Charlevoix county herald., 1913-12-20


may raise the point if injured that
they are mechanics, Just as truly as
though working at a bench in a city
factory. And if this contention is held
good by the courts, the employing
suit bereft of the aforesaid three de-
lenses. The answer to these appar-
emily veXatiOus questions, which
problems is for the farmer employer
not only to accept the act, but to have
his employees affirmatively accept it
also and thus remove from the vale
of doubt all questions relating
thereto. This will relieve from the
minds of the farmers of Michigan the
likelihood of facing the eternal and ex-
pensive bugbear, going to law, for,
having accepted the law himself and
the employees having declared their
willingness on their own behalf to
abide by its provisions, nothing re-
mains to be done but to insure against
any liability that may arise, and rest
easy in the conviction that come what
may, the burden is removed from the
81 --iiuers of the individual farmer
and placed where it rightly belongs
on the industry, just as the automo-
bile industry, the furniture industry
the mines and the railroads, must
bear the burden of accidents occurring
in their several fields.
"A little retrospective history at
this time and while on this interesting
phase of the administration of this
important law will not be amiss. Why
was the farm laborer' excluded is a
question frequently asked. Some
there are who say that were the farm
ers included in the original draft of
the act, the cost of caring for the
wounded in the agricultural fields
would be so great that the farmer
legislators would have risen in their
might, and the bill would have died
a-borning. This, however, it is only
fair to the farmers of the act to say,
was not in the reckoning. When the
commission appointed by Governor
Osborn began it's investigation of the
causes, costs and results of industrial
accidents the farmer end doomed as
large in the prospective as the manu-
featuring, for was it not reported
from Germany that there were as
many accidents in the agricultural
districts as in all the other industries
of the nation put together. Acting on
this tip from the old world, the liza
bility commission held itself to the
Michigan Agricultural college and
asked for the services of several
seniors Cat a fair remuneration) to
go into the rural districts and learn
at first hand of the number and effect
of accidents occurring in the fields,
due to binders, shredders, huskers,
and such like contraptions in use on
every we'll regulated and modern
farm. No difficulty was experienced
in securing the Investigations, for
where is the college that can
not supply a few seniors during
the summer vacation period when
the opportunity offers to replenish a
depleted treasury and gain experience
and knowledge in the retail workaday
world! And to their credit and the
glory of their alma mater be it said
they did their work creditably and
thoroughly, but search as they may,
they could not duplicate in Michigan
the experience of Germany. Every
possible source of information was
investigated. Three men were sent
into widely separated localities, SO
that by no possible chance would any
particular branch of husbandry be
overlooked. The Investigators were
instructed to overlook no accidents,
/ be the injuries ever so rival and to
take advantage of every opportunity
that arose for learning of accidents to
farm hands. And like true American
college boys they not only investigat-
ed through the unknown sources, but
struck out on original lines, and made
opportunity where apparently none
existed. The net results of their con-
certed and statewide efforts were to
learn: First, that the average farm
hand that came to Michigan for the
harvest season was an itinerant char
acter that came and went with the
seasons, coming from no one knew
whittier and going no one knew
whence. Consequently, this class, il
injured was only memory in the To-
cality where the accident occurred
Conclusion: Michigan should not be
burdened with the laborer who
cometh in the morning and goeth al
night. Could the injured man
when found, if native or a resident