its application as its title indicated. The title read "An act to regulate and limit the hours of employment of females in any mechanical or mercantile establishment, laundry, hotel or restaurant", while the first section of the act read "No female (shall) be employed in any mechanical establishment, or factory or laundry in the State more than ten hours during any one day" 371 Thus "in order to get the bill through", stores which formed one of the large groups employing women were allowed their former privilege of unlimited hours.

It is to be observed that this first section permitted employment for seventy hours a week. For though Oregon had a Sunday "closing" law, this could be complied with outwardly, and in a real or fancied emergency women might be employed most of Sunday behind closed doors. Section 2 required every employer of women in the establishments mentioned in Section 1 and in mercantile stores "and any other establishment employing any female" to provide suitable seats for them and to permit them to use them when not engaged in the active duties of their employment. No restriction was placed on night work, Violation of the act was made a misdemeanor, punishable for "each offense by a fine of not less than $10.00 nor more than $25.00". Justices of the peace were given concurrent jurisdiction but in that case they might not impose a fine greater than $5.00. The act as outlined above was the result of amendments in the Senate, one of which declared that as women employes in the State "are not now protected from over-work, an emergency is hereby declared to exist and the act shall be in full force and effect approval by the Governor".

after its

In 1907 the text was amended to include mercantile establishments, but a vicious exception in their favor permitted them to employ women not to exceed 12 hours in any one day for one week immediately preceding Christmas Day.372 This precedent was tenaciously clung to until 1913 when it was set aside by the Industrial Welfare Commission after a difficult struggle.373 In 1907 too, the penalty for violation of the law was raised to a minimum of $25.00 and a maximum of

$100.00. It was further amended in 1909 to include telegraph or telephone establishments, or office or any express or transportation company, and a limit of 60 hours in any one week was set.3

374

Meanwhile enforcement of the law had not been altogether easy. The Labor Commissioner had adopted from the very beginning in the enforcement of this and the Child Labor Law, "a policy of avoiding expensive litigation" by warning an employer, accused of working his employes overtime, and the Commissioner felt that this method was securing co-operation in the enforcement of the law.375 In his Third Biennial Report he stated that "though the ten hour law for females had been violated many times", all except three cases were first complaints; the second complaints had been prosecuted and the offenders fined.376 In the Fifth Biennial Report, a change of policy was recorded. "The law has been in force so long that all who employ females know or ought to know its provisions. This office has discontinued the practice of merely warning violators upon the first offense and is proceeding to prosecute promptly upon proof of violation. The change has caused more arrests and convictions but less violations of the law". The violations reported in this biennial period, 1911-1912, were twenty-seven. Twelve of the offenders paid fines, three forfeited bail, six received suspended sentences, two were dismissed before trial by the Commissioner for lack of evidence sufficient to convict and four failed of conviction.377

In the year 1906 two employers had been convicted; one of these, a laundryman, Curt Muller, attacked the constitutionality of the law.378 He had for his encour agement, the decision of the Illinois Supreme Court which, in 1895, had declared the eight hour law for women unconstitutional.379 But the employed had for their encouragement, the more recent decisions of the Pennsylvania, Nebraska and Washington Supreme Courts, which in 1900 and 1902 upheld similar laws in their respective states.380 The Oregon Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the law and the case was immediately appealed to the United States Supreme

Court whose decision in 1908, written by Mr. Justice Brewer has made "Muller v. Oregon" the precedent for all subsequent hour legislation for women.381

"The single question", wrote the Honorable Justice, "is the constitutionality of the statute under which the defendant was convicted, so far as it affects the work of a female in a laundry. . . It is the law of Oregon that women, whether married or single, have equal contractual and personal rights with men. It thus appears that, putting to one side the elective franchise, in the matter of personal and contractual rights, they stand on the same plane as the other sex.

"That woman's physical structure and the performance of maternal functions place her at a disadvantage in the struggle for subsistence is obvious. This is especially true when the burdens of motherhood are put upon her. Even when they are not, by abundant testimony of the medical fraternity continuance for a long time on her feet at work, repeating this from day to day, tends to injurious effects upon the body, and as healthy mothers are essential to vigorous offspring, the physical well-being of woman becomes an object of public interest and care in order to preserve the strength and vigor of the race. Still, again, history discloses the fact that woman has always been dependent upon man. He established his control at the outset by superior physical strength, and this control in various forms, with diminishing intensity, has continued to the present. As a minor, though not to the same extent, she has been looked up in the courts as needing special care that her rights may be preserved. Differentiated by these matters from the other sex, she is properly placed in a class by herself, and legislation designed for her protection may be sustained, even when like legislation is not necessary for men and could not be sustained. It is impossible to close one's eyes to the fact that she still looks to her brother and depends upon him. That her physical structure and proper discharge of her maternal functions-having in view not merely her own health, but the well-being of the race-justify legislation to pro

tect her from the greed as well as the passion of man. The limitations which this statute places upon her contractual powers, upon her right to agree with her employer as to the time she shall labor, are not imposed solely for her benefit, but also largely for the benefit of all. Many words cannot make this plainer. "The two sexes differ in structure of body, in the functions to be performed by each, in the amount of physical strength, in the capacity for long continued labor, particularly when done standing, the influence of vigorous health upon the future well-being of the race, the self reliance which enables one to assert full rights, and in the capacity to maintain the struggle for subsistence. This difference justified a difference in legislation, and upholds that which is designed to compensate for some of the burdens which rest upon her.

MINIMUM WAGE LEGISLATION.

Meanwhile in far off corners of the world, a new kind of regulation of men's and women's work had been inaugurated but few persons in America expected it to roll on the Pacific's waves to our shores. The idea was not a new one in 1910. Twenty years before, in 1891, the great Pope Leo XIII had issued an Encyclical to his spiritual children known to them as "Rerum Novarum". popularly, in translation, as, "On the Condition of Labor". In this, the doctrine that "workman and employer should make free agreements" as to wages was granted; "nevertheless" the Holy Father said, "there is a dictate of nature more imperious and more ancient than any bargain between man and man, that remuneration must be enough to support the wage earner in reasonable and frugal comfort. If through necessity or fear of a worse evil, the workman accepts harder conditions because an employer or contractor will give him no better, he is the victim of force and injustice'' 382

In 1906 practical application of this principle in American industry was advocated by Dr. John A. Ryan in his book, "A Living Wage", which may be said to have been epoch making in labor legislation of the United

States. Australian and English experiments in wage legislation encouraged Americans to attempt it; and so in 1912, Massachusetts passed the first minimum wage law for women but it lacked any penalizing provision for non-compliance.

The Consumers' League of Oregon decided that same year to investigate the question of family cost of living and in July, under a Consumers' League Social Survey Committee with Reverend E. V. O'Hara as chairman, such an investigation actually got under way. Before much had been accomplished, John Mitchell of the American Federation of Labor during a visit to Oregon advised the Survey Committee to confine its attempt to an inquiry into the cost of living and the wage rates of women, on the ground that both information, and future legislation on women's work would be more easily obtained than that involving the male wage earner. The results of the investigation were embodied in a report by the present writer, known as the Consumers' League Social Survey Report,383 and were used with the legislative solons in urging the need of legislation at the session of 1913. The report did not pretend to be a complete but only a true showing of some conditions which affected women in industry in the State.

There were in Oregon in 1910 according to the United Census of that year384 40,473 females over 10 years of age gainfully employed, of whom 19,547 were in Portland; 6,636 of the latter group were in domestic and personal service, 12,911 in all other occupations.

The Consumers' League Survey published hour regulations of, and details concerning the sanitary conditions surrounding the work of a great many of these and wage statistics of about 5,000, in occupations other than domestic service. Many women and girls were interviewed but fear of losing their "jobs" made large numbers of them reticent about giving exact information. To ensure accuracy in the facts obtained, the director and her assistants worked in twelve different factories. A Cost of Living estimate was made from expense lists which workers were asked to fill, through visitations of houses in typical middle and poorer class neighborhoods,