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Article
Review of Only One Place of Redress: African Americans, Labor Regulations, and the Courts from Reconstruction to the New Deal
The South Carolina Historical Magazine (2004)
  • Brian D. Behnken, University of California - Davis
Abstract
In Only One Place of Redress, David Bernstein contends that between 1890 and 1937 American courts aided black workers in labor disputes. The court did this by upholding the freedom of contract doctrine enshrined in Lochner v. New York, the 1905 case that invalidated legislation limiting the hours a baker could work. "Lochnerism" or "Lochnerian jurisprudence," as Bernstein calls it, benefited blacks by voiding discriminatory labor laws, and he illuminates how these labor regulations harmed African Americans. "The Supreme Court," he writes, "was relatively sympathetic to plaintiffs who challenged government regulations, especially occupational regulations, as violations of the implicit constitutional right to 'liberty of contract"' (p. 2). The author traces work discrimination by examining emigrant agent laws, licensing regulations, and New Deal legislation, among many others, to show how Lochnerism could have, or did, help black Americans.
Publication Date
October, 2004
Publisher Statement
Copyright 2004 South Carolina Historical Society
Citation Information
Brian D. Behnken. "Review of Only One Place of Redress: African Americans, Labor Regulations, and the Courts from Reconstruction to the New Deal" The South Carolina Historical Magazine Vol. 105 Iss. 4 (2004)
Available at: http://works.bepress.com/brian_behnken/2/