Present Factory Laws of the United States.[[23]]
“In all, about half the states have so far passed what may be called a factory act; that is, laws for the regulation, mainly sanitary, of conditions in factories and workshops. These include ... the New England states generally, New York and the Northern Central and Northwestern states following their legislation. There are almost no factory acts in the South nor in the purely agricultural states of the West, but these statutes are being passed rapidly and moreover, in states where they have already been enacted, are being amended every year.
“The most usual statutes are those making provision for proper fire-escapes, or against use of explosive oils, etc.; for the removal of noxious vapors or dust by fans or other contrivances; requiring guards to be placed about dangerous machinery, belting, elevators, wells, air-shafts, crucibles, vats, etc.; providing that doors shall open outward; prohibiting the machinery from being cleaned while in motion; laws to prevent overcrowding and to secure sanitary conditions generally.”[[24]] Building laws also reinforce these measures.
Antedating such factory acts proper, the same states have very generally passed statutes regulating child labor and forbidding employment to those under a stated age. In eleven states this age limit is fourteen years, in nine over twelve, and in four,—New Hampshire, Vermont, Nebraska, and California,—ten years; eleven also make educational provision for older children and illiterate minors.[[25]]
The majority of states have further legislated upon the hours of labor of minors, while fifteen limit the working time of women as well, generally to sixty hours per week, but in Massachusetts to fifty-eight hours, in New Jersey to fifty-five, and in Wisconsin to forty-eight.[[26]] Eight also provide for time for meals, and five prohibit night work.[[27]] This limitation of hours for women and children, considered “wards of the state,” very generally necessitates a similar working day for the adult male laborer in the factory, while it in a measure avoids the serious question of constitutionality that a broader statute could not fail to raise.
“There is absolutely no limitation for persons of any age or sex only in Iowa, Kansas, Oregon, Nevada, Washington, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, Utah, Kentucky, Arkansas, Texas, North Carolina, Alabama, Florida, Mississippi, New Mexico, Arizona, Oklahoma, and the District of Columbia.”[[28]]
Besides these statutes, other laws that must be mentioned, as immediately affecting the interests of factory labor, are those which regulate wage payment and fines, also the employers’ liability acts which allow recovery of damages for bodily injury sustained in service. Thirteen states have passed laws regulating the period of payment by individuals and corporations, and nine others stipulate weekly or fortnightly payments by corporations. Only Massachusetts, Indiana and Ohio have attempted to “prevent the withholding of wages or the imposition of a fine by factory employers for imperfect work.”
Outside of the New England states “anti-truck acts,” similar to the English statute and stipulating a money payment, have been passed in sixteen states, five of which, however, limit its application to corporations. It may be noted in passing that several of these wage-regulating laws have already fallen under the ban of the courts.
Employers’ liability statutes supplement the factory acts by affording additional reason for care on the part of the employer in guarding dangerous machinery and otherwise providing for the safety of those in his employ. Twenty-two states have legislated upon the “fellow-servant” question, and ten make employers liable for injury caused by defective machinery. Of these, however, only six apply in full to factory labor.
The states that have passed factory acts and regulated hours of labor “have usually created one or more factory inspectors, charged with the duty of seeing that the statutes are carried out generally with powers to enter personally or by deputy and to inspect all factories at any time.”[[29]]