The commission has held thirty executive sessions, and thirteen public hearings; five in Chicago and two each at East St. Louiis, Springfield, Rock Island and Peoria.

A joint meeting was held in Chicago with the Wisconsin State Commission, and the secretary and attorney attended a joint conference of the New York Commission and the National Civic Federation at New York City. Several representatives of the commission attended one of the public hearings given by the Wisconsin Commission at Milwaukee. The commission also took an active part in the national convention held at the Auditorium hotel, Chicago, June 10th and 11th, under the auspices of the American Association for the Promotion of Labor Legislation, at which convention the commissions of Minnesota, New York, Wisconsin and Massachusetts were also represented. Delegates from New Jersey, Indiana, Connecticut and other states were in attendance.

The commission agreed with the governor in his statement made at its first meeting that a thorough investigation should first be made into actual working conditions in the industries of the State before any attempt was made to draft a new law covering the general subjects of employers' liability, or to suggest amendments to the present laws. A thorough investigation was therefore immediately planned, and was carried on under the following heads:

SPECIAL REPORTS.

1. A comparative study of the English and German systems of compensation, of the systems proposed by various states of the United States, and of the relief associations operating in the State of Illinois.

2. A study of the systems of compulsory insurance and workmen's compensation in Europe.

3. A preliminary analysis of the state of the law of employers' liability in New York, with a discussion as to the legal adaptability in the State of Illinois of foreign plans of compensation, and a consideration of the most feasible plan to be adopted.

STATISTICAL STUDIES.

1. An investigation was made of 200 industrial fatalities reported to the coroner of Cook county during the year 1908, and of 483 industrial fatalities reported to the authorities as occurring in other portions in the State, for the purpose of discovering the legal and economic result of such accidents, viz: the earning capacity of the workmen killed, the number of dependents, the compensation received from employers by suit or settlement, the amount paid lawyers or agents, and the effect of such accident upon the life of the family.

2. An investigation was made of 771 industrial accident cases, including death and injury, reported to the Railroad and Warehouse Commission, the Bureau of Labor, the Department of Factory Inspection, and to various organizations, boards and associations.

3. An investigation was made of 718 industrial accident cases, including death and injury in mines and quarries.

4. An inquiry was made into the cost of industrial accidents to 500 employers in the State of Illinois, to discover the total cost under the present system of employers' liability and the proportion of amount spent in hospital and medical expenses, insurance premiums, attorney's fees, settlement and damages.

5. A study was made of employers' liability insurance experience for the purpose of ascertaining the number of cases handled, the amount of settlements made, with and without suit, and the proportion of payments to premiums received, et cetera.

GENERAL INQUIRIES.

1. A series of questions were submitted in the form of a letter to 1,200 employers, members of the Illinois Manufacturers' Association and others, and to 1,700 labor organizations of the State, for the purpose of securing their opinion as to the justice and adequacy of the present law relating to employers' liability and as to the advisability of changing the law relating thereto.

2. A letter was sent to about 200 judges and prominent attorneys throughout the State, asking their opinion concerning the constitutionality of a proposed workmen's compensation law which should disregard all questions of negligence and be compulsory upon both employer and employé.

Practically all of the judges declined to express in writing their views upon the constitutionality of such a law on the ground that they might be called upon to pass upon the question in their official capacity after the passage of the law, and they did not think it wise to pre-judge the case. Several of the judges, however, verbally expressed themselves to the attorney for the commission as favoring a change in the present common law rules governing the relation of master and servant.

Several attorneys gave the commission the benefit of their opinion upon the constitutional questions submitted.

Along with these general studies of the legal and legislative aspects of the questions submitted to it, the commission made extensive investigations in more than 5,000 cases of industrial accidents-fatal and nonfatal-in this State, with a view to ascertaining what compensation, if any, is secured under the existing conditions.

Full and complete reports covering 614 fatal cases were secured by investigators of the commission. The facts disclosed were extraordinary. The commission found that of the entire 614 cases, only twenty-four had resulted in a successful settlement in court, and 204 were without any settlement, either in or out of court. The popular notion that the workingman, or his family in the event of his death, has a chance to secure comfortable damages, was utterly refuted by an examination of the facts.

The following table gives a brief summary of the situation as the commission found it:

THE COMMISSION FURTHER FOUND.

That the average compensation paid out of court for the death of a skilled railway employé was $1,157.00. Cases settled in court had an average award of $2,078.00. More than 12 per cent of the cases recovered nothing whatever.

That the average settlement out of court for the death of a railway laborer amounted to $936.00. The few cases that were settled in court were probably not representative. At all events, their average was extremely low-$245.00.

That the average death settlement, out of court, in the skilled building trades was $932.00. The only successful court settlement which the commission found netted $200.00. Almost 50 per cent of the entire number of building trade cases investigated by the commission recovered nothing whatever.

That the average settlement out of court for the death of a miner was $294.00, and ten successful court cases which we found averaged $1,021.00. But more than 60 per cent of the cases had no settlement, either in or out of court.

That in the nineteen teamsters' cases which came under the investigation of the commission, not a single one showed a settlement of any sort, and in only seven of the nineteen were there suits pending.

That the families of steel workers recovered through out of court settlements an average compensation of $1,254.00. The commission found no successful court cases.

But this outline, convenient for certain purposes, scarcely hints at the situation which the commission found. It gives no idea of the suffering and hardship which our investigations disclosed; it tells nothing of the long and tedious fights, of the inequitable verdicts, the delays and uncertainties of the law; it scarcely suggests the unequal character of the struggle between the claim agents and the families of the deceased bread winner. But almost every individual case reflected some aspect or other of this sort, driving home to the members of the commission the conviction that the present system was unjust, haphazard, inadequate and wasteful, the cause of enormous suffering, of much disrespect for law and of a badly distributed burden upon society.

THE FIRST PUBLIC STATEMENT.

Having completed its preliminary investigation, the commission arranged a tour of the State and outlined the following plan as a guide. Ten thousand copies were printed and distributed.

The public meetings were well attended, and the suggestions of the commission created wide discussion. The full text of the public letter and proposed plan for a compensation law follows:

To the Public:

EMPLOYERS' LIABILITY COMMISSION
OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS.

CHICAGO, July 18, 1910.

The Employers' Liability Commission of Illinois was authorized by the forty-sixth session of the Legislature, subsequently appointed by the Gov

ernor, and duly organized March 24, 1910, to "investigate the problem of industrial accidents," and to report a "draft of such bill or bills as may be deemed appropriate" for accomplishing "the most equitable and effectual method of providing for compensation for losses suffered as aforesaid." In this work the commission has for its aim the conservation of human life, and the happiness and opportunity provided by a greater sense of industrial security. The commission has been and still is actively engaged in securing and considering the industrial statistics of this and other states.

The plan of the commission is tentative and susceptible of change both in scope and in form, and suggestions are invited. For the purpose of submitting the ideas of the commission directly to the industrial groups most concerned, to the legal fraternity, and to the people of the State with the least possible inconvenience to all, public meetings will be held (afternoon and evening sessions) as follows: East St. Louis, August 11th; Springfield, August 12th; Rock Island, August 17th; Peoria, August 18th; Chicago, August 24th and 25th.

Stenographic records of these meetings will be kept. After consideration of the comments and suggestions offered, draft of a bill or bills will be subImitted to the Governor of the State.

Respectfully,

EDWIN R. WRIGHT,

Secretary, Employers' Liability Commission of the State of Illinois.

By Order of the Commission.

The condensed scheme first proposed by the commission took the form of the following outline of a compensation measure, and was designed merely as a topical index for discussion, as follows:

THE PLAN OF A WORKMAN'S COMPENSATION BILL UNDER CONSIDERATION BY THE COMMISSION, THE MAIN PURPOSES OF WHICH SHALL BE:

(1) To provide compensation for losses by reason of industrial accidents, resulting in death or incapacity to employés, regardless of any question of negligence or fault, except in cases of serious or willful misconduct of the employé.

(2) To make the law compulsory in form, but elective in fact, providing in the first instance that the employer shall pay the compensation, according to the scale set forth in the Act, but reserving to both employer and employé their common law remedies, including trial by jury, providing, however, as to the employer that if he refuses to pay the compensation according to the scale provided, and forces the employé to his action at the common law, he shall not escape liability by reason of either (1) the fellow servant rule, (2) the assumption of the risk, or (3) the contributory negligence of the employé, unless his negligence be greater than that of the employer, in which event the damages shall be apportioned according to the relative degree of negligence, and the burden of proof shall be upon the employer; and providing as to the employé that he shall be presumed to have accepted the compensation law, and any acceptance by him of compensation under the proposed law, except necessary medical and surgical attention, shall bar the right of action at common law, and the beginning of any action at law shall bar his right to compensation under the proposed law, except in the case of willful negligence of the employer or his failure to comply with statutory or municipal safety regulations; these two limitations upon the rights of the respective parties being imposed for the purpose of inducing them both to accept the compensation law, and to refrain from using the present unsatisfactory methods of settling claims for personal injury.

(3) To provide a scale of compensation as follows:

(a) Death-Where there are dependents, three years' wages, but not less than $1,500.00 nor more than $3,000.00. Where there are no dependents, a sum not to exceed $200.00.

(b) Permanent Disability—A pension on the basis of 50 per cent of the earnings of the employé, to be paid as long as the disability lasts, or until the compensation or pension paid, equals the amount of four years' wages, such pension to commence after two weeks' disability. Where the disability is permanent, but only partial, the percentage of compensation or pension to be reduced in proportion to the reduction in earning capacity.

(c) Temporary Disability-When such disability is determined to have existed in a bona fide form for two weeks or more, then compensation to be awarded from the day the employé left work, on the basis of 50 per cent to the earnings, to be paid as long as the disability lasts; all cases of disability to be determined by physician of employer, or, by consultation, if employé desires, of the employer's physician with one to be engaged by the employé, and if these two cannot agree upon the nature and probable duration of the injury, then a third to be called in; the decision of the physicians to be used as a basis for computing the compensation due, such examinations to be made at subsequent times, for the purpose of reconsidering the question, if circumstances seem to require it.

(d) Minors in case of permanent disability, to be paid compensation as above, on basis of 50 per cent of the earnings of adults, in the same line of employment; in case of temporary disability, when they have dependents, to be paid compensation as long as it lasts as above, on basis of 50 per cent of the earnings of adults in the same line of employment, provided that the compensation paid shall not exceed the full weekly pay; when they have no dependents, on basis of 50 per cent of their own earnings.

(4) Disputes arising under the compensation law to be settled by agreement of the parties, or arbitration, and confirmed by a court of proper jurisdiction.

(5) Claims of employés, under the law shall be preferred, same as wage claims are now preferred under the law, and shall take precedence of other wage claims of other employés not injured.

(6) Reasonable notice of claims shall be given to employer, but failure to comply strictly with statute, in regard to details, not to be fatal to the ' right to compensation unless the employer can show that he has been unduly prejudiced by such failure.

(7) Report to be made by employer, of all cases of injury for which compensation has been or is being paid, to the State Bureau of Labor Statistics.

(8) The compensation to be paid in installments, conforming to the manner of payment of wages while the employé was at work, except the employé or person entitled to benefits may petition county or probate court for leave to have it paid in a lump sum, and if proper showing is made, court may order amount of compensation due, paid in lump sum.

(9) The proposed law to apply to all employés of labor, who have more than five persons employed at one time.

The public meetings were largely attended, and the outline of the commission generally well received. Many expressions were heard as to the acceptability of a measure based on the general theory of workmen's compensation.

A spirit of criticism and hostility developed in a pronounced form during the public meetings held in Chicago, August 24th and 25th. Four meetings were held and a general invitation issued to take part in the debate. Additional meetings were arranged for the convenience of special organizations of employers and employés.

With the resumption of executive sessions, the committee took up the first draft of a compensation measure. The bill outlined the work of other commissions and embraced views expressed by prominent sociologists, business men, labor officials, and the public.