Duncan King
US Hist 102
Tuesday Night Class
Paper #1
October 1st, 2013
Childhood
Prior to the 1920’s, children were commonly abused, not cared for, and even left to die. This had to do with the situation their parents were in, as well as their perspective on childhood in general. The concept of childhood used to be very different than ours generally is today, as death rates were high, family size was large, children were commonly abused, and children were often employed, working in horrible conditions. As the circumstances of children were brought to the public’s attention, reform was soon achieved. This is greatly owed to the “muckrakers,” who were the writers that detailed these conditions to the attention of the public. The overall quality of life of children was greatly improved through reform, and a new definition of childhood was brought with it. Children lived in horrifying conditions before reform was achieved in the early 20th century. They often worked in coalmines or sweatshops for up to twenty hours a day. This helps understand the perspectives of the people living at this time, towards children, as the children weren’t too different from adults, earning wages by spending their days working. In some cases, children worked for weeks in factories without receiving any pay. They did this for the hope of receiving employment after the weeks in which they worked for free. However, employers were well aware of this and often took advantage of the children by either not hiring them in the end of their free labor, or moving after the few weeks to a different area to find more free labor. Outside of being mistreated for labor, children often did not receive care from their parents at home. High infant mortality rates and large family size contributes to this, as it’s harder for a mother of ten to care for all her children, knowing a few are bound to die. “A mother and four children. The youngest, a babe of five months, was found emaciated and apparently dying from starvation. The mother had offered to give the child to any one who would take it. Its body was completely raw from neglect. A boy of three was nearly naked….” (Wheeler. Discovering the American Past. Boston, MA. 1901). In this case, the mother could not afford to care for her four children, so she hoped someone would take them off her hands as she let them die of starvation. This wasn’t uncommon during the time period, as there were many low wage industrial jobs that left a large amount of people in poverty. Children were abused in all aspects of their lives, and people became accustomed to it. It took people challenging the idea and bringing it to the publics eye to bring change. Muckrakers, or journalists who publicized shocking, investigative stories on issues such as child treatment, are responsible for the reform that finally came. Their articles appeared in magazines, such as the McClure Magazine, Cosmopolitan, and Munsey’s. One of the most famous of these journalists is Lewis W. Hine, who printed over 500 photographs of social injustices, such as child labor. Things began to change as people saw these shocking pictures, of kids as young as five working alongside other kids in a coal mine. It was important for people to see these photographs first hand, because it creates more sympathy from the viewer to see the faces of these kids. Also, some people living in rural or wealthy areas were not aware of the treatment of children elsewhere, so these articles and photographs brought it to the attention of everyone. Soon after these journalists provoked reform, organizations such as the National Child Labor Committee formed to fight for the cause by creating legislation on issues such as child labor and education. By 1904 child labor was illegal, but the system was working. It was up to factory inspectors to enforce the laws, and they did a poor job. The laws were sometimes simply ignored by the inspectors or in some cases the owner of the factory would hide the children prior to the inspection. Also, the employers and sometimes parents would tell the children to lie about their age, allowing them to continue working to earn money instead of attending school. Another child reform during the late 1800’s was an education reform, which required children to attend school through the elementary level. This created a new sense of childhood, as they had to spend at least part of it attending school and getting an education, instead of living on the street or working in a factory. However it was up to the attendance officers to enforce this and like the factory inspectors, they often failed to do their job. After these reforms, the conditions of children were still worse than what most people expected. In the early 1900’s, muckrakers such as Lewis Hine photographed children working in factories and on the streets, to prove that children were still working, and under horrible conditions, despite reforms. Children were simply not being protected under the laws that were intact, which is not right. This led to some states passing additional labor and educational laws to help the children. However, some states passing reforms was not enough, so activists decided to work for a federal child labor law to make sure children were being protected nationwide. It was passed by Congress in 1916. The Keating-Owen Act banned any article produced by child labor from being sold in interstate commerce. Just two years later, the act was declared unconstitutional by the US Supreme Court, on the basis that Congress had no such power in the subject of commerce. The next step for child labor activists was a constitutional amendment, which was passed in Congress by 1924, but was never ratified due to the conservative political climate and the church and farm groups who feared this would give the federal government power. The Great Depression changed political attitudes greatly, and child labor reform was benefitted. Finally in the 1930s President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal finally brought federal regulation to child labor, and set the employment age to 16 for boys and 18 for girls. With the reform of child labor came new perspectives on the concept of childhood itself. Prior to the progressive era, children often were not cared for and were mistreated by their parents and exploited by employers. It took journalists exposing these social injustices to evoke change. As reforms brought a required education and no option of a job, childhood became more of a time for children to grow up. The idea of childhood became associated with innocence and care as opposed to the perspective of children during the progressive era. The definition of a word is shaped by society at the time, so the definition of childhood naturally changed as social reforms went into place. Parents began to care for their children more, especially as medical technology caused infant mortality rates to decline along with family size. Childhood became the time of life where a child attends school and gets an education that will start off their own life.