Employment of Women.

other and shorter hours for certain railroad employments than those fixed by the Federal law. In the course of the opinion Mr. Justice McKenna said:

"Regulation is not intended to be a mere wanton exercise of power. It is a restriction upon the management of the railroads. It is induced by the public interest or safety, and the 'hours of service' law of March 4, 1907, is the judgment of Congress of the extent of of the restriction necessary. It admits of no supplement; it is the prescribed measure of what is necessary and sufficient for the public safety, and of the cost and burden which the railroad must endure to secure it."

It will be noted that the purpose sought by the said Federal law and that sought by the said New York statute is not the same as that in view in the said Female Labor Law of this State. The former had in view the safety and efficiency of railroad operation and management. Our Act has in view the welfare of women. The New York statute was, in fact, one regulatory of railroads, while our statute is simply one prescribing the conditions upon which women may be employed in any establishment. This Pennsylvania Act is general in its scope and is in no sense regulatory of commerce, and only affects the same incidentally where women are employed. It is entirely within the reach of the powers of Congress to legislate specifically as to the conditions upon which women may be employed by interstate carriers, but until such time as it does so legislate, I am of the opinion that our own State Act applies.

Laws limiting the hours and regulating the method of employment of women are well within the domain of the police power of a State and have commended themselves to modern thought as essential to the public welfare. The welfare of the Commonwealth is vitally affected by the welfare of its womanhood, and we shall only surrender full control over the subject when Congress acts specifically upon this precise question, or the Courts construe the existing law to that effect.

Your atention, however, is called to the Act of July 5, 1917, P. L. 686, which permits the Industrial Board, by due proceedings, to modify in certain respects the Female Labor Law of 1913. Railroad employment is within the purview of that Act. It is suggested that where railroads desire to employ women in any capacity upon hours other than those expressly stipulated in the Female Labor Law, you take the matter up with them with the view that they invoke the provisions of said Act of 1917, in order that women may be employed by them at hours

Appointment of Policemen

satisfactory for their service and yet in harmony with the Pennsylvania law.

It is further to be noted that pending the Federal control of railroads any State act is necessarily subject to any Federal regulation made by the Federal railroad administration, as to which you can readily keep yourself advised.

-O

POLICEMEN.

Policemen-Appointment of.

There is no Act of Assembly which authorizes the Armory Board or any other State Agency to appoint a policeman with authority to make arrests.

Attorney General's Department. Opinion to Benjamin W. Demming, State Armory Board.

Hargest, Deputy Attorney General, December 31, 1918.

Your favor of the 19th inst., transmitting the letter of Saville Smith, was duly received. You ask whether there is some provision by which he may be sworn and commissioned as a police officer of the State, with authority to make arrests.

He has been special officer of the Second Infantry of the National Guard of Pennsylvania for more than thirty years, and has been appointed by the authorities of the City of Philadelphia. Inasmuch as the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania owns the Armory now, it is suggested that he be sworn as a State policeman, for the protection of the property.

There is no Act of Assembly which authorizes the Armory Board, or any other State agency, to appoint a policeman of this character, and, therefore, I am compelled to advise you that such appointment can not be made.

COST OF TELEGRAMS AND TELEPHONE MESSAGES MADE NECESSARY BY INFLUENZA EPIDEMIC. Telegrams and Telephone Messages made necessary by Influenza Epidemic-Payment of.

The cost of telegrams and telephone messages made necessary by the influenza epidemic should be paid out of the general fund apppropriated to the Department of Health.

Attorney General's Department. Opinion to George A. Shreiner, Superintendent, Board of Commissioners of Public Grounds and Buildings.

Hargest, Deputy Attorney General, December 31, 1918.

This Department is in receipt of your recent favor requesting to be advised as to what appropriation the cost of telegrams

Cost of Messages During Influenza Epidemic.

and telephone messages made necessary by the recent influenza epidemic should be charged.

The appropriation to the Department of Public Grounds and Buildings is, in part, as follows: (Appro. Acts 1917, p. 36.)

"For the payment of rental charges for telephone service, and other patented leased office devices, the cost of toll and long distance telephone messages and telegrams for the Legislature, the several departments, boards, and commissions of the State Government, and Executive Mansion, for two years, the sum of eighty thousand dollars ($80,000).”

The appropriation to the Department of Health is, in part, as follows: (Appro. Acts 1917, p. 77)

"For the payment of the cost of diphtheria antitoxin * * * * for educational work, and for the payment of all other necessary expenses of the Department of Health in the performance of duties imposed upon it by acts of Assembly in supervising epidemics of diseases, and in protecting the public health, two years, the sum of one million and seventyfive thousand dollars ($1,075,000)."

The cost of telegrams and telephone messages made necessary by the influenza epidemic comes directly within the language of the appropriation to the Department of Health, above quoted, because they were necessary expenses “in supervising epidemics of diseases."

The appropriation to the Department of Public Grounds and Buildings was, in my opinion, intended to cover the usual and ordinary telephone service and telegrams necessary in conducting the business of the various Departments of the State government.

I am therefore of opinion, and so advise you, that the cost of the telegrams and telephone messages made necessary by the epidemic should be paid out of the general fund appropriated to the Department of Health.

MOTHERS PENSIONS.

Mothers' Pensions-Act of April 29, 1913.

A County can at this time come into the system provided for the relief of indigent, widowed mothers, or those indigent mothers whose husbands are insane.

Attorney General's Department. Opinion to Miss Mary Bogue, State Supervisor, Mothers' Assistance Board.

Kun, Deputy Attorney General, January 3, 1917.

Mothers' Pensions.

This Department is in receipt of your communication of the 25th ultimo, asking substantially whether a county can now come into the system provided by the Act of April 29, 1913, P. L. 118, entitled:

"An act applicable to all counties of this Commonwealth, to provide monthly payments, as approved by the trustees, to indigent, widowed, or abandoned mothers, for partial support of their children in their own homes. The manner of appointment of trustees; the administration of the trust; the amount of appropriations, proportioning appropriations, coordinate appropriations; amounts to be paid, form of records, eligibility, penalties, and reports, as set forth,"

as amended, and receive a proportionate share of the appropriation made for the purposes of that statute, by the Act of June 29, 1917, P. L. 664.

The system whereby State moneys was appropriated to indigent, widowed or abandoned mothers for the partial support of their children in their own homes, originated in this State by the Act of 1913 above referred to. The system was based upon county units, and by Section 2 there was appropriated the sum of two hundred thousand dollars to be apportioned to the counties according to their respective populations; the State Treasurer being required to place the proportionate amount of the entire appropriation to the various counties to the credit of the trustees. The section further provided as follows:

"Provided, however, That no county, through their trustees or otherwise, shall receive their allotment of the State's appropriation unless an equal amount has been provided by the government of such county desiring the benefits under this act."

Under the above provision, any county could come into the system by appropriating, from the county's funds, an amount equal to the sum allotted to it by the State Treasurer, and this could be done at any time, for there was no express restriction; and the title to the act expressly stated it was applicable "to all counties of the Commonwealth."

The original statute was extensively amended by the Act of June 18, 1915, P. L. 1038. By Section 2 of this latter act, amending Section 2 of the original law, a new appropriation was made of one hundred thousand dollars, and one hundred and fifty thousand dollars of the unexpended balance of the appropriation made for this purpose in 1913, was reappropriated. This section provided that

Mothers' Pensions.

"The moneys hereby appropriated and re-appropriated shall be paid to and apportioned among the counties of the Commonwealth according to the following classification:" (Then follows a division of the counties of the State into six classes based upon population.)

And after providing, as in the original act, that the State Treasurer should place the proportionate amount of the entire appropriation to the various counties, enacted as follows:

"Provided, however, That no county, through its trustees or otherwise, shall receive its allotment of the State's appropriation unless an equal amount has been provided by the government of such county desiring the benefits under this act, within a period of one year after the passage and approval of this bill."

There can be no doubt that, under this language, counties desiring to participate in the appropriation of 1915 must have availed themselves of it within the time indicated in the amendment.

In 1917, by the Act of June 29, P. L. 664, a new appropriation of four hundred thousand dollars was made to carry out the provisions of the Act of 1913, as amended, and Section 3 of this Act of 1917, like that of the original act, contained the provision that

"No county, through its trustees or otherwise, shall receive its allotment of the State's appropriation unless an equal amount has been provided by the county desiring the benefits under this act."

No one year limitation, as contained in the Act of 1915, appears in this latter statute; nor does the Act of 1917 undertake to enlarge or restrict the operation of the limitation period incorporated by the Act of 1915. As the title of the Act of 1917 indicates, the statute undertakes to do nothing more than to make an appropriation and to create the additional offices of Assistant State Supervisors. The disposition of your inquiry, therefore, resolves itself into a construction of the foregoing provision of the Act of 1915. Is that provision a continuing enactment, intended to be permanently operative as part of the system, or was it a condition attached to the appropriation which ended with it?

I am of the opinion that this one year limitation, contained in the Act of 1915, was a condition attached to the appropriation, and that it ceased to exist on June 29, 1917, when the Legislature intended the unexpended balance of the 1915 ap