3. PAYMENT REQUIRED RIGHT TO SET OFF JUDGMENT.

This act requires the payment of wages of persons engaged in mining to be in lawful money on the first and fifteenth days of each month, and gives a remedy for the legal enforcement. Under this act an ordinary judgment can not be set off against a judgment for wages due a miner.

Bosche v. Maurer, 5 Pa. County Ct. Rep. 215, p. 216.

Under this act, as well as under the amendatory act of May 20, 1891 (P. L. 96), an employer in a suit for wages may set off a judgment against the demand of the claimant where the note upon which the judgment was confessed expressly waived the right of exemption and the demands stand upon an equal footing.

Welliver v. Fox, 4 Pa. Dist. Rep. 197, p. 198.
Showalter v. Ehlan, 5 Pa. Supr. Ct. Rep. 242, p. 248.

SEMIMONTHLY PAYMENT-AMENDMENT.

LAWS 1891, P. 96.

MAY 20, 1891.

AN AMENDMENT to an act, entitled "An act to provide for the semimonthly payment of wageworkers," approved May 23, 1887, and providing a penalty for its violation.

SEC. 1. Be it enacted, etc.:

That the first section of an act entitled "An act to provide for the semimonthly payment of wageworkers," approved May 23, 1887, which reads as follows, namely: (here follows sec. 1 of the act of 1887, see p. 395), be amended so that the same shall read as follows, namely:

SEC. 1. That from and after a period of two months subsequent to the date of the passage of this act, every individual, firm, asociation or corporation employing wageworkers, skilled or ordinary, laborers engaged at manual or clerical work, in the business of mining or manufacturing, or any other employees, shall make payment in lawful money of the United States to the said employees, laborers and wageworkers, or to their authorized representatives; the first payment to be made between the first and fifteenth and the second payment between the fifteenth and thirtieth of each month, the full net amount of wages or earnings due said employees, laborers and wageworkers upon the first and fifteenth instant of each and every month wherein such payments are made. And in case any individual, firm, corporation, or association or other employer shall refuse to make payment when demanded, upon the dates herein set forth, to wageworkers, laborers, or other employees employed by or with the authority of such indiivdual, firm, corporation or association or other employer, the said individual, the members of the firm, the directors, officers and superintendents or managers of said corporation and associations, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor, and upon conviction shall be sentenced to pay a fine not to exceed two hundred dollars.

SEC. 2. No assignment of future wages payable semimonthly, under the provisions of this act, shall be valid, nor shall any agreement be valid that relieves the said firms, individuals, corporations or associations from the obligation to pay semimonthly and in the lawful money of the United States.

SEC. 3. It is hereby made the duty of the factory inspector and his deputies to bring actions in the name of the Commonwealth against every individual, firm, corporation and association violating the provisions of this law, upon the request of any citizen of this Commonwealth. Upon his failure to do so, any citizen of this Commonwealth is hereby authorized to do so in the name of the Commonwealth.

SEC. 4. All laws or parts of laws inconsistent with the provisions of this act be and the same are hereby repealed.

ANNOTATIONS.

WAGES-SEMIMONTHLY PAYMENT.

1. CONSTRUCTION-PENAL CHARACTER.

2. PURPOSE OF ACT-CLASSES OF EMPLOYEES EXTENDED.

3. SECTION 2 UNCONSTITUTIONAL.

4. EMPLOYEES INCLUDED IN ACT.

5. SEMIMONTHLY PAYMENTS-EFFECT ON CONTRACTS.

6. ACT LIMITED TO MINING AND MANUFACTURING.

7. PAYMENT OF STORE BILLS-MINER BOUND.

8. SET-OFF-RIGHT NOT DENIED.

1. CONSTRUCTION-PENAL CHARACTER.

This act is highly penal and must be strictly construed.

Bauer v. Reynolds, 3 Pa. Dist. Rep. 502.

This statute is a penal one and falls under the rule of strict construction, which means that in order to apply to any given case the case must come within the letter and the spirit of the statute.

Commonwealth v. Marsh, 14 Pa. County Ct. Rep. 369, p. 370.

2. PURPOSE OF ACT CLASSES OF EMPLOYEES EXTENDED.

This act sought to widen the classification of the business about which those different classes of persons were employed, and the legislature having learned the danger of enumerating the different branches of business as "works, mines, and manufactories," omitted entirely the portions of the acts of 1872 and 1883 which limited the employment to works, mines, and manufactories. This was intended to cure the defects in the prior acts as disclosed by the decisions of the courts, and the provisions of all these acts are by this act extended to the classes of employees designated, without regard to the character of the employer.

Strang v. Adams, 4 Pa. Dist. Rep. 212, p. 215.

3. SECTION 2 UNCONSTITUTIONAL

Section 2 of this act, requiring the payment of wages in lawful money of the United States and attempting to prevent persons otherwise competent from making contracts is unconstitutional.

Sally v. Berwind-White Coal Min. Co., 5 Pa. Dist. Rep. 316, p. 317.

The effect if not the purpose of this act, as well as that of the act of June 29, 1881, was to enable a laborer or miner after making an agreement to accept another commodity In lieu of cash and receiving it, to repudiate the agreement and recover the payment again in money. If employees could thus, by classes, obtain license from the legislature to play fast and loose with their bargains the most solemn contractual relations would become a farce and the courts might as well be closed. This act, like the act of 1881, is invalid as it prevents employers and employees from making their own contracts.

Showalter v. Ehlan, 5 Pa. Supr. Ct. Rep. 242, p. 248.

4. EMPLOYEES INCLUDED IN ACT.

This act applies only to wage workers engaged in mining and manufacturing, The business of lumbering is not mining and does not necessarily involve manufacturing.

Bauer v. Reynolds, 3 Pa. Dist. Rep. 502.

This act requiring semimonthly payments of employees applies to employees engaged in the absence of mining or manufacturing and has no application to persons employed in the work of making the road bed of a railroad and in dig. ging away, piling up and leveling of earth and stone.

Commonwealth v. Marsh, 14 Pa. County Ct. Rep. 369, p. 372.

5. SEMIMONTHLY PAYMENTS-EFFECT ON CONTRACTS.

The act requires only that payments should be made semimonthly of wages due. It does not require an employer to anticipate the payment of wages which by special contract are not due. Possibly the legislative intention was to compel the semimonthly payment of wages regardless of the agreement of the parties, but courts can not thus apply the act in the face of its plain provisions; and in fact such a statute would be beyond the legislative power. Bauer v. Reynolds, 3 Pa. Dist. Rep. 502.

The first section of this act requiring the payment of wages in money is merely a rescript of the act of June 29, 1881, which was declared unconstitutional. No act of the legislature can disqualify a laborer or a miner, or any other person, from making his own contract or relieve him from its binding obligation.

Showalter v. Ehlan, 5 Pa. Supr. Ct. Rep. 242, p. 248.

See Salley v. Berwind-White Coal Min. Co., 5 Pa. Dist. Rep. 316.

6. ACT LIMITED TO MINING AND MANUFACTURING.

Contractors engaged in the construction of railroad beds are not "in the business of mining" and this act applies only to persons engaged in the business of mining or manufacturing.

Commonwealth v. Marsh, 14 Pa. County Ct. Rep. 369, p. 371.

7. PAYMENT OF STORE BILLS-MINER BOUND.

A miner employed by a coal mining company obtained credit at a general store in the vicinity of the mine and directed the storekeeper to present the bills to the mining company and requested the mining company to pay such bills from time to time as they were presented and deduct the amount so paid from the wages due him. This arrangement was carried out and the mining company paid the bills as presented and deducted the amount from the wages of the miner and he accepted the balance due in payment of his wages. Such an arrangement is not in violation of the second section of this act, and a miner so receiving his wages can not sue and recover from the mine operator the entire amount of wages earned by him.

Sally v. Berwind-White Coal Min. Co., 5 Pa. Dist. Rep. 316, p. 317.

A coal miner worked for a mine operator some 13 months and was paid for his labor partly in money and partly by goods voluntarily purchased by him from the mine operator's store. The course of dealing between the parties shows that the goods as they were purchased from time to time were to be payments on the miner's wages and no question of set-off can arise. On each settlement the miner accepted the balance in cash and made no objections

to the monthly accounts rendered him. Under these facts, the miner was not entiled to recover for any amount whatsoever for the wages.

Showalter v. Ehlan, 5 Pa. Supr. Ct. Rep. 242, p. 248.

8. SET-OFF RIGHT NOT DENIED.

This act is no broader in its scope than the act of May 23, 1887 (P. L. 180). which it undertakes to amend, and the direction to pay the wages of miners and employees in lawful money of the United States does not take away the employer's right of set-off.

Welliver v. Fox, 4 Pa. Dist. Rep. 197.

DISCHARGED EMPLOYEE-PAYMENT.

LAWS 1887, P. 181.

AN ACT to regulate the employment of labor.

MAY 28, 1887.

SEC. 1. Be it enacted, etc.: That, from and after the passage of this act, any individual, partnership or corporation, who or which requires from persons in his or its employ, under penalty of forfeiture of part of wages earned by them, a notice of intention to leave such employ, shall be liable to pay to the party injured a sum equal to the amount of said forfeiture, if he or it discharges, without similar notice, a person in such employ, except for incapacity or misconduct, unless in case of a general suspension of labor in his or its mine, shop or factory, or a suspension or work ordered by the employes of such individual, partnership, or corporation.

SEC. 2. Suit may be brought by any person or persons interested under the provisions of the first section of this act before any of the magistrates or justices of the peace of this Commonwealth having jurisdiction for the recovery of the sum or sums of money as are required to be paid by the employer or employers under the first section of this act.

SEC. 3. All acts, or parts of acts, inconsistent herewith, be and the same are hereby repealed.

FAILURE TO PAY-TAXATION OF ORDERS.

LAWS 1901, P. 596.

JUNE 24, 1901.

AN ACT to tax all orders, checks, dividers, coupons, pass books, or other paper, representing wages or earnings of an employe, not paid in cash to the employe or member of his family; to provide for a report to the auditor general of the same, and for the failure to make reports.

SEC. 1. Be it enacted, etc.:

That every person, firm, partnership, corporation or association shall, upon the first day of November of each and every year make a report, under oath or affirmation, to the Auditor General, of the number and amount of all orders, checks, dividers, coupons, pass books, and all other books and papers representing the amount, in part or whole, of the wages or earning of an employe, that was given, made, or issued by him, them, or it for payment of labor, and not redeemed by the said person, firm, partnership, corporation, or association giving, making, or issuing the same, by paying to the employe or a member of his family the full face value of said order, check, divider, coupon, pass book, or other paper representing an amount due for wages or earnings, in lawful money of the

United States, within (30) days from the giving, making or issuing thereof; the honoring, though, of said order, check, divider, coupon, pass book, or other paper, representing an amount due for wages or earnings, by a duly chartered bank, by the payment in lawful money of the United States, to the amount of said paper, representing an amount due for wages or earnings, is a payment, and he, they, or it shall, besides other requirements of law, pay into Treasury of the Commonwealth (25) per centum on the face value of such orders, checks, dividers, coupons, pass books, or other paper, representing an amount due for wages or earnings, not redeemed as aforesaid; and in case any person, firm, partnership, corporation or association shall neglect or refuse to make report, required by this section, to the Auditor General, on or before the first day of December of each and every year, such person, firm, partnership, corporation, or association, so neglecting or refusing, shall, besides other requirements of law, pay as a penalty into the State treasury twenty-five (25) per centum, in addition to the twenty-five (25) per centum tax imposed as aforesaid in this section, on the face value of all such orders, checks, dividers, coupon, pass books, or other paper, representing an amount due for wages or earnings, not redeemed by paying the employe or a member of his family in lawful money of the United States, within said thirty (30) days, by the person, firm, partnership, corporation, or association making, giving, or issuing the same; the honoring of paper, representing wages or earnings, by a bank is a sufficient payment: Provided, This act shall not apply to tools and blasting material, and other mine supplies, furnished by the employer to the employe, used by the employe at or about the employe's vocation; "nor to coal sold by the employer to the employe, nor to rent for houses leased from the employer and occupied by the employe:" And provided further, That this act shall not apply to moneys paid to the treasurers of the employees about coal mines, who have agreed to have a pro rata part of their earnings paid by the operator to such treasurers, who are to pay check weighman or check measurers.

SEC. 2. That all acts or parts of acts inconsistent herewith be and are hereby repealed.

ANNOTATIONS.

FAILURE TO PAY WAGES-TAXATION.

1. PURPOSE OF ACT.

2. STATEMENT OF ACCOUNT-Order OR CHECK-WHEN TAXABLE.

3. PAYMENT OF MINERS BY ORDERS FOR MERCHANDISE.

1. PURPOSE OF ACT.

The manifest intent of this act was to compel the payment of wages earned by employees in cash by imposing a prohibitory tax on orders and checks given by mine operators and not paid or redeemed within 30 days from date.

Commonwealth v. Bethlehem Steel Co., 26 Pa. County Ct. Rep. 225, p. 228. Commonwealth v. Rochester & Pittsburgh Coal & Iron Co., 26 Pa. County Ct. Rep. 481, p. 483.

2. STATEMENT OF ACCOUNT-ORDER OR CHECK-WHEN TAXABLE.

A statement of an account between a coal mining company and a miner, in which the latter is credited with the full amount of wages earned, debited with the amount not due because paid to him, or on his orders, and the balance shown, which is due him and is payable in money, is not an order and is not taxable under the act of June 24, 1901 (P. L. 596).

Commonwealth v. Lehigh Coal & Navigation Co., 206 Pa. St., 641, p. 643.