The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1928-10-01
Child Labor In the Home

At last the department of labor at Wash
ington has discovered one of the most
wretched forms of child labor exploitation
existing in the United States The children's
bureau of the department has recently con-
cluded a survey and yesterday released a
bulletin which contains the following facts:
Finishing mems clothing beading and
broidering womens dresses making powder
puffs artificial flowers and dolls dresses,
scaoping handkerchefs and lace, making
bead jewelry, cardng buttons and safety pins,
only few of about so different occupa-
tions in which many young children were found
to be engaged regular workers, according
to a study of industrial home work in New
Jersey just made public by the Chdren's
Bureau of the United States Department of
Labor. Localities covered by the study
Newark, Paterson, North Bergen, South River,
Sayreyille, Hammonton and Vineland.
Home work lends itself readily to employ
ment of children, and one of its outstanding
features is the tendency on the part of the
parents to the labor of the youngest
members of the family. In household
visited by Childrens Bureau agent, three
children 8, 4, and years of age opened safety
pins while grandmother, aunt, and two
children 10 and years old carded them
Of the 1,131 children under 16 included in
the study who were regular home workers, al
most one-f four under 10 years of age and
only little more than One-fifth had reached
or advanced beyond their fourteenth birthday.
Nineteen children only years of age and
younger were in the group. Boys as well
girls homeworkers, but they in
the minority and on the whole younger than
the girls.
Of 628 families included in the study the
majority had total income of less than 81,
$50 year, although the average number of
members of the family was 6.8. This home
work adds very little to the family income
Qess than 500 year in more than half the
cases. but so poverty stricken are the famil-
les that this meagre sum was eagerly sought
Such facts as these and much worse were
exposed in the columns of the Daily Worker
as far back as 1924. In labor investigation
then conducted children were found working
on beaded dresses that were sold in the high
grade dress shops of New York as imported
gowns" whose eyes were constantly sore
from working on the most intricate patterns
in ill-ventilated, poorly lighted rooms. Many
of them had running sores on their little
fingers from gouging them with needles, but
if they got even the slightest stain on gar
ment they were deprived of their earnings
through a system of fines. In many homes
of this sort where the children were sewing
bags for one of the big tea concerns members
of the family were suffering from loathsome
communicable diseases.
The total absence of social legislation il
the United States and the low wages pre-
valent in many of the industrial centers, par.
ticularly textile towns and Cities is respon
sibe for the existence of these pest-holes.
Thus we have another horrible example OF
Coolidge Hoover prosperity; this time in the
state of New Jersey controlled by the cor
rupt democratic machine of Frank Hague
whose governor, A. Harry Moore, is booster
for Tammany Al. Smith.
Neither of the old parties offers any relief
from this condition, which distills the very
bodies of children into profits. Only the
Workers (Communist) Party offers a real
program to the working class for eliminating
child labor by demanding the compulsory
abolition of child labor under the age of 16
the six hour working day and five-day week
for all children between the ages of 16 and
10; and minimum wage of $50 for young
workers.
To fight child labor vote Communist