the safety requirements of the law more stringent. The second deals with the problem of unemployment and concludes with a recommendation for a chain of free public employment exchanges to be located at different points in New York State and to be under the direction of a third deputy commissioner of labor. This report includes a full discussion of European experience with employment exchanges. The third discusses the decision of the New York Court of Appeals declaring unconstitutional the workmen's compensation law enacted in 1910, on the recommendation of this commission. The commission now urges the legislature to amend the state constitution so that the legislation which has been declared void, or similar legislation, may be reenacted.

In addition to the routine topics discussed in the Tenth Annual Report of the Commissioner of Labor of New York, for the year ended September 30, 1910 (Albany, 1911, pp. 328), there are two reports in the field of industrial hygiene, dealing with special investigations of the phosphorus match and pearl button industries (pp. 83-111).

The National Civic Federation has published a pamphlet, Views of Legal Committee Department on Compensation for Industrial Accidents and their Prevention (1 Madison Square, N. Y., 1911, pp. 36, 11). This gives the opinion of the Court of Appeals in Ives v. South Buffalo Railway Co., and brief comments on the effect of the decision by Messrs. P. T. Sherman, W. J. Moran, John Mitchell, and Launcelot Packer.

The difficulty of remedying existing legislation in regard to employers' liability because of constitutional obstacles is dwelt upon in the Report of Commission on Employers' Liability, made to the governor of New Jersey, January 11, 1911. This, together with a message of the governor, evidence, and a proposed act has been published as a separate document (Trenton, 1911, pp. 91). The commission was apparently inclined to favor the principle of a general workmen's compensation act, but legal opinion was against the constitutionality of an act which would compel an employer to compensate an injured employee without regard to the fault or negligence of the latter. A bill is therefore proposed providing for a system of elective compensation after a mutual agreement of employer and employee, whereby the question of contributory negligence is eliminated.

In the Twenty-Fourth Annual Report of the Department of Labor and Printing of North Carolina (Raleigh, 1910, pp. 328), the commissioner calls attention to the need of a factory inspection law, doubts

the advisability of establishing a free employment bureau, and advocates a ten-hour day for factories and the enactment of an age limit of thirteen years.

tions.

The Ohio Commission on Employers' Liability and Employees' Compensation has completed its report and submitted its recommendaOn these the commission divides. The majority recommends the adoption of a plan whereby the employee or his family shall receive a minimum of $1500 in case of total incapacity, or death, with $150 for medical assistance and a like sum for burial expenses. The maximum amount is $3400 in case of death. These sums are to be met out of a state insurance fund to which the employer is to contribute three fourths and the employees one fourth. The cost of administration is to be borne by the state. The minority assent to the main features of the foregoing plan, but retain the existing right to sue and exempt the employees from financial contributions.

The subject of diseases incident to employment is treated at length in the Report of Commission on Occupational Diseases, made to the Governor of Illinois (Professor Charles R. Henderson, Secretary of the Commission, Chicago; January, 1911, pp. 219). About twenty-five special agents took part in the investigation, and among the inquiries covered were the industries concerned with smelting, metallic lead, printing, plumbing, painting, storage batteries, putty powder, rubber, and brass chills. The commission recommended a continuation of the study of the subject for a period of at least two years in order that proper legislation may be enacted.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics of Illinois has printed a special report on The Cherry Mine Disaster (Springfield, 1910, pp. 90). It includes a history of the accident, the relief measures, the settlement with the St. Paul Company, and a discussion of industrial accidents and methods of compensation.

Part II of the Twelfth Biennial Report of the Bureau of Labor of Minnesota is devoted to a study of industrial accidents and employers' liability in Minnesota (pp. 121-324) by Don D. Lescohier. Of special interest are the ten chapters discussing accidents in industrial occupations, thus contributing information in regard to the risk of each of the industries analyzed. By such inquiries it is hoped to be able to determine what proportion of accidents are due to other causes than human negligence. An appendix gives a bibliography of three pages.

To the list of reports on workmen's compensation referred to in the March number of the REVIEW is to be added the Report of Minnesota

Employees' Compensation Commission (1911, pp. 289, xiv). This opens with a general discussion of the law, in which the subject is localized by illustrations taken from the court records of Minnesota, showing the cost of judicial procedure on personal injury cases. Successive chapters give a review of European systems, discuss the action of the federal government, and summarize the agitation for a change of law in the several states. In the discussion of a plan of insurance it is stated that for Minnesota there are constitutional obstacles. The latter part of the report presents an act for a workmen's compensation code, which practically follows the English plan.

The report of the Washington Commission on Employees' Compensation, summarized in the REVIEW, pages 154-157, has been quickly followed by legislation (Ch. 74, laws of 1911).

The Tenth Annual Report of the Kansas Free Employment Bureau (Topeka, 1911) calls attention to the development during the past two years of furnishing farm hands to harvest the wheat crop. In 1910 the supply of labor for the first time in many years was sufficient and, moreover, labor was well distributed.

The Addresses made at the Fourth Annual Meeting of The Liability Insurance Association, held in New York, October 20, 1910, have been printed (Secretary, Walter E. Hoag, General Accident Fire and Life Assurance Corporation, Philadelphia). Of special value is the paper by Mr. H. V. Mercer on the constitutionality of workmen's compensation laws.

Money and Banking

The proceedings of the International Conference on Bills of Exchange, held at the Hague, June 23 to July 25, 1910, have been published as a government document (Sen. Doc., No. 768; 61 Cong., 3 Sess., 1911, pp. 511). This includes the report of the American delegate, Mr. Charles A. Conant, a summary of the discussions at the several sessions, and the papers submitted by the several delegations, several of which deal with the history of the law of exchange. Among these is a comparison of the New York and English laws. The Conference is to reassemble in September.

Mr. Andrew MacFarland Davis has added a Supplement to the Origin of the National Banking System (National Monetary Commission, Sen. Doc., No. 582, Part 2, 61 Cong., 2 Sess., 1911, pp. 215246). This is an appendix on the Moorhead bill of 1863.

Other recent publications of the National Monetary Commission are The Banks of Issue in Italy, by Tito Canovai, general secretary of the Bank of Italy, with an article by Professor Ferraris (Sen. Doc., No. 575, 61 Cong., 2 Sess., 1911, pp. 345); and Banking in Russia, AustroHungary, the Netherlands and Japan (Sen. Doc., No. 586, 61 Cong., 2 Sess., 1911, pp. 214).

In the Proceedings of the Arizona Bankers' Association, seventh annual session, November 11-12, 1910 (Morris Goldwater, secretary, Prescott, Arizona; 1911, pp. 87), is an interesting paper on Foreign Exchange, by H. Choynski, of San Francisco, in which information may be found in regard to practices covering exchange dealings with the Orient.

In 1909 Massachusetts passed an act authorizing the establishment of credit unions, the first law enacted in the United States for this purpose. In order to encourage the formation of such associations the Bank Commissioner has issued a pamphlet Credit Unions (Boston, 1910, pp. 34) in which there is a brief statement of the history and principles of foreign credit associations, a discussion of opportunities in Massachusetts, and instructions in regard to organization and management.

Students of the history of banking in the United States will find a serviceable list, alphabetically arranged, of all the state banks incorporated in Rhode Island, with the dates of charter, in the Third Annual Report of the Bank Commissioner of Rhode Island. Brief comments show the subsequent fate of these institutions as to reorganization, liquidation, or failure. (Providence, R. I., 1910. Pp. 267.)

Prices

The Thirty-Third Annual Report of the Bureau of Statistics and Labor of New Jersey for the year ending October 31, 1910 (pp. 291) has a chapter on the cost of living in New Jersey. The retail prices for a selected bill of food supplies were obtained from grocers and butchers in twenty-one counties of the state. The total average for the state is given as $13.143. The several counties are then rated in comparison with this standard average, the extremes of the range running from $10.745 to $15.810. The prices are for June, 1910.

The Seventh Biennial Report of the Bureau of Labor Statistics of Washington, 1909-1910 (Olympia, 1911, pp. 365) includes the results of a special investigation of the cost of living. The prices for 1900 are used as a base.

A considerable amount of data in regard to prices of food commodities in different cities in Pennsylvania with some discussion of the cost of living based upon local conditions may be found in the Annual Report of the Secretary of Internal Affairs of Pennsylvania (Part III, Industrial Statistics; Harrisburg, 1910).

Public Finance

Several public documents relating to proposed reciprocity legislation have been published, among which are the special message of President Taft, on Canadian Reciprocity (Washington, 1911, pp. 75), containing the letters from the Canadian ministers, and proposed schedules; Reciprocity with Canada (Sen. Doc., No. 862; 61 Cong. 3 Sess. pp. 55), containing the bill, an analysis, and two addresses by President Taft; and Reciprocity with Canada (Sen. Doc. No. 849; 61 Cong. 3 Sess. pp. 132), which includes the report of the Tariff Board under date of February 28, 1911, in regard to various commodities affected by the reciprocity bill. Further information may be found in Trade Relations of Canada, by Frank R. Rutter (Bureau of Manufactures, Washington, Tariff Series, No. 26; March, 1911, pp. 39). This deals with the system now in force and proposed concessions to the United States.

Other documents on the tariff are Hearings before the Committee on Ways and Means, December 13, 1910 (Washington, pp. 58), relating to the bills for the establishment of a Tariff Board; and Foreign Tariff Notes, No. 1, issued by the Bureau of Manufactures (Washington, pp. 32), in which the reports of consular officers originally published in the Daily Consular and Trade Reports, July 5 to November 11, 1910, are brought together.

The Twentieth Annual Report of the New York Tax Reform Association, for 1910 (29 Broadway, N. Y., pp. 8) furnishes an instructive survey of tax problems as they exist in New York. Special comment is made on the inheritance tax law.

The Federal Commissioner of Corporations has continued his studies of Taxation of Corporations into the Middle Atlantic States. (Part II; June 6, 1910, pp. 115.) The states covered are New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, and District of Columbia, the section in which corporate activity has been developed to the highest degree. New Jersey derives 92 per cent of its total state tax revenue from corporations; Pennsylvania 72 per cent; Delaware 62 per cent; New York 32 per cent; and Maryland 32 per cent. The distinctive