The Washington herald., 1921-11-13
CHILD LABOR FOES
NOW CENTER FIGHT
ON FARMER BOYS
Contend That Environ
ment Is Sometimes Worse
Than Factory or Mine.

The popular conception that child
labor Is limited to employment for
wages In factories. mines and stores
Is subject to revision. According to
q recent survey by the national
child labor committee, which con-
tends that the farm, far from being
the ideal environment for the child.
Is as evil an agent Of exploitation
as the factory or the mine. The re-
port closes with the Recommendation
that the rural child labor problem
must be solved by better school and
school attendance laws, rather than
rigid anti.chfld labor laws.
Kentucky the report points out.
comes very close to being 100 per
cent American as far as its popula-
ton 10 concerned Census figures
for 1910 for example. shows that
the foreign born In Kentucky num-
bered only Is per cent of the total.
Yet in this state. inhabited largely
by native Americans Of American
parentage. more than - per cent
were clssified ~ illiterate. The
State raises annually some 456.0o0..
900 pounds Of tobacco, yet falls to
raise about one-eighth Of its annual
crop of. children to the point of
ripeness where they can read and
write their own names.
Boys TIL Tobacco.
In the southwestern part Of the
State. for instance" to quote from
the report. "a certain tenant lives
with his wife and family of I'VE
children, coolest Of whom 10 IL
years of age, on q small farm, hav-
ing had nine acres in tobacco and
fourteen IN corn last summer. Last
year was their first season on this
place and they received one-haif of
the crops In return for their labor.
No help was hired, but the . and
11-year-old sons worked with their
father In the fields. Last autumn
when the school in the vicinity Mas
visited, their register showed that
out OF the seventy-four school days
that had passed since the opening
Of the term early in July these two
boys had each missed forty-fve days
more than two school months. The
absence of the older boy was due
to entirely tobacco culture, and his
9-year-old brother had been out
twenty-five days for the same rea-
son. and twenty because of illness"
Work Like Grownups.
: The report goes on to state that
in the tobacco fields children COM
monty work as many hours as
grown persons-from sunrise to
sunset-planting, hoeing. cultivat-
ing. worming. suckering. topping.
cutting. spiking, housing and strip
ping. Indeed, the only task In to-
bacco culture which children do not
perform is firing. which Is done In
the barn where the crop 10 housed
and requires the care and judgment
of an adult"
Examples such as those of fire.
quent absence from school while the
tobacco Is In the making. are cited,
and the writer continues that 1t is
not only the very poor among the
tobacco raisers who use their chill
dren's labor to the detriment Of
their education. Ono family con-
sisting of three sons and three
daughters, all under II, lived In q
residence characterized as "modefn,"
substantial and handsome. and had
other land elsewhere. Yet the
teachers In the district school
showed that the children were un-
able to pass from grade to grade
because of their long absences from
school due to work in the tobacco
fields.
Deprived Of Schooling.
DIR. Edward N. Chopper. who d.
rected the study Of child welfare in
Kentucky for the National Child
Labor Committee. has defined child
labor as "the employment Of q child
under Is years Of age at any task,
with or without pay, under direc-
ton or independently Of others,
which deprives him of proper
amount Of schooling. training. recre-
alton and healthy development"
The National Child Labor Com
mittee believes that the welfare of
the child should be the prime con-
sideration In any problem involving