president of the board of inspectors shall give notice thereof by publication in one or more newspapers in each of the cities of Mobile, Montgomery, Birmingham, Huntsville and Selma for at least three weeks previous to a day designated in said notice, that sealed proposals will be received at his office for the hire of convicts. The notice shall state the terms and conditions upon which the convicts shall be hired. The proposals for hire must be written or printed, and shall state the number and class of convicts wanted, and the price to be paid for each per month, and the kind and locality of the labor to be performed, and shall be enclosed in an envelope and securely sealed, and there shall be nothing on the outside of the envelope except the name and address of the president of the board of inspectors, and across the left end the words, "Proposals for convicts." The president of the board shall keep such proposals safely, and on the day designated in the advertisement of hiring, the proposals shall be opened by him in the presence of the governor and the members of the board of inspectors, and the bids shall be accepted or rejected by the board of inspectors, subject to the approval of the governor; and in the acceptance or rejection of the bids regard must be had to the character and reputation of the bidder, the occupation, the healthfulness and the accessibility of the place where convicts are to be worked. Each proposal accepted or rejected must be so endorsed, with the date, and signed by the board of inspectors and the governor, and must be kept by the president in his office, subject to examination by any citizen of the State; Provided, That any convicts that may have been reserved from any letting under the provisions of this section because they were needed for the use of the State or because they were at the time of the letting unable to perform manual labor, or who, under the provisions of the law, are required to be changed from the work for which they were hired, having been declared by the physician to be unfit for such labor, or on account of their sex, may be hired at any time by advertisement as provided herein by the board of inspectors with the approval of the governor, by such person or persons, and for such work as in the judgment of the board of inspectors and the governor may seem best for the interests of the state and the welfare of the convicts; Provided further, That whenever convicts are hired elsewhere than at the mines, not less than fifty may be hired to one person or company, and kept at one prison, except that the females must be kept at one prison separate from the males, whether there be fifty or less.

(Chapter 140, acts of 1890-91.)

SEC. 2. The convicts hired out under this act [section 4641, above] shall be hired for not less than two nor more than five years.

SEC. 4648 (as amended by act No. 241, acts of 1890-91). Not less than fifty state or county convicts shall be hired to one person, or kept at one prison, and none of those hired to any person must be related to him by consanguinity or affinity, and they shall be governed, worked and guarded as prescribed by the rules and regulations for working penitentiary convicts outside the walls. The violation of this section is a misdemeanor, punishable on conviction by a fine not exceeding one thousand dollars, and hard labor not exceeding twelve months; Provided, That when convicts are worked in the county where convicted, less than fifty may be worked at one place: Provided further, That when convicts are worked at a coal mine, not less than one hundred shall be kept at one prison, or worked at one place. SEC. 4657. It is unlawful to work upon railroads any convicts;

ACTS OF 1886-87.

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ACT No. 47.-Color blindness of railroad employees. (a)

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SECTION 1. All persons affected with color blindness and loss of visual power, one or both, to the extent to be defined in accordance with the requirements of this act, shall be and they are hereby disqualified from serving on railroad lines within this State in the capacity of locomotive engineer, fireman, train conductor, brakeman, station agent, switchman, flagman, gate-tender or signal man, or in any other position which requires the use of discrimination of form or color signals.

SEC. 2. Any person who shall serve in any of the capacities mentioned in section one of this act without first having obtained a certificate of fitness for his position, in accordance with the provisions of this act, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor, and on conviction thereof before any court of competent jurisdiction, shall be fined not less than ten nor more than fifty dollars, for each and every offense.

SEC. 3. On and after the first day of June, 1887, examinations and re-examinations, at the expense of the railroad companies, shall be required under this law, and

a See Decision, page 1257.

any railroad company, officer or agent of the same, employing after said date a person in any of the capacities specified in section one of this act, who does not possess a certificate of fitness therefor, in so far as color blindness and visual powers are concerned, duly issued in accordance with the requirements of this act, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor, and for each and every offense shall be punished by a fine of not less than fifty nor more than five hundred dollars; Provided, That those persons already in employment in said capacities on the first day of June, 1887, shall be allowed until the first day of August, 1887, in which to procure the necessary certificates.

SEC. 6. The following rules shall govern the actions of the examiners; Provided, That the State board of health may from time to time make such alterations in or additions to these rules and requirements as they may deem just and proper:

Rule 1. All railroad employees requiring examination under this act shall be divided into two classes: Class first, shall include engineers, firemen and brakemen; class second, shall include train conductors, station agents, switchmen, flagmen, gate-tenders, signal men, and all others whose duties require them to use or distinguish form or color signals.

Rule 2. Certificates shall be given for each class in accordance with the following directions for examinations; promotion from one class to the other requires re-examination and certificate.

Rule 3. Re-examinations shall be made once every five years, and also under the following conditions, viz: After any serious disease of the eyes; after all injuries affecting the head or eyes; after any disease of the brain; after every long continued illness, as typhoid fever; after mistakes or acts which call in question the visual powers, either of form or color; and whenever a majority of the board may deem it necessary and so direct.

Rule 6. After an employee has held his position for five years or more, the standard required in each class may be determined by special action of the examining board.

ACT NO. 59.-Examination and licensing of locomotive engineers. (a)

SEC. 1. It shall be unlawful for the engineer of any railroad train in this State to drive or operate or engineer any train of cars or engine upon the main line or road bed of any railroad in this State which is used for the transportation of persons, passengers or freight, without first undergoing an examination once, obtaining a license as hereinafter provided.

SEC. 2. Before any locomotive engineer shall operate or drive an engine upon the main line or road bed of any railroad in this State used for the transportation of persons or freight, he shall apply to the board of examiners hereinafter provided for in this act, and be examined by said board or two or more members thereof, in practical mechanics, and concerning his knowledge of operating a locomotive engine and his competency as an engineer.

SEC. 3. Upon the examination of any engineer as provided in this act, if the applicant is found competent, he shall upon payment of five dollars, receive a license, which shall be signed by each member of the board, and which shall set forth the fact that the said engineer has been duly examined as required by law and is authorized to engage as an engineer on any of the railroads in this State. SEC. 4. In addition to the examination provided for in section two (2), it shall be the duty of said board of examiners, before issuing the license provided for in this act, to enquire into the character and habits of all engineers applying for license; and in no case shall a license be issued, if the applicant is found to be of reckless or intemperate habits.

SEC. 5. Any engineer, who, after procuring a license as provided in this act, shall at any time be guilty of any act of recklessness, carelessness or negligence, while running an engine, by which any damage to persons or property is done; or who shall within six hours before, or during the time he is engaged in running an engine, be in a state of intoxication, shall forfeit his license, with all the rights and privileges acquired by it, indefinitely or for a stated period, as the board may determine after notifying such engineer to appear before the board, and inquiring into his act or conduct. It shall be the duty of the board to determine whether the engineer is unfit or incompetent by reason of any act, or habit unknown at the time of his examination, or acquired or formed subsequent to it, and if it is made to appear that he is unfit or incompetent from any cause, the board shall revoke or cancel his license and shall notify every railroad in this State of the action of the board.

a See Decisions, page 1257.

SEC. 6. It shall be the duty of the Governor, as soon after the approval of this act as practicable, to appoint and commission five skilled mechanics, one of whom shall reside in Birmingham, one in Montgomery, one in Mobile, one in Selma, and one in Eufaula, who shall constitute a board of examiners for locomotive engineers. It shall be the duty of said board to examine locomotive engineers, issue licenses, hear causes of complaint, revoke or cancel licenses, and perform such duties as are provided in this act; Provided, That any one of said board shall have authority to examine applicants for licenses, and if the applicant is found competent, to issue license to him; Provided further, That for every examination provided in this act, the board or member thereof making the examination shall be entitled to five dollars, to be paid by the applicant.

SEC. 7. All engineers now employed in running or operating engines upon railroads in this State, shall have three months after the appointment of the board herein provided, within which to be examined and to obtain license.

SEC. 8. Any engineer violating the provisions of this act, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor, and upon conviction, shall be fined not less than fifty, nor more than five hundred dollars, and may also be sentenced to hard labor for the county for not more than six months.

ACT No. 316.-Convict labor.

SEC. 6 (as amended by act No. 110, acts of 1894-95). The road commissioner shall, when, he and the court of county commissioners, determine to work any road, or part of a road, or to construct or repair any bridge or culvert by special contract, after giving twenty days notice by publication in some newspaper published in the county, let such contract to the lowest responsible bidder, having due regard to such bidder[']s knowledge and capacity to work roads or build bridges, upon such contractor giving bond, with sufficient sureties, in double the amount of his contract, payable to the said commissioner, conditioned for the faithful performance of his duties and compliance with the terms of his contract, and approved by the judge of probate of the county; Provided, The commissioner, by, and with the approval of the court of county commissioners may, at the discretion of said court, employ to said contractor the county convicts of said [Talladega] county in working the public roads thereof, under such regulations as said court may adopt; Provided, further, Said convicts shall not be worked in the same squad or contiguous to free labor working on said public roads under the control of said contractor.

ACT No. 333.—Exemption from taxation-Agricultural produots.

SEC. 1. On and after the first day of January, 1887, all cotton and other agricultural products which were raised or grown during the preceding year, and which shall remain in the hands of the producers thereof on the first day of January of any year, immediately succeeding that in which they were raised, shall be exempted from taxation.

ACTS OF 1888-89.

ACT No. 92.-Seats for female employees.

SECTION 1. It shall be unlawful for anyone to employ any female clerk in any store in this State, without providing them with the proper accommodations for sitting down and resting, and permitting them to do so when not otherwise employed.

SEC. 2. Any person, firm or corporation who shall violate the provisions of this act, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor, and on conviction thereof shall be fined not less than ten dollars for each offense.

ACTS OF 1890-91.

ACT No. 271.-Mechanics' liens.

SECTION 4. Any contractor, or subcontractor, receiving money or other consideration due on his contract, and who fraudulently fails to pay the person performing any labor or furnishing any material expended or used in the construction of any building, article, improvement or utility, or in altering, improving, repairing or beautifying the same, thereby allowing a lien to be filed against such property, shall be guilty of obtaining money under false pretenses, and may be punished under the statute made and provided for the offense.

ACT No. 449.-Industrial school.

SPC. 1. There shall be established in this State an institution for the education the industrial arts and sciences of the destitute children of the State who are endants of Confederate soldiers and sailors. Such institution shall be located a springville in St. Clair County, in this State, and shall be known as the Confiderate Children's Industrial School.

SEC. 7. The main object of the institution shall be to afford means of education in the industrial arts and sciences to destitute descendants of Confederate soldiers and sailors. Application for admission must be made to the board of trustees in writing, and must state name, age and place of birth, and present residence of the applicant, the relationship, name and financial circumstances of applicant's nearest rectives living, and the names of the applicant's ancestors who were Confederate silers, and that the applicant is in destitute circumstances. Such application shall be indorsed by the judge of probate of the county of the applicant's residence, which indorsement shall state the judge's belief as to each fact stated in the application, and that the applicant is worthy to become a pupil in the institution. Such applications shall be considered by the board from time to time, and such number of applicants as the institution can support shall be appointed as the institution can maintain, having regard to a proper distribution of the appointed among the veral counties of the state; preference shall in all cases be given to those who have been only one year at the institution, but no pupil shall be received into the institution who at the time of his appointment is over twenty years old, and no child shall be received as a pupil who is under two years old.

SEC. 8. The board of trustees shall have power to admit pay students into the institution upon such terms as they may think fit, but no pay pupil shall be allowed to the exclusion of a destitute one.

SEC. 9. Nothing in this act shall be taken or held as making the school herein provided for a state school or as incurring any liabilities on the part of the State of Alabama for establishing or maintaining said school.

ACT No. 526.-Convict labor.

SEC. 40. All persons confined in the county jails or prisons in the county, awaiting trial, and who prefer to work, and persons who are sentenced to hard labor for the county, not otherwise disposed of, or persons who are imprisoned for nonpayment of fines and costs, may be employed by the commissioner's court, or bard of revenue, in working the public roads, but the costs incident to the conviction of criminals shall be paid or otherwise provided for by the court of county coramissioners, or board of revenue, but to all prisoners who have not been convicted who work on the public roads, certificates shall be issued by the road overseer, or road commissioner, showing the number of days they have worked, and the same shall be received in the payment of their taxes or fines and costs assessed against them, or in commutation for road services, at fifty cents per day.

ACTS OF 1892-93.

ACT No. 59.-Labor day.

SECTION 1. The first Monday in September in each year shall be known as labor day, and the same is hereby declared to be a legal holiday within this State.

ACT No. 71.-Industrial school.

[Amending sections 1 and 2 of an act approved February 16, 1883, so as to read as follows:1

SEC. 1 (as amended by chapter 399, acts of 1892-93). George W. Campbell, S. Q. Hale, Louis Adams, Oliver Howard, Henry D. Smith, B. T. Washington, Geo. S. Chaney, R. C. Bradford, Warren Logan, C. N. Dorsette, and such others as they may under this act associate with them, and their successors, are hereby constituted a body politic and corporate, by the name of the Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institute, and shall have perpetual succession and a common seal, and by the name aforesaid they and their successors shall be capable in law and shall Lave full power and authority to acquire, hold, possess, purchase, receive and retain to themselves and their successors forever any lands, tenements, rents, goods, chattels or interest of any kind whatsoever, which may be given or bequeathed to them or by them purchased, or which have already been bequeathed or purchased for the use of said institution; and said trustees may receive any

gift or inheritance which may be given as an endowment fund, and they and their successors shall have full power to convey, transfer and dispose of the same in any manner whatsoever they may judge most useful to the interest and legal purposes of said institution, and by their corporate name they may sue and implead and be sued and impleaded answer and be answered in all courts of law and equity, and said trustees shall have the right to make contracts in behalf of said institution.

SEC. 2 (as amended by chapter 399, acts of 1892-93). The purposes of said Tuskegee Normal and Industrial institution shall be as follows: For the instruction of colored teachers and youth in the various common academic and collegiate branches, the best method of teaching the same, the best method of theoretical and practical industry in their application to agriculture and the mechanic arts, and for the carrying out of these purposes said trustees shall have the power to establish and provide for the support of any department or school in said institution, and to control the operations of the same, to grant such diplomas, and to confer such degrees as are customary in other colleges of like grade, to appoint such officers for presiding over and transacting the business of their body as may be necessary and prescribe their duties and obligations, to appoint the time and place of their meetings, to determine their own tenure of office, and to adopt such rules, regulations and by-laws, not contrary to the laws of this state or the United States as may be necessary for the good government of said Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institute. Said institute shall not be begun nor continued with a less number than twenty-five pupils nor be taught for a period of less than nine months of each year. Pupils from this state shall be admitted free of tuition on giving an obligation in writing to teach for two years in the public schools of this state after they have become qualified.

ACT No. 191.-Convict labor.

SEC. 6 (as amended by act No. 214, acts of 1891-95). The commissioner's court of said county [Escambia] may in its discretion, place under the control of the road superintendent to be employed in work on the public roads, the able-bodied male convicts sentenced to hard labor for the county, or any of them making the necessary apportions from time to time out of the general fund to pay the amounts earned by their labor, for costs and witness fees as now provided by law.

ACT No. 241.-Railroads-Examination of applicants for employment. SEC. 1. Hereafter it shall be the duty of every person or corporation operating a railroad in this State, before engaging any person or persons in their service as engineer, fireman, train dispatcher, conductor, flagman, brakeman, trackman or switchman, to subject the applicant for employment in such service to a thorough and rigid examination, to ascertain if the applicant for such employment be competent and well qualified to fill the position applied for. Such examination shall be made by the superintendent, or by some competent and skillful official or officials of the railroad, selected for such purpose by the superintendent.

SEC. 2. Such examination shall be reduced to writing on printed blank forms provided for the purpose, and if the applicant shall be found qualified in all respects for the position before employment, the examination papers shall be referred to the general manager, or other chief executive of the railroad for his approval or disapproval, and by him shall be filed in his office for future reference, and copies thereof shall be filed in the office of the superintendent in this State, or if there be no such superintendent, then in the principal office of such railroad in this State. Such examination papers, duly certified to by the officials of the railroad who shall have the custody of them, shall be evidence of their contracts, and of the fact of such examination without further proof.

SEC. 3. If, upon such examination, the applicant shall be found competent and well qualified to fill the position applied for, and his examination papers are approved by the general manager, or other executive officer of the railroad, then such board of managers shall issue a license to the applicant to engage in the occupation about which he has been examined, free of cost to the applicant.

SEC. 4. Such examination shall be made respecting the capacity of the applicant to fill the position applied for, his moral character and reputation, his sobriety and his previous record, and his knowledge and familiarity with the rules and regulations of the railroad, governing its employees in the position applied for, as well as all of the general rules and regulations of the railroad, the knowledge of which may be necessary or proper for the skillful performance of his duty.

SEC. 5. Any person or corporation, operating a railroad in this State, who shall employ any person to fill any of the above named positions, without having first