corning gave the male nightshift inspectors more money.

Fair Labor Standards

In 1963, Congress passed the Equal Pay Act. The law required companies to pay men and women equally for similar work. By then, New York and Pennsylvania had gotten rid of the laws that prevented women from working at night.

In June 1966, Corning began to allow women to get the higher paying nightshift inspection jobs. Then in January 1969, Corning signed an

Practicing fair labor standards has always been a problem with businesses.

Reproduced by permission of the Corbis Corporation.

Page 1037

agreement to pay dayshift and nightshift inspectors the same money. The agreement, however, contained an exception for nightshift workers hired before January 1969. Those...

To continue reading

Request your trial

VLEX uses login cookies to provide you with a better browsing experience. If you click on 'Accept' or continue browsing this site we consider that you accept our cookie policy. ACCEPT