The Nonpartisan Leader Newspaper, February 24, 1919, Page 4

. workman’s weekly wages. f ;- s | # ¢ i ¥ of the workingmen prin- cipally in their title. In all states but two the state, instead of collecting _ money from employers and paying it to injured workmen, allows insurance companies to “protect” the employes. What the in- surance companies really protect are the employers. The natural tendency of an insurance company, called upon to pay the claim of an injured work- man, is to fight the claim instead of paying it. In- vestigations have shown that the insurance com- panies have used from $55 to $70 of every $100 col- lected from the employer in “expenses”—that is, in commissions, advertising, court costs and attorneys’ fees in fighting workmen’s claims, and so forth, spending only from 30 to 45 per cent for payment to injured workmen. . The North Dakota law ends all this. The state of North Dakota will collect what money is needed from the employers. It will pay it out to the injured workmen. The insurance companies have no finger in the pie. Any injured workman will be given free med- ical, surgical and hospital treatment from the fund collected from employers. During the time he is prevented from working, he will re- ceive two-thirds of his usual wages, but in no case less than $6 nor more than $20 per week. In case an accident is fatal, the workman’s widow will get 35 per cent of his wages as a pen- sion. If the workman leaves a widow and one child their pension will be 45 per cent of his wages; if a widow and two children, 55 per cent, and so on upwards to a maximum of 662 per cent of the Pensions are to be paid to widows until they die or remarry and to children until they reach the age of 18. | - 1f the workman suffers an injury such as the loss of an arm that permanently disables him, he is to be paid an amount that represents his loss - HE HAS BOTH L 1 . The North Dakota farmer has known the road to industrial independence for many years. by riding on the back seat. The special interests had the lines and did the driving. still had the other, the senate. Of course, he didn’t get very far on the right road has both lines and he is driving straight to his destination. The fat boys legislation for the people—not just for farmers as the anti George A. Malone (left), a coal miner of Wilton, and John O’Brien, barber of James- town, elected to the North Dakota legislature with League indorsement and working with the League farmers for fair treatment for the workers of both city and country. in earning power, consid- ering the occupation he was~ in previously and what he may be able to do thereafter. Another enlightened labor measure is the coal mining code. There are some 200- odd coal mines in North Dakota. Here- tofore the miners have lacked any protection + and mine operators and owners have been: able to force miners to work in danger of the deadly “black- damp”—a mine gas as deadly as any the Germans released in France—in tunnels unprotected by any timbering and under incompetent foremen. Also there has been no way by which the miners, generally paid by tonnage of output, could be sure whether they were getting fair pay for their work. The coal mining code creates the office of state mine inspector and authorizes him to inspect the mines for safety and for accuracy of weights and measures. It provides for proper timbering and ventilation in mines, proper handling of explosives and for adoption of safety devices and provision for emergency exits. Maps of the mine workings are also to be provided and mine owners are to provide washhouses and sanitary arrangements for workers. Mine foremen are required to pass an examina- tion to show that they are competent to fill a job and to be intrusted with_the lives of the men under them. : ! The bill establishes eight hours as a day’s/work, and prohibits the employment of any children un- der 16 years of age underground. Another advanced labor bill, house bill No. 184, establishes $1.50 as a daily minimum wage for women workers and places enforcement of the law under the public welfare commission. - PAGE FOUR 8 INES AND KNOWS THE ROAD i AND IR THE ROADE s s - A companion bill, H. B, No. 186, establishes an eight-hour workday for women. All of these bills have been introduced by Mr. Malone and have been approved by the League farmers unanimously. Most of them have already passed both houses and before this article appears in print they will be established law of the state of North Dakota. Mr. O’Brien is the author of another series of labor bills. One of the most important of these, H. B. No. 57, is an anti-injunction law, to prevent employers from using the injunction process of the courts to coerce dissatisfied workmen. This bill already has been passed by both houses and signed- by Governor Frazier. In another bill, H. B. No. 163, the state of North Dakota officially indorses fair working hours and conditions for labor by re- quiring the union label on all state printing. The railroad brotherhoods asked the enactment of two laws for the safety of railroad worKkers and the general public. Both of these bills were intro- duced in the senate and have been passed by that body. One of them, S. B. No. 85, iz the “full crew” bill. It requires a crew of five men on trains of less than 40 cars and six men on trains of more than 40 cars. The second, S. B. No. 84, requires railroad companies to build sheds under which cars are to be repaired, instead of compelling work- men to work in rain and snow. All of these bills are virtually certain to pass without being cut to pieces with hostile amend- ments to make them unworkable. That is the usual scheme that the politicians adopt when they find themselves forced to pay some kind of attention to labor’s demands. Thus many of the states have workmen’s compensation acts that protect the workers in their titles only, eight-hour laws that fail to provide an eight-hour day, minimum wage ° laws that can not be enforced. It is different in North Dakota. The work- men have not been compelled to keep lobbies at Bismarck to see that the laws are passed as they should be. They have not been com- pelled to do this because the farmers of North Dakota realize that their fight is the same as the fight of the workers in the cities. The city workers in North Dakota are few in numbers, but the farm workers have their cause at heart and' are looking after their interests. For years organized labor has attempted to get something from the old parties by bargaining away its political power, but the old parties always had an agreement about how far to go in the bidding. North Dakota labor has found the right way out. -—Drawn expressly for the Leader by W. C. Morris But until the Nonpartisan league came along, he tried to get there Then in 1916 he got one of the lines, the house, and the special interests with only one line to pull on. Now, as Cartoonist Morris shows here, he are desperate because they know they can not turn him-off the road. His load is -farmer gang has charged in the hope of deceiving labor. eloquent proof of what throwing out the special interests means to labor as well as to the farmers of North Dakota. The story on this page is