The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1910-03-23
SHALL It Be THE
DOLLAR OR Child?
Miss Jean Gordon Talks on
Child Labor
rrurs At Al A MIA AVLT
ROASTS ALABAMA LAW
Louisiana Inspector says Practice of
Letting Little Girls Go ON Nnude-
VILE Stage Is a Most In
human Practice.

gne address of DR.. A. j. MckeiwaN
OF Washington was presented to the con
ference. though Dr.. McKelway was un
able 10 be present DR.. Alexander John
sen. n great authority ON child labor, tool
his pace in the discussion
The address of Miss Jean Gordon OF
New Orleans, the well-known factory
inspector, who is best acquainted with
child labor conditions in the south, was
an eloquent appeal for the child. Miss
Gordon said that the Alabama child labor
laws are not worth the>paper they are
written on and urged her hearers to make
fight for better conditions, gaining les
sons in influencing legislation from the
cotton manufacturers themselves, and to
take stand for southern ideals. to pro-
teot the women and children from the
hypnotizing glitter of the silver dollar.
Miss Gordon said;
Seems Pitiful subject
1T always seems so pitiful to me TO
have talk on this subject of child
labor. One would think if there was any
thing on the face of the earth that men
and women would protect it would be the
children. but that they do not I can tes-
tify after many years of social work.
we have found the children have to be
protected from the drunken, lazy, indif-
ferent parent, the greedy. grasping mer-
chant and manufacturer and from them
selves, for in their ignorance of results
they are willing to barter their life's
energy in return for the few cents they
get al the end of the week.
Felix Adler says the whole American
nation has been hypnotized by the shining
silver dollar which has been dangled be-
fore our eyes until today we sacrifice
arybody and anything in our desire to
accumulate wealth. and the manufacturer
has learned that the cheapest power to
work is the woman and the child. The
wo. of women and children is an enor-
nous part of our industrial world, and
their work is not something new, as so
ninny seem 10 think. Women and chill
dren have always worked, women partic-
ulaIly have done more than their share
OF the worlds work, for they have borne
ard tended the race at the time that
they manufactured in the home the in
dlstIies which are now being done in the
factories. And it is this changed condi.
ton of work which is making this great
social question. What is to be the future
of our race if the women and children are
not to be protected from this money-mad
coiGmerciaism. No child can go to work
at any age as they do in Alabama, for
under your present system of only re-
outing the word of the parents as proof
OF The child age there is no safeguard
ing the child, and no child can work for
IS hours Ia a day without that childs vi
tally being so impaired that 1t is impos
sioie for 1t TO be equal TO the demands of
citizenship and parenthood, and it takes
strong men and women TO make a nation
morally and commercially strong.
There is no doubt that the work and
TIE hours of the woman and the child in
the home were often longer and very
often harder than the work and hours
In the factories. but there was diversity
of work IN the home, the child learned
many things. the air was better, there
was no foreman speeding the workers on.
Effect on Young Women
MY attention was first called to the eff
feet of factory work upon young women
and children when I was secretary OF
the charity organization. Men and wom-
en- would come to the office asking for
employment. 1 would ask their ages and
would he astounded to find that women
who / thought were fully 30 or more were
yet young women of 20 or a little more.
Their teeth were gone, their cheeks hol-
| low, their chests sunken, their shoulders
stopped. I would ask them If they could
sew or cook or do house work; they would
shake their heads. Well, what can you
do: have always worked in the MILL
| Why do You not work there now% oh,
they won't have me any more; I've lost
my specdv That sentence has become to
me enc of the saddest in the English
language. Lost my speed! 1t means they
are Gown and out in the Industrial strug-
gle. that they have been sacrificed TO our
industrial greed our craze for that shin
ing dollar. 1t means they went into that
great mill with its moist, hot atmosphere
filed with lint or dust, badly ventilated
and worked at the nerve-racking speed
limit at which all our machines are set
could no longer keep up the speed
| If our modern industrialism is to con.
tinue at the present rate of speed AM
hours, then we will come to regard the
jrggernaut of old as benefcfent frienc
for ii crushed the life out of its victims.
while the present-day Juggernaut, tho
mill. only trushes the nerves, leaving it's
victim to drag out long years of semi
inyalidism, burden to themselves and
society.
| Two Grave Dangers
| Il wish TO call your attention to two
grave dangers which face the working
children, The first is that the manufac-
turers have learned that the people have
learned that the two most important fac
tors in any child labor law are the pro-
visions for enforcing the law, which, CT
course, include proper penalties and the
factory inspector, and the proof of age
of the child, how obtained and from whai
source, and this knowledge will make II
harder each year TO have any real pro-
tective measure passed. As long as leg
| islatoTs would pass law which made tho
parents statement az 10 the age of the
child necessary ard failed to provide for
adequate inspection the manufactures
made no objection to the passage of our
labor laws. but from now ON we can
lx..-