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ROSEBERRY EMPLOYERS'

EMPLOYERS' LIABILITY

ACT.

CHAPTER 399, LAWS OF 1911.

AN ACT relating to the liability of employers for injuries or death sustained by their employees, providing for compensation for the accidental injury of employees, establishing an industrial accident board, making an appropriation therefor, defining its powers and providing for a review of its awards.

The people of the State of California, represented in senate and assembly, do enact as follows:

ABROGATION OF DEFENSES.

Section 1. In any action to recover damages for a personal injury sustained within this state by an employee while engaged in the line of his duty or the course of his employment as such, or for death resulting from personal injury so sustained, in which recovery is sought upon the ground of want of ordinary or reasonable care of the employer, or of any officer, agent or servant of the employer, the fact that such employee may have been guilty of contributory negligence shall not bar a recovery therein where his contributory negligence was slight and that of the employer was gross, in comparison, but the damages may be diminished by the jury in proportion to the amount of negligence attributable to such employee, and it shall be conclusively presumed that such employee was not guilty of contributory negligence in any case where the violation of any statute enacted for the safety of employees contributed to such employee's injury; and it shall not be a defense:

(1). That the employee either expressly or impliedly assumed the risk of the hazard complained of.

(2). That the injury or death was caused in whole or in part by the want of ordinary or reasonable care of a fellow servant.

Sec. 2. No contract, rule or regulation, shall exempt the em

ployer from any of the provisions of the preceding section of this act.

LIABILITY FOR COMPENSATION.

Sec. 3. Liability for the compensation hereinafter provided for, in lieu of any other liability whatsoever, shall, without regard to negligence, exist against an employer for any personal injury accidentally sustained by his employees, and for his death if the injury shall approximately cause death, in those cases where the following conditions of compensation concur:

(1). Where, at the time of the accident, both the employer and employee are subject to the provisions of this act according to the succeeding sections hereof.

(2). Where, at the time of the accident, the employee is performing service growing out of and incidental to his employment and is acting within the line of his duty or course of his employment as such.

(3). Where the injury is approximately caused by accident, either with or without negligence, and is not so caused by the wilful misconduct of the employee.

And where such conditions of compensation exist for any personal injury or death, the right to the recovery of such compensation pursuant to the provisions of this act, and acts amendatory thereof, shall be the exclusive remedy against the employer for such injury or death, except that when the injury was caused by the personal gross negligence or wilful personal misconduct of the employer, or by reason of his violation of any statute designed for the protection of employees from bodily injury, the employee may, at his option, either claim compensation under this act, or maintain an action for damages therefor; in all other cases the liability of the employer shall be the same as if this and the succeeding sections of this act had not been passed, but shall be subject to the provisions, of the preceding sections of this act.

Sec. 4. The following shall constitute employers subject to the provisions of this act within the meaning of the preceding section: (1). The state, and each county, city and county, city, town, village and school districts and all public corporations, every person, firm, and private corporation, (including any public service corporation) who has any person in service under any contract of hire, express or implied, oral or written, and who, at or

prior to the time of the accident to the employee for which compensation under this act may be claimed, shall, in the manner provided in the next section, have elected to become subject to the provisions of this act, and who shall not, at the time of such (accident, have withdrawn such election, in the manner provided in the next section.

Sec. 5. Such election on the part of the employer shall be made by filing with the industrial accident board, hereinafter provided for a written statement to the effect that he accepts the provisions of this act, the filing of which statement shall operate, within the meaning of section three of this act, to subject such employer to the provisions of this act and all acts amendatory thereof for the term of one year from the day of the filing of such statement, and thereafter, without further act on his part, for successive terms of one year each, unless such employer shall, at least sixty days prior to the expiration of such first or any succeeding year, file in the office of said board a notice in writing to the effect that he withdraws his election to be subject to the provisions of the act.

Sec. 6. The term "employee" as used in section three of this act shall be construed to mean:

(1). Every person in the service of the state, or any county, city and county, city, town, village or school district therein, and all public corporations, under any appointment or contract of hire, express or implied, oral or written, except any official of the state, or of any county, city and county, city, town, village or school district therein or any public corporation, who shall have been elected or appointed for a regular term of one or more years, or to complete the unexpired portion of any such regular term.

(2). Every person in the service of another under any contract of hire, express or implied, oral or written, including aliens, and also including minors who are legally permitted to work under the laws of the state, (who, for the purposes of the next section of this act, shall be considered the same and shall have the same power of contracting as adult employees), but not including any person whose employment is but casual and not in the usual course of the trade, business, profession or occupation of his employer.

Sec. 7. Any employee as defined in subsection (1) of the preceding section shall be subject to the provisions of this act and of

any act amendatory thereof. Any employee as defined in subsection (2) of the preceding section shall be deemed to have accepted and shall, within the meaning of section 3 of this act be subject to the provisions of this act and of any act amendatory thereof, if, at the time of the accident upon which liability is claimed:

(1). The employer charged with such liability is subject to the provisions of this act, whether the employee has actual notice thereof or not; and

(2). At the time of entering into his contract of hire, express or implied, with such employer, such employee shall not have given to his employer notice in writing that he elects not to be subject to the provisions of this act, or, in the event that such contract of hire was made in advance of such employer becoming subject to the provisions of the act, such employee shall, without giving such notice, remain in the service of such employer for thirty days after the employer has filed with said board an election to be subject to the terms of this act.

SCALE OF COMPENSATION.

Sec. 8. Where liability for compensation under this act exists the same shall be as provided in the following schedule:

(1) Such medical and surgical treatment, medicines, medical and surgical supplies, crutches and apparatus, as may be reasonably required at the time of the injury and thereafter during the disability, but not exceeding ninety days, to cure and relieve from the effects of the injury, the same to be provided by the employer, and in case of his neglect or refusal seasonably to do so, the employer to be liable for the reasonable expense incurred by or on behalf of the employee in providing the same; provided, however, that the total liability under this subdivision shall not exceed the sum of $100.00.

(2) If the accident causes disability, an indemnity which shall be payable as wages on the eighth day after the injured employee leaves work as the result of the injury, and weekly thereafter, which weekly indemnity shall be as follows:

(a) If the accident causes total disability, sixty-five per cent of the average weekly earnings during the period of such total disability; provided, that if the disability is such as not only to render the injured employee entirely incapable of work, but also so helpless as to require the assistance of a nurse, the weekly in

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