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The Green Bag
division of our subject and we notice it here only to call attention to that phase of it which touches the point we wish to illustrate. One of the reasons given by the New York courts for upholding this law was that it directly affects the public health, because bread is more likely to be clean and wholesome if the workman is not fatigued by long hours of work, and clean and whole some bread is conducive to the public health. The case later went to the Supreme Court of the United States, Lockner v. New York, 198 U. S. 45, 1905, but that Court could see no such direct relation between the law and the public health. It said, in substance, that it is impossible to discover any connection between hours of labor and healthy bread, and that, if it exists, it is "too thin and shadowy to build an argument on it." The conclusion, therefore, was that the law could not be sustained on that ground. //. Laws Regulating and Limiting Hours of Labor Which do Not Directly Affect the Public. General Rule. Let us now see what the situation is with regard to laws which admittedly have no such direct relation to the public health, safety, morals or welfare. The broad, fundamental rule undoubt edly is that such laws are invalid be cause they restrict the inalienable right of every citizen to contract as he pleases concerning his labor and property. But there is another principle as firmly established as the preceding one, to the effect that both liberty and property, including the right to contract, are subject to reasonable regulation by the state when there are particular circum stances which require it. A few courts, though recognizing this principle in other connections, seem to forget it
when they are dealing with laws limit ing hours of labor, and, adhering strictly to the main rule, absolutely refuse to sustain such laws. A large majority of the courts, however, recognize and apply this principle in considering laws limiting hours of labor as they do in considering other laws, with the result that there are now three well estab lished exceptions to the broad, funda mental rule first above stated. The cases which absolutely deny the right of the legislature to make such laws under any circumstances, we will take up in connection with, and as denying, the exceptions which naturally furnish the classification for the rest of this article. ///. Exceptions to the General Rule That Laws Regulating and Limiting Hours of Labor Which Do Not Directly Affect the Public are Invalid. 1. LAWS WHICH LIMIT THE HOURS OF LABOR OF PERSONS ENGAGED ON PUBLIC WORKS. A common form of statutory regula tion of the hours of labor is the pro vision that workmen on public works shall not be required to work more than a prescribed number of hours each day. These laws indicate a general belief on the part of the legislators that re stricting the number of hours of work is conducive to the general welfare, because they are often passed regard less of whether there are any special circumstances connected with the situa tion they are to govern calling for such laws. Most courts sustain legislation of this kind. This is not because it has such a direct relation to the public welfare as is required in other cases, or even because it has any relation to it at all, but because laws of this kind are regarded as in the nature of a direction
