In the early days of American history, children had to help support their families. In colonial
times, even very young children worked right alongside their parents. But today in the United
States, employers are not allowed to hire young children. Teenagers can have jobs, but the
Department of Labor limits the number of hours they can work until they reach the age of
sixteen to ensure that working will not keep teens from going to school. Companies cannot
hire minors to work dangerous jobs, or those that require driving or operating heavy
machinery. These laws keep minors safe and make sure they can get an education. What
changes led our society to pass these laws protecting minors from unsafe working conditions
and long work hours? Child labor laws were a response to broad changes in American industry
as well as changing attitudes about what childhood should be like.
When America was still a colony, American children often joined their families in the work that
supported them. Other children worked to learn a job from experienced cobblers, tailors, and
other workers. By learning from experienced workers, they learned each step of the job from
beginning to end, and so were able to support themselves once they became adults. Child labor
was considered natural, and even positive. It was a normal part of growing up for most children.
But in the years following American independence, the country experienced a huge change.
These changes were called industrialization. Technology such as the steam engine and the
cotton mill made it possible to make bigger numbers of products in factories instead of one at
a time in people’s homes. People, including children, left home and went to work in factories.
Industrialization changed work for everyone, not just children. In the factory setting, each
worker did only one task. The workers didn’t learn valuable skills that they could use to
support themselves independently. Factory work was often dangerous and unpleasant. In
addition, many factory owners actually preferred to hire children. They could pay child workers
less money, and child workers were easier to control.
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In the 1800s, the first child labor laws were a response to the changes brought about by
industrialization. In 1842, Massachusetts passed a law that limited children’s workdays to ten
hours. Many other states followed suit. There were efforts to pass minimum age labor laws. In
1903, New York even passed a law requiring workers to meet minimum height and weight
requirements. But even when these and other such laws were passed, they were not always
enforced. Factory owners still hired children, even very young children, for long days of
sometimes dangerous work. In this way, many factory owners seemed to play the role of
real-life villains from a Charles Dickens novel.
America can thank a man named Lewis Hine for demonstrating the need for well-enforced child
labor laws. Lewis Hine was a teacher in New York who left his job in 1908 to become a
photographer for the newly formed National Child Labor Committee. Hine photographed children
as young as three years old working in dangerous conditions in fields, factories, mines, and
mills. One of Hine’s most famous photographs showed a young girl looking longingly out the
window of the mill where she worked. Hine’s photographs showed America that child labor was
not just dangerous. It was robbing children of their educations, even their childhoods.
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Lewis Hine’s work with the National Child Labor Committee eventually resulted in sweeping
changes in America’s child labor laws. But these changes didn’t occur overnight. Many states
passed child labor laws right away, but other states were slower to accept the change. Federal
laws were slow to come. The first federal child labor law, passed in 1916, was declared
unconstitutional two years later. In 1924, Congress passed a constitutional amendment that
was meant to give the government the authority to pass child labor laws. However, not enough
states agreed to the amendment, and it ultimately failed.
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Finally, in 1938, Congress passed the Fair Labor Standards Act. Part of the Fair Labor
Standards Act regulated child labor. For the first time, the changes some states had made
decades before were enacted nationwide. Though slow in coming, these changes improved life
for millions of children in America, thanks in part to a compassionate man named Lewis Hine
whose photographs helped change the American attitude towards child labor.