The Birmingham age-herald., 1916-01-23

To be sure, no social worker feels that the child of his state alone must be protected but all children in indus trial life must be under the protection of the law.
 As matter of history, it is interest," ing to know that Alabama was the first southern state to pass a child labor law, this was done as far back as 1887, but in 1895 the law was repealed through the influence of eastern manu- lecturers located in the state. Again Alabama led the southern states in 1903 in a fight to regulate the child labor but four years later stood again as low as even Georgia. At the last legisla- ture real child labor bill was en- acted, and now in the United States only two states have no laws gov erning the work of children, South Carolina and Georgia
 Why then is 1t necessary here in Alabama to take up the questions again?" you ask. "We have already passed a bill that makes better condi- tions for the children" This is so, but the desire to better what we already have is partly the reason for the ob- servation of such a day as the Child Labor Day, and the necessity of ob taining federal legislation to regulate the state laws is the other pressing argument.
 There are still in the United States places where children and 10 years old may be found at work in mills | There are still states where child l , years old may work II hours a day even in Alabama-where the children are not allowed to work until they are 14, they may work so hours a week.
 Have you ever stopped to think who 1 made what you buy? We'll, the na- tional child labor committee has | thought for you, and tells the most | pitiful stories of conditions that still | exist in spite of the laws that have | been passed to regulate the hours of 1 work and the ages of the children 1 doing the work.
 Do you know that nothing you wear 1 eat or use was produced in the states i where the standards are lower than i in your state, and do you know that i your own law is enforced? Unless you | are sure of these two points you are | not justified in assuming that you | have no further responsibility in the i matter.
 WHAT YOU WEAR
 Wears spends all her spare time after school 1 hours putting the yellow centers in | the artificial flowers. These are made 1 in New Yorll. and she recei"es 3 cents gross for them. She also helps with the house work and the care of the i little baby brother, and he is IS months old and is learning to put the yellow centers in for get-me-nots" His mother says it will not be long before i
  quite possibly stitched in a tenement | home: children of and 10 make gloves and it is little wonder the children | are worn out and tired before they are 25 years old
 And the Irish lace crochet that you | wear; Pasqualina, age 12 got up at 6 o'clock in the coldest days of the | year so that she could get in an hour 1 and a half work before school. It | takes two hours and half to make one | of these yokes even by these expert | little fingers and for this the child l received cents
 The tiny knitting mill children work i on your stockings and underwear Lit | tie Mamie Coleson is II years old; she l works at machine which fastens the l toe of the stocking together. and earns 1 S3 a week. Mamie is a very bright 1 little girl, and has made the fifth grade, but this is all the schooling she will ever have.
 The federal report on conditions of women and child wage earners in the l United States shows that the cotton l mills are not very good places for the | children to be placed in. and yet cotton { goods of all kinds are handled by chill | dren It has been found that the death | rate for boys 15 and years of age | working in the cotton mills was twice as high as for the nonoperative popu- lation of the same age.
 WHAT YOU EAT
 You buy canned peas, beans, fruit and fish from your local trades people, I