Under the second tentative bill we have had public hearings throughout the State, particularly in the industrial centers, and concluded those hearings last Friday. We expect to meet as a committee, redraft our bills and get them into substantial form, and then I suppose, after we have determined what the committee intends to do as a committee in submitting its report to the Legislature on the essential points, we will then have public hearings and the questions that are debatable will be debated before that committee at these hearings, and then we will make our report accordingly.
New York.
Miss Crystal Eastman: The New York Commission is in a peculiarly fortunate position. Our bills have both passed and one of them has already been signed by the Governor, so that to-day our labors would be all over and we could return to rest, except for the fact that we still have to inquire into the causes and prevention of industrial accidents, the causes and effects and remedies of non-employment, and the causes and remedies for the lack of farm labor in New York State. You will see from this that we received a life sentence on the New York Commission. The Legislature evidently thought it would give to us the solution of all the problems of modern industry and keep the reformers quiet for fifty years. However, we have finished up the Employers' Liability part of our job and we feel that we have done our part of the work in that regard and now have put it up to the Legislature.
When I was planning what I should say here, I rather thought I would discuss the two bills which we have introduced, and passed, and leave out the discussion of how we did the work, but since I have come here I believe it is more important to tell you how we did it, and take it for granted that you know about the bills and are familiar with them.
Our work, to my mind, is divided into five different sections. In the first place we had reports specially prepared for the Commission, one on the Employers' Liability Law in New York State and the other States. That was prepared by our counsel and sent to every member of the Commission early last summer. Then we had a report prepared on the Foreign Systems of Compensation and Insurance: That was mailed to the members of the Commission for their information. Then we had a report on Relief Associations in New York State, which was very voluminous and was not generally mailed, but was kept in the office for reference.
The next section of our work was printed inquiries sent to all the employers whom we could get the names of from the State Department of Labor, and to all labor unions on record. These inquiries were just about the same as those sent to the employers, and in a general way we asked both the labor unions and the employers what they thought of the present law on employers' liability, how they thought it met the situation; and we asked them how they would like a law on workmen's compensation, describing it very briefly. We received replies from only a small proportion of the inquiries we sent out, but a large enough number to give us some general idea of the feeling of both the employers and the laboring people in the State on this subject. I can say positively, however, that we found no satisfaction; practically nobody liked the law. The employers disliked it for one reason and the workmen disliked it for another, and so nobody was satisfied with it.
Another printed inquiry we sent to the insurance companies. This was more in the line of investigation, however, as we got from them not opinions so much as figures showing how much they had received in premiums from employers for liability insurance, and what proportion of this had been spent in paying actual claims, thus showing us what proportion was, so to speak, wasted in the business of defending claims.
We then wrote letters, not printed inquiries, but letters containing a list of questions to a great many lawyers, and to all the judges in the State, asking their opinion about the constitutional questions involved. That, I think, ended the inquiry section of our work.
Then we held public hearings, five or six up the State and as many in New York City, and tried to make the invitations as general as we could. Many of us felt that those hearings were not going to be important and perhaps were a waste of money, but after we had them I believe we all felt that they were worth while. They perhaps did not furnish us with any definite statistical information, but they did put us in touch with the feelings of the people of the State on this subject, and gave us a more concrete view of the subject than we could have gotten by correspondence or by any statistical inquiry, and brought us in touch with the people on both sides of the question, who were interested in the problem. But quite apart from the value to us, of these written inquiries and of the public hearings, in informing us on the situation, they were valuable in arousing interest all over the State, and in educating the public in regard to the problem.
We were particularly gratified to see the way in which labor unions seized the opportunity to become interested and to educate themselves in regard to employers' liability and workmen's compensation. When we started out last fall most of the labor unions that answered our inquiries did not know what we were talking about, and now I hardly think there is a union of any size in the State that is not in a position to know what it wants in the matter of employers' liability and workmen's' compensation.