Title 17Elections

Title 17Elections

Chapter 23Election Offenses

R.I. Gen. Laws § 17-23-6

§ 17-23-6. Improper influence by employers.

(a) Every person being an employer who, within ninety (90) days of a general election, pays any of his or her employees the salary or wages due them in “pay envelopes” upon which there is written or printed, or in which there is inserted: (1) a notice or information, to the effect that if any particular ticket or candidate is elected or defeated, work in the employer’s place or establishment will cease, in whole or in part, or the employer’s establishment will be closed, or the wages of the employer’s employees will be reduced, or (2) any political motto, device, or argument containing threats, expressed or implied, intended or calculated to influence the political actions or opinions of the employees, or who puts up or otherwise exhibits, in the employer’s establishment or place where the employer’s employees are engaged in labor, any handbill or placard containing any such notice or information or threat, shall be guilty of a felony.

(b) Any person, after conviction of this offense, shall forfeit that person’s right to vote in any election or upon any proposition before the people, or to hold any public office, except that a corporation shall forfeit its charter; and no evidence given by any witness testifying in the trial of any charge of violation of this section shall be used against the person giving the evidence.

History of Section.G.L. 1923, ch. 19, § 3; P.L. 1936 (s.s.), ch. 2468, § 1; G.L. 1938, ch. 325, § 5; G.L. 1956, § 17-23-6; P.L. 1958, ch. 18, § 1; P.L. 1978, ch. 201, § 13.