Solution of the Child Labor Problem/Chapter 5
CHAPTER V
THE CAUSES OF CHILD LABOR
I. The Discussion of Causes
In the voluminous literature which, has recently appeared on the general subject of cMld labor, little careful attention has been devoted to the causes underlying the problem. The history of child labor has been related; its evils have been depicted in minutest detail; remedies innumerable have been suggested; but nowhere has particular emphasis been laid upon the reasons for its existence. Child labor literature clearly shows that many of the writers have assumed certain causes and then, with this assumption as a basis, they have proceeded to devise and apply remedies.
This chapter aims to show that the coercive, legislative remedies that have been adopted are not calculated to work a permanent cure for the evils of child labor, because they are directed at its result rather than at its cause.
What are the causes of modern child labor? An answer to the question may be found by discussing four general groups of causes:—(1) industrial evolution; (2) greed; (3) necessity; (4) ignorance and indifference. The next few pages will be devoted to an analysis of these groups in order to ascertain, if possible, which one or which combination of them is the moving force which has sent three-quarters of a million of children into the industries of the United States.
II. Industrial Evolution
Without the factory system child labor in its present form would be impossible. During a period of 150 years industry has gone from the home to the factory, involving in the transition the minute subdivisions of labor which must necessarily accompany work on a large scale. The operations requiring skill are performed by skilled persons, and those which are purely mechanical are performed by an unskilled laborer until a machine is invented to replace him.
Modern invention has gone so deeply into the details of mechanical operations, and division of labor has rendered the part which any one man performs so simple, that it is an easy matter to substitute the actions of a machine for the mechanical, standardized work of an unskilled or often of a semi-skilled laborer. Hence modern machinery; hence the opportunity for machine tending,—a purely mechanical task, possible even for a child; hence the opportunity for an unskilled child to become a part of the most intricate system of manufacturing, by performing one infinitely small operation in connection with many other operations, which, combined and unified, result in a substantial product.
Can this industrial evolution which has remade industry be described as a cause of child labor? If this view of the situation be accepted, it is apparent that the responsibility for the prevalence and increase of child labor in a modern community may be placed upon the character of modern industry.
In the South, where child labor in the cotton mills has developed some of the worst child labor conditions with which the country must contend, machinery is being built just high enough to accommodate a child. Is it, however, fair to say that the child labor in the Southern mills is due to the character of the machinery which is being introduced into those mills?
An unknowing organism, such as a machine, can scarcely be held responsible, if, while operated by human intelligence, it becomes a party to a social wrong; yet the responsibility must rest somewhere. Is it reasonable to place the responsibility for child labor upon a machine which is being used, as the servant of man? Such an explanation is clearly inadequate. It leads to no conclusion as to the cause that is sending the children to work.
The evolution of modern industry unquestionably forms the basis upon which child labor rests; but so does the use of fire; so the atmosphere; so the old earth herself. Modern industry forms the basis for the existence of child labor, just as the crust on the surface of the earth forms the basis for man's life. Each allows of the continuance of certain activities, but in neither case can the immediate cause be traced to modern industry or to the earth's crust. The earth's crust is never spoken of as the "cause" of men's activity; no more can modern industry be described as the cause of child labor. Child labor without modern industry would be impossible, yet modern industry cannot be described as the active cause which is at present leading children to work.
Where, then, can the responsibility be laid? It must clearly depend on some personal factor. Can the responsibility be laid upon the parent who, in ignorance of what the ultimate consequences will be, sends the child out to labor in the fields of modern industry; upon the parent who is compelled by the presence of many children and few dollars to supplement the family income in every conceivable manner in order to provide an adequate subsistence?
And what can be said of the manufacturer who employs the children, often in ignorance of the facts, but with adequate opportunity to discover them if he so desires? Of the manufacturer who pays $2 or $3 as wages for child labor, and takes an enormous surplus in profits? Of the manufacturer who knowingly, for the sake of an extra automobile or some other plaything that may appeal to his fancy, takes from the children the vitality and life which he can never replace? Of the employer who pays his adult laborers such low wages that it is a physical impossibility for them to bring up a family and procure not the luxuries, but the bare necessities of life, and who are, therefore, compelled to send their children at the earliest moment into the mills?
And what shall the community which permits such a system to prevail answer for itself? The community which allows an employer to pay wages that are below the line of possible subsistence, and to take from the children services for which, he gives no adequate return; which allows parents, often through blind greed, to live from the work of their children; which allows the child, the future mainstay of civilization, to enter upon a life that may lead to physical, mental, and moral decay or ruin?
Which one, or which combination of these factors is sending children to work?
III. Greed as a Cause of Child Labor
Greed means a desire for appetite satisfaction. Defined thus, how extensively does it enter as a cause of child labor?
"They most all leave after their First Communion. The boys want to gamble, and some of the girls want to buy fancy ribbons, so they go to work, and in a short time you tell them by the 'factory voice,'—all the factory children have it,—especially the girls." In these words the principal of a large parochial school portrayed the greed of the child, and it is a very real factor in the situation. From many homes children go out to work, not because there is any necessity nor even any wish on the part of the parent, but because the child longs to become a wage-earner, and indulge in freedom which comes only with pocket money. Among the great majority of boys pocket money is a rarity unless they are at work, and in view of the character of modern ideals, it is not strange that the average youngster should be so anxious to get his share.
In the small industrial towns, many cases are found where the child leaves school against the parents' wishes and goes to work. When compelled to return to school, the child "plays hookey," and gets back to the factory, or mine, or mill, where his friends are employed. "All the boys is at work, and I ain't goin' to go to school," is an attitude often found where most of the boys work, and where, if nine members of "the gang" are earning wages, it requires strenuous pulling in the opposite direction to keep the last member in school.
The age of youth is the age of education. Children are not expected to form mature judgments, nor to understand what things are best for them to do, hence it is manifestly ridiculous to expect the child to be able to decide judiciously between the school, with its education, and work, with its freedom and pocket money.
The desire of the child to get money, and the things which money buys, can scarcely be classed as greed, nor can it be assigned as a moving cause of child labor. It is rather an incidental one. On the other hand, there is a greed of parents which deserves the most absolute condemnation.
In one soft-coal mining town a man was found who, though hale and hearty, spent most of his time carousing at the saloon. He was enabled to do this because his three boys, of nineteen, seventeen, and eleven, were steadily employed in the mines, where they were able to make an average of about $100 a month, when the work was good. The family owned a farm of sixty-five acres, a good house and barn, and a horse and cow. One sister was making good wages "working out," and the mother did her best. Thus, in spite of father's idleness, the family lived very well and kept him in liquor besides.
Such cases are comparatively rare in the North, but in the South the prevalence of child labor and parental idleness is notorious, and has developed into a definite social custom. A poor white, idling at mid-day around the saloon in a small Southern town, is said to have replied to an investigator, "What all's the use of me workin' when I have three head of gals in the mill?"
"Greedy and indifferent parents," you will say. That is very true. These cases, and many like them which might be cited, present that side of the problem. There are parents who consider their children as an asset from which they have a right to live, as they would live from their horses, or garden patches, or any other possession. Yet these cases are the exception rather than the rule. "Greedy and indifferent parents" are not so prevalent in the community as many writers on child labor would have their readers suppose. Cases constantly come to light, where, for a mess of pottage, parents sell their children into industrial slavery. Yet a close acquaintance with the parents of working children shows that they are very much like other parents. They love their children as much and have as much care for their well-being as other fathers and mothers. They send them to work, as a rule, only when necessity demands it.
Would many "pocket-money-saving" children and a few greedy parents have caused the child labor problem? Undoubtedly not. Neither childish love of money nor parental greed can be assigned as a leading cause, nor even as an important cause of child labor.
Can the same be said of the greedy employer,—greedy, not for children, but for profits; the manufacturer who must needs have profits even though he grind up a few children's futures in the getting of them?
All manufacturers are not greedy. Many give attention and study to the child labor problem, because they feel that it is hurting them as well as the public at large, but there are a group of manufacturers who are madly struggling for wealth, and so madly do they struggle, that they overlook all human relations and obligations. Wealth they must have, and that quickly. Children are worn out in the process? No matter. Homes are wrecked and the community made poorer by the loss of some of its best bone and sinew? No matter. Look at our ledger, look at our cashbook, look at our undivided surplus! Look at them,—and then behind them.
Such employers are in the smallest minority, yet when they exist in a competitive industry, their competitors must do as they do or go out of business. Morris Hillquit once said, in the course of a speech:—"If Jesus Christ came on earth to-day and established a coat shop on Hester Street, he would be forced to do one of two things,—either to exploit his workers or to go out of business." The same thing holds good for child labor. The meanest, hardest, cheapest employer sets the pace. One such can force nineteen others to provide for their employees the most rigorous of working conditions, or fall behind in the race for business.
It is to protect the children from this class of employers that child labor laws are enacted. They are men hungering after profits,—and when they take them in the form of children, the community balances the account. But competition is disappearing from industry, and is being replaced by combination. Moreover, manufacturers are coming to see, more and more, the undesirability and the unprofitableness of child labor. Child labor has ceased to be an industrial benefit and has become instead an industrial detriment. And the thinking manufacturer recognizes this fact. But even granting for the sake of argument that the average employer is a profit-hungry, child-grabbing ogre, it would be impossible for the children to get into the mills unless they were willing to go, or unless their parents were willing to send them. The manufacturer may provide the means for child labor, but he cannot secure the children without their consent, or that of their parents.
The statements which are constantly made, laying the entire blame for child labor upon the manufacturer, are, therefore, unfounded and unfair. The employer may, as in the case of industrial evolution, make child labor possible, but he does not actively cause it. There is still another factor—the greedy public. "Give us dividends," cry the stock-holders, "give us dividends, and big ones!" and the president of the company, with his salary at stake, turns in the children. "Give us bargains," cry the consumers, " give us bargains, and cheap ones," and the retailer, his business at stake, turns to the sweat shop and child labor.
A demand for cheap finery, for bargains, for cheap goods of all kinds, is a demand on the sweat shop and on child labor. Child labor goods are cheap goods. The South has found this true to her cost. It requires skill to produce quality as much as it ever did before the invention of the machinery which is doing the heavy and mechanical work of the world.
But the public, by its insatiable demand for cheapness, furnishes the manufacturer with the incentive for cheap production. He, in turn, advertises for child labor. One factor is the complement of the other. Neither, however, furnishes an explanation of the hosts of working children in all parts of the country. The public may demand tawdry products; the machinery may be built to accommodate a child; the manufacturer may advertise, "Small girls wanted," but why do the small girls come? For the explanation search must be made elsewhere.
IV. Necessity and Child Labor
"When I was a boy of seven, I went to work, and I don't see any good reason why boys shouldn't do it now. I learned my business that way, and from my point of view, it's better to learn it by starting at the bottom and working up." This attitude is a common one, but much less common than it was ten years ago. Men are learning that their doing things in a particular way furnishes no good reason why the next generation should do things in the same way. Progress can be made only when each generation does things a little differently.
There are still a few people who use the "I started to work at seven" argument to prevent the enactment of child labor legislation, but a careful review of the facts in the case shows that these men "started to work at seven" as helpers on a farm or in a country store, where all-round educational work was the daily routine. The owner of the farm or store was a friend of the family, and "wanted to see Jim's kid get a good start." From first to last there was a close personal contact between the "boss" and the boy. From work on such a basis, it is a long and fatal step to work in a modern factory or mill, or store, where all is minute subdivision of tasks and of responsibility.
The boy who went to work on a farm or in a country store, "learned the business" early because the head of the business had a keen interest in his success, and kept close watch of every stage in his progress. He was given the best chance that there was to succeed. At all times he was under the watchful eye of "the firm." Under modern industrial conditions the boy starting to work has little more chance of "learning the business," than a British tar has of becoming Lord High Admiral. Furthermore, one-third of the child laborers are girls who do not wish to "learn the business,"—who are not even wanted in the business. They have a commodity to sell,—their labor,—and they are willing to sell it cheaply to the employer who hires them. It is a mere matter of bargain and sale.
Again, the school has to-day in large measure replaced the "learning a business" in the old way. Some firms, particularly those engaged in technical work, will scarcely take any but college men in the higher branches of their business. There is a great and an increasing demand for men trained in Trade and Manual Training Schools, and such are given the preference. The time is past when it is necessary for a boy to go to work at seven or ten, or even fourteen, to learn the business. It is becoming a universal rule in many houses to insist on the completion of a certain amount of high school or college work before starting in business. There is no longer a necessity for the child to go to work at an early age in order to learn to do his part of the world's work.
Clearly, then, from the standpoint of the child, there is no excuse for his working at an early age. There is no necessity of child labor for a "learning of the business." But there are other sides to the necessity problem. From the standpoint of the child, there is no necessity. What of the parent?
"The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose." The man looking for a justification of some policy will most easily find it in a plea that a particular act is necessary to prevent individual hardship and suffering.
It is probably fair to say that no legislature which ever met to discuss a child labor bill was not confronted with the "widowed mother" argument. Indeed, it sometimes happens that the very firm whose unguarded machinery snuffed out the life of the father, will plead hardest for the protection of the "helpless widow and her baby orphans," and will allow the "baby orphans" to get the same place in the same factory that was responsible for the death of the father.
It is a noticeable fact that the "widowed mother" argument is always used by the employer—never by the labor union interests which, representing the interests of the woman and her children, to whom they may well be paying death benefits, is almost unanimous in urging greater restrictions on the employment of children.
The necessity of the "widowed mother," so often and so effectively used to prevent the change of bad conditions, is clearly representative of only a small portion of working children. Probably not more than one working child in a hundred is the sole support of a widowed mother. At the present time there is, however, a great group of workers in the United States whose wages are so low as to make it practically impossible for them to provide a decent living for their children.
Aside from the necessity arising in the family because of the disability of its head, there are cases in every community of men employed as unskilled and as semi-skilled laborers, who have large families,—their name is legion. The average pay of such men is $1.50 a day, or $9.00 a week. In a modern city one-fifth of this income goes for rent. Setting aside 25 cents a week for light, and 50 cents for fuel, there remains $6.50. A man and his wife and four children, ranging in ages from one to seven years, will thus have less than a dollar a day to pay for clothing, medicine, car fare, and extras. If we allow two-thirds of this $6.50 for food, it will mean that each of the twenty-one meals eaten in the week must be gotten for 20 cents,—a 20-eent meal for six persons.
The words, "greedy and indifferent parents" are often emphasized in speaking and writing about child labor. In the case of the unskilled worker, the parent who sends the children to work at fourteen or even thirteen, is neither greedy nor indifferent. Eliminating the "widowed mother," there is a family necessity, common in every industrial community, which results in the child's being sent to the mill. Here is a clear undoubted case of necessity,—a necessity which is being felt more keenly every day as the rise in wages lags behind the jump in the cost of living. It is a necessity so real that children are sent to the mills, not because parents are "greedy and indifferent," but because the whole amount which a hard-working day laborer can earn will not keep his family supplied with the necessities, not to mention the luxuries of life.
In addition to pleading for the widow and the orphan, the employer who fights child labor legislation invariably pleads for himself. The point is well illustrated by a comment from the National Glass Budget, published in Pittsburg and representing the glass manufacturing interest.
Let it be borne in mind that in New York children under sixteen work only eight hours per day, and those hours must be between eight a.m. and five p.m.; in Illinois no child under sixteen may work after seven p.m. or before seven a.m.; but in Pennsylvania children of fourteen may work in glass houses at any hour of the day or night, providing this working time does not exceed eight consecutive hours. In view of these facts, and of a law prepared to bring legislation in Pennsylvania nearer the high standard attained by New York and Illinois, the Budget says:—In other words, our legislators will be requested to lend their support to a movement which, if successful, will drive out [1]of our state the industries which have lifted her up to the proud position of first place in the galaxy of states."
It is a common argument often heard, and echoed and re-echoed in the legislative halls. In Pennsylvania the argument was crystallized into the law of 1905. No child, says the law, under sixteen, may work between the hours of nine p.m. and six a.m., except "where the material in process of manufacture" would be wasted if allowed to stand over night, and, "to prevent waste or destruction of such material," boys of fourteen may work at any hour of the night. Blessed "material in process of manufacture," what crimes do Americans commit in thy name!
As has already been pointed out, manufacturers are coming to see more and more clearly that child labor is not necessary to industry, but is in most cases positively harmful. Tradition decrees that in glass bottle works, children of nine and ten must be hired to carry the bottles because they are "nimble" and can "handle themselves," yet in certain factories machinery has been introduced which replaces the boys and saves money.
What part does "Necessity" play among the causes of child labor? The necessary thing for a young American to do is to attend school. There is no necessity for his working in order to "learn the business." The necessity of child labor to the manufacturer is traditional rather than real. The only really important part played by necessity, is the actual need of the great group of parents whose wage is so low as to preclude the possibility of bringing up their family decently, in the absence of some addition to the man's wage. And this necessity of the unskilled worker's family is a real, vital cause sending children to work.
V. Ignorance and Indifference as Causes of Child Labor
The average child likes to "earn money." There is a fascination about it, and an excitement accompanying it that is well nigh irresistible to the healthy American boy.
"How do you like the mines, Tom?" I asked a fourteen-year-old boy who had been working for some time in a soft-coal mine. "I don't like 'em. Just at first it was all to the good. We was dirty and nobody said nothin' to us. We used to carry dinner-pails and the school kids wished they was us. It went good for a month or so, and then I begins to get tired, and wants to lay off, but 'No sir,' says the old man, 'you started in and you got to stick at it.' It ain't no fun after the first month, I can tell ye."
This case is typical of a large number. It is no uncommon thing to find children going to work with all the enthusiasm of childhood, taking up a "job," and soon tiring of it. By that time, however, the parents have felt the added value of the wages of the child to the family income, and there is a tendency to insist on the child's staying at work, even in cases where the parent originally insisted that the child remain in school.
Investigations have shown that when the child does get tired of one job and quits, he simply goes to some other form of labor. From this arises one of the worst abuses of child labor, the rapid change from one industry to another, and the consequent failure to become proficient along any line. Thus, in addition to the evil effects of the work and lack of schooling, the child early acquires the "moving on" habit, which grows up with the constant changing of jobs, and, if fully developed, results inevitably in the professional "tramp," who is always "moving on."
The child goes to work through ignorance of the real conditions of life, and of the good things sacrificed. A bright lad in school often becomes a stolid drudge in the factory, never learning, never rising, condemned because of inefficiency to be a common drudge to the end of his days.
The children are ignorant of the step they are taking when they begin to work in a factory without having had a chance to learn the best things in the schools, while without the consent of parents this step would be impossible. Yet, the child who goes to work in ignorance of conditions and of ultimate consequences, is by no means culpable, nor is it reasonable to describe childish ignorance as a cause of child labor.
In many families a real need exists for the wages that the child can earn, because the wage of the father is so low that he cannot support himself. In many other cases, the parents are not actively interested in the question of the school and of child labor.
"I don't believe it hurts Sam to work nights," said one father; "he's strong and he likes the work." The boy was fourteen years old. But the parent had never been taught that the growing body needs a certain quota of rest which in the average household, because of the turmoil and noise going on by day, can be secured only at night.
When a child says, "I don't want to go to school any more, I'm going to work," parents are apt to acquiesce, instead of asserting their authority and compelling the child to obtain at least a minimum amount of schooling. Here, too, there is not only ignorance of the most pronounced sort, but, in some cases, an indifference as to what really becomes of the child.
The manager of a large factory seldom sees his "kids." The "business end" of the work occupies his entire attention. Competition is sharp and he is constantly struggling for supremacy in a market which is dominated by men who are fighting for profits. The manager looks after the "business end," and leaves to his superintendents the task of hiring and discharging the help and seeing that they are cared for in accordance with the provisions of the factory law. In a few cases, much fewer than they should really be, the manufacturer makes provisions not required by law. The great majority, however, simply handle their "business," leaving to their foremen or superintendents the task of complying with the law.
In many factories, even the provisions of the law are not observed, because the "business end" of the work is "running behind," and "business comes first every time."
"Good God! Do these children work in my factory?" represents the position not of one, but of many manufacturers. It would fall from the lips of thousands could they be confronted with the conditions of their mills as they actually exist.
The majority of manufacturers are, however, neither ignorant nor indifferent, but alive to the undesirability of child employment. Even in the case of the minority who are ignorant of conditions, or indifferent to law, it cannot be fairly said that their attitude constitutes a cause of child labor. It helps to make child labor possible, but it is not a moving factor, leading children to the mills.
Aside from the ignorance of the child, the indifference of some parents, the ignorance of many others, and the devotion of employees to the "business end" of their work to the exclusion of the "human end," there is a cause of child labor more potent and far-reaching than all of these combined, for it includes them all,—the ignorance and indifference of society. Attention has already been called to the social greed, the demand for things—many and cheap,—and the fact that such a demand inevitably leads to the production of cheap goods by cheap labor.
Cheap labor means the sweat shops and the labor of little children. Could the average member of the purchasing public be made to see the revolting conditions out of which "bargain" products come, and to demand goods made under fair conditions, a long step would have been taken toward solving the child labor problem. Such a result can be attained only by education extending over a long series of years. The public mind is slow to move, and even slower to change from an old, deep rut.
The social demand for cheap goods makes it possible for manufacturers to employ children, but it does not send the children to work. The chief factor in doing that, also a result of social ignorance and indifference, is the school system.
The fact that 186,000 children, between ten and thirteen, are employed in the United States in gainful occupations other than agriculture, is a proof conclusive that the community has failed to insist upon school attendance. Even when the children are kept out of the factories they are not in the schools, and it is in that fact that the leading cause of child labor may be read.
"The most potent reason, in my opinion, why the children are in the factory, is our school system," says Jean M. Gordon, a Louisiana factory inspector. A careful canvass of any group of child laborers will reveal the fact that this statement is absolutely true. The average working child would far rather work in the factory than return to school.
VI. The Why of Child Labor
The preceding analysis of industrial evolution, greed, necessity, and ignorance and indifference, narrows the field of causes to two. The average child laborer goes to work because his family needs the income, or because he "hates school." Often, both reasons are operating.
Family necessity is a prime cause of child labor. It is not, as many writers would lead us to believe, dire poverty which sends children to work. The wolf could be kept from the door without the aid of the children, but then there is a difference between warding off starvation, "the wolf," and maintaining the family on a wholesome diet. The wages of the father alone will buy food and keep back the wolf. An additional $3 a week will buy more food and insure a better diet. The parent chooses the better diet for the family, and the child goes to work.
The child goes to work because the father cannot earn enough to support the family; the father's earning power is low either because his training has been defective, or because low-standard people, usually immigrants, are bidding against him for jobs, and are willing to live on very little; in the competitive struggle for jobs, the lowest bidder gets the work, and sets a standard to which the others must conform; and this standard has been set so low that men cannot provide a decent living for their families.
It is impossible to say just what proportion of the workers of the United States are receiving wages which are so low that they are compelled to supplement them by sending their children to the factory. There are, however, figures which roughly indicate the facts.
Dr. Robert C. Chapin analyzed a series of schedules of workingmen's family expenditures, collected in Manhattan Island, and concluded that:—"An income of $900 or over probably permits the maintenance of a normal standard, at least so far as the physical man is concerned.…"
These figures were compiled for the Borough of Manhattan, but, with the exception of rent, none of the other items would be materially reduced in any large-sized industrial town or city. According to this analysis $900 is a minimum wage which will permit the maintenance of physical efficiency for a man, wife, and three children under fourteen years of age. What proportion of the families in the United States receive $900?
An investigation made in 1903 by the United States Department of Labor covered 25,440 families, among which the average total income was $749.50. These families were of wage-earners, and were taken from all of the representative states and industrial centers. Of 610 native families having three children, the average income was $666. Of 518 foreign families having three children, the average income was $654.
The most recent wage investigation is that made by the United States Commissioner of Labor into wages in the Bethlehem Steel Works.[2] In all, 9,184 men were employed. Of this number
- 48.5 % were receiving less than 16 cents per hour ($550 per year).
- 74.5 % were receiving less than 22 cents per hour ($675 per year).
- 91.8 % were receiving less than 30 cents per hour ($950 per year).
The discrepancy between the minimum physical efficiency standard, $900, and the wages actually received, is startling. To be sure, the $900 estimate was made for New York City, while the wage figures refer to the country at large, and to a small city, but a discrepancy still exists.
Here, then, is a real cause of child labor. It is clearly a social and economic one; social in so far as society is responsible for maintaining its children—economic in so far as the smallness of the income of a definite group in the community does not enable the man to provide adequately for the needs of his family. In no sense is it an individual cause.
The second important cause of child labor to which allusion has been made is the desire of the child to go to work. The average child has two alternatives—work and school. Few children choose the school. A little questioning of school children will show that most of them—particularly the boys,—detest school and long for work. A similar questioning of working children will show an all but universal preference for work. The reasons given for this preference are various, but the preference remains the same,—in favor of work and against the school.
What elements in the educational institutions of the country lead to such widespread dislike on the part of the children? This question, put to hundreds of children, is answered in hundreds of different ways. In general, however, the objections have reference to:—(1) the curriculum; (2) the school machinery; (3) the teachers; (4) the discipline.
If, as Spencer maintains, the object of education is complete living, then manifestly the purpose of the school should be to take children from the home at the age of six or seven or eight, and so train them that at the age of fifteen or sixteen or seventeen, they are prepared to take their places in the world, and do it efficiently. The education of the school should have a direct bearing on life and the boy or girl with the most complete education should, therefore, be best prepared to live. Surprising though it may seem, this is not the case in the United States, because the educational system is not so shaped as to appeal either to the parent or the child.
The boy of twelve who wishes to continue school has no choice. Be his mind square, triangular, or hexagonal, it will be hammered, pushed, and pulled through the same round hole, the school curriculum, which has been worn smooth and polished by the passage of other minds, square, triangular, hexagonal, which were one and all hammered, pushed, and pulled through the identical round school curriculum in the same manner. The boy of twelve who wishes to go to work has an infinite variety of choices before him. Each business holds out a different inducement, appealing to a peculiar temperament. There is no attempt at uniformity. Every opportunity is offered for individual selection.
The boy faces the dilemma presented by the school on the one hand and employment on the other. The school offers monotony, sameness, discipline, and dependence; while employment offers interest, variety, freedom, and pocket money. In view of these facts, it is small wonder that the boy chooses employment. The choices presented by employment to the girl are not so overwhelmingly attractive, but they are, nevertheless, sufficient, and becoming more so every day, to win multitudes of girls away from the school.
The failure of the school to reach the child is clearly indicated by the astounding degree of illiteracy in the United States. Dr. Andrew S. Draper, New York's Commissioner of Education, says:—
"In Chicago or New York there is a much larger percentage of people ten years old and more who can neither read nor write than there is in London, or Paris, or Berlin, or Zurich, or Copenhagen, or even Tokio.… The immigration is an inadequate explanation. There is a larger percentage of illiterate children of native born than of foreign born parents in the state of New York. This statement is also true of Illinois."[3]
The presence of this group of illiterates indicates clearly that the schools are failing to fulfill their allotted sphere in the community; but why? Dr. Draper indicates clearly:—
"We cannot exculpate the schools. They are as wasteful of child life as are the homes. From bottom to the top of the American educational system we take little account of the time of the child. We are anxious to do everything under the sun, and to put into the head of the young child all that it is expected to know."[4]
The opinion of Dr. Draper is corroborated and confirmed by Dr. Woods Hutchinson, who says:—"This utter lack of appeal of the public school curriculum to the working boy of thirteen or more, is one of the principal causes of the rush of child labor into the shop and the factory,[5]
It is not only the school curriculum that is distasteful.[6] The child is prone to leave school because of three other considerations within the school itself. They will be mentioned rather than discussed. They are:—
1. The incompetent school teachers.
2. The defective school equipment.
3. The repressive school discipline.
Instead of twenty, the ideal number of children in the elementary grades, the large cities of the country show an average of from thirty to forty scholars per teacher. A girl of twenty, graduating from a normal school in June, is not competent in September to take charge of forty pupils and make their work interesting and beneficial, especially when she is handicapped by the inability of the foreign children to understand English. In spite of the patency of this fact, thousands of girls are being yearly hurried through the normal schools, and given charge of large classes of children while they are but children themselves. It does not follow, however, that the girl is at fault. Meager appropriations for educational purposes necessitate large classes and small salaries. Society cannot hope to have the cake and eat it. Competent teachers can be secured only by providing reasonable salaries.
With classes averaging forty small childdren, discipline is essential. If a group of forty children once break from the control of the teacher, all is lost,—Bedlam is the result. In consequence all such teachers, but particularly the younger and less experienced, are laboring under a constant strain. The problem with them is not "How shall I teach?" but, "How shall I maintain discipline?"
This discipline becomes irksome. It is, for the average child, a burden grievous to bear, and, revolting under this burden, the children leave school, preferring the comparative freedom of the factory and the mine.
After a careful study of 666 children who left school in New York City during 1908, Mary Flexner concludes:—"The reasons assigned [for leaving school] show that the children are not in harmony with the present school environment."[7]
Good work is impossible and interest must necessarily flag, in dark, poorly ventilated, and overcrowded classrooms. When the ideal class for elementary work is twenty, good results cannot be secured, nor even anticipated, in classes containing four times that number.
Another factor which militates against continuance in school is the repressive character of the school discipline. To "sit in order" and "study" are occupations which grow dreadfully monotonous. Bodily energy accumulates, and must be worked off, yet in the average school no provision whatever is made for any kind of exercise that will relieve the feelings. Manual training in some form would answer, but that requires money, and no extra funds are forthcoming.
Thus the school system with its defective curriculum, its imperfect, overworked machinery, its young, inexperienced teachers, and its repressive discipline, forms in the aggregate an ogre from which the child turns to the burden and the soul-destroying monotony of factory work.
Here, then, are two causes, the needy family and the defective school system, which are immediately responsible for child labor. Personal causes—greed, ignorance, and indifference of manufacturer, parent, and child—are insignificant factors. The causes of child labor are primarily economic and social. If society is not responsible for the inability of parents to provide for the support of their children, it is at least responsible for the support of those children while they are securing an education, and whatever may be said regarding social responsibility for good feeding, society is clearly responsible for not providing an educational system that will hold the children out of the mills.
Briefly the causes of child labor may be thus stated:—The system of modern industry with its labor-saving appliances, its means of employing mechanical power, and its division of labor, makes the manufacture of cheap goods possible; an insatiable public demand for quantity rather than quality leads the manufacturer to turn out many things and cheap ones; in turning out these cheap goods, the manufacturer, through the division of labor and the development of machinery, is enabled to employ children; in a competitive industry if one manufacturer adopts a cheap device, the others must do likewise or go bankrupt, and thus is created, out of the system of competitive industry, the condition which always permits and at times requires the employment of children. Two other factors enter prominently as causes of child labor. They are the moving causes that are actively operating to send children to work,—
so low as to preclude the possibility of his bringing up a family without some outside aid. This is often secured
by sending the children to work.curriculum, rigorous discipline, and low-paid, inexperienced teachers, is heartily detested by the average boy, and probably by the average girl, who take the first opportunity to escape from its monotony and confinement to the
freedom of work.
- ↑ National Glass Budget, December 22, 1906.
- ↑ Report on Strike at Bethlehem Steel Works. By Charles P. Neill, Washington, 1910. P. 60.
- ↑ "Conserving Childhood." By Andrew S. Draper, LL.B., LL.D., Commissioner of Education of the State of New York. Proceedings of the Fifth Annual Conference, National Child Labor Committee, 1909. Pp. 3-4.
- ↑ Supra, p. 9.
- ↑ "Overworked Children." By Woods Hutchinson, M.D. Proceedings Fifth Annual Conference, National Child Labor Committee, 1909. P. 120.
- ↑ American Education. By Andrew S. Draper. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin Co., 1909. A justly severe arraignment of the present school system.
- ↑ "A Plea for Vocational Training." By Mary Flexner. The Survey, vol. xxii, p. 651.