The objections urged before the committee against the present system of liability were in substance

(1) That uncertainty of rights and obligations involves suffering to the workmen and hardship upon the employers.

(2) That only a small proportion of the workmen injured by accidents of employment get small compensation, and that as a result they and their dependents are forced into a lower standard of living, and often become burdens upon the State through public or private charity.

(3) That the system is wasteful, being costly to employers and the State and of small benefit to the victims of accidents, as a very large proportion of amounts recovered is paid for costs of litigation and for attorneys' fees.

(4) That the system is slow in operation, involving of necessity great delay in the settlement of cases, and that delay is fatal to families dependent on daily earnings.

(5) That the operation of the law breeds antagonism between employers and employees.

(6) That antagonism of interests retards development of prevention of accident measures.

As a result of these hearings the committee and the parties. directly interested, the common carriers and the employees, were of the opinion that it was important that more information of a definite, tangible, and thorough character should be obtained before a scheme could be devised which would be satisfactory to employers and employees.

This report was incorporated bodily into the Senate report accompanying the resolution as submitted to the upper House. The commission consists of two Members of each House, together with two persons to be selected by the President of the United States. It is authorized to employ persons familiar with the subject, to issue subpœnas, administer oaths, summon witnesses, require the production of books and papers, and receive testimony taken before any proper officer in any State or Territory of the United States. Expenditures not to exceed $15,000 are authorized. The commission is to report to Congress through the President not later than the 1st Monday in December, 1911, and shall recommend such legislation as seems advisable.

ATTITUDE OF STATE LEGISLATURES TOWARD THE COMPENSATION

SYSTEM.

The attitude of the state legislatures toward the doctrine of compensation may be said to be at least receptive, since not less than eight have recently passed laws or resolutions providing for commissions with the object of making investigations and proposing legislation of a nature suited to better meet the conditions of industrial operations than does the present system: while the governors of Montana and Washington have recently appointed commissions, appar ently without special legislative authorization.

MASSACHUSETTS.

Probably the first State to move in this direction was Massachusetts, which in 1903 provided by a resolution adopted by the state legislature for a committee of five citizens of the Commonwealth to be known as a committee on the relations between employer and employee. The question of the liability of the employer for injuries to employees was mentioned as to be especially considered. The report of this committee supported "the theory that, where a man receives injury while in the course of his employment, society should recoup him in some measure without resorting to charity. * As the deterioration of a plant is paid for by being added to the cost of production, the deterioration of the man should also be added to the cost of production. The theory is also and this has determined the acts of foreign countries in this respect-that society ultimately pays all such costs through consumption." The conclusion was reached that the liability theory was not satisfactory, and the committee recommended a compensation law, applicable to employment on, in, or about railroads, street railways, factories, workshops, warehouses, mines, quarries, engineering work, and work in the construction, alteration, or repair of a building where scaffolding, staging, or ladders are used, on buildings being demolished, or in work about the construction, repair, or destruction of buildings where steam, water, or other mechanical power is used in the work.

The commission was unanimous in the opinion that the compensation law should operate exclusively in its field, but would reserve to an injured employee the right to sue in cases where the employer's gross negligence was the cause of the injury. The bill provided that proceedings instituted under either the compensation or the liability law barred the employee from action under the other. Medical inspection at the option and cost of the employer was provided for, with reference in disputed cases to medical referees to be appointed by the governor and paid by the county. Disputes as to facts were to be settled by a committee representing the employer and the employee, by an arbitrator agreed upon by the parties, or by a referee appointed by a justice of the superior court. Appeals were to be permitted on questions of law to the supreme judicial court, pending which any justice of the superior court might order compensation to be paid on proper and adequate representations. The maximum compensation for death was 3 years' earnings, not less than $1,000 nor more than $2,000; for disability, 50 per cent of the daily earnings to amount to not more than $10 weekly, and to be allowed for not more than 4 years.

This bill was rejected, and no further action was taken until by an order of the senate, concurred in by the house, a committee of

8 members of the house and 3 of the senate was appointed in 1907 to report to the next legislature (among other matters) as to the expediency of legislation providing for "compensating workmen who are accidentally injured in the course of their employment." The majority of this committee felt that a compensation law of general application was at least not feasible at the time, though 5 members renewed the recommendation of the earlier committee. What was actually done by the legislature was to enact a law (acts of 1908, ch. 489; see acts of 1909, ch. 514, secs. 136–142, Bull. No. 85, p. 626) authorizing employers to submit to the state board of conciliation and arbitration schemes of compensation, which, if approved by the board, might form a basis of contracts between such employers and their employees by virtue of which the provisions of the compensation scheme should be substituted for the liability of the employer under the common law or the employers' liability act.

That such tentative and permissive legislation has not satisfied the demands of the parties in interest in the State of Massachusetts is evidenced by the adoption of a resolution by the legislature of that State (approved June 7, 1910) to the effect that "the public good requires a change in the present system of determining the compensation of employees for injuries sustained in industrial accidents, and that the Commonwealth ought to provide different and more suitable relief." The governor was therefore authorized to appoint, with the advice and consent of the council, a commission of 5 persons for the purpose of investigating the present laws of the State on the subject of employers' liability, and the laws and systems of other States and countries, and to "draft an act for the compensation of employees for industrial accidents." A printed report of data and statistics and a draft of an act are to be submitted on or before the second Wednesday in January, 1911. Expenditures by the committee may not exceed $10,000.

ILLINOIS.

In the State of Illinois a committee appointed in 1905 reported a bill to the legislature of 1907 intended to provide a system of insurance of employees against the consequences of industrial accidents and authorizing contracts between employers and employees on the basis of an insurance scheme embodied in the bill. This bill failed of enactment. At an extra session of the legislature in 1910 an act was passed providing for a commission of 12 members, to be appointed by the governor, 6 of whom should be employers of labor, and 6" either employees or persons known to represent the interests of workmen." The duties of this commission are to investigate the problems of industrial accidents, and especially the present condition of the law of liability for injuries or death suffered in the course of

industrial employment, both in Illinois and in other States and countries; to inquire into the most equitable and effectual method of providing for compensation for such losses, and to report its conclusions with a draft of such bill or bills as may be deemed appropriate, on or before September 15, 1910. Cooperation with similar commissions of other States, so far as practical, is directed; and the sum of $10,000 appropriated for the expenses of the commission.

CONNECTICUT.

A senate joint resolution of the State of Connecticut (No. 228, approved February 27, 1907) directed the appointment by the governor of a committee to make investigations and recommendations with reference to laws for the regulation of the liability of employers for injuries to employees. This committee consisted of 1 employer, 1 employee, and a lawyer, and was to report on or before April 2 following, but the time was extended to May 20, 1907, and subsequently to the early part of January, 1909. This committee considered the subject of compensation, and while unanimously recognizing the high authority of the indorsements of the system and agreeing that the future relations of employer and employee will very probably be settled by legislation along this line, they were not able to agree in the matter of recommending such an act at that time. The existing law of the State of Connecticut is a bare restatement of some of the principles of common law applicable to this subject, and the committee reported a bill modifying the fellow-servant doctrine to some extent, and particularly in the matter of employment on railroads, the bill being of the general type of the British liability law of 1880, as adopted by the neighboring States of Massachusetts and New York. The bill failed of adoption.

WISCONSIN.

The legislature of Wisconsin in 1907 considered a bill embodying the idea of compensation somewhat as represented in the British act, but without adopting such a measure. In 1909 a resolution was passed looking to the appointment of a committee, consisting of 4 members of the assembly and 3 of the senate, "to thoroughly investigate the subject of industrial insurance and to report a bill or bills covering that subject." The line of investigation mentioned was not to limit the field of the committee's inquiries and it was empowered to enter upon such others in connection therewith as it should deem expedient. Expenditures for stenographers, clerks, assistants, and experts, and the reimbursement of personal expenses of the committee were authorized.

MINNESOTA AND NEW YORK.

Two other commissions were appointed in 1909, the legislature of New York, by an act of May 27 (ch. 518), and that of Minnesota, by its act of April 20 (ch. 286), providing such bodies. The New York commission consists of 14 persons, of whom 6 were to be appointed by the governor, 3 by the president of the senate from the senate, and 5 by the speaker of the assembly from the assembly. The working of the New York law was to be investigated as well as "the comparative efficiency, cost, justice, merits, and defects of the laws of other industrial States and countries relative to the same subject." The sum of $10,000 was put at the disposal of this commission, and the commissioner of labor directed to cooperate with it. The commission was to report to the legislature of 1910, if practicable; otherwise, to that of 1911.

The Minnesota commission consists of 3 persons appointed by the governor, by and with the consent of the senate, and was by the act creating it given the name of "The Minnesota Employees' Compensation Commission." By the terms of the act 1 employer, 1 employee, and 1 member learned in the law were to be selected, each of them to be known to possess knowledge of and training in the subject of compensation of employees for injuries received in the course of employment. The laws of other States and foreign countries were to be studied, with a view to discovering whether or not they were successfully adapted to the needs of the jurisdictions in which they are operative, and sufficient data and information furnished to indicate the practical adaptability of such laws to the industrial and constitutional conditions controlling in the State. The report of information collected and the bill or bills drafted by the commission are to be in readiness at the opening of the legislative session of 1911. This commission is allowed only its expenses, in an amount not to exceed $5,000.

NEW JERSEY AND OHIO.

Two other legislatures besides that of Massachusetts provided in 1910 for commissions of the same nature as those above mentioned. In New Jersey the governor in his annual message recommended the appointment of a commission "to consider the provisions of the employers' liability acts of Great Britain, Germany, and other foreign countries, and to report to the next session of the legislature a draft of an act with relation to compensation for accidents to employees." Joint resolution No. 2, approved April 9, 1910, called for the appointment by the governor of two representatives of the labor interests of the State, two who are representative of the employers' interests, together with one member of the senate named by its president and