mally large, the fact that the number of domestic-working persons has more than kept pace with this increase means that there has been a strong movement toward the large cities and away from the small towns. In the mountain regions, however, there is a tendency to remain. The regions which most attract the domestic system are, therefore, the very thinly populated and the very densely populated regions of the country. Such are the main features of the industries using the domestic-working system as gathered from the tables presented by the census reports. As sketched from the bare figures a rough picture of these industries would be as follows:

In 1895 these industries were composed of over 340,000 establishments employing over 450,000 persons, or nearly 6 per cent of the industrial population of the Empire. Since 1882 a decrease of over 11 per cent in the number of establishments and of nearly 4 per cent in the number of persons has occurred. Of the house-working persons nearly 43 per cent were employed in the textile industries, in which group practically all of the decreases just mentioned have taken place. Fifty-three per cent of the population under discussion was employed in the five groups classed as clothing and cleaning, wood and cut materials, metal working, foods and drinks, machinery and instruments. These groups in nearly every case showed an increase both in the number of domestic-working persons employed and in the proportion which those persons bore to the total persons employed in those groups, and it may be concluded that, except in the case of the textile industries, there was a tendency to an increased use of the domestic system.

In the total number of domestic-working establishments there is a decrease, but as this decrease has come from the one-person establishments, we may say that, excluding the textile industries, there is a tendency to the formation of economically stronger productive units. There is also a movement toward the large towns.

To sum up, the thirteen years between the census dates have shown that in nearly 43 per cent of the domestic-working population, those engaged in the textile group of industries, there is a general decrease in both absolute and relative importance, while in the five groups mentioned, comprising the greater portion of the remaining domesticworking population, there is a clear increase in absolute and relative importance. But that the figures alone will give a trustworthy picture of the system can not be maintained. The figures themselves are incomplete, both in regard to what they are supposed to present and in that they give only a part of what must be known in order to form an approximately clear picture of the domestic system of industry.

The census returns give us only the quantitative relations of the domestic-working industries. We must seek other sources for information in regard to the character of the workmen, the quality

of work turned out, the conditions under which the work is performed, and similar questions which are beyond the scope of a census investigation.

The reports of the Verein für Socialpolitik on these subjects do not show a uniform state of affairs in all of the domestic industries. In the majority of the textile establishments, especially in weaving, the persons engaged are on a lower plane than the factory employees. In the garment-making industries the majority of the persons employed have cheapness as their only recommendation; and naturally, the tendency to depress wages finds full scope. On the other hand, workers possessing even a moderate amount of skill are in continual demand (a) and secure incomes which compare favorably with those earned by workers under the other forms of production. With the state of affairs now existing in some of these industries, where any one after a half-hour's practice can perform all the operations almost as well as those engaged in the industry for years, only the worst of conditions may be expected. From this lowest class of workers is found an ascending scale rising up to what may be termed the élite of the domestic workers, such as the makers of musical instruments in various parts of Saxony or the cutlers of Solingen. The better situated workers are by no means few in number, though it is impossible to make any definite statements as to their numbers. They are found in certain parts of the textile, the garment-making, and the cigar-making trades; where a certain amount of skill or taste is required, these workers have found themselves able to compete successfully with the stronger capitalistic form of production.

Similarly with the question of the quality of the work turned out by the domestic system, no general statement can be made, though Weber's claim (b) that the quality of the goods produced under this system is inferior to the factory-produced goods has much in its favor; he ignores, however, such classes as embroidering, lace making, musical instruments, and cutlery, where long experience has shown that the wares are of high quality.

In respect to the other conditions existing in the domestic industries, the reports seem strikingly familiar; the evils connected with overcrowding in dwellings, excessively long hours of labor, unwarranted deductions from wages already too low, employment of women and children under unwholesome conditions, all read like the reports on the sweating system in New York, Chicago, or other large cities in other parts of the world. With the recital of the facts has come the demand that the whole system be abolished. The Social Democratic party has been especially energetic in demanding prohibitive legislation against this form of production, and in harmony with this view

a Schriften des Vereins für Socialpolitik. Volume 88, page 69.

b Ibid., page 24.

are many of the writers upon the subject, as, for example, Weber and Brentano. On the other hand is the view represented by Philippovich, who recognizes the many evils existing in the domestic industries, but who can not see the way clear to a prohibition of work in the home, and seeks the amelioration of the evils through an extension of legislation similar to the factory legislation and the introduction of a stringent sanitary inspection of dwellings. This more moderate view is in harmony with the experience gained from the past history of industrial regulation. There are certain industries where production on a large scale is not possible; where interruptions to production are frequent; where machinery can not be extensively employed, and where the product itself can never count upon a large number of consumers. (a) In such industries it will be hardly possible to avoid using the domestic system, and where there is present a large population which is in need of a subsidiary source of income, such as the small farmers in the thinly populated districts and the vast number of women in the large cities, there the conditions are present which make it probable that the system will continue to be used for many years to come.

GENERAL CONCLUSIONS.

In answer to the question as to how far the two weaker systems of production, the hand-working and the domestic systems, have been able to compete with the factory in Germany, we have arrived at the following result: The two weaker systems have succeeded in maintaining their positions in great part; the hand-working system, on the whole, has not decreased in numbers; the domestic system has decreased in the textile industries, it has increased in the other industries where it is represented, and it tends for the most part to an increased influence. The tendency of both forms is toward the use of a larger establishment. The domestic form is moving to the very thinly populated dis tricts and to the large cities, while the hand-working form is settling in the regions between these two extremes.

Such conclusions, it must be remembered, are based wholly on the number of persons employed, the only criterion afforded by the census by which we can compare the various forms. It has been explained how imperfect is this standard, and in view of the fact that the increased number of persons in the factory system is accompanied by a still greater increase in the mechanical aids to production, the conclusions given above may not be taken at their face value. But it is nevertheless true that though the influence of these two forms of production on the total output is not so great as the figures might indicate, yet they are still earnest competitors in the field of production, and the time of their complete absorption by the factory is still far distant, if it is ever to take place.

a W. Roscher, Ansichten der Volkswirtschaft. Volume 2, page 150.

The

The importance of the question of the small producer arises from the influence which the technique of production exerts on the structure of society. The noncapitalistic forms of industry produced social classes in which the "captains of industry" were accompanied by but small groups of workmen; the distance between the leader and his dependents was not great and was continually being passed over. capitalistic forms have increased this gap, have caused the separation of producers into large masses of dependents on the one hand and of a small group of leaders on the other, and have introduced an almost military discipline into economic life. This is but a suggestion of the many influences which events in the world of mechanics have had on the structure of society and which form one of the most important chapters of economic history.

WORKMEN'S COMPENSATION ACTS OF FOREIGN COUNTRIES. (a)

BY ADNA F. WEBER.

Modern industrialism rests on machinery; the use of machinery entails frequent injury upon the workman. These two statements explain the prominence in all manufacturing communities of the problem of industrial accidents. The question of providing for injuries sustained by workingmen in the course of their employment has in one form or another occupied the attention of legislatures of all industrial States. In America discussion has heretofore turned upon the enactment of laws designed either to diminish the risk of accident, like the factory laws requiring the guarding of machinery, the automatic car-coupler law, etc., or to enforce the pecuniary responsibility of employers for accidents resulting from the negligence of themselves or their agents. Such employers' liability laws, modifying the common-law rules or principles as to negligence, have been enacted in 25 or more States (b); while Europe and Australia, finding liability laws inadequate for the support of maimed laborers and their families, have gone further than the United States and made the employer responsible for all accidents to his employees, with the single exception of injuries caused by the willful misconduct of the victim himself. While the expense of supporting the crippled employees

a Sources.—Aside from the text of the statutes in official publications of the governments concerned, the best source is the admirable series of monographs by Dr. Zacher, of the German imperial insurance bureau, Die Arbeiterversicherung im Auslande, in which he has reproduced the acts in the original text and also in a German translation. French versions of the texts may be found in the quarterly bulletin issued by the permanent committee of the Congrès International des Accidents du Travail et des Assurances Sociales, in M. Bellom's Lois d'Assurance ouvrière à l'Étranger, and with the exception of two or three of the earlier statutes in the Annuaire de la Legislation du Travail, begun in 1897 by the Belgian Bureau of Labor. English translations of these acts must be sought in scattered publications; the original German law was translated for John Graham Brooks's report in 1893 (Fourth Special Report of the Commissioner of Labor); all other laws, down to 1900, were translated in the Seventeenth Annual Report of the New York Bureau of Labor Statistics (1899). The more recent laws have nowhere been translated in their entirety; but a comprehensive summary of the Dutch act of 1901 was given in the Bulletin of the Department of Labor, No. 34, May, 1901, and summaries of the salient features of the other acts may be found in the monthly Labor Gazette, published by the British Board of Trade.

b Present Status of Employers' Liability in the United States, Bulletin No. 31, November, 1900.