The Cairo bulletin. (Cairo, Ill.) 1???-1928, 1912-07-01

SaAbWAS ASIhSaGs
Exclusive Service THE SURVEY
Press Bureau)
During the last century while
many who have seen the practical re.
suits of overwork In industry and
year after year sough legal remedy
men of various sciences have. un.
known to them been studying the
same phenomena in the laboratory
Psychologists, chemists, bacteriolo-
gists and psychologists, have cor
tributed to this study. 1t is the facts
brought out by Investigations which
as presented b. louis D. Brandais
and Miss Goldmark, have afforded a
powerful and successful argument be-
fore the Federal Supreme Court for
uphelding state legislation regulat
ing health conditions in industry J.
A tired person is literally and ac-
tually poisoned person-poisoned
by his own waste products. But
so marvelously is the body construct
ed that like a running stream it puri-
fies itself and during repose the cast
of impurities are normally burned
up by the oxygen brought by the
blood, excreted by the kidneys, des-
troyed in the liver. or eliminated
from the body through the lungs.
So rest repairs fatigue.
This balance is kept true and fati-
que is repaired Just as long as it re-
mains with physiological limits:
that is, as long as activity is balanced
by repose, the obnoxious products of
activity are more quickly eliminated
and tissue is rebuilt. The physl-
illogical normal phenomenon of fati-
que becomes pathological or abnor.
NAL exhaustion, as soon as the bal
ance between rest and fatigue IS
destroyed.
In extreme instances, as when
hunted animals drop dead in the
chase they die not from oversfraln
of any particular organ. such as the
heart, but from sheer chemical poiss
oning iiIe to the unexpected vast
matter OF fatigue.
The scientific Investigations of
fatigue in its varied aspects throw
flood of light upon the intricate in
juries Of speed, overtime, piece-work
and the like industrial requirements.
For If fatigue le due to demonstrat-
ed action, removable only by prrer
intervales of rest; II over-fatigue or
exhaustion results from the accumu-
lation CT chemical fatigue products
and the destru lion of energy yield
iag material nerve and muscle
tissue; If strain or labor carried on
after fatigta has Sc. in it is prov cd
to be more exhausting than simple
work; and if muscular training out
runs nervous strength, then the need
for the shorter work day rests upon
scientific basis. Science makes
out its case for the short day in in
dustry.
Factory legislation has been foAnd-
ed on 3 priori logic. 1t has been
rather essentially illogical, the result
OF half way measures and opposing
forces. Not mans foresight but the
enexorable results OF labor long car
ried on counter to natures laws,
have been on the whole responsible
for the meager protection which In
dnstrial communities have granted
their workers. Self-interest on the
one side, self-defense and philan-
tfropy on the other, hampered by
pi ejudices of every sort these for the
most part have brought about such
protection as exists today.
But the laws of fatigue furnish . |
scientific basis for legislation and
an explanation of the effect Of over
work on health, output and produc-
ton. This is the more important
because regulation of the length of |
working hours has been SO bitterly |
opposed by those who fear that the |
lessening of the hours of labor means
corresponding economic loss. From
the first dawn of protective legis- |
lation in England over a century ago
70 the present day, the rallying cry
for the most deverse-minded oppon-
ents OF legislation has been the |
ruin of industry and
manufacturers. Yet the nnconcious
consensus Of testimony from various
states and countries on the economic
benefits of the short day, recorded in
offfciel and unofficial documents, liz
IN its tarn as impress. as we found