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<FONT size=2>U.S. Supreme Court
</FONT><FONT size=2>BUTCHERS' UNION CO. v. CRESCENT CITY CO., 111 U.S. 746 (1884) </FONT>


"It has been well said that 'the property which every man has in his own labor, as it is the original foundation of all other property, so it is the most sacred and inviolable. The patrimony of the poor man lies in the strength and dexterity of his own hands, and to hinder his employing this strength and dexterity in what manner he thinks proper, without injury to his neighbor, is a plain violation of this most sacred property."<FONT face=Tahoma size=2>


U.S. Supreme Court
COPPAGE v. STATE OF KANSAS, 236 U.S. 1 (1915)

"The principle is fundamental and vital. Included in the right of personal liberty and the right of private property-partaking of the nature of each- is the right to make contracts for the acquisition of property. Chief among such contracts is that of personal employment, by which labor and other services are exchanged for money or other forms of property. If this right be struck down or arbitrarily interfered with, there is a substantial impairment of liberty in the long-established constitutional sense. The right is as essential to the laborer as to the capitalist, to the poor as to the rich; for the vast majority of persons have no other honest way to begin to acquire property, save by working for money.

"But the 14th Amendment, in declaring that a state shall not 'deprive any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law,' gives to each of these an equal sanction; it recognizes 'liberty' and 'property' as coexistent human rights, and debars the states from any unwarranted interference with either."&


Randy</FONT></FONT>