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West Coast Hotel v. Parrish - Significance, A Test Case, A Close Vote, James Clark Mcreynolds, Further Readings

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Appellant

West Coast Hotel Company

Appellee

Elsie Parrish

Appellant's Claim

That Parrish was not due back pay to bring her up to the level she would have received under Washington's 1913 minimum wage law.

Chief Lawyers for Appellant

John W. Roberts, E. L. Skeel

Chief Lawyers for Appellee

C. B. Conner, Sam M. Driver

Justices for the Court

Louis D. Brandeis, Benjamin N. Cardozo, Charles Evans Hughes (writing for the Court), Owen Josephus Roberts, Harlan Fiske Stone

Justices Dissenting

Pierce Butler, James Clark McReynolds, George Sutherland, Willis Van Devanter

Place

Washington, D.C.

Date of Decision

29 March 1937

Decision

The public interest in setting a minimum wage for women and children is more important than freedom of contract.

Related Cases

  • Lochner v. New York, 198 U.S. 45 (1905).
  • Muller v. Oregon, 208 U.S. 412 (1918).
  • Adkins v. Children's Hospital, 261 U.S. 525 (1923).
  • Morehead v. New York ex rel. Tipaldo, 298 U.S. 587 (1936).
  • United States v. Darby, 312 U.S. 100 (1941).

Sources

Cushman, Clare, ed. The Supreme Court Justices: Illustrated Biographies, 1789-1993. Washington, DC: Congressional Quarterly Inc., 1993.

Friedman, Leon, and Fred L. Israel, eds. The Justices of the U.S. Supreme Court 1789-1969: Their Lives and Major Opinions. New York: Chelsea House Publishers, 1969.

Additional Topics

West Coast Hotel v. Parrish - Further Readings

West Coast Hotel v. Parrish - Significance

In one of the rare instances in which the Supreme Court overruled one of its own precedents, West Coast Hotel v. Parrish set the stage for the passage of the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938. In the late nineteenth century, many Americans believed women were a separate class from men--physically, economically, and socially. Wisconsin, presuming females were "handicapped for motherhood" by working …

West Coast Hotel v. Parrish - A Test Case

The Great Depression of the 1930s heated up the debate. Reformers fixed their hopes on Elsie Parrish--a grandmother. In 1933, she had gone to work as a chambermaid at the Cascadian Hotel in Wenatchee, Washington. When her job ended, the hotel offered her $17 for the balance of her services. Parrish and her husband knew that the state's minimum wage law for women (1913) had set wages at a minimum o…

West Coast Hotel v. Parrish - A Close Vote

On 29 March 1937, by a 5-4 vote the Supreme Court upheld the minimum wage law in Washington, ordering the West Coast Hotels Company to pay Parrish the money owed plus court costs. She declared, "I'm not sure I understand all the things but I'm glad its all over." Two months after West Coast Hotel v. Parrish, 16 states added minimum wage laws to their books. The decision was the beginning of the en…

West Coast Hotel v. Parrish - James Clark Mcreynolds

James Clark McReynolds (1862--1946), an associate justice on the U.S. Supreme Court from 1914 until 1941, grew up in an area of Kentucky characterized by frontier based individualism. McReynolds' strictly religious parents gave him a sharply defined sense of right and wrong. Later at the University of Virginia, a law professor reinforced this ethic by teaching the law as a permanent, inflexible en…

Whitney v. California - Significance, Supreme Court Upholds California Criminal Syndicalism Law, The California Criminal Syndicalism Act, Further Readings [next] [back] Weeks v. United States - Significance, Great Principles Must Not Be Sacrificed, A Personal Right Of The Defendant?, Impact

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3 months ago

smith

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over 4 years ago

I live in Wenatchee, WA and have been speaking about Elsie Parrish for over 20 years to any group that will listen. Before the computer age in this area, I had a hard time finding information. The city has finally recognized the significance of the case and has placed a plaque outside of the Cascadian Hotel with a dedication to Elsie Parrish