More than a decade before a federal law set a minimum wage for workers, the Stat

Question

More than a decade before a federal law set a minimum wage for workers, the State of Oklahoma passed a statute that established a minimum wage for workers performing services for the state government. The law based the minimum wage on “the current rate of per diem wages in the locality where the work is to be perfume.” The state’s commissioner of labor charged General Construction with violating the minimum wage law. The commissioner alleged that various workers were being underpaid. General Construction argued that the statue was too vague to be enforceable.

Is there any other ambiguous or vague language in the statue? How could the statue be reworded in order to overcome any notion of vagueness?

Explanation / Answer

In the case Re Sigsworth (1935) where a son had murdered his mother. Ordinarily under the relevant act the next of kin would inherit the deceased’s estate, this was clearly understood by the wording in the statute however if the literal rule was applied it would lead to an unjust result.

Interpretation of statutes is effectively left to the discretion of the judge, in 1978 Parliament passed the Interpretation Act to set out general rules for courts to interpret acts. Three rules had been developed accordingly to provide a framework of interpretation. These rules are; Literal Rule, Golden Rule and the Mischief Rule.

Statute law revision Bills are prepared by the Statute Law Revision Programme. It was not until 1866 and the administration of President Johnson that the Congress finally approved Sumner's An Act to provide for the Revision and Consolidation of the Statute Laws of the United States

References

www.inbrief.co.uk/legal-system

Wikipedia.org

Related Questions

Navigate

• Browse (All)
• Browse M
• Subjects

Integrity-first tutoring: explanations and feedback only — we do not complete graded work. Learn more.