A Class by Herself (ebook)

Argumento de A Class by Herself (ebook)

A Class by Herself explores the historical role and influence of protective legislation for American women workers, both as a step toward modern labor standards and as a barrier to equal rights. Spanning the twentieth century, the book tracks the rise and fall of women-only state protective laws—such as maximum hour laws, minimum wage laws, and night work laws—from their roots in progressive reform through the passage of New Deal labor law to the feminist attack on single-sex protective laws in the 1960s and 1970s.

Nancy Woloch considers the network of institutions that promoted women-only protective laws, such as the National Consumers' League and the federal Women's Bureau; the global context in which the laws arose; the challenges that proponents faced; the rationales they espoused; the opposition that evolved; the impact of protective laws in ever-changing circumstances; and their dismantling in the wake of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Above all, Woloch examines the constitutional conversation that the laws provoked—the debates that arose in the courts and in the women's movement. Protective laws set precedents that led to the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 and to current labor law; they also sustained a tradition of gendered law that abridged citizenship and impeded equality for much of the century.

Drawing on decades of scholarship, institutional and legal records, and personal accounts, A Class by Herself sets forth a new narrative about the tensions inherent in women-only protective labor laws and their consequences.

Winner of the 2016 Philip Taft Labor History Award, Cornell University School of Industrial & Labor Relations
Winner of the 2015 William G. Bowen Award, Industrial Relations Section of Princeton University
Honorable Mention for the 2015 David J. Langum, Sr. Prize for American Legal History/Biography, Langum Charitable Trust

"A monumental contribution to the history of gendered labor law, Woloch's clear and authoritative guide to this complex topic provides a solid foundation for future scholars. Its commanding perspective offers effective summaries, astute interpretations, and thoughtful connections across a century of social, economic, and political change. This is a book of enduring value to historians, legal scholars, and everyone interested in fairness in the workplace."--Kathryn Kish Sklar, author of Florence Kelley and the Nation's Work

"Rarely are we fortunate enough to get such a careful and nuanced exploration of such an important subject. Woloch moves well beyond polemics to help us genuinely understand the complexities of issues that remain in a class by themselves in terms of their significance in American legal and political history. Woloch's chronological reach is especially impressive, ultimately helping us to understand the many different conceptions of 'progressive' politics that have enlivened modern America."--Robert D. Johnston, author of The Radical Middle Class

"How did women move from the border of belonging to the center of the struggle for equality? Many historians have tackled pieces of the story, but nobody has traced the history of single-sex protective legislation from its conception to its disintegration until now. Well-researched, elegantly composed, and persuasive, A Class by Herself is a sterling account of one of the great issues in American women’s history."--Alice Kessler-Harris, Columbia University

"Employing a wide array of scholarship, this book looks at single-sex protective labor laws, from their appearance in the late nineteenth century to their virtual disappearance at the end of the twentieth. Woloch is the right person to pull together the enormous literature on women’s history and protective labor laws and to clarify where we are in this century-long debate. A much-needed book."--Cynthia Harrison, George Washington University

"Historian Woloch analyzes the fraught history of protective laws for women workers. She skillfully synthesizes many strands of the historiography of protective legislation while making an original contribution with close analyses of the people and particulars of key court cases and decisions that shaped the reformist and legislative landscape over a century. . . . Woloch deftly illustrates how post-1960, arguments for workplace equality based on 14th Amendment protections ultimately trumped those based on difference--but not without difficulty, as evidenced by debates over maternal health and leave policies."--Choice0Introduction 1
1 Roots of Protection: The National Consumers' League and Progressive Reform 5
Progressives Mobilize 6
Florence Kelley and the NCL 11
Rationales: The Perils of Pragmatism 18
Roadblocks: Business and Labor 25
Law: Constraint and Opportunity 28
2 Gender, Protection, and the Courts, 1895?1907 33
Freedom of Contract versus the Police Power 35
A Lowell Mill: Commonwealth v. Hamilton Manufacturing Co. (1876) 38
A Chicago Box Factory: Ritchie v. People (1895) 39
A Utah Mine: Holden v. Hardy (1898) 43
Women's Hours Laws: Pennsylvania, Washington, Nebraska 45
A Utica Bakery: Lochner v. New York (1905) 48
A New York Bookbindery: People v. Williams (1907) 51
3 A Class by Herself: Muller v. Oregon (1908) 54
Local Roots of the Muller Case 55
Muller Goes to Court 58
The NCL Steps In 61
The Brandeis Brief 64
Curt Muller's Brief 70
The Muller v. Oregon Opinion 73
Assessing the Law of 1903 79
4 Protection in Ascent, 1908?23 85
Maximum Hours Cases 87
Night Work Laws 93
Protecting Men 97
The Minimum Wage 103
War and Peace 109
Adkins v. Children's Hospital (1923) 112
5 Different versus Equal: The 1920s 121
Alice Paul, the National Woman's Party, and the ERA 122
The NCL, Social Feminism, and the Minimum Wage 125
Factions Collide: The Women's Movement 130
Close Combat: The Conferences 133
The Women's Bureau Report of 1928 137
Did the Laws Work? Enforcement and Effectiveness 141
Working Women's Voices 145
6 Transformations: The New Deal through the 1950s 152
New Deal Women 153
The Minimum Wage and the Revolution of 1937 158
FLSA: Protection Triumphant 162
The 1940s: War and Postwar 167
Bartending: Goesaert v. Cleary (1948) 174
Women in Unions 180
The Women's Bureau and the NWP 184
7 Trading Places: The 1960s and 1970s 191
The Early 1960s: PCSW and Equal Pay 193
Title VII, the EEOC , and Protective Laws 197
Protection Debated: Pressure and Politics, 1965?69 202
Protection Challenged: Three Landmark Cases 207
Protection Dismantled: The Courts and the States 212
Closing Arguments: 1970 221
The ERA and the Women's Movement 224
8 Last Lap: Work and Pregnancy 235
Pregnancy Cases: The 1970s 236
The Pregnancy Discrimination Act (1978) 242
Toward Family Leave 248
The Toxic Workplace 250
The Johnson Controls Decision (1991) 255
Conclusion: Protection Revisited 261
Looking Back: The Clash over Overtime 263
Moving On: After Protection 267
Acknowledgments 273
Notes 275
Index 321