In the following twelve States the law, though elective as to private employers, is compulsory as to such public employments as are covered: Colorado, Indiana, Iowa, Louisiana, Maine, Michigan, Missouri, Montana, Nevada, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, South Dakota, and Wisconsin.

In the following eleven States and one Territory the law is compulsory as to some or all classes of rrivate employers affected: Arizona California, Idaho, Illinois, Maryland, New York, Ohio, Oklahoma, Utah, Washington, Wyoming and Hawaii. All of these laws except that of Arizona are equally compulsory as to employees. North Dakota is compulsory as to all employers and employees. The Porto Rico Act which compulsory upon employees was held to be compulsory as to employers also. Camunas v. N. Y. & P. R. S. S. Co., 171 C. C. A. 76.

In the following thirty-one states and two Territories the law is elective as to all private émployments covered: Alabama, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Georgia, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Vermont, West Virginia, Virginia, Wisconsin, Alaska, and Porto Rico. And New York, besides a compulsory act, has also a little used elective act of wider scope. (Art. 14 of ch. 36 Laws 1909, as amended.) Under all these acts except that of West Virginia, the liability for compensation is elective as to both employers and employees. Under the act of that State employers only have the right of election. Under the New Hampshire act (which is elective as to employers) employees have the right of election after injury, this was formerly also true of the Arizona Act.

The following quotation from the opinion of the Supreme Court of the United States in the case of New York Central Railroad Co. v. White, 243 U. S. 188, 61 L. Ed. 667, 13 N. C. C. A. 943, while lengthly, is so pertinent and valuable on the question of the Constitutionality of Compensation Acts generally that the author feels justified in inserting it. "In considering the constitutional question, it is necessary to view the matter from the standpoint of the employee as well as from that of the employer. For, while plaintiff in error is an employer, and cannot succeed without showing that its rights as such are infringed (Plymouth Coal Co. v. Pennsylvania, 232 U. S. 531, 544 (58 L. Ed. 713); Jeffrey Mfg. Co. v. Blagg, 235 U. S. 167, 576 (59 L. Ed.

C. A. 466; Perry v. Industrial Accident Commission of California et al. (Cal.) 181 Pac. 788, 4 W. C. L. J. 350 (1919); Dominguez v. Pendoia, Cal. App. —, (1920), 188 Pac. 1025, 6 W. C. L. J. 3.

364, 7 N. C. C. A. 570) yet, as pointed out by the court of appeals in the Jensen Case (215 N. Y. 526) 1916 A, L. R. A. 403, 109 N. E. 600, the exemption from further liability is an essential part of the scheme, so that the statute, if invalid as against the employee, is invalid as against the employer. The close relation of the rules governing responsibility as between employer and employee to the fundamental rights of liberty and property is of course recognized. But those rules, as guides of conduct, are not beyond alteration by legislation in the public interest. No person has a vested interest in any rule of law entitling him to insist that it shall remain unchanged for his benefit. Munn v. Illinois, 94 U. S. 113, 134 (24 L. Ed. 77); Hurtado v. California, 110 U. S. 516, 532 (28 L. Ed. 232); Martin v. Pittsburg & Lake Erie R. R., 203 U. S. 284, 294 (51 L. Ed. 184, 8 Ann. Cas. 87); Second Employers' Liability Cases, 223 U. S. 1, 50 (56 L. Ed. 327, i N. C. C. A. 875, 38 L. R. A. (N. S.) 44); Chicago & Alton R. R. v. Tranbarger, 238 U. S. 67, 76 (59 L. Ed 1204). The common law bases the employer's liability for injuries to the employee upon the ground of negligence; but negligence is merely the disregard of some duty imposed by law; and the nature and extent of the duty may be modified by legislation, with corresponding change in the test of negligence. Indeed, liability may be imposed for the consequences of a failure to comply with a statutory duty, irrespective of negligence in the ordinary sense; safety appliance acts being a familiar instance. St. Louis & Iron Mountain Ry. v. Tayler, 210 U. S. 281, 295 (52 L. Ed. 1061, 21 Am. Neg. Rep. 464; Texas & Pacific Ry. Co. v. Rigsby, 241 U. S. 33, 39, 43 (60 L. Ed. 874).

"The fault may be that of the employer himself, or-most frequently-that of another for whose conduct he is made responsible according to the maxim respondeat superior. In the latter case the employer may be entirely blameless, may have exercised the utmost human foresight to safeguard the employee; yet, if the alter ego while acting within the scope of his duties be negligent-in disobedience, it may be, of the employer's positive and specific command-the employer is answerable for the consequences. It cannot be that the rule embodied in the maxim is unalterable by legislation,"

"The immunity of the employer from responsibility to an employee for the negligence of a fellow employee is of comparatively recent origin, it being the product of the judicial conception that the probability of a fellow workman's negligence is one of the natural and ordinary risks of the occupation, assumed by the employee and presumably taken into account in the fixing of his wages. The earliest reported cases are Murray v. Railroad Company (1841), 1 McMull. (S. C.) 385, 398 (17 Am. Neg. Cas. 308); Farwell v. Boston & Worcester R. R. Corp. (1842), 4 Metc. 49, 57 (15 Am. Neg. Cas. 407); Hutchison v. York, Newcastle & Berwick Ry. Co. (1850), 5 Exch. 343, 351, 19 L. J. Exch. 296, 299, 14 Jr. 837, 840; Bartonsville Coal Co. v. Reid (1858), 3 Macq. H. L. Cas. 266, 284, 295. And see Randall v. Baltimore & Ohio R. R. Co., 109 U. S. 478, 483 (27 L. Ed. 1003); Northern Pacific R. R. Co. v. Herbert, 116 U. S. 642, 647 (29 L. Ed. 755). The doctrine has prevailed generally throughout the United States, but with material differences in different jurisdictions respecting who should be deemed a fellow-servant and who a vice principal or alter ego of the master, turning sometimes upon refined distinctions as to grades and departments in the employment. See Knutter v. N. Y. & N. J. Telephone Co., 67 N. J. Law 646, 650-653, 52 Atl. 565 (12 Am. Neg. Rep. 109, 58 L. R. A. 808). It needs no argument to show that such a rule is subject to modification or abrogation by a state upon proper occasion.

"The same may be said with respect to the general doctrine of assumption of risk. By the common law the employee assumes the risks normally incident to the occupation in which he voluntarily engages; other and extraordinary risks and those due to the employer's negligence he does not assume until made aware of them, or until they become so obvious that an ordinarily prudent man would observe and appreciate them, in either of which cases he does assume them, if he continue in the employment without obtaining from the employer an assurance that the matter will be remedied; but if he receive such an assurance, then, pending performance of the promise, the employee does not in ordinary cases assume the special risk. Seaboard Air Line v. Horton, 233 U. S. 492, 504 (58 L. Ed. 1062,

8 N. C. C. A. 834, Ann. Cas. 1915 B 475); 239 U. S. 595, 599 (60 L. Ed. 458). Plainly, these rules, as guides of conduct and tests of liability, are subject to change in the exercise of the sovereign authority of the state.

"So, also, with respect to contributory negligence. Aside from injuries intentionally self-inflicted, for which the statute under consideration affords no compensation, it is plain that the rules of law upon the subject, in their bearing upon the employer's responsibility, are subject to legislative change; for contributory negligence, again, involves a default in some duty resting on the employee, and his duties are subject to modification.

"It may be added, by way of reminder, that the entire matter of liability for death caused by wrongful act, both within and without the relation of employer and employee, is a modern statutory innovation, in which the states differ as to who may sue, for whose benefit, and the measure of damages.

"But it is not necessary to extend the discussion. This court repeatedly has upheld the authority of the states to establish by legislation departures from the follow-servant rule and other common-law rules affecting the employer's liability for personal injuries to the employee. Missouri Ry. Co. v. Mackey, 127 U. S. 205, 208 (32 L. Ed. 107); Minneapolis & C. Railway Co. v. Herrick, 127 U. S. 210 (32 L. Ed. 109); Minnesota Iron Co. v. Kline, 199 U. S. 593, 598 (50 L. Ed. 322); Tullis v. Lake Erie & Western R. R., 175 U. S. 348 (44 L. Ed. 192, 21 Am. Neg. Rep. 401n); Louisville & Nashville R. R. v. Melton, 218 U. S. 36, 53 (54 L. Ed. 921, 47 L. R. A. (N. S.) 84); Chicago, Ind. & L. Ry. Co. v. Hackett, 228 U. S. 559 (57 L. Ed. 966); Wilmington Mining Co. v. Fulton, 205 U. S. 60, 73 (51 L. Ed. 708); Missouri Pacific Ry. Co. v. Castle, 224 U. S. 541, 544 (56 L. Ed. 875). A corresponding power on the part of congress, when legislating within its appropriate sphere, was sustained in Second Employers' Liability Cases, 223 U. S. 1 (56 L. Ed. 327, 1 N. C. C. A. 875, 38 L. R. A. (N. S.) 44). And see El Paso & N. E. Ry. v. Gutierrez, 215 U. S. 87, 97 (54 L. Ed. 106); Balt. & Ohio R. R. v. Int. Com. Comm., 221 U. S. 612, 619 (55 L. Ed. 878).

"It is true that in the case of the statutes thus sustained there were reasons rendering the particular departures appropriate.

Nor is it necessary, for the purposes of the present case, to say that a state might, without violence to the constitutional guaranty of "due process of law," suddenly set aside all common-law rules respecting liability as between employer and employee, without providing a reasonably just substitute. Considering the vast industrial organization of the State of New York, for instance, with hundreds of thousands of plants and millions of wage earners, each employer on the one hand having embarked his capital and each employee on the other having taken up his particular mode of earning a livelihood, in reliance upon the probable permanence of an established body of law governing relation, it perhaps may be doubted whether the state could abolish all rights of action on the one hand, or all defenses on the other, without setting up something adequate in their stead. No such question is here presented, and we intimate no opinion upon it. The statute under consideration sets aside one body of rules only to establish another system in its place. If the employee is no longer able to recover as much as before in case of being injured through the employer's negligence, he is entitled to moderate compensation in all cases of injury, and has a certain and speedy remedy without the difficulty and expense of establishing negligence or proving the amount of the damages. Instead of assuming the entire consequences of all ordinary risks of the occupation, he assumes the consequences, in excess of the scheduled compensation, of risks ordinary and extraordinary. On the other hand, if the employer is left without defense respecting the question of fault, he at the same time is assured that the recovery is limited, and that it goes directly to, the relief of the designated beneficiary. And just as the employee's assumption of ordinary risks at common law presumably was taken into account in fixing the rate of wages, so the fixed responsibility of the employer, and the modified assumption of risk by the employee under the new system, presumably will be reflected in the wage scale. The act evidently is tendered as a just settlement of a difficult problem, affecting one of the most important of social relations, and it is to be judged in its entirety. We have said enough to demonstrate that, in such an adjustment, the particular rules of the common law affecting