1ft* RURAL. NCW<YORKER 
.1349 
The Child Labor Amendment Analyzed 
[In tlie following article Mr. E. F. 
Dickenson of Massachusetts gives an 
analysis of the proposed child labor 
amendment and what would follow if it 
should be ratified. It is high time our 
readers woke up and realized what may 
follow if they permit this amendemnt to 
become law.] 
“Section 1. The Congress shall have 
power to limit, regulate, or prohibit the 
labor of persons under eighteen years of 
age.” 
Educational and social effects of this 
amendment, if adopted, by approval of 
the Legistatures of three-fourth of the 
several States: 
Aside from its political aspect (pre¬ 
viously considered), it is a serious ques¬ 
tion what will be the influence upon the 
present and future generations of chil¬ 
dren of our country in an educational 
way, if this amendment is adopted and 
laws enforcing it in fullest extent be 
passed by Congress. 
We may expect the power so granted 
to be used to limit; for the same radical 
and socialistic influences largely respon¬ 
sible for the amendment would be still 
active and demand this in the exacting 
laws. Would this not mean revolution 
in the educational and social life of 
America? I cannot see it otherwise, 
and I find this view common with men 
and women of serious mind, with whom 
I have talked upon this subject. The 
Secretary of Agriculture said he “be¬ 
lieved children should learn to work in 
their early years.” 
The school of work, from which most 
of us have graduated, to be closed to our 
children; a graduate from high school, 
for instance, just ready to enter the kin¬ 
dergarten of useful activities, and to 
learn to do things ! A wrong philosophy 
of education, and of life, is behind this! 
An authority in broad education ideas 
has told me that there are three teachers 
from whom we can all learn, at all times, 
in school or out. and that they stand in 
this order: First, our work; second, 
our society; and third, our books. He 
further says (and is he not right?) that 
“the workless man is the worthless man.” 
Does this not apply as well, to other 
workless boy or girl? 
A recent convention of teachers has 
given its endorsement to “learning by 
doing” as a first principle in child teach¬ 
ing. 
From the school of doing, and of rea¬ 
sonable work in early years, most of our 
men of real achievement have graduated. 
Leslie M. Shaw, in his book, “Vanishing 
Landmarks,” says: “I can recall very 
few men whose names have been known 
beyond the confines of local communities, 
whether bankers, lawyers, manufactur¬ 
ers, merchants, or railroad presidents, 
whose hands have not been calloused with 
humble toil.” Does not “From Log Cab- 
into White House” give us this story in 
Garfield’s life? 
Andrew Carnegie, at the age of 10, 
was a bobbin boy in a cotton mill, earn¬ 
ing $1.20 per week ; at 13 he was run¬ 
ning the mill’s engine amid smoke and 
steam. Have not such stories as these 
been true of most men who have helped 
prominently in the building up of our 
country ? 
The dean of the college of education in 
one of our largest universities recently 
remarked that during his boyhood on the 
farm he had but three months in the year 
for schooling, which left nine months for 
hi u to get an education. In the exten¬ 
sion service of the Agricultural Depart¬ 
ments, Federal and State, boys’ and girls’ 
club work is quite a feature, as we know. 
I happen to be a local director of this, in 
my home town. The aims of this club 
work plan are for work, efficiency, prod¬ 
uction and profit, for the young people of 
our country districts. This is usually 
home work, and not for wages, but is 
sympathetic with wage employment. It 
is learning by doing, and earning by do¬ 
ing; it is work for profit, educationally 
and financially. As I recall it, the larg¬ 
est crop of corn ner acre ever grown in 
the country was raised by a boy in the 
Carolinas, some years ago; this in his 
club work connection. 
Even this plan of club work, designed 
for the benefit of country children by its 
training in thrift and earning, might be 
controlled (or at least discouraged! un¬ 
der influence of this proposed amend¬ 
ment. 
We all. as virile Americans should ap¬ 
prove of the Boy Scout organization. 
Article 9 of the Scout Law, reads: “A 
Scout is thrifty; he does not wantonly 
destroy property; he works faithfully, 
wastes nothing, and makes the best use 
of his opportunities. He saves his money 
so that he may pay his own way; is 
generous to those in need, and helpful to 
worthy objects. He may work for pay. 
but not receive tips for courtesies or good 
turns.” How unsympathetic (to say the 
least) is the amendment, allowing pro¬ 
hibition of work of boys under 18, with 
the Scout law and practice! 
The evils of divorce are today much 
deprecated, and the breaking up of fam¬ 
ilies from this cause. Is it not a like evil 
to divorce the child from his family, by 
substituting (as by amendment pro¬ 
posed), for the authority of the father 
and mother the authority of the super¬ 
state at Washington? If we distrust the 
American family for the upbringing of 
its children, where may our confidence 
for this be placed? 
Can the Congress be wisely designated 
as a general educational board for the 
Union—'Superseding the authority (in 
industrial and economic matters) of the 
48 States, the local communities and the 
homes of our land? 
To ask this question seems a sufficient 
answer to it. An authority tells us that 
the child is not a ward of the State, but 
of the family. He is not a national child. 
This principle is violated in Russia, 
under its Soviet regime, but up to this 
time has had respect in America. Should 
this child labor amendment be adopted, 
we shall swing far toward the socialistic 
view that the child, the family and prop¬ 
erty, merge in the State, and are under 
centralized control. 
Just here is the parting of the ways, 
for us! But, to return to the more edu¬ 
cational side of our question, the school 
of work was not attended by Harry Thaw, 
of long-time notoriety; nor by young 
Leopold and Loeb, of Chicago. “Respon¬ 
sibility makes men” is one of the wisest 
of sayings. Irresponsibility and idleness 
and money for vicious uses—did these not 
make the three young men of criminal 
record named above? And as the switch 
of a young man’s life is turned, either 
toward rational occupation of some kind, 
or toward irrational and vicious ones, 
is not his future largely determined? 
Our everyday observation shows this to 
be true. 
The older idea of education used to deal 
almost wholly with the branches of 
knowledge, and with books; now it is 
coming every day to deal more and more 
with human values, and character, and 
technical training of the boy and girl, 
this through work and play, as well as by 
book studies. This progressive new ideal 
is evidenced, perhaps most fully, in the 
half-work, half-study program lately es¬ 
tablished at Antioch College, Ohio, which 
is attracting world-wide attention and 
most favorable comment. “The most in¬ 
teresting and perhaps the most important 
experiment now going on in the whole 
range of American education is Antioch.” 
The venerable President Emeritus of 
Harvard. Dr. Charles W, Eliot, says 
this: “Antioch is a college of liberal arts, 
and the standards of scholarship, as to 
curriculum, degree of hard mental ap¬ 
plication required, and achievement neces¬ 
sary for graduation, are in no essential 
inferior to those elsewhere. The work 
the student does in an outside job for 
regular current-rate wages, while it may 
and probably usually does, help to pay 
his (or her) way, and may often result 
incidentally in his learning a trade, busi¬ 
ness, or profession in which he will go on 
afterwards, is pursued wholly for its 
value as a coherent and organic indis¬ 
pensable part of his education, as vital 
a factor in his ‘culture’ as his ‘book 
learning.’ If anything, more so !” 
Mr. Gavit, interpreting Antioch, con¬ 
tinues : “Modern education lays, and 
will lay increasingly its stress upon de¬ 
velopment through real activities, upon 
experience as superior for educational 
purposes to instruction ; upon living as a 
primary means to learning; upon doing 
as equal and complement to reading, talk- 
and listening. The direct aim of Antioch 
is to send forth soundly developed men 
and women with a running start in all 
the ensemble of life; trained not exclu¬ 
sively by reading of books and hearing 
the expounding of books, but also by first¬ 
hand experience with living; developed by 
what they have done and learned for 
themselves in the doing of it; in self- 
reliance, initiation, sound judgment, and 
the actual practice of responsibility in 
activities valuable for their own sake. 
The outside jobs are of almost every con¬ 
ceivable kind, from farming to steno¬ 
graphy, from common labor in a foundry 
to translating advertising matter from 
English into Chinese. Several students 
here organized and operated business en¬ 
terprises of their own.” 
Here is a modern ideal of education 
that is full, sane and complete, and this 
account of the principles and methods at 
Antioch is under the magazine title “Edu¬ 
cation by Book and Life.” The result of 
the proposed amendment, would be the 
taking of life out of the education of 
American children. Is not this alone, 
sufficient argument against it? While 
the other reasons for opposing it (po¬ 
litical and economic) are equally com¬ 
pelling ! E. F. DICKINSON. 
Making Apple Honey 
Use sweet apples. Do not peel but 
cut in slices right through the core about 
one-eighth inch thick taking out any bad 
or wormy parts. Put pared apples in 
kettle with enough water to cover them 
and cook until just done; hang in cloth 
bags to drip. 
Then boil the juice to syrup, so thick 
that as much as three tablespoonsful can 
be taken out on one tablespoon by wind¬ 
ing. This is apple honey and one of the 
finest spreads made. w. f. s. 
Sweet Apple Conserve 
To two quarts of sweet apples after 
they are cut in dice with skins left on, 
add _ one-third of a package of seedless 
raisins, three oranges cut in small pieces, 
the peel of one cut small, *4 lb. of wal¬ 
nut meats cut in quarters, four cups of 
sugar and water enough to cook. After 
it begins to boil remove to back of stove 
and cook slowly until thick. Bottle and 
seal with paraffin. mks. l. j. f. 
mmi i 
mrnmmmmrnmmmmR 
: 
C Worth of Fuel 
In a Sturdy 
McCormlck-Deering 
Engine 
Will Do Any of These Jobs 
s 
Separate 4000 pounds of milk 
Pump 3000 gallons of water 
Shell 25 bushels of corn 
Grind 6 bushels of feed 
Cut 1 ton of ensilage 
Press 15 gallons of cider 
Grind 2 bushels of corn meal 
Saw 1 cord of wood 
Churn 200 pounds of butter 
Bale */2 ton of hay 
Clean 30 bushels of seed wheat 
Grind 25 gallons of cane juice 
Light up the farm for 2 hours 
Do a family’s weekly washing 
Grind the mower knives for a season 
* 
% 
A Tireless Hired Man 
Removable 
Cylinder 
Sleeves 
Enclosed 
Crank 
Case 
iy 2 , 3 , 6 , 10 h. p. 
International Harvester Company 
606 So. Michigan Ave. Chicago, Ill. 
CANVAS C0VERS'«--.‘s™.“- 
■w tors, etc. All sizes and 
shapes. Best quality and lowest prices. Write for cata log. 
BOWMAN. DURHAM. ROBBINS. 26 Front St.. Brooklyn, N Y. 
EASY NOW TO SAW LOGS 
AH D FELL TR EES 
WITTE Log-Saw Does the Work of 
10 Men at 1/ 20 the Cost— 
Saws 25 Cords a Day 
A log saw that will burn any fuel and 
deliver the surplus power so necessary to 
fast sawing is sure to show every owner 
an extra profit of over $1,000 a year. 
Such an outfit is the Witte Log-Saw 
which has met such sensational success. 
The WICO Magneto equipped Witte is 
known as the standard of power saws— 
fast cutting, with a natural “arm-swing” 
and free from the usual log-saw troubles. 
It burns kerosene, gasoline or distillate 
so economically that a full day’s work 
costs only twenty-two cents. 
As Low as $10 
Buy your saw direct at lowest factory prices. 
Guaranteed staunch, durable and depend¬ 
able. Cost as little as $10. 
Hertzler & Zook 
Portable Wood 
SAW 
lath, posts, 
' ed. Lowest 
etc. 
Wm. Middlestadt reports that the Witte has 
replaced forty men using buck-saws. Hundreds 
or users saw as much as twenty-five cords a day. 
Mr. Witte says that the average user of a 
Witte Log and Tree saw can make easily $50 
a day with the outfit and so confident is he 
that he offers to send the complete combina¬ 
tion log and tree saw on ninety days’ free trial 
to anyone who will write tio him. The prices 
are lowest in history and under the method of 
easy payments spread over a year only a few 
dollars down puts the Witte to work 'for you. 
If you are interested in making more money 
sawing wood and clearing your place at small 
cost, write Mr. Witte today for full details of 
this remarkable offer. You are under no obli¬ 
gation by writing. 
THE WITTE ENGINE WORKS 
6893 Witte Bldg. Kansas City, Mo. 
6893 Empire Bldg. Pittsburgh, Pa. 
f 
|: 
■ SawB firewood, lumber, 
I Ripping table can be attached 
I priced practical saw made. Other Btylea 
■ and sizes at money-saving prices. Made of 
. _ , best materials. $10,000.00 
■Guaranteedbond backs our guar- 
W*_ m\ Jr\ antee! Write today for 
FREE CATALOG showing 
n all kinds saws, engines, 
feed mills, concrete mixer 
and fen ce. Ford & Fordson 
Attachments, etc. Full of 
surprising bargains. 
HERTZLER & ZOOK CO. 
Box 3 Belleville, Pa. 
[Illllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll! 
YOUNG PEOPLE’S CLASSICS 
These books have been read with th<* 
greatest interest by thousands of young 
people and grown-ups. We are able to 
offer them in attractive cloth binding, 
many illustrations for only 50 cents 
each postpaid. 
Treasure Island, Stevenson 
Child’s Garden of Verses, Stevenson 
Robinson Crusoe, DeFoe 
Robin Hood 
Mother Goose Rhymes 
Little Lame Prince, Mulock 
Grimm’s Fairy Tales 
Gulliver’s Travels, Swift 
Dog of Flanders, Ouida 
Black Beauty 
Age of liable, Bullfinch 
Andersen’s Fairy Tales 
Alice in Wonderland 
Through the Looking Glass 
For Sale by 
THE RURAL NEW-YORKER 
333 W. 30th Street New York City 
•lllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll 
