Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1909-01-15

Letter from Mr.. s. A. PARROT, president
| of the Atlanta Compress company, of
Atlanta, declining to become an associate
member of the National Child Labor com
mittee, in response to an invitation from
the membership committee of that organ
! ization.
Rev. A. j. McKelway, secretary for the
southern states of the National Child La
| Dor committee, has replied to Mr.. Par
rott's letter as follows:
Reply to MFR. ParrOtt
ATLANTA, Ga, Jan. s. 1909.
Mr.. S. f. PARROT, President Atlanta
Compress Company, Atlanta, Ga.
Dear Sir: Upon receiving an invitation
| by circular letter from the membership
committee of the National Child Labor
committee to become an associate mem
Der of that organization for the sum OF
$500 year, with the condition that you
were to receive the literature published
| by the committee, which costs not less
than s1.OO per year. you saw fit to pub
lish your letter to the committee, de-
clining the invitation. You would allow
me to address you an open letter, there
fore, in reply to the reasons given for
declining to become a member.
OF course, you had a perfect right to
decline a contribution to this or any
other cause. The work of the National
Child Labor committee is supported by
membership fees from thousands of peo-
pie all over the country who believe in
the cause of child labor reform.
To decline a contribution, however, to a
cause, is one thing, but to use the oc-
CASTOR of such invitation as the means Of
injuring the cause is quite another thing.
You say: II think it is an open ques-
ton as to whether or not there should
be any drastic legislation with respect
to this Observation-Disclosures that may
mean. / do not regard it as an open
question that there should be drastic leg
islation about anything; and certainly the
National Child Labor committee cannot
be accused of advocating drastic legis-
lation. The committee was asked, for
instance, by the Georgia Child Labor
committee which. together with the
forces of organized labor, had been earn
estly advocating the child labor law for
Georgia for several years, to assist the
local forces in their work. Through this
combination of forces the Georgia child
labor law was enacted.
I suppose you would hardly call 1t
drastic law when 1t Is recalled that the
general age limit is II years, while the
standard age limit both for most of the
American states and the nations of
Europe is Ia years. Under the operation
of that law it is still possible in Georgia
for 1O-year-old child to work 66 hours
week as a penalty for partial or COM
plete orphanage. So much for drastic leg
islation.
/ regard it as an open question, how
ever as to whether the people resident
of the mountain districts have been
vastly improved by the erection and ope-
ration of the cotton mills. While many
of the mills have done a good work in
building school houses and employing
teachers, there are other mills. even in
Georgia, where there are practically no
opportunities for instruction and the
census figures for 1900 are overwhelming
on the point as to comparative Iliteracy
of the mill districts. For instance, the
percentage of iIliterates for the white
children of Georgia 10 to IA years of age
is 1914 per cent while for the factory
families the illiterates among the white
children Of the same age are 44.S per
cent; that Is, the illiteracy among the
white children from 10 to IA years of age
among the factory families is something
more than four times as great as the IL
literacy among the white children OF the
same age in the state at large, so that
the problem of white illiteracy should al
most be solved or2Georgia by compelling
the children of the factory districts to at
tend school. Whether the condition Of the
family is improved by taking the family
from the tenant farms or the mountain
districts of the south is perhaps an open
question, though am inclined to resent
the frequent slurs that are cast upon
even the poorer classes of our agricul-
tural population on the plea of superior
advantages in the cotton mills But what
ever may be the truth as to this matter,
II is not an open question whether the
child who is brought UP today In the
pure air of our mountains, whittier both
the school and the church have now gone,
with their educational influence, is helped
by being brought to the cotton mills and
confined there at work for IL hours
day, or for a similar period during the
night, and this is the question to which
the child labor law is directed.
You say again, II am clearly of the
opinion that If the money expended in
connection with the child labor compaign
and that expended in an effort to educate
the negroes was devoted to the education
of these mountain people, vastly more
benefit would be derived than in the chan
nels above referred to-" The question or
negro education is entirely an irrelevant
one. Whatever other 'tso-called philan-
thropists in the east have been doing for
negro education, 1 do not know of
mittee who is particularly concerned with
this problem. Certainly a committee
which numbers among its charter mem
hers such men as Governor Hoke Smith,
Hon. Clark Howell and DR.. C. B. Wilmer,
of Georgia; Judge N. B. Feagin and
Judge ]. b. CASTOR, of Alabama; Sena-
tor Tillman, of South Carolina; Rev.
Neal L. Anderson, of North Carolina;
Hon. Beverly b. Munford of Richmond,
Va. should not be accused of neglecting
the white children of the south for the
cause CT negro education.
1t happens that our committee is not
concerned with the negro problem, as
with rare exceptions, the negro children
are not employed in the industries which
are deemed physically harmful to young
children. The amount Of money con-
tributed to the cause of child labor re-
form in the United States through its
membership would hardly be contributed
for any other cause, and would be
mere drop -the-bucket If it could be d.
verted to the general cause of educa-
ton, as compared with the appropriations
that are made by any southern state for
that cause.
During the four years of the existence
of the committee So states have amended
their child labor laws in the right di-
rection. or passed such laws for the
first time. We are dealing with the
present and future condition of at least