Document Lknj4brQqq9NREQ5B34gYEVd

1--Occupational Safety FlC 1-3 --The employee safety meeting was pioneered about the same time the National Safetv Council was organized This safety rally at the Falk Company, Milwaukee, was made more effective bv use of flip chart (right) as visual aid and the problems had to be known before corrective measures could be considered, tested, and proved While this change in work environment was taking place, the thinking of the public, man agement, and the law was still reflecting the past, when the worker was an independent craftsman or a member of the family-owned shop In laige industrial centers, the ugly results of industrial accidents and poor industrial health conditions became more and more ob vious Voices of protest were raised Though theie were employers who denied the exist ence of the problem, wiser management men began to try to meet specific aspects of it As early as 1867, Massachusetts had begun to use factory inspectors, and ten years later that state had a law requiring the safeguarding 4 of dangerous machinery From 1898 on, there were various efforts to make the employer financially liable for acci dents In 1911, the first effective workmen's compensation act was passed in Wisconsin (some authorities give this credit to New Jersey) This was followed by similar laws m many other states These laws were, at first, declared invalid because of conflict with the due process of law provisions of the 14th Amendment After the U S Supreme Court m 1916 declared it to be constitutional, many states passed compulsory laws on workmen's compensation There had also been progress on the tech nical side of the problem The railroads, which, perhaps, had suffered the most adverse publicity from accidents, adopted the air brake and the automatic coupler well before the turn