A complaint by one Government against
another may be referred by the governing body to a commission of inquiry
nominated by the Secretary General of the League. If the commission
report fails to bring satisfactory action the matter may be taken to a
permanent court of international justice for final decision. The chief
reliance for securing enforcement of the law will be publicity with a
possibility of economic action in the background.
[Sidenote: Labor conferences.]
The first meeting of the conference will take place in October, 1919, at
Washington, to discuss the eight-hour day or forty-eight-hour week;
prevention of unemployment; extension and application of the
international conventions adopted at Berne in 1906, prohibiting night
work for women, and the use of white phosphorus in the manufacture of
matches; and employment of women and children at night or in unhealthy
work, of women before and after childbirth, including maternity benefit,
and of children as regards minimum age.
LABOR CLAUSES.
[Sidenote: Of supreme national importance.]
Nine principles of labor conditions were recognized on the ground that
"the well-being, physical and moral, of the industrial wage earners is
of supreme International importance." With exceptions necessitated by
differences of climate, habits and economic development. They include:
the guiding principle that labor should not be regarded merely as a
commodity or article of commerce; the right of association of employers
and employes; a wage adequate to maintain a reasonable standard of life;
the eight-hour day or forty-eight-hour week; a weekly rest of at least
twenty-four hours; which should include Sunday wherever practicable;
abolition of child labor and assurance of the continuation of the
education and proper physical development of children; equal pay for
equal work as between men and women; equitable treatment of all workers
lawfully resident therein, including foreigners; and a system of
inspection in which women should take part.
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