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science of the prevention of accidents is studied in all its bearings. Research and invention are stimulated in the direction of safety appliances by prizes. Bulletins and articles in periodical reviews are published; exhibitions are held; museums and agricultural societies display special collections of devices. There are imperial laws and trade regulations making it obligatory upon employers to minimize dangers; there are state and technical inspectors and trade officials whose duty it is to see that wholesome regulations are faithfully observed; and there are heavy penalties for delinquents.

The supervision and inspection concerns itself with machinery, its dangers, and proper safety devices; with precautions against various kinds of dust, gases, vapors, and poisonous substances; with the supply of respirators and eye-protectors; with the matter of cleanliness, changing of clothes, facilities for washing and bathing; with the location, construction, lighting, heating, ventilation, and general hygienic condition of buildings; and with the matter of intemperance, long working hours, excessive exertions, protracted work in certain attitudes as bearing upon the fitness of men to work in a given industry.

It may be claimed fairly for this great scheme of insurance that it has passed beyond

the phase of experiment. It encountered in the outset, especially before the attitude of Emperor William I had been indicated, bitter criticism and opposition. A writer in a German insurance journal in 1876, five years before the message of the Emperor to the Reichstag, declared that the scheme was Utopian and was popular only with ignoramuses and pot-house politicians.' The change in public sentiment may be illustrated by the fact that in 1889 the old-age and invalidity law passed the Reichstag by a small majority, the revision of the law in 1899 was carried almost unanimously. While the public mind is alert to suggest improvements, there is no considerable body of men who would advocate a repeal. The plan has commended itself not only to the German people, but to increasing numbers among all the nations of Europe. While this result may be attributed in some measure to the ferment which has been working in the minds of men for a generation, it must be credited largely to the bold initiative of Germany. This took the subject out of the category of academic discussion and successfully demonstrated on a colossal scale and in a dramatic fashion what might be accomplished by a resolute will, an honest and philanthropic purpose, and tireless patience in elaboration.

1 Quoted by Walford, Insurance Cyclopædia, v, 91.

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It furnished a revelation as to the possibilities of sane, beneficent, social legislation. It has endured the keen scrutiny and criticism, not always friendly, of observers at home and abroad, and after a trial of twenty-five years has won their approval. They concur with great unanimity in the judgment that it has produced a deep and lasting effect upon the moral and material welfare of the working classes of the Empire.1

Never before, perhaps, on any arena has there been, in any brief time, through legislation, a social awakening so significant and so profound. During the same period there has been a degree of commercial industrial progress almost without parallel. We may not insist that these two facts are related as cause and effect, although that is the confident claim of competent observers; but there would seem to be a refutation of the prediction that such legislation would prove highly disastrous to the Empire in its competitive struggle with its commercial rivals.

But there have been moral results which far transcend in importance any considerations of material progress or commercial supremacy. The German people have found a solution of

1 L. Lass, op. cit. p. 30; A. Shadwell, Industrial Efficiency, ii, 147, 161; J. G. Brooks, Social Unrest, p. 249; I. M. Rubinow, in Chautauquan, xli, 59; F. Kestner, in North American Review, clxxix, 445; F. A. Vanderlip, in North American Review, clxxxi, 922.

a problem of the greatest possible consequence to the laboring classes; they have ascertained and proclaimed to the world that there was an obligation to these classes which must be paid as a matter of right rather than of charity; that before showing mercy it was necessary to do justice.

V

ACCIDENT INSURANCE AND WORKMEN'S

COMPENSATION

WORKMEN suffer no class of misfortunes which appeal more strongly to sympathy than accidents. Old age, the gradual impairment of bodily strength, even death after wasting sickness, do not come with the same tragic effect as the accident which falls like a thunderbolt out of a clear sky. It may have the most disastrous consequences; it may befall the young man in the full use of his physical powers; it may maim; it may incapacitate for labor either temporarily or permanently; it may reduce a family to poverty and helplessness in an instant. These appalling features of accidents have disposed workmen, especially in dangerous employments, to the plan of mutual protection. For example, some form of accident insurance has been in existence in certain mining regions for centuries.

But however keenly those engaged in dangerous industries have appreciated the perils which constantly menace them, the outside world has often looked on with too much indifference. We are far more impressed by the loss of 22,000 men in the two years of the Boer

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