Publications of the University of Pennsylvania Volume 19; Series in Political Economy and Public Law (Paperback)

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III. Fire-escape Legislation (1879-1885.) Act of 1879. The factory problem was now allowed to drop for a quarter of a century. This may fairly be attributed to the Civil War and Reconstruction epoch, which, like the Napoleonic wars for England, put a check on economic and social legislation. When the subject reappears, in 1878, it has taken on a new form, that of compelling the erection of fire-escapes on factories, hotels and other tall buildings. Bills on this subject were introduced in both houses at about the same time, and the Senate bill formed the groundwork of the act passed the following year. This act of 18791 provided as follows: "Section 1. Be it enacted, etc., That all the following described buildings within this commonwealth, to wit, every building used as a seminary, college, academy, hospital, asylum, or a hotel for the accommodation of the public, every storehouse, factory, manufactory, or workshop of any kind, in which employees, or operatives are usually employed at work, in the third, or any higher story, every tenement house or building in which rooms or floors are usually let to lodgers or families, and every public school building, when any of such buildings are three or more stories in height, shall be provided with a permanent, safe, external means of escape therefrom in case of fire; and it shall be the duty of the owners or keepers of such hotels, or the owners, superintendents, or managers of such seminaries, colleges, academies, hospitals, asylums, storehouses, factories, manufactories, or workshops, of the P. L. No. 132, p. 128. owners or landlords of such tenement houses, or their agents, and the board of school directors of the proper school districts, to provide and cause to be affixed to every such building such permanent ...