325 
American Agriculturist, November 8, 1924 
The Child Labor Amendment 
What It Is—How and Why Congress Passed It 
r PHE amendment designed to give 
A Congress power to legislate in the 
matter of child labor has been passed by 
both the Senate and the House, and i,s now 
before the State Legislatures for ratifica¬ 
tion. This bill, known as J. H. R. 184, 
was introduced by Israel M. Foster of 
Ohio, and reads as follows: 
Section 1. The Congress shall have 
power to limit, regulate and prohibit the 
labor of persons under the age of 18 years. 
Section 2. The power of the several 
States is unimpaired by this Article 
except that the operation of State laws 
shall be suspended to the extent necessary 
to give effect to legislation enacted by the 
Congress. 
This bill was the one chosen, because of 
its wording and scope, from some twenty- 
two proposed amendments designed to 
bear upon the child labor problem. A 
hearing before the committee of the 
judiciary of the House was held during 
February and March, at which both 
advocates and opponents of the bill were 
heard. It was then submitted to the 
House, passing on April 2G with a vote of 
297 to 69, after a two-day debate. Some 
time elapsed before the Senate considered 
the bill, but in the last few days of the 
session, June 2, it went through, and is 
now before the individual States. 
Ratificat ion has already come from one 
State, Arkansas, but as some legislatures 
will not convene for some time to come, it 
may be several years before all the States 
have an opportunity to act upon the 
measure. 
The first organized attempt to check 
child labor in the United States resulted 
from the disclosures of the census of 1900, 
which showed that nearly two million 
children between 10 and 15 years (or 
practically one out of every six) were 
gainfully employed. 
The first move to decrease this figure 
came from the South, when Alabama 
organized a State committee. The 
national committee was founded in 1904 
and incorporated in 1907. 
The first federal legislation came in 
1916. It excluded from interstate com¬ 
merce articles manufactured in factories 
by children under 14 years of age. This 
law was in operation until 1918, when the 
Supreme Court declared it unconstitu¬ 
tional. In 1919, a second federal law was 
passed, placing a 10 per cent, tax on the 
net profits of factories and mines employ¬ 
ing child labor. In 1922 the Supreme 
Court declared this also unconstitutional. 
Aside from federal legislation, every 
State in the Union but one has, during the 
past twenty years, placed on its statute 
books some law to protect its child 
workers. Among the points covered are 
the length of the working day, the pro¬ 
hibition of night work under certain ages, 
the prohibition of employment in certain 
dangerous trades, provisions for health 
certificates and compulsory school at¬ 
tendance. Among the States having 
high-standard child labor laws is New 
York, but on the other hand, certain 
States have so few provisions of the sort as 
to bring the average child labor standards 
of the United States below that of all the 
important European countries, which w r e 
once far surpassed. 1 
On the map which indicates the relative 
standing of the States since the last 
federal law was declared unconstitu¬ 
tional there are 18 “white” States and 
30 “black.” The white States are those 
now having law's equal or superior to the 
standards of the first and second federal 
laws, while the black are those now below 
these former standards. 
The last census (1920) showed a marked 
decrease in the number of child laborers, 
but more than one million are still “gain¬ 
fully employed” (1,060,858). This report 
covers children between 10 and 15, with 
no count of those under 10, many of 
whom are employed in certain sections of 
the country. It shows a falling off to a 
ratio of one to twelve instead of one to 
six, as in 1900. It was the testimony of 
federal officials at the hearing that since 
the repeal of the last federal law, the 
number had increased considerably, so 
that the 1920 figures are not now accurate. 
They must, however, be taken as the 
latest official compilation. 
The alignment for and against the 
proposed amendment has been brought 
out in two ways: At the special hearing 
before the judiciary committee and on the 
floor in Congress. 
The committee, composed of members 
from 19 different States, met over a 
period of four weeks to hear witnesses on 
both sides. Among those who appeared 
were several members of Congress, Miss 
Grace Abbott, chief of the Children’s 
Bureau; Mr. Edgar Wallace of the 
American Federation of Labor, Mr. Gray 
Silver of the American Farm Bureau 
Federation, Mr. Owen Lovejoy, Executive 
Secretary of the National Child Labor 
Committee; Mr. David Clark, editor of 
the Southern Textile Bulletin, and many 
lawyers, welfare executives and repre¬ 
sentatives of the women’s committees of 
various political and religious bodies. 
The testimony and evidence read into the 
record fills a volume of 307 pages. 
In the main, the arguments for and 
against grouped themselves under the 
head of States’ Rights vs. Federal Con¬ 
trol. Very little was said as to the ques¬ 
tion of child labor itself, even the op¬ 
ponents of the measure declaring them¬ 
selves for regulation of some sort. There 
was contradictory testimony as to various 
points, notably the efficacy of federal 
control. Government agents testified 
that the existence of the federal laws had 
made it much easier to enforce local laws; 
that since the federal statute was de¬ 
clared unconstitutional, the regulations in 
many States had been difficult or impos¬ 
sible to enforce. They cited the case of 
New Jersey, a “white” State, adjoining 
Pennsylvania, from which migratory 
families with children came to work in the 
cranberry bogs, thus evading the school 
laws of Pennsylvania, but not subject to 
those of New Jersey. 
Opponents of the bill claimed, on the 
other hand, that federal interference made 
the enforcement of local laws more 
difficult and that the States would do 
better if allowed to work out their own 
problems. 
However, the storm center of the dis¬ 
cussion was the question of States’ rights, 
regarded by many witnesses as imperilled 
by the addition of a new amendment to 
the constitution. 
In addition to arguing the benefits of 
the bill, its supporters sought to establish 
several things that it is not. Among them 
are: 
1. That it is not in itself a statute. It 
{Continued on page 333) 
Here Are the Facts 
O NE of the most important things before the people and the dif¬ 
ferent States to consider during the coming year is the proposed 
Child Labor Amendment to the United States Constitution. This 
amendment has been passed by Congress and is now before the States 
for ratification. Because of the very great importance of this amend¬ 
ment, we are publishing on this page, first, a carefully prepared state¬ 
ment of the amendment itself, and of the arguments both for and 
against it used in Congress when it was passed. This article is followed 
t by a second one by H. E. Cook, author of “Plow Handle Talks,” stating 
why he is opposed to it. 
In publishing these two statements, we are putting all of the facts 
we could obtain on this proposed legislation before you in the belief 
that when you have all of the information you will be able to arrive at 
correct and just conclusions. — The Editor. 
Why I Am Opposed to the Child Labor Amendment 
H. E. Cook Gives Some Reasons Why He Is Against Its Ratification 
M AYBE I am not qualified to speak 
on the proposed amendment to our 
federal constitution giving Congress the 
power to prohibit or to regulate the labor 
of children under the age of 18 years. 
And on the other hand, maybe I am 
qualified. If not, then pass this—if I am, 
listen. 
I have written and spoken openly for a 
good many years, more than thirty, 
against the prevention of farm youth 
from receiving a school education because 
they were kept home and away from 
educational influences until an age when 
other habits had been formed and all 
desire had been lost for the knowledge 
that comes through our public school and 
college system. 
Some First-Hand Experience 
I have been in a good many farm homes 
soliciting students for the St. Lawrence 
State School of Agriculture, where very 
capable parents were restraining their 
young men, less often the girls, of the 
family from getting an education because 
they wanted their labor at home—very 
seldom are the boys wanted at home 
because of their administrative ability, 
but for the physical labor involved. And 
I am wondering now how long rural life 
i can stand this sort of viewpoint. But at 
kflie same time the proposed regulation is 
Ear more dangerous — the first problem 
■ ill be settled as economic conditions are 
jL>re nearly balanced and the farm has its 
Bare of industrial favor, if we grant that 
Bat it has not now. 
■ The proposed plan becomes in its 
■t tlement wholly political and our 
experience has not been especially satis¬ 
factory in the political control of economic 
problems. If the motive back of this 
proposed law is righteous, surely farm 
children cannot be exempted, and then 
what? When reduced down to its final 
working analysis, I doubt about the en¬ 
forcement of any such law on farms—no 
legal supervision so far as my imagination 
ventures can be made available without a 
supervisory agent in every farm home— 
many children who are not very ambitious 
would welcome with delight a chance to 
back up against the United States Con¬ 
stitution when asked by their parents to 
fill up the woodbox, or bring the cows, or 
to do innumerable things that _ are 
humanly sound and sensible. Who is to 
interpret for the dairy farm or for the 
trucking farm w r here the labor on each is 
unlike that on the other? Or on one farm 
where labor is plenty and the parents 
have well-balanced viewpoints and on 
another where the opposite prevails? Do 
you think we are inviting anarchy and 
chaos? I fear the remedy for a lack of 
school training is worse than the disease. 
Work Does Young Folks Good 
Reasonable rules are possible of execu¬ 
tion in shops and factories but not on 
farms. I expect that a majority of edu¬ 
cators and employers of labor having to 
do with farm boys and girls in after life, 
will say that city children would be more 
efficient and effective when they take 
their places in life if they had been 
privileged to have these same advantages 
now possessed by farm boys and girls. 
My observation is that there are com¬ 
paratively few r young folks overworked in 
school or out. I am acquainted with 
many over 18 and under 18 who are over¬ 
dissipated in an endless number of ways— 
lack of sleep, overeating and hilarious 
society. Most young folks of the. so- 
called nervous type who are specially 
pitied by their parents will get over their 
trouble if put to bed early and allowed to 
get up when rested and fed wdiolesome 
food only, and obliged by their parents 
and teachers to do worthwhile work. 
Not As Dangerous As Loafing 
When young farm laborers yawn all the 
forenoon because of dissipation and lack 
of sleep the night before and complain of 
the hard work they have to do, you know 
and I know where the trouble is. During 
my school experience there was always 
ready one stock-phrase in reply to the 
overworked student, “no normal young 
or middle-aged person who has eight 
hours of sound sleep every twenty-four 
hours and is properly fed can be over¬ 
worked in the remaining sixteen hours.” 
When we run down the exceptions to this 
rule w'e shall find either some organic 
trouble which should be removed or that 
the eight hours a day sound sleep is not 
that kind at all, or that some way the 
actual truth of the case has been tampered 
with. Nature has provided in most of us 
a strain of laziness which provides against 
danger. There will be more young people 
injured by automobiles in the next twelve 
months than by overwork. So far as I 
have been able to judge in the time since 
my birth, December 12, 1858, this over¬ 
work business is principally indisposition 
and bunk, in this United States of 
America, and we don’t want any consti¬ 
tutional amendment or legislative enact¬ 
ment to prevent plain, old-fashioned 
work. On our youngsters, on the other 
hand, we can safely use more home 
discipline and in some cases the “birch” 
of my youthful days. And from the larger 
number to be acted upon as compared to a 
half-century ago and because we are, 
through inventive genius, building up a 
machine-age someone should be able to 
contrive a way of handling this piece of 
flexible hardwood by gasoline motive 
power and thereby save a lot of human 
energy for other purposes. 
Farmers Against It 
Now if I am right in this matter a 
campaign should be started at once after 
election to make ; t clear to legislators that 
this proposed amendment has more bad 
than good in it so far as the farm is 
concerned. 
It is a painful forecast to me of what the 
future will be to note this tendency to go 
to our law-making bodies for action upon 
so many things that come properly under 
the function of the home. Germany tried 
out detailed human control by govern¬ 
ment law and action and the results are 
pretty well known. How many of our 
readers will say that our homes are having 
taken away some of those very funda¬ 
mentals that have made us a strong 
nation? 
To be up-to-date every village must 
have a men’s club and a women’s club for 
evening assembly and now in order to 
{Continued on page 334) 
