Is there such a thing as minimum wages or labor rights for prisoners in the United States? Is there such a thing as minimum wages or labor rights for prisoners? I know that slavery is legal in the United States if it involves prisoners, but I am wondering if there are certain rights prisoners enjoy as forced labor. What are some of the rights that prisoners enjoy as forced labor in the United States if they have any?
The primary source of minimum wage and hours laws for the United States as a whole is the Fair Labor Standard Act. Generally courts have held that prisoners are not employees within the meaning of the act. The amount paid for prison labor is a matter of state correctional system policy, and some states, such as Texas, pay nothing to prisoners for their labor, while others pay a tiny fraction of the federal minimum wage. The main rights of prisoners who are detained pursuant to a conviction is to be free of physical harm arising from deliberate indifference to their well being, or to be free of punishment beyond what they were sentenced to for their crimes. Prisoners who are detained awaiting a trial have greater rights. I know that slavery is legal in the United States if it involves prisoners The 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution does not prohibit this but some state constitutions (e.g. Colorado's), and some state laws, do prohibit it. So the law in the United States is not uniform on this subject.
Some states (including California, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Minnesota, New York and Oregon, per the website below) have recently passed legislation outlawing pay secrecy requirements. Check online to see if the state you will work in is among them. Also see http://www.npr.org/2014/04/13/301989789/pay-secrecy-policies-at-work-often-illegal-and-misunderstood and https://www.shrm.org/ResourcesAndTools/legal-and-compliance/state-and-local-updates/Pages/Proposed-State-Laws-Address-Pay-Secrecy.aspx
england-and-wales Can military necessity override POW rights? NO. The Geneva Conventions Act 1957 provides prisoners of war with certain fundamental guarantees for humane treatment at Article 4 of Part 2 of Schedule 6: 1 All persons who do not take a direct part or who have ceased to take part in hostilities, whether or not their liberty has been restricted, are entitled to respect for their person, honour and convictions and religious practices. They shall in all circumstances be treated humanely, without any adverse distinction. It is prohibited to order that there shall be no survivors. 2 Without prejudice to the generality of the foregoing, the following acts against the persons referred to in paragraph 1 are and shall remain prohibited at any time and in any place whatsoever: (a) violence to the life, health and physical or mental well-being of persons, in particular murder as well as cruel treatment such as torture, mutilation or any form of corporal punishment; (b) collective punishments; (c) taking of hostages; (d) acts of terrorism; (e) outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment, rape, enforced prostitution and any form of indecent assault; (f) slavery and the slave trade in all their forms; (g) pillage; (h) threats to commit any of the foregoing acts ... 4 If it is decided to release persons deprived of their liberty, necessary measures to ensure their safety shall be taken by those so deciding. Q1 What shall he do? The humane and fair treatment of prisoners of war takes primacy, so if the commander cannot complete his mission without properly securing the prisoners it should be aborted until he can. Q2 Is it legal to release him? Shoot him? There is nothing to prevent a prisoner being released (para 4) but shooting him will probably amount to murder and may well be a war crime. Q3 What should they do? As combatants, they should guarantee the prisoner be treated humanely and without distinction - a lack of amenities does not necessarily equate to inhumane treatment, although it may depend on the particular circumstances. Q4 Are they allowed to kill him? No, the prisoner's liberty has been restricted so the fireteam must treat him humanely, which may mean aborting the mission if they cannot safely release him - killing him will probably amount to murder and may well be a war crime. I assume the united-states has similar, if not identical provisions
Yes. American descendents of African slaves filed several lawsuits in the early 2000s seeking &quot;monetary relief under both federal and state law for harms stemming from the enslavement of black people in America,&quot; i.e., reparations. Those cases were consolidated into a single case heard in Chicago, where the judge ruled there was no standing to bring the cases, given the many degrees of separation between the defendants' conduct in the 1800s and the 21st Century plaintiffs. The Seventh Circuit affirmed: If there were a legal wrong, it would not be a wrong to any living persons unless they were somehow the authorized representatives to bring suits on behalf of their enslaved ancestors. With some exceptions to be noted, the plaintiffs are suing to redress harms to third parties (their ancestors), without being authorized to sue on behalf of those parties. It is like a suit by a descendant of a Union soldier, killed in battle, against a Civil War era gun manufacturer still in business that sold guns to the Confederacy in violation of federal law. A federal court could not entertain the suit because the plaintiff would be unable to prove a harm to an interest of his (such as his bank account) that the law protects. In re African-Am. Slave Descendants Litig., 471 F.3d 754, 760–61 (7th Cir. 2006). The Seventh Circuit permitted one very small portion of the case to proceed, and the Supreme Court declined to review the case.
This question and many related ones are analysed in detail by Eugene Volokh, in a long paper that is worth reading in its entirety if you are interested in the topic. The [Supreme] Court has offered “speech integral to [illegal] conduct” as one of the “well-defined and narrowly limited classes of speech” excluded from First Amendment protection. But if this exception is indeed to be well defined and narrowly limited, courts need to explain and cabin its scope. This Article — the first, to my knowledge, to consider the exception in depth — aims to help with that task. On threats, he says: Companies are generally barred from firing employees for voting for a union, and unions are generally barred from retaliating against employees for their speech. The Court therefore concluded that speech that threatens unlawful retaliation is itself unlawful. On blackmail, he says: [...] telling black citizens “stop shopping at white-owned stores or we’ll publicize your behavior to your neighbors and fellow church members” is similarly constitutionally protected. On the other hand, “vote for this civil rights bill or I’ll disclose that you cheated on your wife” is likely unprotected. In general the line where the First Amendment protections end and criminal speech begins is surprisingly vague. General advice to avoid self-incrimination by not answering questions from the police is clearly protected. Threatening a witness with violence is clearly not. In between are shades of grey.
In germany, this is called Friedenspflicht. Both employers and employees (and their unions) are required to refrain from strikes and lockouts in disputes on issues which are covered by a currently valid collective bargaining agreement. The agreement may also stipulate that there will be no labor actions on issues which are not covered, as long as the agreement is in force, but that is not necessary. Example: There is a collective bargaining agreement on wages, which is still running. Strikes for higher wages are prohibited. Strikes to get better staffing for the night shift would be allowed, if the agreement doesn't say how many employees should be on duty even during slack hours.
Most U.S. states provide zero compensation of any kind in this situation, although there are a few states that are exceptions. (Far more states provide compensation from conviction to release for a wrongfully convicted person.) Even in those few states that provide compensation to acquitted defendants, the compensation is typically set by statute and is frequently much less than what a middle class person would earn and certainly does not capture the full extent of the defendant's economic loss.
Primary Theory I suspect there might not be a legal answer to this question. I have always suspected a sort of pseudo-intellectual elitism (or simple preference or carelessness) with passive voice sentence construction in general. I sense license writers have not (yet) escaped this general trend. I would love someone to prove this theory incorrect. But, alas, I doubt it will happen. Alternative Theory But because this is a Law Q&amp;A site, I will advance the following alternative theory. I don't believe it's correct. But I will advance it because it's the only possible explanation I can think of that might be even remotely based on legal reasoning... Maybe they are just basing their construction on the way the law itself is written? For example, if the law says, "Permission must be granted..." Then it would follow that a writer who wants to comply with the law might choose, "Permission is hereby granted..." instead of something like "The authors hereby grant permission..." or, as the OP suggested, "You may..."