Outline

OUTLINE

CHILD LABOR IN THE PROGRESSIVE ERA

Working Conditions for Children During the Progressive Era

General Nature of the Problem

§ Lovejoy: American Review of Reviews 42, November 1910
§ Chambers: Tyranny of Change, St. Martin’s Press 1992

Causes

(1) Traditional European and Puritanical American Values Regarding Child Labor

§ Edith Abbott, American Journal of Sociology, July 1908

(2) Families Under Extreme Economic Pressure

§ New York Times, September 3, 1901

(3) Benefits of using children – (a) Lower wages, (b) minimal labor problems, (c) physical size of children beneficial to working with factory machinery

§ Fink: Major Problems in the Gilded Age and the Progressive Era, Houghton Miffin Company, 2001

§ Lovejoy: American Review of Reviews 42, November 1910.

Abuses
· Many workers under 16, and even under 10, years old

· Excessive hours

· Dangerous working conditions

· No educational opportunities,

· Little opportunity to develop skills--dead end jobs.

o Lucy Larcom, A New England Girlhood, Houghton Miffin, 1889

o Chicago Tribune February 22, 1903

o The Public March 3, 1903

o The Public, October 10, 1906

o Children Labor Bulletin –August 1914

o Fink p. 380-381

o New York Times, December 4, 1913

Reformers and Reform

§ Muckrakers: Jacob Riis, Upton Sinclair, Lincoln Steffens, Ida Tarbull

§ Reformers: Jane Addams, Ellen Starr, La Follettee, T. R. Roosevelt,
William Howard

§ Federal Legislative reform

§ Local and State laws

§ National Child Labor Committee and Children’s bureau department of labor

o Felix Adler’s address to the National Child Labor Committee, 1906
o Addams, Twenty Years at Hull House
o Riis, How the Other Half Lives
o Lovejoy, American Review of Reviews 42—November 1910
o Lovejoy, Charities--August 26, 1905
o New York Times—August 5, 1913
o Anthracite Coal Communities 1904

Major Obstacles to Effective Enforcement of Child Labor Laws

· No compulsory education

· Lack of prosecution for violators

· Lack of published information available to the public on abuses

· Lack of personnel responsibility

o Kelley, Child Labor and the Republic, National Child Labor Committee, 1907

o Van Kleeck, Charities and the Commons, January 18, 1908

o New York Times, October 6, 1901

o Chambers, 92-93

o Addams 122

o Lovejoy, Charities, August 26, 1905

o New York Times, October 10, 1901

Conclusions