West Coast Hotel Company v. Parrish 300 U.S. 379 (1937)

• Author: Stanley I. Kutler
• Pages: 2881-2882

Page 2881

This decision sustaining a Washington state minimum wage statute in March 1937 signaled a seismic shift in judicial philosophy toward acceptance of the validity of social and economic legislation. Together with the WAGNER ACT CASES, the decision reflected a new, favorable judicial attitude toward the NEW DEAL, thus defusing FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT'S COURT-PACKING proposal.

The constitutionality of minimum wage legislation had a peculiar history. In MULLER V. OREGON (1908) and BUNTING V. OREGON (1917) the Justices had approved state laws regulating maximum working hours, including provisions for overtime wages. In 1917, the Court divided evenly on an Oregon minimum wage law. WILLIAM HOWARD TAFT, among others, confidently presumed that LOCHNER V. NEW YORK'S (1905) rigorous FREEDOM OF CONTRACT doctrines no

Page 2882

longer applied. Yet in 1923, a 5?3 majority of the Court reaffirmed the Lochner ruling, and in ADKINS V. CHILDREN ' S HOSPITAL (1923) the Court invalidated a DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA minimum wage statute. New Chief Justice Taft sharply attacked the majority's reasoning. He found no distinction between MAXIMUM HOUR AND MINIMUM WAGE LAWS : one was the "multiplier and the other the multiplicand." Although Taft reiterated his belief that Lochner had been tacitly overruled, Lochner nevertheless persisted until the Parrish decision in 1937.

After Adkins, the Court invalidated other state minimum wage laws. The Great Depression, however, stimulated new state laws, perhaps encouraged by Justice GEORGE SUTHERLAND ' S OBITER DICTUM that "exceptional circumstances" might justify such legislation. But in MORE-HEAD V. NEW YORK EX REL. TIPALDO (1936), a 5?4 majority held to the Adkins precedent and invalidated a recent New York law. The Court's opinion masked Justice OWEN J. ROBERTS'S uneasiness. Roberts had supported PIERCE & BUTLER, JAMES C. MCREYNOLDS, George Sutherland, and WILLIS VAN DEVANTER in Tipaldo, but he later revealed that the state counsel's argument that Adkins merely be distinguished, and not overthrown, had obliged him to follow the precedent. Six months later, Roberts provided the key vote to consider the Washington law. On the surface, the procedure was justified on the ground that the state court had upheld the statute, but the combination of the Tipaldo dissenters' strongly held views on constitutionality and Roberts's skepticism toward Adkins dictated a full-scale review of the issue.

Roberts later...