Factory legislation of the Russian Empire

Despite the relatively weak development of industry in Russia , the awareness of the need for factory legislation was understood already in the middle of the XIX century . Starting from the commission of 1859, which revised the industry charter , which was outdated and did not meet the requirements of life, all subsequent commissions that worked out the issue of regulating the hiring of workers assumed restrictions on the work of children, adolescents, and women . In the research literature, the commissions for developing draft labor laws are known by the names of the leaders who led them: the Stackelberg commission (1859-1862), the Ignatieff commission (1870-1872), and the Valuev commission (1874-1875). The projects developed by all these commissions did not receive legislative sanction and, except for the rules on ten-hour work per day in craft establishments, established even under Catherine II in 1785 , which remained a “dead letter” until the beginning of the 19th century, the first step in factory legislation should recognize the law of June 1, 1882 "On minors working in factories, factories and manufactories" , issued with the filing of the Minister of Finance N.X. Bunge .

The law on June 1, 1882 established a ban on the work of children under 12 years of age, for children 12-15 years of age they limited their working hours to 8 hours a day (moreover, no more than 4 hours without a break) and prohibited night work (from 9 pm to 5 am) and Sunday work, and also prohibited the use of child labor in hazardous industries. The owners of the enterprises had to “provide an opportunity” for children who did not have a certificate of graduation from at least one class public school or an equivalent institution to attend schools for at least 3 hours a day or 18 hours a week.

Initially, it was intended to extend the law on the work of children to all industrial establishments, but the State Council found it more cautious for the first time to limit its scope to factories . The law was to enter into force on May 1, 1883 , but at the request of Moscow manufacturers, its introduction was delayed until May 1, 1884 , and for another two years, if necessary, the work of children 10-12 years old was allowed and night work (no more than 4 hours) for children 12-15 years old. At the same time, the Institute of Factory Inspection was established to monitor the implementation of the law and a chief inspector (E. N. Andreev) and two district officers were appointed, in Moscow (Professor I. I. Yanzhul ) and in Vladimir (Dr. P. A. Peskov), initially engaged in the study of factory life. After that, the law was issued on June 12, 1884 on schooling of children, and the first amendment to the law of 1882 was made, allowing six-hour continuous work of children instead of eight-hour, four hours with a break. Then the inspection staff was increased to nine district officers with ten assistants. Although the supervision of the inspection extended only to the European part of the Russian Empire , nevertheless, the lack of its composition forced the use of excise warders , who were supervised by factories that paid excise taxes.

The next was the law of June 3, 1885 "On the prohibition of night work for minors and women in factories, factories and manufactories . " It prohibited the night work of adolescents under 17 years old and women in cotton, linen and wool factories. Entered into force on October 1, 1885. The Minister of Finance could extend the law to other industries, but this was done only for harmful work in porcelain and match industries. In 1897, the law was also extended to all textile production, that is, additionally to enterprises in the linen industry and for processing mixed fabrics (although this was established by administrative procedure as early as March 1886).

Laws of 1882 and 1885 time rules mattered; The Minister of Finance was given the right to make final assumptions to the Council of State in two and three years. This period was continued until 1890. The bill, introduced in 1890 by the Minister of Finance I. A. Vyshnegradsky , somewhat weakened the significance of the original laws. From now on, young workers could, “when it turns out to be necessary for the type of production,” employ 9 hours in two shifts of 4.5 hours each. In glass production it was even allowed to put minors at 6 hours of night work. Legally defined night time in certain cases was reduced to an interval from 10 pm to 4 am. This law (“On changing the regulations on the work of minors, adolescents and women in factories, factories and manufactories and on extending the rules on the work and training of minors to craft establishments”) was adopted by the State Council and was highly approved on April 24, 1890.

The introduction of the laws just mentioned coincided with the industrial crisis, and since there were no rules governing the mutual relations of employers and workers in Russian legislation, this crisis especially affected the workers. The extreme diversity of the order established in the factories, which gave wide scope to arbitrariness, led the factories of the Vladimir and Moscow provinces to major unrest, requiring the intervention of military force.

Soon after, the law was issued on June 3, 1886. It consisted of two parts: general rules of employment that apply to the entire Russian empire, and " special rules on supervision of factory establishments and on the mutual relations of manufacturers and workers ", which are part of the development of of the rules, partly new decrees directly related to the newly formed supervisory authorities - provincial and metropolitan presences for matters of factory legislation.

The law of 1886 established the procedure for hiring and dismissing workers: each worker was given a standard pay book during the week, and its acceptance by the worker was considered an act of concluding an employment contract on the conditions set forth in the book. A number of important aspects of the relationship between the administration of enterprises and workers were regulated. In particular, it was forbidden to pay workers with conventional signs, bread, goods and other items (except coupons), as well as to take interest from workers on money issued to them in debt. It was forbidden to charge workers for medical assistance, lighting workshops and the use of implements. The activities of the nursery shops were organized to supply the workers with the most important products: the factory inspection limited the range of goods and approved prices. It was allowed to collect fines from workers only “for malfunctioning”, “for absenteeism” and for “violation of order”; the essence of these reasons was explained and the maximum fines were established. The total amount of fines for calculation could not exceed one third of the worker’s earnings. The transfer of penal money into profit was prohibited, a special penal capital was drawn up, which could be spent only on benefits for workers. The liability of manufacturers for violation of the rules (fines or legal proceedings) was established. The factory inspection was entrusted with the task of monitoring compliance with all the rules governing labor relations, examining workers' complaints and resolving conflicts, as well as reviewing and approving rates, time sheets, schedules and internal regulations in factories.

Initially, special rules were introduced only in the most industrially developed provinces - St. Petersburg , Moscow and Vladimir, and only in them were the institutions (Presences) established for labor legislative affairs with a simultaneous increase in the composition of the inspection by 10 assistant district inspectors; then they were gradually extended to all other provinces. In 1891, they were introduced in the Petrokov and Warsaw provinces, and the Warsaw District was divided into two, and the number of inspectors was increased by one district and five assistants. The law of March 14, 1894 “On the transformation of factory inspections and positions of provincial mechanics and on the extension of the rules on the supervision of factory establishments and on the mutual relations of manufacturers and workers”, the application of special rules was extended to 13 new provinces, and the whole structure inspection changed. The positions of the chief inspector and 10 districts were abolished: in 18 provinces covered by special rules, senior inspectors were appointed and with them more or less number of district inspectors; the remaining 42 provinces comprised 42 sites, of which each inspector was in charge, reporting directly to the department of trade and manufactories . Three posts of auditors were established at the department, and for the training of labor inspectors, the institute of candidates (10 persons) was established, distributed according to requirements to the most industrial provinces. To ease government spending on the maintenance of the labor inspectorate, the posts of provincial mechanics were abolished, steam boilers were taxed and supervised by inspectors. Two years later, the special rules of the law of 1886 were extended to eight more provinces, and in the next 1897 to all other provinces of European Russia and the Kingdom of Poland , simultaneously with the publication of the law on June 2 of that year, which laid the foundation for normalizing working hours for adolescents and adult workers.

The rules governing the time and duration of work and the law of 1886 were extended to mining plants and trades (mining of mineral resources) under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Agriculture and State Property in 1892 , first in the European part of the Russian Empire and then everywhere. For mining, the factory law institution was replaced by mining departments of six mining departments; the duties of senior inspectors were assigned to the heads of mining departments, the duties of district inspectors were assigned to district mining engineers.

Only on June 2, 1897, after a long history of projects and debates, the law "On the duration and distribution of working time in the institutions of the factory industry" was passed. This law introduced a limitation of working hours at factories to 11.5 hours for men, and in the case of work at night, as well as on Saturday and before the holidays - 10 hours. For women and children, a working day limit of 10 hours was established. The law also prohibited work on Sunday and established 14 compulsory holidays (in 1900 3 more days were added to them). By “mutual agreement”, workers could work on Sunday to replace workdays. At the same time, in addition to the working time established by this law, it was also possible to introduce overtime work under a special agreement. The law entered into force on January 1, 1898, and was immediately extended to 60 provinces of European Russia and covered all industrial establishments and mining, private and state-owned factories (although in practice, state-owned factories already generally had a shorter working day) .

The history of the factory legislation of the Russian Empire is not limited to the 19th century. The most important legislative acts of the period 1901-1917. are the "Rules for the compensation of workers and employees injured as a result of accidents of their families in factory, mining, and mining enterprises" of June 2, 1903 and a set of four laws on insurance of workers in case of illness or accident adopted on June 23, 1912.

• Dementiev E.M. , Ivaschenko N.I. Factory legislation // Encyclopedic Dictionary of Brockhaus and Efron : 86 volumes (82 volumes and 4 additional). - SPb. , 1890-1907.

• Texts of a number of factory laws of the Russian Empire
• A collection of factory laws and regulations that are relevant by September 1908 (compiled by M.S. Balabanov, St. Petersburg, 1909)
• Charter on industrial labor as of March 1, 1915 (compiled by V.V. Groman, Pg., 1915) (unavailable link)
• V. P. Litvinov-Falinsky “Factory legislation and factory inspection in Russia” (M., 1904)
• I.I. Yanzhul. “From the memoirs and correspondence of the factory inspector of the first draft” (St. Petersburg, 1907)
• L. N. Nisselovich. "History of factory legislation of the Russian Empire. Part 2. Legislation of Emperor Alexander I (St. Petersburg, 1884)
• The history of the consideration by the Duma of laws on insurance of workers in case of illness or accident, see the book by A. Ya. Avrekh P. A. Stolypin and the fate of reforms in Russia. // Chapter IV. Stolypin and the working question
• Katulsky E. D., Menshikova O. I. Collective-contractual regulation of social and labor relations in Russia: evolution, evaluation criteria // Electronic Journal “ Knowledge. Understanding. Skill . " - 2008. - No. 8 - Economics and law .
• Act on the mutual relations of manufacturers and workers . 06/03/1886. Project of the Russian Military Historical Society "100 main documents of Russian history."