PARTICULAR PROVISIONS OF THE LAWS.

INJURIES COMPENSATED.

Accidents.-The Supreme Court of Minnesota (State ex rel. Faribault Woolen Mills Co. v. District Court, p. 201) reversed an award in favor of a claimant whose injury was typhoid fever, said to have been contracted from drinking infected water furnished by the employer, the court holding that such an event was not of a sudden and violent nature, essential to constitute an accident. This court held, however, that freezing (State ex rel. Nelson v. District Court, p. 202) and sunstroke (State ex rel. Rau v. District Court, p. 202) were accidental injuries compensable under the act.

The Court of Appeals of Connecticut reversed an award in behalf of a fireman in a brewery, whose death was due to pneumonia following an unusual exposure, added to exhaustion, holding that exhaustion, although due to accident, could not be classed as a bodily injury within the meaning of the act. (Linnane v. Aetna Brewing Co., p. 277.)

A rather peculiar definition of the term "accident" is insisted upon by the Supreme Court of Michigan (Landers v. City of Muskegon, p. 200), when it holds that pneumonia following protracted wetting in a freezing temperature was the sequel of but a common occurrence in the occupation of a city fireman, and that even a sudden rush of water drenching the fireman from head to foot was only an ordinary incident of his duties and not an accident; the disease that followed was brought on, therefore, not by an unexpected event but by one incident to that nature of employment. A more liberal view was taken by the Appellate Court of Indiana in a case (United Paper Board Co. v. Lewis, p. 277), where nephritis followed overheating and wetting and subsequent chill, the employee being engaged in flushing hot pulp out of a basement into which it had escaped from a broken pipe. The court held that any disease due to such exposure might properly be classed as a personal injury by accident, compensable under the law of that State.

Occupational disease.-The element of accident as a cause is not in evidence in a case (In re Maggelet, p. 274), decided by the Supreme Court of Massachusetts, the claimant being a cigar maker who suffered from neurosis, claimed to be due to the employment. In view of medical testimony to the effect that the disease was probably caused by a stooping position assumed by the workman, but not necessary to the conduct of his work, the case was distinguished from one of true occupational disease, and the claim disallowed.

An inflamed condition of the lining membranes of the nose and mouth due to dust inhaled in handling pulverized grain was classed as a compensable injury by the Supreme Court of California (Hartford Accident & Indemnity Co. v. Industrial Commission, p. 239).

COVERAGE

Employment status.—A claim for compensation made by the president and principal stockholder of a lumber company for injuries received while handling lumber was denied by the Court of Appeals of New York (Bowne v. S. W. Bowne Co., p. 228), the court saying that the provisions of the law were evidently directed to persons of a different status from that in evidence for the claimant in the case, and the distinction was such as should not be obliterated. A wife employed as cashier and bookkeeper in a store owned by her husband was held by the Supreme Court of Massachusetts not to be an employee under the act, since a married woman can not make a contract with her husband (In re Humphrey, p. 229).

Election.-Some difficulty attended the adjudication of a case which was before the Supreme Court of Arizona (Woodruff v. Producers' Oil Co., p. 224), the case coming before the court a second time, with the result that the first decision was reversed. In the first place the court denied to the plaintiff employee any right to sue for damages, declaring that his only recourse was under the compensation law, which he would therefore have no interest in having declared unconstitutional, and it refused to pass upon the points of unconstitutionality raised by him. On the second trial it was decided that since the act calls for express or implied election before it can become applicable, but establishes a presumption in favor of such election unless an express statement in writing is given not less than 30 days prior to the accident, the apparent contradiction must be solved by giving effect to the paragraph of presumably later enactment, and since 30 days had not elapsed from the time of employment the compensation act would not be considered to govern.

The status of minors was involved in two cases before the Court of Errors and Appeals of New Jersey, in one of which (Brost v. Whitall-Tatum Co., p. 226) the father was held to be duly notified of the son's exclusion from the benefits of the compensation act by a printed notice appearing on the boy's pay envelope. The company was therefore not allowed to plead its liability under the compensation law as a bar to a suit for damages. In the second case (Young v. Sterling Leather Works, p. 226), the provision making the law applicable to minors in the absence of a written statement to the contrary, which, in the case of minor employees, must be given by or to the parent or guardian, was claimed to deprive minors of their right of election, and so of their property rights. The court held that the effect of the law was exactly to the contrary, being to safeguard the minor's interest and protect him against acts of immature judgment, as the legislature had the power to do.

Place of employment.-The law of New Hampshire is applicable to work in shops, mills, factories, etc., employing five or more per

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sons. It was held (King v. Berlin Mills Co., p. 230) not to cover the case of a workman erecting a carrier for pulp wood at a distance of about a mile from the mill of the employer, though engaged at the time with five or more other men. So also the Supreme Court of Kansas (Hicks v. Swift & Co., p. 258) reversed an award in behalf of a driver delivering meat at a distance from the employer's packing house, since the accident did not occur on, in, or about any of the company's establishments.

Casual employment.-The problem of a workman employed for the odd job, or not in the regular line of the employer's business, remains unsolved. The laws of a majority of the States exclude the so-called casual employee from the benefits of compensation, though the definitions are not uniform. The courts, of course, can not initiate action, but there is a considerable diversity in the definitions formulated by them, where this duty devolves upon them. Whether the disjunctive "or" or the conjunctive "and" is used in describing the employees under consideration is significant, some laws saying "casual and not in the regular line of the employer's business," while others use the word "or" instead. In a case passed upon by the Supreme Court of Minnesota (State ex rel. Nienaber v. District Court, p. 229), the driver of a sprinkler cart was requested by a teamster delivering coal to assist in extricating him from a mudhole. While rendering this assistance the driver received an injury, and made claim of compensation against the coal dealer, which the court allowed, since, though the employment was casual in the ordinary sense, it was in the usual course of the dealer's business. On the other hand, a workman engaged in plastering a room being erected as an addition to a brewing establishment was denied the benefits of the Illinois statute on the ground that employment for three or four days was casual and not contemplated for inclusion in the enactment of the law (Aurora Brewing Co. v. Industrial Board, p. 210).

A denial of the benefits was the result of a consideration by the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania of a case (Marsh v. Groner, p. 230) in which a residence was being remodeled, a plasterer employed in the work receiving injury. The employer was held not to be engaged in business in this undertaking, so that no responsibility for injury to the workman could be predicated on the existing facts. A different status appeared in a case passed upon by an appellate court of California (Miller & Lux (Inc.) v. Industrial Accident Commission, p. 211), where it appeared that building operations were a part of the regular business of a company owning a ranch, so that a carpenter in their employment was entitled to the benefits of the act. The defense that farm employments are excluded was not allowed, and the commission's award was approved. Another case involving

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the principle of casual employment is discussed under the succeeding heading (McLaughlin case, p. 227).

Hazardous employments.-The limitation of the acts to classes of employment designated as hazardous renders necessary adjudications as to the meaning of this term and also as to how far an incident of the principal employment is to be affected by the character of that employment. The Court of Appeals of New York (Dose v. Moehle Lithographic Co., p. 233) affirmed an award made by the industrial commission of the State in favor of a building laborer who was engaged in repairing the building used by the company, though the appellate division of the supreme court had denied the right. The company was engaged in a so-called hazardous employment, and under the definition of "employee" in the amended New York law benefits were available to employees of the company in connection with its business, even though not employed in the main line of its industry. It is clear that this differs from the doctrine announced in the Bargey case (Bul. 224, p. 270), where similar employment was held not to be in the line of the employer's business-a rule followed in the Aurora Brewing Co. case, noted under the previous heading. The New York court pointed out that the conduct of the business necessitated proper buildings, and that repair work was so essential thereto that it could properly be called part of the undertaking.

The same court found it necessary, however, to distinguish between the general business of an employer and the duties of a specific employee in a case (Glatzl v. Stumpp, p. 235), in which a florist, whose business was not hazardous under the act, employed a driver, this specific employment being classed as one of the hazardous occupations. Notwithstanding this, a driver who went so far as to undertake to arrange a window box for which flowers were being delivered, was held to have departed from his hazardous employment as driver in so doing, and not to be within the protection of the law. Another case passed upon by this court involved identical principles, a salesman in a nonhazardous business having been fatally injured while operating a motorcycle, i. e., a vehicle propelled by gasoline or other power, and by reason of such specific act bringing himself within the terms of the law. The claim that the employer was not engaged in the business of operating motorcycles for gain was admitted, but since he was engaged in a business for gain, and in that business made use of motorcycles, this was held to bring him within the act. (Mulford v. A. S. Pettit & Sons (Inc.), p. 236.)

The New York law classes storage as one of the hazardous occupations to which it applies, but the appellate division of the supreme court held (In re Roberto, p. 237) that the storing of coal by a large 64919°-18-Bull, 246- 3

retail dealer was not such storage as the law contemplates; so also in a retail establishment, where an employer was injured while moving the goods temporarily stored in the basement. (Walsh v. F. W. Woolworth Co., p. 237.) The contrary view was taken by the Supreme Court of Illinois (Friebel v. Chicago City Ry. Co., p. -), in which it was held that where a furniture company maintained a warehouse for the storage of its furniture, it was operating a warehouse within the meaning of the act.

The loading and unloading of goods in transportation is called hazardous by the New York law, and anthrax contracted through an abrasion of the skin received while handling hides was held compensable as an accidental injury in an included employment. (Hiers v. John A. Hall & Co., p. 238.)

Admitting the work of blasting out stumps on a highway to be hazardous, the Supreme Court of Illinois (McLaughlin v. Industrial Board, p. 227) denied benefits in the case of a workman killed while so employed, on the ground that such work was merely casual or incidental. Thus, though the injured man was a regular employee in road building, the fact that blasting was not regarded as a regular part of that work debarred him from the benefits of the law.

Farm labor.-The common exclusion of agricultural, horticultural, etc., employments was held by the appellate court of Indiana not to be applicable in the case of a workman employed about a thrashing machine that went about from farm to farm (In re Boyer, p. 233); so also in the case of a workman operating an ensilage cutter propelled by a gasoline engine (Raney v. State Industrial Commission, p. 235), in which case the Supreme Court of Oregon classed this work as the operation of a feed mill, which is designated as one of the hazardous occupations under the law. Such a decision, however, is no longer possible, since an explicit exemption of such work on farms is made by an amendment enacted in 1917. The janitor of a building injured while pruning a tree was held to be engaged in horticultural labor, and an award of the California commission in his favor was on that ground reversed. (Kramer v. Industrial Accident Commission, p. 239.)

Public employees.-While public employees are commonly included under the terms of the various State laws, the phraseology is often such as to debar them of their presumptive rights. Thus the Supreme Court of Kansas denied the right of a workman engaged in hauling gravel for use on the county road, since the county was not engaged in the work of road construction for the purpose of business, trade, or gain. (Gray v. Board of County Commissioners, p. 280.) Another case before the same court (Griswold v. City of Wichita, p. 281) was decided adversely to the claimant, a police captain killed by a burglar being held not to be a workman. It was also pointed out that in the