11 N.Y.S. 314 | N.Y. Sup. Ct. | 1890
The submission to this court, made in pursuance of the provisions of the Code of Civil Procedure, is for the purpose of obtaining a judicial construction and application of chapter 388, Laws 1890, entitled “An act to provide weekly payments of wages by corporations.” By the terms of the agreement of submission, if the plaintiffs prevail, there should be a recovery of five penalties of $10 each against the defendant, by reason of the fail
The primary general sense of a word often ramifies into different senses, as Webster illustrates in the preface to his dictionary. He says, in substance, that by attention to the different uses and applications of the word we become able, in most cases, to arrive at a satisfactory explanation of the manner in which the same word comes to be used with different significations. Prof. Whitney says that, “both historically and with regard to present usage, it is impossible to draw a hard and fast line between the two sides of words used in our language, either with respect to the words or to their individual senses.” It may be broadly stated, therefore, that the word “employe,” as used in the body of this statute, standing by itself, without words of limitation, is sufficient to include, not only persons engaged in manual labor, such as servants and laborers, but also such as may be employed otherwise, as was well held in the case of Gurney v. Railway Co., 58 N. Y. 358, where, under an order and judgment of this court requiring the receiver to pay the laborers and employes of the company for labor and services actually done in connection with that company’s railway, the compensation of Jeremiah S. Black, a lawyer, was held to be payable by the assignee. In that case Chief Justice Church says: “It is quite as rational to believe that the intent was to include as to exclude the debt of the claimant. Debts for materials and supplies were protected, and why may we not suppose that the claimant’s demand was regarded to be as just and equitable as those, especially under the circumstances referred to? The mortgage creditors received what they regarded -a great benefit by making these concessions in the immediate appointment of the receiver, and the order should be liberally construed in favor of creditors who are presumed to have assented to them, and relied upon them for the payment of their debts.” Judge Allen, in the same case, says: “In the absence of any intent apparent on the face of the order to discriminate between different classes of employes, or different kinds of service, the court cannot confine it to a single class, or to a particular service. The term < employe ’ is the correlative of ‘ employer,’ and neither term has, either technically or in general use, a restricted meaning by which any particular employment or service is indicated. The terms are as applicable to attorney and client, physician and patient, as to master and servant, a farmer and day laborer, or a master mechanic and his workmen.” But, conceding so much to the extent of the meaning of the word “employe,” it brings us only to the real question in issue. That word must be read in connection with the word “wages,” contained in the body as well as in the title of the act. The word “wages” here used limits the meaning of the word “employe.” In the case already cited from the court of appeals, np one, while conceding the correctness of the allowances to Mr. Black, would say that such allowances were wages. The statute therefore contains within itself a limitation upon the meaning of the word “employe.” The case, consequently, as presented to us, is not whether
Under these rules of construction and interpretation, it is obvious, that this act was intended by the legislature to take its place among others for the protection of laborers and workmen. There is no special reason observable, either from the act itself or from the preceding legislation leading up to it, why the license clerk in the mayor’s department, in the city of Buffalo, or the secretary and treasurer of the park commissioners of that city, or a public school teacher, or a fireman, or a patrolman should be paid otherwise