The Theory and Policy of Labour Protection
I do not wish to deal with the regulations of all countries; I am only concerned to point out that, as compared with the labour protective legislation of England, the foremost industrial nation, German legislation on the protection of intervals appears to be rather cautious, as even in the von Berlepsch Bill it merely secures regular intervals for children within the 6 hours work, and for young persons (from 14 to 16 years) an interval of half an hour at mid-day, besides half an hour in the forenoon and afternoon, and for women workers an interval of an hour at midday (§ 135f).
The English law requires simultaneous intervals for meals for all protected persons working together in the same place of business; and such intervals may not be spent in the work-rooms where work is afterwards to be resumed.
The von Berlepsch Bill (§ 136, 2) requires only the young workers to leave the work-rooms for meals, and even this with reservation: “During the intervals the young workers shall only be permitted to remain in the work-rooms on condition that work is entirely suspended throughout the interval, in that part of the business in which the young workers are employed, or where it is found impracticable for them to remain in the open air, or where other rooms cannot be procured without disproportionate difficulty.”
The lengthening of the mid-day interval for married women or heads of households, to enable them to fulfil their domestic duties, is recommended by the German Reichstag and provided for in the von Berlepsch Bill, in the fourth paragraph of § 137, as follows: “Women workers above the age of 16 years, having the care of a household, shall be set free half an hour before the mid-day interval unless this interval amounts to at least 1½ hours. Married women and widows with children shall be accounted as persons having the care of a household, unless the contrary is certified in writing by the local police magistrate, such certificate to be granted free of stamp and duty.” This measure indicates a fragmentary attempt from the outside to protect the woman in her family vocation, and as such belongs to the question of protection of married women. The opponents of the measure – and they are many – make the objection that the result will be that women with families will be unable to obtain employment. Whatever may be said for or against the measure, there is no doubt that an interval of an hour and a half at mid-day ought to be granted to every workwoman, to place and keep her in a position in which she can discharge the duties of preparing the family meals and looking after her children. Therefore the injunction of a mid-day interval of 1½ hours in all factory business in which women over 16 years of age are employed would perhaps be a juster, more effectual, and more expedient measure, and would not prejudice the employment of women. But will it be possible to bring about the international uniform extension of the present interval of two hours to two hours and a half (inclusive of the forenoon and afternoon intervals)? The problem is surrounded by undeniable practical difficulties.
The Auer Motion (§ 106a, 2. cf. § 130) demands the extension of protection of intervals of work to all industries. Hitherto it has only been extended to women and young workers, and only to such as are employed in factory and quasi-factory business. We need not here go into the question whether it can be proved to be to some extent necessary in the more irksome and laborious trades and in household industry.
2. Protection of night rest (“Prohibition of night work.”)Night rest has long been subjected by force of custom and necessity to very comprehensive measures of protection. Nevertheless it has become more or less of a necessity, even for men, to supplement such protection by extraordinary intervention of the State in factory and quasi-factory industrial trades, in some cases also in handicraft business (e. g. in bakeries, in public-house business, and in traffic and transport business). The self-help of the workmen and the moral influence of the civil and religious conscience are no longer a sufficient power of protection.
The entire general prohibition of all industrial night work would go beyond the limits of practical necessity, and the State would have no means of enforcing such a general prohibition.
Exceptions to the prohibition of night work are unavoidable, even in factory and quasi-factory business (cf. Chap. VII.).
The number of women and children employed in night work is not great. It might, however, become greater through the introduction of electric lighting in Germany. Protection of night rest for women and children is, therefore, as practically necessary as ever.
The actual condition of Labour Protection in regard to night work, and the efforts and tendencies to be discerned in reference to it at the present time, are as follows. The resolutions of the Berlin Conference demand the cessation of night work (and Sunday work) for children under 14, also for young persons, of 14 to 16 years and for women workers under 21 years of age.
The von Berlepsch Bill (§ 137i) altogether excludes night work for women in factory (§ 154) and quasi-factory business.
Of course exceptions may be permitted by order of the Bundesrath (Federal Council). The power of the Bundesrath to grant exceptions is very general and unrestricted (§ 139a, 2). “The employment of women over 16 years of age in night work in certain branches of manufacturing industry in which such employment has hitherto been customary, shall be permitted subject to certain conditions demanded by health and morality.”
The Auer Motion demands the exclusion of all women and young persons from “regular” night work.
3. Protection of holidaysProtection of daily intervals secures the necessary intermission of work during the day. Protection of night rest guarantees the necessary and natural chief interval within every astronomical day. Protection of holidays makes provision for the no less needed ordinary and extraordinary intermission of work during entire days, Sundays, and festivals.
Strictly speaking, protection of holidays has long existed. The Church exercised a powerful influence in this respect over legislation and popular custom. Labour protection only seeks to restore this protection in its entirety (and as far as possible in its former extent – hence not merely in factory and quasi-factory business) in the State of to-day, which is practically severed from the controlling influence of the Church. Holidays are a general necessity; not merely a necessity for young persons, not merely in factory and quasi-factory industries, but in all industries.
But England, the greater number of the North American States, Denmark, Holland, Belgium, France and hitherto Germany (with its highly unpractical article § 105, 2, of the Imp. Ind. Code), grant protection of Sunday rest only to their “protected persons,” and only in factory and quasi-factory business; but we must not here forget that there exists also protection of opportunities for religious observances extending over nearly the whole area of national industry, which is enforced partly by law and partly by tradition.
Austria prohibits Sunday employment in all industrial work.
An important extension and equalising of protection of holidays in Europe is projected in the resolutions of the Berlin Conference. The resolutions read as follows: “1. It is desirable, with provision for certain necessary exceptions and delays in any State: (a) that one day of rest weekly be ensured to protected persons; (b) that one day of rest be ensured to all industrial workers; (c) that this day of rest be fixed on the Sunday for all protected persons; (d) that this day of rest be fixed on the Sunday for all industrial workers. 2. Exceptions are permissible (a) in the case of any business which on technical grounds requires that production shall be carried on without intermission, or which supplies the public with such indispensable necessaries of life as require to be produced daily; (b) in the case of any business which from its nature can only be carried on at definite seasons of the year, or which is dependent on the irregular activity of elemental forces. It is desirable that even in such cases as are enumerated in this category, every workman be granted one out of every two Sundays free. 3. To the end that exceptions everywhere be dealt with on the same general method, it is desirable that the determination of such exceptions result from an understanding between the different States.”
The von Berlepsch Bill ensures a very extensive measure of protection of holidays by the following means: it extends the application of provisions § 105a to 105h in paragraph 1 of Chapter VII. of the Imp. Ind. Code to all workshop labour, it strictly limits Sunday work in trade and defines the permissible exceptions: moreover, it allows of unlimited extension of this kind of protection to all industry by means of an imperial rescript (§ 105g), and finally it foreshadows further protective action in the sphere of common law (105h).
The Auer Motion contains a general extension and simplification of protection of holidays (§ 107, 1): “Industrial work shall be forbidden on Sundays and festivals” (with certain specified and strictly defined exceptions).
Protection of holidays serves to four great ends: religious instruction, physical and mental recreation, family life and social intercourse. Protection of holidays has to take special measures to meet these four special ends.
In the first place holidays must be general, for the whole population, in order to allow of instruction in common, and general social intercourse. For this reason even the most “free-thinking” friend of holiday rest will be willing to grant it in the form of Sunday rest and festival days, and will allow it to be so called; in France and Belgium only, as appears from the reports of the Berlin Conference, do difficulties lie in the way of allowing protection of holidays to take the form of protection of Sundays and festival days.
The second end subserved by protection of holidays will be to ensure that only the absolutely necessary amount of work shall be performed on Sundays in those industries in which there is only a conditional possibility of devoting the Sunday to recreation, family life, and social intercourse, especially in carrying trades, employment in places of amusement and in public houses, in professional business, personal service, and the like, also in all labours which are socially indispensable. We shall return to this question in Chapter VII. (exceptions to protective legislation). The question now arises whether the religious protection of holidays does not already indirectly serve all the purposes of the necessary weekly rest for labour. This question must be answered in the negative. It is true that this does effect something which Labour Protection as such cannot effect, in that it extends beyond the workers and enforces rest on the employers also and their families. But it does not ensure to the workers themselves the complete protection necessary, and it does not fulfil all the purposes of protection of holidays.
The actual condition of affairs in Germany is as follows, according to the “systematic survey of existing legal and police regulations of employment on Sundays and festivals” (Imperial Act of 1885-6). In one part of Germany the police protection of the Sunday rest is in effect only protection of religious worship. In another group of districts, the suspension during the entire Sunday of all noisy work carried on in public places is enforced, but within industrial establishments noisy work is not forbidden. A third group of rules lays down the principle that Sundays and festivals shall be devoted not only to religious worship and sacred gatherings, but also to rest from labour and business.
The rules contained in this group apply especially to factory labour, but in many cases also to handicraft and various kinds of trading business, without regard to the question whether the work carried on in such business is noisy or disturbing to the public, exceptions being granted in certain defined cases. This third group of rules is in force in the provinces of Posen, Silesia, Saxony, the Rhine Provinces, Westphalia, the former Duchy of Nassau, and in the governmental district of Stettin, but in all these only with respect to factory work; also in the former Electorate of Hesse, the Bishopric of Fulda, the province of Hesse-Homburg, and in the town of Cassel; in Saxony, Wurtemburg, Mecklenburg Schwerin, Mecklenburg Strelitz, Saxe-Altenburg, Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, Anhalt, Schwartzburg-Rudolstadt, the old and the new Duchy of Reuss and Alsace-Lorraine.
A supplementary statistical inquiry into the extent of Sunday work in Prussia (not including districts whose official records could not be consulted) shows that Sunday work is carried on: —
In wholesale industries: in 16 governmental districts, by 49.4 % of the works, and by 29.8 % of the workers.
In handicraft business: in 15 governmental districts, by 47.1 % of the works, and by 41.8 % of the workers.
In trading and carrying industries: in 29 governmental districts, by 77.6 % of the employers or companies, and by 57.8 % of the workers.
Hence there can be no doubt as to the necessity in Germany for extraordinary State protection of the Sunday holiday, by means of protective legislation, applying also to handicraft business and to a part of trading and carrying industry.
About two-thirds of the employers and three-fourths of the workmen have declared themselves for the practicability of the prohibition of Sunday work, nearly all with the proviso that exceptions shall be permitted.
The duration of holiday rest practically can in most cases be fixed from Saturday evening till early on Monday morning.
The von Berlepsch Bill proposes to enforce legally only 24 hours; the Auer Motion demands 36 hours, and when Sundays and festivals fall on consecutive days, 60 hours.
The shortening of work hours on Saturday evening in factory industries and in industries carried on in workshops of a like nature to factories is a very necessary addition to Sunday rest; provision must also be made to prevent the work from beginning too early on Monday morning if Sunday protection is to attain its object. The shortening of work hours on Saturday evening is especially necessary to women workers to enable them to fulfil their household duties, and it is necessary to all workers to enable them to make their purchases. England and Switzerland grant protection of the Saturday evening holiday.
Legislation will not have completed its work of extending protection of holidays, even when the limits have been widened to admit trading business. Further special regulations must be made for the business of transport and traffic. Switzerland has already set to work in this direction. In Germany, in consequence of the nationalisation of all important means of traffic, much can be done if the authorities are willing, merely by way of administration.
We cannot lay too much stress on this question of the regulation and preservation of holiday time by means both of legislative and administrative action. For its actual enforcement it is true the co-operation of the local police magistrates is necessary, but the regulation of this protection ought not to be left in their hands. It must be carried on in a uniform system and with the sanction of the higher administrative bodies. We shall return to this question also in Chapter VII.
CHAPTER VI.
ENACTMENTS PROHIBITING CERTAIN KINDS OF WORK
Besides the mere protective limitations of working time and of the intervals of work, we have also the actual prohibition of certain kinds of work. Freedom in the pursuit of work being the right of all, and work being a moral and social necessity to the whole population, prohibition of work must evidently be restricted to certain extreme cases.
Such prohibition is however indispensable, for there are certain ways of employing labour which involve actual injury to the whole working force of the nation, and actual neglect of the cares necessary to the rearing and bringing up of its citizens, and there are certain kinds of necessary social tasks, other than industrial, the performance of which, in the special circumstances of industrial employment, require to be watched over and ensured by special means in a manner which would be wholly unnecessary among other sections of the community. And thus we find a series of prohibitions of work, partly in force already, and partly in course of development.
1. Prohibition of child-labourThis is prohibition of the employment of children under 12 years of age (13 in the south), of children under 10 years of age, in factory work (see Book I.). Prohibition of child-labour must not be confused with restriction of child-labour (see Book I.), viz. restriction of the labour of children of 12 to 14 years of age, in the south of 10 to 12 years of age. It does not involve prohibition of all employment of children under 12 years of age, such as help in the household or in the fields.
The prohibition of child-labour within certain limits is necessary in the interests of the whole nation, for the physical and intellectual preservation of the rising generation, hence it is to the interest also of the employers of industrial labour themselves.
Special Labour Protection with regard to child-labour is indeed necessary. Ordinary administrative and judicial protection evidently are insufficient to ensure complete security to childhood. Equally insufficient are any of the existing not governmental agencies, such as family protection; the child of half-civilised factory hands and impoverished workers in household industries needs protection against his own parents, whose moral sense is often completely blunted.
Prohibition of child-labour in factory and quasi-factory industries rests on very good grounds. It is not impossible, not even very improbable, that prohibition of child-labour may sooner or later be extended to household industry; the abuse of child-labour is even more possible here than in factory work; the possibility is by no means excluded by enforcement of school attendance. But all family industry is not counted as household industry. The extension of Labour Protection in general, and of prohibition of child-labour in particular, to household industry, raises difficulties of a very serious kind when it comes to a question of how it is to be enforced.
In the main, prohibition of child-labour will have to be made binding by legislation. In its eventual extension to household industry, the Government will however have to be allowed facilities for gradually extending its methods of administration.
The task of superintending the enforcement of prohibition will in the main be assigned to the Industrial Inspectorate. The oldest hands in any business, the “Labour Chambers,” and voluntary labour-unions, will moreover be able to lend effectual assistance to the industrial inspector or to a general labour-board. The factory list of young workers may be used as an instrument of administration.
In Germany childhood is protected until the age of 12 years. The extension of prohibition of child-labour to the age of 14 years in factory and quasi-factory business, is, however, in Germany probably only a question of time. The Auer Motion in regard to this represents the views of many others besides the Social Democrats. Switzerland, as I have shown, has already conceded this demand, claimed on grounds of national health. The impending Imp. Ind. Code Amendment Bill places the limit at 13.
An internationally uniform advance towards this end by the equalisation of laws affecting the age of compulsory school attendance, would certainly be desirable.
The widest measure of protection of children is contained in the Austrian legislation, which decrees in the Act of 1885, that until the age of 12 years children shall be excluded from all regular industrial work, and until the age of 14 years, from factory work: “Before the completion of the 14th year, no children shall be employed for regular industrial work in industrial undertakings of the nature of factory business; young wage-workers between the completion of the 14th and the completion of the 16th year shall only be employed in light work, such as shall not be injurious to the health of such workers, and shall not prevent their physical development.”
The resolutions of the Berlin Conference recommended the prohibition of employment in factories of children below the age of compulsory school attendance.
Resolution III. 4 requires: “That children shall previously have satisfied the requirements of the regulations on elementary education.”
Exclusion of child-labour extends beyond the general inferior limit of age, in individual cases where the employment of children is made conditional on evidence of their health, as in England. And here the medical certificate of health comes in as a special instrument of administration in Labour Protection.
In certain kinds of business, prohibition of child-labour extends beyond the general inferior limit of age. England has led the way in such prohibition, excluding by law the employment of children below the age of 11 years in the workrooms of certain branches of industry, e. g. wherever the polishing of metal is carried on; of children below the age of 14 years, in places where dipping of matches and dry polishing of metal is carried on; of girls below the age of 16 years, in brick and tile-kilns, and salt works (salt-pits, etc.); of children below the age of 14 years, and girls below the age of 18 years, in the melting and cooling rooms in glass factories; of persons below the age of 18 years in places where mirrors are coated with quicksilver, or where white-lead is used.
2. Prohibition of employment in occupations dangerous to health and moralitySuch prohibition seems necessary in all industrial trades. It is however difficult to enforce it so generally, and hitherto this has not been accomplished.
The Imperial Industrial Code in the von Berlepsch Bill (cf. resolutions of the Berlin Conference, Chap. IV. 4, and V. 4) admits an absolute prohibition of all female and juvenile labour, under sanction of the local authorities (§ 139a 1.): “The Bundesrath shall be empowered to entirely prohibit or to allow only under certain conditions, the employment of women and young workers in certain branches of factory work, in which special dangers to health and to morality are involved.” The same Bill (§ 154, 2, 3, 4) extends such prohibition over the greater part of the sphere of quasi-factory business.
The last aim of protection of health – the exclusion of such injurious methods of working as may be replaced by non-injurious methods in all industrial work, and for male workers as well as for women and children – must be attained by progressive extension of that administrative protection to which the von Berlepsch Bill opens the way for quasi-factory labour (§ 154). It would be difficult to carry out in any other way the Auer Motion, for the “prohibition of all injurious methods of working, wherever non-injurious methods are possible.”
The general principle of prohibition might be laid down by law, and the enforcement of such prohibition, by order of a Supreme Central Bureau of Labour Protection, might be left to the control of popular representative bodies and to public opinion. Special legal prohibition, with regard to certain defined industries and methods of work injurious to health, would not be superfluous in addition to general prohibition; such special prohibition is already in force to a greater or less degree.
The success of the prohibition in question depends on the good organisation of Labour Protection in matters of technique and health; on the efficiency of local government organs, as well as of the Imperial Central Bureau, and on the impulse given by the more important representative organs of the labouring classes. All these organs need perfecting. Special prohibition needs the assistance of police trade-regulations in regard to instruments and materials dangerous to health.