The Montgomery advertiser., 1902-02-28
MES. HAcFADYEN


 HAS RETURNED.
 Mrs. Ashby-Macfadyen has been in Chicago and Louisville, Ky. for the past two weeks. She iectured on Child Labor six times in Chicago and was, while there, the guest of Jane Adams, the founder and principal of Hall House Set clement Among her lectures were: One before the Sociological Department of the University of Chicago. the Woman's Club and Social Economics Club.
 In Louisville she lectured three times. And in Frankfort once in the Senate chamber proffered her by the Legislature for the occasion.
 Mrs. Macfadyen says of the Child Labor question in Kentucky:
 The Child Labor bill will probably come up shortly for its third reading. to be put upon its final passage through the Legislature of Kentucky. It is not a very effective bill providing simply that children under l4 shall not be allowed to work in factories and requiring sworn statement of age to be made by the parent and filed by the employer. The effectiveness has been further imperilled by an amendment permitting children to work by the, permission of the county judge upon the simple application of the parent provided that no complaint is lu8QS IIOH OIneT QudTtcTS dUOut SuCu Cui- pioyment. Only very strong political in- fiuef,ce on the part of the promoters of the bill in its administration. or public opinion could prevent this law being a dead letter.
 .It is, happily. probable that public opinion will support this measure and make for its betterment at the next legislature. During the last few days the question has been brought to the notice of influential people in Kentucky and it is probable that central com- mittee will be formed in that State similar to the nonpartisan committee in Alabama with which all classes and sets of people interested in this important act of justice toward the children of their commonwealth may cooperate. The wo- men of Kentucky will play no small part in thus bringing their State into line with the movement for civilization and humanity in industry which has become general in the Southern States.
 'In Kentucky the question has not reached the acute stage that 1t has In South Carolina and Georgia and is rapid ly reaching in Alabama There are. how ever, some forty tobacco factories where children from 9 to 10 years old work for ten to eleven hours a day-there are a few hemp mills and textile factories each of which claims it's batch of white child slaves. But the insidious growth of child labor to the exclusion and impoverish- ment of grown labor is clearly seen. Furniture and nail and other miscella- neous industries are drawing in the chil- dren like octopi The color complications is also present on Tuesday morning last at 7:3o saw white children at work in the hemp factory at Frankfort, inhaline the deadly dust that made me gasp and choke, from which some have become blind, two hours later from the windows of down town store I watched spruce little colored girls running to school with their books under their arms. Both at Frankfort and Louisville, Ky, there were many both men and women who at presentation of the fact on this subject realized the peril that their State was facing as common with the rest of the South snd who will set themselves to see that tho law which will have been carried by the quiet, persistent work of laborins men of that State has the intelligent and enthusiastic support 1t deserves from all section of the community"