1. Building a Great Nation on the Backs of its Youth
Adolescent girls from Bibb Mfg. Co. in Macon, Georgia.
Child Labor in America
Building a Great Nation on the Backs of its Youth

2. When is child labor ok?
When is child labor a useful and healthy introduction to work?
How do you distinguish between freedom and idleness, which may be less wholesome than some types of work?
Is some work suitable for young children and how do you distinguish “suitable?”

3. Factors for child labor
Reflected socio-economic class stratification
Immigration and tenement living
Availability of children and economic forces

4. The facts
In 1870, the first U.S. census to report child labor numbers counted 750,000 workers under the age of 15, not including children who worked for their families in businesses or on farms.
By 1911, more than two million American children under the age of 16 were working

5. Types of labor
Street Trades- newsies, delivery and errand boys, shoe shiners
Industrial factory workers
Textiles, food preparation, garment/ piece goods
Breaker Boys- coal miners
Agriculture/Farm labor

6. Textiles
1. Furman Owens, 12 years old. Can't read. Doesn't know his A,B,C's. Said, "Yes I want to learn but can't when I work all the time." Been in the mills 4 years, 3 years in the Olympia Mill. Columbia, South Carolina.
2. A general view of spinning room, Cornell Mill. Fall River, Massachusetts.

7. Textiles
1. Some boys and girls were so small they had to climb up on to the spinning frame to mend broken threads and to put back the empty bobbins. Bibb Mill No. 1. Macon, Georgia.
2. The overseer said apologetically, "She just happened in." She was working steadily. The mills seem full of youngsters who "just happened in" or "are helping sister." Newberry, South Carolina.

8. Street Trades
1. Francis Lance, 5 years old, 41 inches high. He jumps on and off moving trolley cars at the risk of his life. St. Louis, Missouri.
2. A group of newsies selling on the Capitol steps. Tony, age 8, Dan, 9, Joseph, 10, and John, age 11. Washington, D.C.
3. A small newsie downtown on a Saturday afternoon. St. Louis, Missouri.

9. vices
1. Messengers absorbed in their usual game of poker in the "Den of the terrible nine" (the waiting room for Western Union Messengers). They play for money. Some lose a whole month's wages in a day and then are afraid to go home. The boy on the right has been a messenger for 4 years. Began at 12 years of age. He works all night now. During an evening's conversation he told me stories about his experiences with prostitutes to whom he carries messages frequently. Hartford, Connecticut.
2. 11 a.m. Newsies at Skeeter's Branch. They were all smoking. St. Louis, Missouri.

10. Breaker boys
1. View of the Ewen Breaker of the Pennsylvania Coal Co. The dust was so dense at times as to obscure the view. This dust penetrated the utmost recesses of the boys' lungs. A kind of slave-driver sometimes stands over the boys, prodding or kicking them into obedience. South Pittston, Pennsylvania.
2. Breaker boys. Smallest is Angelo Ross. Pittston, Pennsylvania.

11. miners
1. A young driver in the Brown Mine. Has been driving one year. Works 7 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. daily. Brown, West Virginia.
2. At the close of day. Waiting for the cage to go up. The cage is entirely open on two sides and not very well protected on the other two, and is usually crowded like this. The small boy in front is Jo Puma. South Pittston, Pennsylvania.

12. Agricultural workers
Norris Luvitt. Been picking 3 years in berry fields near Baltimore. Right - Three boys, one of 13 yrs., two of 14 yrs., picking shade-grown tobacco on Hackett Farm. The "first picking" necessitates a sitting posture. Buckland, Connecticut.- Camille Carmo, age 7, and Justine, age 9. The older girl picks about 4 pails a day. Rochester, Massachusetts.
Bottom Left - Twelve-year-old Lahnert boy topping beets. The father, mother, and two boys (9 and 12 yrs.) expect to make $700 in about 2 months time in the beet work. "The boys can keep up with me all right, and all day long," the father said. Begin at 6 a.m. and work until 6 p.m. with an hour off at noon. Fort Collins, Colorado.

13. Seafood workers
1.Hiram Pulk, age 9, working in a canning company. "I ain't very fast only about 5 boxes a day. They pay about 5 cents a box," he said. Eastport, Maine.
2.Manuel the young shrimp picker, age 5, and a mountain of child labor oyster shells behind him. He worked last year. Understands not a word of English. Biloxi, Mississippi.
3.Oyster shuckers working in a canning factory. All but the very smallest babies work. Began work at 3:30 a.m. and expected to work until 5 p.m. The little girl in the center was working. Her mother said she is "a real help to me." Dunbar, Louisiana.

14. Labor conditions 68-72 hour work weeks From Can till Cain t
Lived in company owned houses, towns
Paid in company script for overpriced goods at the company store

15. Labor conditions Tenement living in slums
Homework after shifts were over
Immigrant families targeted because some state laws did not apply to immigrants

16. Homework/tenement living
1.A Jewish family and neighbors working until late at night sewing garters. This happens several nights a week when there is plenty of work. The youngest work until 9 p.m. The others until 11 p.m. or later. On the left is Mary, age 7, and 10-year-old Sam, and next to the mother is a 12-year-old boy. On the right are Sarah, age 7, next is her 11-year-old sister, 13-year-old brother. Father is out of work and also helps make garters. New York City.
2.Picking nuts in dirty basement. The dirtiest imaginable children were pawing over the nuts and eating lunch on the table. Mother had a cold and blew her nose frequently (without washing her hands) and the dirty handkerchiefs reposed comfortably on table close to the nuts and nut meats. The father picks now. New York City.

17. Regulation
Started slowly at the state level banning employment of underage children
Motivations for regulation varied
Economic, humane, and social
Children were viewed as a source of low-wage labor that was in competition with adults

18. Regulation-Reasons
Products of child labor competed against adult made products causing market pressures to force down wages and living standards
Health and safety hazards as well as exhaustion left children ill prepared for education
As adults they were ill-prepared for employment elsewhere, which led to cyclical poverty

19. Trade unions & the nclc
AFL leader Samuel Gompers favored child labor laws
1904 the National Child Labor Committee was formed to end child exploitation in the workplace
State labor laws were loosely constructed and difficult to enforce

20. Opponents of child labor regulation argued
Unavoidable stage of development
Necessary for survival
Essential for regional competition
Southern manufacturers viewed labor restrictions as an “effort of northern agitators to kill the infant industries of the south”

21. In Defense of Child Labor
“I believe there are just about as many children spoiled by indulgence as there are by overwork.” Daniel A. Tompkins Carolina mill owner
“There is such a thing as too much education for working people sometimes.” Charles Harding Merchants Woolen Co.

22. Federal legislation
After a few unsuccessful attempts, Congress passed the Owen-Keating Act in 1916
1918 the US Supreme Court declared the law unconstitutional
Congress and Gompers tried again unsuccessfully in 1919 and 1924
1919- Pomerene child labor tax Act declared unconstitutional
1924- child labor amendment failed to pass enough state legislatures

23. Federal Legislation
Finally in 1938 Congress passed the Fair Labor Standards Act aka. The Federal Wage and Hour Law

24. Fair Labor standards act
Set a 40 hour work week
Minimum wage of 40 cents per hour
Prohibited child labor under 16 and restricted when and for how long children could work

25. Building a Great Nation on the Backs of its Youth
Child Labor in America
Building a Great Nation on the Backs of its Youth