Lochner era

The Lochner era is a period in American legal history from roughly 1897 to 1937 in which the Supreme Court of the United States tended to strike down economic regulations mandating certain working conditions or wages, or limiting working hours. The Lochner era coincided roughly with the Second Industrial Revolution and it is possible to think of the actions of the court as mimicking, underwriting and in turn encouraging the economic assumptions-at-large of that era, i.e. laissez-faire economics and libertarian ideals.

Important Cases

A general feel for the principles that played foundational roles in the Lochner era might arise from examining the legal terrain of the time.

Allgeyer v. Louisiana

The Supreme Court first held the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment protected an individual's "liberty to contract" in the 1897 case of Allgeyer v. Louisiana.

Lochner v. New York

In the era's namesake 1905 case of Lochner v. New York, the Court struck down a New York State law limiting the number of hours bakers could work on the grounds that it violated bakers' "right to contract," a right the court found implicit in the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. This doctrine, known as Economic Substantive Due Process, defined the Court during the Lochner era.

Other cases

• In Hammer v. Dagenhart (1918), the court struck down legislation outlawing child labor in factories where children under 14 worked.

• In Bailey v. Drexel Furniture Co. (1922), where the court invalidated a tax on interstate commerce by employers hiring children.

• In Adkins v. Children's Hospital (1923) the court struck down federal legislation that mandated a minimum wage level for women in the District of Columbia.

• The era is considered to have ended with the overturning of Adkins v. Children's Hospital in the 1937 case of West Coast Hotel Co. v. Parrish.

• It should be also noted that the two early cases that use Substantive Due Process to protect civil liberties, Pierce v. Society of Sisters and Meyer v. Nebraska, were decided during the Lochner era.

Criticism

Since West Coast Hotel Co. v. Parrish, the case many feel ends the period, the Lochner era has been considered by both liberals and conservatives alike to be a regrettable period in U.S. jurisprudence, each for different reasons. Liberals consider it a shameful time for workers' rights, while conservatives cite it as an example of inappropriate judicial activism (the latter opinion articulated in Holmes’s dissenting Lochner opinion).^{[citation needed]}

However, many libertarians viewed Lochner and its progeny as laudable cases for their recognition of individual liberty.^{[citation needed]} They see it not as judicial activism but as the proper exercise of judicial review, striking down laws that are unconstitutional under the fifth and/or fourteenth amendments (the fourteenth amendment was, of course, the grounds on which Lochner was decided). Supporters of Lochner maintained that the shift in economic circumstances that brought about its demise do not change the meaning of the Constitution. ^[1]

Notes

References

• Bernstein, David E. "Lochner Era Revisionism, Revised: Lochner and the Origins of Fundamental Rights Constitutionalism." Georgetown Law Journal. November 2003.
• Cushman, Barry. Rethinking the New Deal Court: The Structure of a Constitutional Revolution. Paperback ed. New York: Oxford University Press, 1998. ISBN 0195120434
• Gillman, Howard. The Constitution Besieged: The Rise and Demise of Lochner Era Police Powers Jurisprudence. New ed. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1993. ISBN 0822316420
• Sunstein, Cass R. "Lochner's Legacy." Columbia Law Review. 87:873 (June 1987).