{"product_id":"making-minimum-wage-helen-j-knowles-9780806169385","title":"Making Minimum Wage: Elsie Parrish Versus the West Coast Hotel Company Volume 4","description":"The US Supreme Court's 1937 decision in \u003ci\u003eWest Coast Hotel v. Parrish\u003c\/i\u003e, upholding the constitutionality of Washington State's minimum wage law for women, had monumental consequences for all American workers. It also marked a major shift in the Court's response to President Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal agenda. In \u003ci\u003eMaking Minimum Wage\u003c\/i\u003e, Helen J. Knowles tells the human story behind this historic case. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ci\u003eWest Coast Hotel v. Parrish\u003c\/i\u003e pitted a Washington State hotel against a chambermaid, Elsie Parrish, who claimed that she was owed the state's minimum wage. The hotel argued that under the concept of \"freedom of contract,\" the US Constitution allowed it to pay its female workers whatever low wages they were willing to accept. Knowles unpacks the legal complexities of the case while telling the litigants' stories. Drawing on archival and private materials, including the unpublished memoir of Elsie's lawyer, C. B. Conner, Knowles exposes the profound courage and resolve of the former chambermaid. Her book reveals why Elsie--who, in her mid-thirties was already a grandmother--was fired from her job at the Cascadian Hotel in Wenatchee, and why she undertook the outsized risk of suing the hotel for back wages. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e Minimum wage laws are \"not an academic question or even a legal one,\" Elinore Morehouse Herrick, the New York director of the National Labor Relations Board, said in 1936. Rather, they are \"a human problem.\" A pioneering analysis that illuminates the life stories behind \u003ci\u003eWest Coast Hotel v. Parrish\u003c\/i\u003e as well as the case's impact on local, state, and national levels, \u003ci\u003eMaking Minimum Wage\u003c\/i\u003e vividly demonstrates the fundamental truth of Morehouse Herrick's statement. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e Helen J. Knowles\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-10:\u003c\/b\u003e 0806169389\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-13:\u003c\/b\u003e 9780806169385\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e University of Oklahoma Press\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eLanguage:\u003c\/b\u003e English\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 08\/05\/2021\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 396\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eFormat:\u003c\/b\u003e Paperback\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWeight:\u003c\/b\u003e 1.27lbs\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSize:\u003c\/b\u003e 9.00h x 6.00w x 0.88d","brand":"Helen J. Knowles","offers":[{"title":"Paperback","offer_id":44129951777023,"sku":"9780806169385","price":26.95,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0662\/2982\/9887\/files\/img_2d38c5ab-3db4-4171-a386-443756f02472.jpg?v=1687466713","url":"https:\/\/www.whiterainbookhouse.com\/products\/making-minimum-wage-helen-j-knowles-9780806169385","provider":"WR Book House","version":"1.0","type":"link"}