EMPLOYERS' LIABILITY, a term gen erally used to denote the liability of employers for injuries inflicted upon workmen in their em ploy. In many States workmen injured in the course of their ernployment can recover damages from their employers only if the employers be proved guilty of negligence and if such negli gence resulted in the injury. Employers are not liable for injuries resulting from the obvious occupational rislcs or for accidents that are in evitable or for which blame cannot be fixed. Since an employer is responsible for injuries due to his own negligence or that of his serv ants, an employee thus injured supposedly would be entitled to recover damages from the em ployer. But under the common-law relation of master and servant, as interpreted in foreign countries until recently, and now discarded in nearly all civilized countries save the United States, an employee, on entering service, agrees to run all the ordinary risks of the service, in cluding injuries that might befall him through negligence on the part of fellow-employees. The so-called absolute duties of the employer are to furnish a reasonably safe and proper place in which employees may engage in their work, suitable appliances, reasonably cortipetent em ployees, such as superintendents, foremen and other servants, and rules and instructions when they are reasonably necessary. The employer is liable tor gross negligence, for risks of an ex traordinary nature involved in the service, and for all acts of negligence, whether committed by himself or by employees, occurring outside the regular service. Modern industrial condi tions necessitated a modification of these com mon-law rules, especially in England, where the liabilities of employers has been greatly extended by such acts as the Employers' Lia bility Act of 1880 (43 and 44 Vict. c. 42) and the Workmen's Compensation Acts of 1897, 1900 and 1906 (60 and 61 Vict. c. 37; 63 and 64 Vict. c. 22; and 6 Edw. VII c. 58). Under this legislation employees are virtually insured by the employer against injury while in his employ, the employer being compelled to pay a limited sum to the injured or to the families of employees killed by such accidents, whether or not due to the negligence of the employer or to that of fellow-employee.s.
In the United States the employee must prove that in a given instance the master has failed to fulfil one of the above-mentioned absolute duties. In contesting such an action the employer, in general, may rely on three de fenses: (1) that the injury sustained by the employee was among the ordinary occupational risks which he assumed when entering the em ploy of the master, or was caused by a danger of which the employee either was or should have been cognizant, but in spite of which he continued to work; (2) that the injury inflicted upon the employee was not due to negligence on the employer's part but on the part of a fellow-servant of the plaintiff, wherefore the employer is not liable since the employee as sumed this risk, too; (3) that the injured em ployee failed to use reasonable precautions against accident and that this contributory neg ligence had resulted in his injury. During the
past few years several of the United States have enacted laws of a very diverse character which differ widely from the general principles of the American system as above set forth and considerably extend the liability of em ployers. Attempts have been made to offset the liability laws by compelling employees to sign contracts waiving the .benefits of such legislation, but subsequent enactments have overcome this evasion of the law by forbidding such contracts or rendering them null and void. The liability laws should be studied in connec tion with the new compensation laws which have been enacted to replace the former in order to provide a system of definite compen sation for accident without litigation. Some of these laws have been attacked as unconstitu tional on the ground that the forcible grant of compensation to an employee injured through no fault of the employer was confiscation of property for no public purpose and without due process of law. Where the courts have sus tained such contentions the tendency has been to amend the constitutions so as to permit such legislation, and acts passed under such amend ments have been upheld in the court of last resort. The rapid advancement of the move ment to compel compensation to injured work men led to the extension of the field of insurance, some companies now issuing employ-. ers' liability policies, under which, for a stipulated premium, the employer is insured against loss resulting from accidents to em ployees, any damages for which the employer may be legally liable being paid by the insur ance company. The most recent laws make such insurance compulsory, while State insur ance funds, placed on a sound actuarial basis, have been created in some States, since, as the New Jersey commission on employers' liability reported in 1915, previous laws have not ensured the payment of compensation in case the em ployer should become insolvent. Most of the States have compensation laws which apply to public as well as to private employees, while the Canal Zone order and the Federal statute apply to public employees and to persons en gaged in interstate commerce. In general either compensation or insurance is provided and either type of law may be elective or compul sory. Alaska, Colorado, Connecticut, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Maine, Mich igan, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont and Wisconsin provide elective compensation; while in Arizona, California., Canal Zone, Hawaii, Maryland, New York and Oklahoma the compensation is compulsory as it is under the Federal statute. Massachusetts, Nevada, Oregon, Texas and West Virginia have elective insurance laws, while Ohio, Washington and Wyoming have compulsory insurance laws. See ACCIDENTS; WORKMEN'S COMPENSATION; LABOR; FAMILY LAW; FACTORIES AND FACTORY INSPECTION; DISEASES, OCCUPATIONAL.