Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 11.djvu/724

LABOR LEGISLATION. attendance for a portion of the year, or to permit attendance at night schools.

Several of the States which regulate the labor of minors as above stated make no restrictions upon the labor of adult women. In others, however, such labor is subject to the same rules as that of minors. Absolute prohibition of woman's labor in mines exists in several of the States.

Much less frequent is the effort to restrict the number of hours of adult males. Wyoming has a constitutional provision providing for an eight-hour day in the mines, and Utah and Missouri have statutory regulations to the same effect. On the other hand, several States, either by constitutional provision or statute, prescribe an eight-hour day for those employed in the public service or working under contractors for public labor. Legislation fixing the hours of labor in the absence of contract provides generally for an eight-hour day, but ten hours also occurs.

Laws fixing the intervals at which wages shall be paid have been enacted in several States, but they are of doubtful validity. More frequent is the attempt to prescribe that all payments shall be made in money, by declaring illegal payments in store orders and the like. Corporations are especially enjoined from establishing company stores or having an interest in such concerns.

Laws designed to protect the workmen against accident or disease are especially applicable to labor in inclosed places, in workshops and factories, and in recent legislation in so-called sweatshops. Among other things, such laws aim to require adequate fire-escapes, outward-opening doors, guards for dangerous machinery, elevators, belting, etc., connection of rooms where machinery is used with engine-rooms by tubes or bells. Other laws provide that machinery shall not be cleaned while in motion, and frequently that women and minors below a certain age shall not be employed in cleaning machinery; that a certain number of cubic feet of air-space for each person employed shall be provided; that fans and other contrivances shall be used to rid the air of noxious vapors and dust. Similar in character is the legislation in regard to sweatshop production—i.e. the manufacture of goods, particularly clothing, in dwellings and tenements—which aims to restrict the production of goods in unsanitary surroundings. These laws either place such production under the general factory law, or seek to prevent overcrowding by restricting such labor to members of the family living in the dwelling, or requiring a license for all persons engaged in such production.

Under the common law the employer is liable in pecuniary damages for the bodily injury or death of his employees by accident when in his employ, in so far as such accident is not due to the negligence, direct or contributory, of the employee. But the rigor of this rule was greatly modified by the principle which relieved the employer of liability in case the accident was traceable, not to his negligence, but to that of another employee. (See .) Strictly construed, this doctrine made it practically impossible for the laboring man to avail himself of this liability, as he was forced to prove the negligence of the employer. Legislation has been invoked in England and in the United States to remove this difficulty. Such laws declare the employer directly liable for all accidents except in case of negligence of the person injured, or in a less extreme form attempt to define who are fellow servants. The effect of such legislation is to place upon the employer the burden of proof that the injured workman was negligent. Such laws apply in a number of States to railroads, but in a very few cases to employees generally. In Europe such laws are more frequent, and are especially favorable to the workman in England and Switzerland.

The labor legislation of England has not only been imitated in the United States, but has been widely copied in the industrial countries of Continental Europe and in the English colonies. While certain general features, such as factory inspection and limitation of the hours of labor of children and women, are common to all, the labor codes of the various countries show marked individuality, as the result of peculiar conditions or of historic tradition. Hence we find the different aspects of the labor laws in different stages of development in the different countries.

In Germany (and this is true of Continental Europe generally) the main interest in labor legislation has centred about the question of employers' liability and the evils it is designed to meet. After struggling for some time with a liability law which gave very unsatisfactory results, Germany was led to introduce the insurance principle as a means of alleviating the suffering caused by accidents to workingmen in industrial pursuits. From protecting the workman and his family from the effects of accidents directly attributable to his occupation, it was an easy step to extend this protection to sickness, which in many cases was also incident to the occupation. A still further step has been taken in providing by insurance against the incapacity of old age. This dominant feature of the legislation of Continental countries is treated more fully in the article.

Of all countries, the Australasian colonies of Great Britain have been most radical in their labor legislation. Industrial labor is most directly affected by the laws providing for compulsory arbitration of all labor disputes. See ; ;.

The most complete guide to the labor legislation of the United States is contained in the Report on Labor Legislation (Washington, 1900), which forms vol. v. of the Report of the United States Industrial Commission. The compilation of labor laws issued in 1892 as the Second Special Report of the United States Department of Labor is fuller in its citation of laws. The Annual Summaries of State Legislation issued by the New York State Library can also be consulted with profit. Details of labor legislation are also found in the Bulletins of the United States Department of Labor (since 1896), where especial attention is given to foreign labor laws. Among foreign sources attention may be directed especially to the Archiv für sociale Gesetzgebung und Statistik, and to the Annuaire de législation de travail, issued since 1897 by the Belgian Office du Travail. An excellent study, Massachusetts Labor Legislation (with a bibliography of labor legislation and labor generally), by Sarah S. [sic] 