Conciliation and arbitration (including strikes and lockouts).

Labor laws of the United States (including decisions of courts relating to labor).

Foreign labor laws.

Miscellaneous series.

The bulletins will be numbered consecutively in each series and will also carry a consecutive whole number beginning with No. 101.

The report on retail prices of food and wages in the principal industries in the United States, covering the period 1890 to 1911, is now in press and will be published as a bulletin in the series "Retail prices and cost of living." A second bulletin in this series, also in press, brings the information regarding retail prices of food and wages down to and including June, 1912. Other bulletins which have been transmitted to the printer relate to the following subjects: Care of tuberculous wage earners in Germany; lead poisoning in potteries, tile works, and porcelain enameled sanitary ware factories, and workmen's insurance laws of Great Britain, Germany, and Switzerland.

Reports on the employment of women in the canning industry in Wisconsin and in laundries in Milwaukee will be ready for the printer in a short time and work is going forward in connection with the study of conciliation and arbitration in the building trades in New York City. An investigation of accidents in the foundry and machine-shop industry similar to that on accidents in the iron and steel industry is also in progress, and in addition further statistics of accidents in the iron and steel industry will be collected in order that comparative figures on this subject may be secured for a series of years.

GOVERNMENT WORKINGMEN'S COMPENSATION ACT.

Under the act of May 30, 1908, providing for compensation for injuries to certain employees of the United States, 2,080 claims for compensation were received during the year ended June 30, 1912, besides 15 cases pending July 1, 1911. Of these 2,095, 77 were claims for compensation on account of deaths of employees, of which 60 were found to be established, 8 were not allowed, and 9 were pending at the close of the year. The cases in which death did not result were 2,018 in number, of which 1,854 were found to be entitled to compensation, while in 97 cases the claim for compensation was not supported and 67 cases were pending at the end of the year.

In connection with the administration of the compensation act, provision is made for reporting injuries to all classes of employees of the Government which occur in the course of employment when the injury causes disability for one day or longer or results in death, without regard to the scope of the compensation act. The

total number of accidents thus reported was 4,389, including 114 reports of accidental death.

The above totals do not include cases of injury to employees of the Isthmian Canal Commission where the resultant disability was of less than 15 days' duration; neither do they include injuries or claims arising since March 3, 1911, on account of accidents to employees of the Isthmian Canal Commission, the administration of the law in respect to such employees having been transferred to the Commission on that date.

Various amendments to the law were proposed during the last session of Congress, of which but two were adopted. These amendments provide that the law shall apply to any artisan, laborer, or other employee engaged in hazardous work under the Bureau of Mines, the Forestry Service, and the Lighthouse Service.

CHILDREN'S BUREAU.

By "An act to establish in the Department of Commerce and Labor a bureau to be known as the Children's Bureau," approved April 9, 1912, Congress provided for the organization of the twelfth separate bureau under the jurisdiction of this Department. The functions of the new bureau as recited in the law are to investigate and report on all matters pertaining to the welfare of children and child life among all classes of our people, and especially to investigate the questions of infant mortality, the birth rate, orphanage, juvenile courts, desertion, dangerous occupations, accidents and diseases of children, employment, and legislation affecting children in the several States.

The law is not designed to encroach on the right of States or to relieve them from the duty of dealing with this subject, but to furnish information to enable them to deal with it more successfully. It also presumes that there is a duty on the part of the National Government to aid in getting information and data with a view to assisting in this work and that the Government can get such information and data more effectively than the respective States.

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BUREAU OF MANUFACTURES.

The Bureau of Manufactures again reports a year of satisfactory growth in its service of investigation and publicity in behalf of

commerce.

The work of this Bureau is perhaps more closely related than any other branch of the Government to the primary function of promoting the commerce of the United States. Appreciation of the facilities of this service is shown by constantly increasing demands upon it, this increase reaching 45 per cent in the fiscal year 1912 as compared with 1911.

PUBLICITY.

The Daily Consular and Trade Reports are now issued to the full limit of 20,000 copies permitted by the existing law, and there are hundreds of applications for this journal on file. The Bureau is seriously embarrassed by its inability to comply with these legitimate requests, and it is urged that action be taken by Congress to authorize a larger edition. Distribution of these reports should not be unduly restricted. The demand for the special bulletins and reports of the Bureau is also increasing. This demand can be supplied in part through the office of the Superintendent of Documents, since several of the publications now have a continuing sale. Packing for Export, Factors in Foreign Trade, the World Trade Directory, and other bulletins are in steady demand by purchasers. Sixteen consular and special agents' reports and 139 confidential bulletins and circulars were issued during the year. The number of single copies of the various publications of the office distributed reached a total of considerably over 5,500,000.

NATIONAL COMMERCIAL CONFERENCE.

This Bureau, at my direction, in April, 1912, transmitted to over 1.100 commercial organizations in the United States an invitation to send representatives to a conference called by the President to consider the establishment of a national commercial organization broadly representative of all the commercial interests of the United States. The need for coordination of the unrelated efforts of chambers of commerce, boards of trade, and similar associations in the field of trade promotion has long been recognized, and the time seemed opportune to aid the founding of such a national body.

As a result of the very successful meeting, which was held in Washington on April 22 and 23 and attended by 700 delegates from 400 commercial associations in every part of the United States, the Chamber of Commerce of the United States of America was organized.

DIVISION OF FOREIGN TARIFFS.

The duty of furnishing "information to Congress and the Executive relative to customs laws and regulations of foreign countries," first assigned to the Bureau of Manufactures by the act making appropriatons for legislative, executive, and judicial expenses of the Government for the fiscal year 1911, became of paramount importance during the last fiscal year, because of the many measures under consideration in Congress that required, for their careful study, a knowledge of foreign legislation. Comprehensive statements were prepared by the Division of Foreign Tariffs for committees of Congress, for the Tariff Board, and for other branches of the departmental service, showing the import duties on manufactures of metal, cotton manufactures, sugar, and tobacco and the restrictions on the importation and sale of oleomargarine in foreign countries.

The rapid expansion of trade between the United States and LatinAmerican countries gives rise to many inquiries concerning the various charges incident to the entry of merchandise in those countries. Their intricate tariff systems and the numerous additional duties and other charges imposed made it advisable to undertake a comprehensive investigation of the subject in all its branches. The investigation was intrusted to the Chief of the Division of Foreign Tariffs, who, in the capacity of commercial agent, visited most of the capitals and chief ports of South America during the last six months of the fiscal year. Full information concerning actual customs practice in each of the countries visited, obtained both from customs officials and from the principal importers of American manufactures, is embodied in a series of reports in course of publication in the Daily Consular and Trade Reports. These reports will later be collected in a monograph.

The special work to which reference has already been made, together with the increasing volume of correspondence as manufacturers are coming to make fuller use of the tariff information on file in the Bureau, has necessarily curtailed the publications of the year. Nevertheless, the Customs Tariff of Japan was prepared for publication, several supplements to earlier numbers of the Tariff Series were issued, and a large number of items concerning tariff changes were inserted in the Daily Consular and Trade Reports and reprinted in Foreign Tariff Notes.