[Footnote 1:  See the author’s Report to the U.S.  Industrial Commission, vol.  XVI, page 173.]

Similar laws exist in Belgium, Switzerland, Germany, Austria, Holland, New Zealand, Australia, and Canada.

The apprentice system still exists in perfection in all European states, including Great Britain, although there most of the unions restrict the number that may be employed.  In the United States it has, unfortunately, fallen entirely into disuse.

It has already been mentioned that the factory laws, laws regulating the sanitary conditions, etc., of factories and sweat-shops, are far more complicated and intelligent upon the Continent, and even in England, than in the United States of America.

Coming finally to what most persons consider the most important line, that of strikes, boycotts, and intimidation, the legislation of the Continent of Europe where common-law principles of individual liberty do not interfere, is, of course, far more complex and far more effective than that of either England or the United States.  The principle of combination we leave for the next chapter.  In European legislation, where we are met with no constitutional difficulties, we shall expect to find a more paternalistic control by the state, although in France the decree of March 2, 1791, provided that every person “shall be free to engage in such an enterprise or exercise, such profession, art or trade, as he may desire.”  In Germany an elaborate attempt has been recently made to re-introduce the old guild system made over from its mediaeval form to suit modern conditions, and in other countries where the government does not interfere, the trade guilds, or unions, present insuperable obstacles to any one engaging in their industry who is not a member of the guild or has not gone through the required apprenticeship.[1]

[Footnote 1:  U.S.  Industrial Commission Reports, vol.  XVI, p. 9.]

The French decree of 1791 freeing labor took effect also in French Switzerland.  A most interesting account of the experiment of the Swiss Cantons on freedom of labor and the guild system will be found in the U.S.  Industrial Commission Report above referred to.[1] Germany differs from England and France in that the old guild system was never absolutely done away with; in 1807 serfdom was abolished in Prussia, and a decree of December, 1808, apparently under the influence of Napoleon, proclaimed the right of citizens freely to engage in such occupations as they desired.  Exclusive privileges and industrial monopolies were abolished by subsequent decrees, and the general movement for the freeing of industry was consummated in 1845 by the labor code of that year, which, by the labor code of 1883, extends over all Germany:  “The practice of any trade is made free to all....  The distinctions between town and country in relation to the practice of any handicraft trade is abolished....  Trade and merchant guilds have no right to exclude others from the practice of any trade....  The right to the independent exercise of a trade shall in no way depend upon the sex...."[2]