Page:Sergei Ilich Kaplun - The Protection of Labor in Soviet Russia (1920).pdf/6

 were allowed to be engaged for 9 hours a day during the two shifts instead of the maximum 8 hour working day according to the law of 1882. Night work was permitted for children in the glass industry, although from a hygienic point of view this is one of the most harmful trades; yet this night work was permitted owing to the fact that it was demanded by the interests of the industrial magnates. Further, the factory inspection was given the right to permit Sunday and holiday work for children. Finally, night work, which was generally prohibited by law to children and women could be sanctioned by the factory and works managements, or by the governor of the gubernia, in all cases where such children were engaged in work together with their parents, that is to say, this night work became a general rule.

With regard to the protection of woman labor, nothing at all was undertaken. No care whatsoever was taken of the sanitary and hygienic state of factories or workshops. In the sphere of technical safety and safeguards from dangerous machines, the government acted very timidly, almost refraining from establishing any important rules or obligatory regulations.

Little can be said of the rights of the workers. Absolute rule of the employer, endless fines and impositions, dismissal of workers without serious reason, constant interference of the police, and armed force at the first signs of agitation of the workers,—such is the well remembered picture of Russian factory life. Equally little was done in the sphere of social maintenance of the workers in the event of loss of livelihood. Social insurance, which was established only in 1903, and was more or less. developed by the legislation of 1912, provided only for cases of sickness and accidents. But in spite of the fact that the workers were heavily taxed for state insurance, unemployable men were given a most beggarly assistance. And even here insurance did not by any means embrace all the workers.

Especially important was the character of those organs which were charged with the enforcement