In addition to the foregoing, the fol- | Inspection Bureau, the Compensation lowing five important events should be noted in this field of insurance: (1) The decision of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court in June, 1916, upholding the constitutionality of the Workmen's Compensation Act passed in 1915. (2) The decision of the Court of Appeals of New York State in November, 1915, holding that the New York workmen's-compensation law applies to employees of railroads engaged in interstate commerce until such time as the Federal Government enacts a workmen's-compensation law. Inspection and Rating Board of New York and the insurance departments of California, Maryland, Massachusetts, New York and Pennsylvania, as well as the Industrial Commission of Wisconsin. The object of the conference was to discuss methods of compiling experience and of constructing rates, and represents the beginning of coöperation by agencies throughout the United States in the construction of scientific compensation rates. (5) The attention devoted by the National Convention of Insurance Commissioners during 1915 to the (3) The adoption of a Federal work- subject of liability and compensation men's-compensation law in September, loss reserves. The work of the Con1916, which supersedes all existing vention's committee on reserves other laws relating to the compensation of than life is explained in the last reinjured Federal employees. The act port of the superintendent of insurmakes provision for disability or ance of New York State. "Indicadeath of civil employees of the United tions are," according to this report, States resulting from personal injury "that the committee will be prepared sustained in the performance of duty. to make definite recommendations to Two-thirds of the monthly pay at the the National Convention for new legtime of injury (the total not to ex-islation in order that a bill, approved ceed $66.67 a month nor to be less than $33.33 unless the monthly pay is smaller) is allowed as compensation. Partial disability is compensated for at two-thirds of the difference between the monthly pay at the time of injury and the monthly wage-earning capacity following the accident, the total, however, not to exceed $66.67 a month. (See also XVI, Labor Legis-cident premiums written by 106 comlation.) (4) The meeting of the Joint Conference on Workmen's-Compensation Insurance Rates in New York in September and December, 1915. At this conference were representatives of the Workmen's-Compensation Service Bureau, the Massachusetts Rating and by the Convention, may be prepared in time for submission to the 1917 legislatures." Accident and Health Insurance.The following table, compiled from the Insurance Year Book, shows the premiums, losses, and loss ratios in the accident- and health-insurance business for the past eight years. Ac panies during 1915 totaled $36,977,988, an increase of only $453,176 over 1914, while the ratio of losses to premiums increased from 44.7 to 46.6 per cent. In health insurance the premium income of 49 companies writing health insurance separately totaled $7,891,030, an increase of $296,190. Fidelity Insurance and Corporate | per cent. Considered separately, 38 Suretyship. The results in this busi- companies received on their fidelity ness for the past eight years are in- business $8,294,341 in premiums, paid dicated by the following table, com- losses amounting to $2,752,373, and piled from the Insurance Year Book: experienced a ratio of losses to premiums of 33.2 per cent. Thirty-six companies received on their surety business $14,538,469 in premiums, paid losses of $4,569,410, and report an average loss ratio of 31.4 per cent. Ratio of Premiums Losses Losses to (thousands) (thousands) Premiums (per cent.) 1915. $22,732 $7,321 32.0 1914. 21,270 7,975 37.5 1913 20,027 6,947 34.6 1912. 19,243 5,192 27.0 1911. Miscellaneous Forms of Insurance. -The importance of the minor forms of insurance is indicated in the following table, which presents the 1915 record for the eight leading kinds of insurance coming under this heading as regards premiums received, losses paid, and the ratio of losses to premiums. Total premium income for all these types of insurance aggregated $21,620,962, while total losses The combined results in the fidelity and surety business during 1915 show premiums received of $22,832,000, losses paid of $7,321,000, and a ratio of losses to premiums of 32.1 | amounted to $7,769,441. MISCELLANEOUS INSURANCE IN THE UNITED STATES, 19151 1 Table based on Edwin W. DeLeon's discussion in the Insurance Year Book for 1916, p. A-397. XV. SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC PROBLEMS SOCIOLOGY HERBERT N. SHENTON he devotes the seventh chapter to a discussion of responsibility for conduct, in which he writes: "Beyond question different men have different degrees of capacity for mental and moral training." The lower degrees of capacity being associated with misery in all its forms, "Why go on alleviating various kinds of misery that might equally well be prevented" by having children well-born? Environment.-The relations which | ters a well digested summation of the exist between the varieties and varia- general findings concerning heredity, tions (i. e., "pulsations") of climate and the behavior of the groups affected by them have been outlined and in part verified by Prof. Ellsworth Huntington in his Civilization and Climate. The study, which is a product of the new science of geography, is based upon an analysis of climate as a stimulus in determining human character (result of habitual reaction and selected structure) as expressed in civilization. The general nature of the inductive methods which he uses is to be commended. Of course there are errors due to the subjective element of judgments, limited sampling, etc., but it is the kind of work that must be done, and we must patiently eliminate the errors by the checks of successive investigations. Professor Huntington does seem to resolve the associations, or partial associations, between certain rather definite phenomena of climate and those of group behavior. The author, however, does not defend the hypothesis as deterministic, but remarks in his concluding chapter: "If our hypothesis is true, man is more closely dependent upon nature than he has realized," but, "a realization of his limitations, however, is the first step toward freedom." Heredity. Continuous collective behavior can be better understood and explained and social policies determined as we learn more of structure or tendency inheritance. The sociologist, therefore, welcomes contributions to this subject. In a well written small volume entitled Being WellBorn, Prof. Michael F. Guyer of the University of Wisconsin has defended the thesis that the right of rights of a child is that of being well-born. After having presented in six chap A Critique of the Theory of Evolu tion, by Prof. T. H. Morgan, in addition to criticizing old evidence and appreciating and presenting new evidence, develops the thesis "that chance variation combined with a property of living things to manifold themselves is the key note of modern evolutionary thought." The new evidence which Professor Morgan presents is especially valuable because of the extensive scientific experimentation from which it has been derived. Adaptation. The theories regarding the structure and behavior of social groups in their struggle with environment have been examined by Prof. F. M. Bristol in a scholarly theoretical study entitled Social Adaptation. The author, influenced especially by the theories of Prof. T. N. Carver, attempts to trace the development of the doctrine of adaptation as a theory of social progress and "to indicate the utility of the concept of adaptation in interpreting various phases of social endeavor. Adaptation is considered both as a "state" and as a "process." The "state" in relation to a physical or material environment is described as "passive physical and physio-social adaptation"; in relation to the spiritual (including social) environment, it is the country. articles made in settlements all over | ber of social surveys made each year In Dennison House, has steadily increased. While in 1909 hardly a dozen had appeared, in 1912 over 50 were made. By 1915 this number was doubled, and although the figures for 1916 are not yet exact, it is probable that the hundred mark will be well passed. Among the investigations of 1916, however, there has been no community-wide survey, touching and correlating the network of industrial and social problems of a single city. The only development in this field has been the publication of the two final reports of the Springfield, Ill., survey (A. Y. B., 1915, p. 386), thereby completing this most thorough and important analysis of working and living conditions in a typical city of 60,000 inhabitants. Time has been given during the year to observe the effects of civic awakening in Springfield since the survey was started in 1914, and to tabulate such results as some 14 improvements in the educational system, six in the department of courts and corrections, five in health service, and nine in charitable relief. Another development, coming out more and more strongly each year, is the effort to make the settlement a really democratic institution by giving the neighborhood a larger share in its management. This is evidenced by the increasing number of club boys who become club leaders, and by the founding on the lower East Side, New York City, of a new settlement house by boys from the Madison Street settlement. Most of all it is seen in an action of the National Federation of Settlements, which in 1916 asked not only settlement workers and directors but representatives of neighborhood | groups themselves to confer at its annual meeting. On the other hand, the absence of a big comprehensive survey during the year is made up by a grist of intensive studies covering every field of social research. To-day both public and private organizations are so permeated with the scientific spirit that new undertakings are impossible without a careful diagnosis of the situation and expert advice. Among the specific studies the most notable achievement is the completion of the Cleveland school survey after more than a year of work and the expenditure of $50,000. Twenty brochures on such subjects as "The School and the Immigrant," "School Lunches," "The Public Library and the Public Schools,” etc., and nine monographs on vocational education are evidence that the survey was social rather than scholastic, because it kept continually in mind the conviction that education should train for actual life. No less remarkable than the scope and quality of the work was the degree to which the investigation worked itself into the consciousness of all classes of people, due to the publicity Social Surveys.-Ever since the given it through newspapers and pubPittsburgh survey of 1907, the num-lic meetings. The schools have been A special way-mark in settlement work was the announcement in June of a gift of $100,000 to the "House on Henry Street," the nurses' settlement, New York City, of which Lillian D. Wald is director. The sum was presented by Elizabeth Milbank Anderson toward a fund to establish upon a permanent foundation of $1,000,000 the visiting-nurse service of the settlement, which in 1915 totaled 210,000 visits to nearly 35,000 patients in Manhattan and the Bronx. how various institutions may be both impressed with social responsibility and made more effective in socializing the individuals in our present organization of society. Professor Goodsell has written an excellent text on the history of The Family as a Social and Educational Institution, which contains a final well synthesized chapter on "Current Theories of Reform." Fundamentals of Sociology, by Prof. E. A. Kirkpatrick, is an educator's discussion of the development of social groups, their various needs and activities, especially those which are educational, and of the groups as organized communities. The volume has considerable pedagogic merit to offset its many sociological deficiencies. Its best sections are those which discuss educational institutions. CONSTRUCTIVE AND PREVENTIVE SOCIAL WORK development and the calling of a national conference, there was no unusual feature in the work during 1916. The intensive use of the school plant for dances, motion pictures, Americanization classes, athletics, dramatics, etc., has steadily progressed, until it is estimated there are now some 272 centers in 72 cities. Social Centers.-The first National | cities in 32 states opened the schools Conference on Community Centers, for polling places. Aside from this held in New York City in 1916, demonstrated that the wider use of the school plant is no longer an isolated experiment, but an established fact in most large cities and in some small ones. It was natural that at the first general gathering of communitycenter workers from all over the country there should be some difficulty in establishing a common ground_on New York City has found the movewhich to build a national body. The ment so significant that it has apgreatest divergence of opinion was pointed a permanent committee of with regard to management. One the Board of Education, to be known group stood for direct supervision of as the recreation committee, for the centers by public authority, with the purpose of dealing with all schoolschool principal or his deputy present center matters. The policy announced at all meetings, and for full support holds that the duty of the local schoolof centers by public taxation. The center director is to discover the latother faction favored the system in ent recreation aspirations of the use in New York City, whereby the neighborhood itself and help them state or municipality issues charters find wholesome expression, a contrast to responsible groups of citizens who to the former autocratic policy of precontrol the activities of a center so senting a programme formulated in long as the privilege is not abused. the central office. The name "neighAs to finances it argued that addi-borhood centers" is to apply hencetional public revenue should be derived from admission charges to motion pictures, dances, and the like. The conference as finally organized accepted these two fundamental principles of community-center work: (1) that community centers should be administered through responsible public officials; and (2) that tax money should be used in the promotion, development, and maintenance of community centers. Questions of administration and the exclusive support of taxation remain to be threshed out at the next conference. Many cities recognized the political value of the school house for the first time in 1916, with the result that 143 forth to activities in this field in New York City, but other places still cling to the terms "recreation," "community," or "social center," all of them referring to the socialized school plant. (See also Recreation, infra.) Social Settlements.-Not yet have the social settlements forgotten the bitter winter of unemployment in 1914-15 (A. Y. B., 1915, p. 420). That period of misery stirred them from apathy regarding labor conditions to a keen desire to do something for industrial betterment. Hence the trend of new settlement work in 1916 has been largely along industrial lines. In Washington, Neighborhood House established a retail shop for |