{"id":23,"date":"2019-09-26T12:58:04","date_gmt":"2019-09-26T16:58:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.uvm.edu\/mcope-childhoods\/?page_id=23"},"modified":"2025-06-16T16:34:20","modified_gmt":"2025-06-16T20:34:20","slug":"working-and-schooling-mapping-child-labor-laws-and-compulsory-education-in-early-20th-c-us","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/blog.uvm.edu\/mcope-childhoods\/working-and-schooling-mapping-child-labor-laws-and-compulsory-education-in-early-20th-c-us\/","title":{"rendered":"Working and Schooling"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Mapping Child Labor Laws and Compulsory Education in early 20th C. US<\/strong>
Meghan Cope, Dept. of Geography, University of Vermont<\/em>, mcope@uvm.edu <\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This work was supported by a grant from the Oaklawn Faculty Research fund, which is gratefully acknowledged. The full material is available as a book chapter here <\/a>or as: “Working and Schooling: A critical geography of child labor and compulsory education laws in early twentieth century United States.” In Howerton, Gloria & Purdum, Leanne (eds.) 2023. <\/a>Critical Geographies of Youth: Law, Policy, and Power<\/em><\/a>,<\/em> West Virginia University Press, pp. 21-46<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although children have always worked in and alongside their families in various capacities, the 19th c. shift in America toward industrial work involved the dislocation of work outside of the home\/farm and a switch from subsistence or trade to waged labor. As manufacturing became less based on skill, and more mechanized, children were seen as viable, cheap, and expendable workers. Waves of horror stories of abuse, mutilation, and death of child workers resulted in concomitant waves of public demands for reform. It is notable that the ‘white’ child was the spur for greater concern in the realm of labor, while Black children, many of whom were farm laborers, rarely sparked the interest of reformers (Alphonso, 2014).<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"Map
Cartography by Gemayel Goxcon<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Geographic Perspectives<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Several dimensions of the debates and policies limiting child labor and encouraging schooling have geographic significance:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \n
  1. Because child labor laws were only implemented at the state (and sometimes local) level before the National Labor Standards Act (NLSA) of 1938, there was a lot of regional variation<\/strong> based on context of the state’s economic, political, and ethnic\/racial characteristics.  <\/li>\n\n\n\n
  2. The state-by-state initiation of child labor laws and compulsory schooling happened against a backdrop of efforts by reformers to create federal-level policy, meaning that there are scale<\/strong> issues here. Reformers repeatedly proposed legislation that was passed by Congress only to have it rejected by the Supreme Court as ‘unconstitutional’. Then, in 1924 both Houses passed the Child Labor Amendment to the US Constitution giving Congress “the \u201cpower to limit, regulate, and prohibit the labor of persons under 18 years old\u201d (quoted in Fliter, 2018, p. 141); the CLA was never ratified by three quarters of states but it was preempted by the NLSA in 1938. To this day, compulsory schooling is legislated at the state level.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  3. One of the flash-points of child labor law was in border<\/strong> areas between states with higher levels of protection for children and those with looser laws. For example, one reformer  bemoaned the situation of the “Pittsburgh District” of glass-making industries: “Ohio has a fourteen year age limit for the employment of children, Pennsylvania a thirteen year limit, West Virginia a twelve year limit. Ohio prohibits the employment of children under sixteen at night, Pennsylvania permits the employment at night of children of thirteen, while West Virginia permits children twelve years old to work at night.” (Owen Lovejoy, National Child Labor Committee, 1905, p. 47)<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  4. The rhetoric of both reformers and their opponents frequently called on images and ideals of rights, patriotism, and ‘the nation’<\/strong>. For example, one reformer wrote: “we are agitating and striving more and more, not only to save the children from the wrong kind of work at the wrong time and under wrong conditions, but at the same time to prepare them for the right kind of work at the right time and under right conditions that the citizens of to-morrow may work for and be worthy of the highest ideals of the republic<\/em> (emphasis added, Ben Lindsey, National Child Labor Committee, 1905, p. 101)<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  5. The practices of working, schooling, and experiencing the rapid changes in economic and family life of the early 20th C. meant many children’s everyday spaces<\/strong> were also changing. Children experienced industrial work-spaces such as the factory floor, different kinds of living arrangements, the expansion of the playground movement in cities (Gagen, 2000), and the rise of danger in the streets with the coming of automobiles.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n

    Copyright Meghan Cope 2019<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Timeline of Key Events<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

    Bibliography<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Scholarly Publications:<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Agyepong, T. E. 2018. The\nCriminalization of Black Children: Race, Gender, and Delinquency in Chicago\u2019s\nJuvenile Justice System, 1899-1945.<\/em> Chapel Hill, NC: University of North\nCarolina Press.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Alphonso, G. 2014. \u201cOf Families or Individuals?\nSouthern Child Workers and the Progressive Crusade for Child Labor Regulation,\n1899-1920\u201d, in Marten, J. (ed.) Children\nand Youth during the Gilded Age and Progressive Era<\/em>. New York: NYU Press,\npp. 59-80.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Bandiera, O. Mohnen, M., Rasul, I., and Viarengo,\nM. 2018. Nation-building through Compulsory Schooling During the Age of Mass\nMigration, The Economic Journal<\/em>, 129 (617):\n62\u2013109 https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1111\/ecoj.12624<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Bernstein, R. 2011. Racial Innocence: Performing American Childhood from Slavery to Civil\nRights<\/em>. New York: NYU Press. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Clay, K.; Lingwall, J.; and Stephens, J. 2012.\nDo Schooling Laws Matter? Evidence from the Introduction of Compulsory\nAttendance Laws in the United States, Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research<\/em>, https:\/\/www.nber.org\/papers\/w18477<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Fliter, J. 2018. Child Labor in America: The Epic Legal Struggle to Protect Children<\/em>.\nLawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Gagen, E. 2004. Making America Flesh:\nPhysicality and nationhood in early twentieth-century physical education\nreform, Cultural Geographies<\/em> (11): 417-442.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Hart, J. F. 1977. The Demise of King Cotton, Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 67(3):  307-322, DOI: 10.1111\/j.1467-8306.1977.tb01144.x<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Hindman, H. D. 2002. Child Labor: An American History<\/em>. Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Holloway, S. & Valentine, G. (eds.) Children\u2019s Geographies: Playing, Living,\nLearning<\/em>. London: Routledge.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Lindenmeyer, K. 1997. \u201cA Right to Childhood\u201d: The US Children\u2019s Bureau and Child Welfare,\n1912-1946<\/em>. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Mills, S. 2013. \u2018An instruction in good\ncitizenship\u2019: Scouting and the historical geographies of citizenship education,\nTransactions of the Institute of British\nGeographers<\/em> (38): 120-134.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Mintz, S. 2004. Huck\u2019s Raft: A History of American Childhood<\/em>, Cambridge, MA:\nBelknap Press\/Harvard.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Moehling, C. 1999. State Child Labor Laws and\nthe Decline of Child Labor, Explorations\nin Economic History<\/em>, 35: 72-106. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Sallee, S. 2004. The Whiteness of Child Labor Reform in the New South<\/em>. Athens, GA:\nUniversity of Georgia Press. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Schmidt, J. 2010. Industrial Violence and the Legal Origins of Child Labor<\/em>,\nCambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Schuman, M. 2017. History of child labor in the United States \u2013\npart 2: the reform movement. January, Monthly\nLabor Review<\/em>, Bureau of Labor Statistics. https:\/\/www.bls.gov\/opub\/mlr\/2017\/article\/history-of-child-labor-in-the-united-states-part-2-the-reform-movement.htm<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Shapiro, E. 2019. Desegregation Plan: Eliminate all Gifted\nPrograms in NY. New York Times<\/em> Aug.\n27, Section A, Page 1. https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2019\/08\/26\/nyregion\/gifted-programs-nyc-desegregation.html?searchResultPosition=6<\/a>\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Simmons, L. 2015. Crescent City Girls: The Lives of Young Black Women in Segregated New\nOrleans<\/em>. Chapel Hill: UNC Press.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Trattner, W. I. 1970. Crusade for the Children: A History of the National Child Labor\nCommittee and Child Labor Reform in America<\/em>. Chicago: Quadrangle Books. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Wilkerson, I. 2010. The Warmth of Other Suns: The epic story of America\u2019s Great Migration<\/em>.\nNew York: Random House. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Zelizer, V. 1985. Pricing the Priceless Child: The Changing Social Value of Children<\/em>,\nPrinceton, NJ: Princeton University Press.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Reports, Proceedings, and Period References:<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Abbott, E. 1908. A Study of the Early History of Child Labor in\nAmerica, American Journal of Sociology<\/em>,\nIV (17): 15-37. https:\/\/www.journals.uchicago.edu\/doi\/pdfplus\/10.1086\/211641<\/a>\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Anderson, N. L. 1905. Child Labor Legislation and the Methods of\nits Enforcement: The Southern States, Addresses\nat the First Annual Meeting of the NCLC, NYC<\/em>. New York: NCLC, pp. 77-93.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Ensign, F. C. 1921. Compulsory School Attendance and Child Labor<\/em>. Iowa City, IA: The\nAthens Press. Reprinted in American\nEducation: Its Men, Ideas, and Institutions<\/em>, 1969, New York: Arno Press and\nThe New York Times. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Erickson, H. 1905. Child Labor Legislation and the Methods of its\nEnforcement: The Northern Central States, Addresses\nat the First Annual Meeting of the NCLC, NYC<\/em>. New York: NCLC, pp. 53-65.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Hand, W. H. 1914. The Need of Compulsory\nEducation in the South, Compulsory School\nAttendance<\/em>. US Bureau of Education Bulletin No. 2; Washington: Government\nPrinting Office. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Johnson, E. S. 1935. Child Labor Legislation, in Brandeis, E. and\nJ. R. Commons (eds.) History of Labor in\nthe United States, 1896-1932<\/em>. New York: Macmillan.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Kelley, F. 1905. Some Ethical Gains Through Legislation<\/em>. New York: Macmillan. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Lindsay, B. B. 1905. Child Labor Legislation and the Methods of\nits Enforcement: The Western States, Addresses\nat the First Annual Meeting of the NCLC, NYC<\/em>. New York: NCLC, pp. 94-101.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Lovejoy, O. R. 1905. The Test of Effective Child Labor\nLegislation, Addresses at the First\nAnnual Meeting of the NCLC, NYC<\/em>. New York: NCLC, pp.45-52.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    McKelway, A. J. 1905. Child Labor in Southern Industry, Addresses at the First Annual Meeting of the\nNCLC, NYC<\/em>. New York: NCLC, pp.16-22.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    McDowell, J. R. 1909. The Difficulties of Child-Labor Legislation\nin a Southern State, The Child Workers of\nthe Nation: Proceedings of the Fifth Annual Conference, Chicago, IL. <\/em>New\nYork: NCLC, pp. 166-171.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    NCLC (National Child Labor Committee) 1928. Child Labor Facts<\/em>, Publication #343. New York: NCLC. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    NCLC (National Child Labor Committee) 1938. Child Labor Facts<\/em>, Publication #372. New York: NCLC. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Plessy v.\nFerguson<\/em>. 1896. Text available at https:\/\/www.loc.gov\/item\/usrep163537\/<\/a> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Riis, J. 1892. The Children of the Poor<\/em>. New York: Charles Scribner\u2019s Sons.<\/p>\n\n\n\n