Opinion

The Employers'liability Cases

  • 207 U.S. 463
  • 28 S. Ct. 141
  • 52 L. Ed. 297
  • 1908 U.S. LEXIS 1412
Court
Supreme Court of the United States
Filed
Jan 6, 1908
Status
Published
Author
Peckham
On the bench
Holmes, White, Peckham, Moody, Harlan, Day
Cited by
294 cases

suggesting that regulation of the employment relations of railroad employees "actually engaged in an operation of interstate commerce" is permissible under the Commerce Clause but that regulation of a railroad company's clerical force is not

How later courts described this case

  • suggesting that regulation of the employment relations of railroad employees "actually engaged in an operation of interstate commerce" is permissible under the Commerce Clause but that regulation of a railroad company's clerical force is not
  • invalidating statute creating negligence action against common carriers for personal injuries of employees sustained in the course of employment, because the statute "regulates the persons because they engage in interstate commerce and does not alone regulate the business of interstate commerce"
  • holding unconstitutional jurisdictional provision in Federal Employers Liability Act (FELA) covering the employees of "every common carrier engaged in trade or commerce"
  • "There is nothing in the words of the grant [of commerce power to Congress] that permits the belief that the power is not coextensive over foreign, interstate, and Indian trade, or is anything less than the whole power which any government may properly exercise over either_”

Written by the judges who cited it.

The opinion

Mb. Justice Peckham,

concurring.

I concur in the result of the foregoing opinion, but I am, not prepared to agree with all that is stated as to the power of Congress to legislate upon the subject of the relations between master and servant.

I concur in the -proposition, that as to traffic or other matters within the State, the act is unconstitutional, and it cannot be separated from that part which is claimed to be valid as relating to interstate commerce. As that is all' that it is necessary to decide in this case, I place my concurrence, upon that part of the opinion which decides it.

I am authorized to state that the Chief Justice and Mr. Justice Breweb agree in this view.

This is a copy of a public record, reproduced as it was published. It is not legal advice, and it may not be the version a court would rely on. Check the official source before you cite it.

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