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SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XLIV. No. 1143 



ditional division of the diurnal twenty- 

 four hours into eight hours each of work, 

 recreation and sleep. It is said that the 

 customary duration of the working-day of 

 the fifteenth century was eight hours. 

 Whether this be true or not, during the sub- 

 sequent three hundred years all the evils of 

 unrestricted labor flourished vigorously. 

 At the beginning of the nineteenth century 

 most English artisans were accustomed to 

 work from eleven to fifteen hours in the 

 day. No delicate physiological tests were 

 needed to demonstrate what such a sys- 

 tem was doing to destroy the vital mechan- 

 isms of men, women and children. The 

 results were sufficiently obvious, and the 

 next one hundred years were marked by a 

 series of struggles between workers and 

 humanitarians on the one side, and capi- 

 talists on the other, in which progress 

 toward a physiological working-day was 

 gradually, though slowly, made. After 

 sporadic reductions of the working-period 

 to twelve hours or less, a ten-hour move- 

 ment was succeeded in time by a nine-hour 

 movement, and by the middle of the cen- 

 tury the eight-hour day had been definitely 

 proposed. It was won first, not in the 

 mother-country, but by the artisans of Mel- 

 bourne, Australia, in 1856, and this date 

 marks the beginning of achievement of the 

 eight-hour movement. In the United States 

 agitation in its favor began immediately 

 after the close of the Civil War, stimulated, 

 no doubt, by the great extension of indus- 

 trial work which then occurred- Thus, 

 since the middle of the nineteenth century 

 the eight-hour day has been the goal of 

 labor. Such a day presupposes one day's 

 rest in every seven and thus signifies a 

 forty-eight-hour week. It is usually 

 coupled, however, with an extra half 

 holiday, which for the majority of per- 

 sons would be taken on Saturday after- 

 noon. In this manner the week's work 

 would be reduced to forty-four hours, 



and this represents the present demand of 

 the eight-hour movement. Partly by law 

 and partly by private agreement between 

 employer and employed the eight-hour day 

 has been granted in recent years to one 

 group of workers here and another there, 

 usually localized groups and rarely in- 

 cluding all the workers in a single industry 

 of a single country. At the present time it 

 has become legalized in our own country 

 for public employees and employees on 

 public works in the federal service and in 

 thirty states and territories; for miners in 

 the service of fourteen states; for em- 

 ployees in smelting and reduction works 

 in nine states; for railroad telegraphers 

 in six states; for employees in rolling, rod 

 and stamp mills in five states; for em- 

 ployees in tunnels and in coke ovens in 

 three states; for employees in blast fur- 

 naces, in cement and plaster mills, and 

 .those who work under high air pressure 

 in two states; for employees in electric 

 light and power plants, glass works and 

 irrigation works in one state; and for 

 employees in day's work, unless otherwise 

 stipulated, in nine states. In 1913 of the 

 1,276,048 employees constituting the shop 

 force of the 51,118 factories in the state of 

 New York, 354,641, or 28 per cent., worked 

 51 hours or less in the week. The eight- 

 hour day will doubtless ultimately be 

 achieved by a very large proportion of the 

 world 's workers in the more highly civilized 

 countries. 



What should determine the duration of 

 daily labor? Here I would place, as of 

 first importance, the physiological effects of 

 the work and, as secondary and subordi- 

 nate factors, its economic and social fea- 

 tures. 



The physiological effects of labor are now 

 so well known as to require here only brief 

 mention. The expenditure of energy by 

 the bodily organs involves chemical and 

 physical changes in them which, if con- 



