Cockcroft v. Mitchell

Headnote

Constitutional law ■— constitutionality of provision of Labor Law requiring provision for exits and the fireproofing of stairways and passageways in factory buildings.

Cockcroft v. Mitchell, 187 App. Div. 189 , affirmed.

Appeal from a judgment of the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court in the first judicial department, entered March 24, 1919, unanimously affirming a judgment in favor of defendants entered upon a decision of the court on trial at Special Term. The action was brought under section 52b of the Labor Law, as amended by chapter 674 of the Laws of 1915, to determine the reasonableness and validity of an order of the industrial commission of the department of labor of the state of New York directing the plaintiff, as the owner of the Cockcroft Building, situated at Nos. 71-73 Nassau street, New York city, to make certain extensive structural alterations in the building in order to conform with the provisions of section 79b of the Labor Law, requiring that every factory building over two stories in height

shall be provided on each floor with at least two means of exit or escape from fire remote from each other, and that all interior stairways serving as required means of. exit in factory buildings more than five stories high, together with their landings, platforms and passageways, shall be inclosed on all sides by partitions of fire-resisting material extending continuously from the basement to three feet above the roof. The question of the constitutionality of said section 79b of the Labor Law when read in connection with the definition of a factory as contained in section 2 of the Labor Law, as amended by the Laws of 1915, chapter 650, was the chief question argued on the appeal.