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There was a time in this country when young children routinely worked legally. As industry grew in the period following the Civil War, children, often as young as 10 years old but sometimes much younger, labored. They worked not only in industrial settings but also in retail stores, on the streets, on farms, and in home-based industries. This article discusses the use of child labor in the United States, concentrating on the period after the Civil War through the rise of the child labor reform movement.

The golf links lie so near the mill
That almost every day
The laboring children can look out
And see the men at play.

- Sarah N. Cleghorn

The September 1906 edition of Cosmopolitan magazine recounts a story once told of an old Native American chieftain. The chieftain was given a tour of the modern city of New York. On this excursion, he saw the soaring heights of the grand skyscrapers and the majesty of the Brooklyn Bridge. He observed the comfortable masses gathered in amusement at the circus and the poor huddled in tenements. Upon the completion of the chieftain's journey, several Christian men asked him, "What is the most surprising thing you have seen?" The chieftain replied slowly with three words: "little children working."

As economic tensions increased between England and the American colonies, the desire for an independent manufacturing sector in America became more pronounced. By manufacturers employing women and children in this pursuit, the man of the household could still tend the farm at home. This practice helped fulfill the Jeffersonian ideal of the yeoman farmer. Child labor also served the Hamiltonian commercial vision of America, by providing increased labor to support industry. In accordance with this vision, Alexander Hamilton, as Secretary of the Treasury, noted in a 1791 report on manufacturing that children "who would otherwise be idle" could become a source of cheap labor.

Around the same time, the influential Niles' Register (a national newsweekly magazine) noted that factory work was not for able-bodied men, but rather "better done by little girls from six to twelve years old." Industrialists viewed progress as having machines so simple to operate that a child could do it." This labor was perceived as beneficial not only to the child but also to the public as a whole. In keeping with this ideal of child productivity, an 1802 advertisement in the Baltimore Federal Gazette sought children from the ages of 8 to 12 to work in a cotton mill. The ad stated, "It is hoped that those citizens having a knowledge of families, having children destitute of employment, will do an act of public benefit by directing them to the institution [cotton mill]." In New England, the allure of employing children in the mills was thought by one editorial writer to be so strong that it led parents to choose its settlements versus the less developed Western frontier where no such job opportunities existed. By 1820, children made up more than 40 percent of the mill employees in at least three New England states. That same year, Niles' Register calculated that if a mill were to employ 200 children from the age of 7 to 16 "that [previously] produced nothing towards their [own] maintenance . . . it would make an immediate difference of $13,500 a year to the value produced in the town!"

The parallel beliefs that labor benefited children by helping them avoid the sin of idleness and economically benefited society by helping it increase its productive capacity fueled the spread of the practice. Women and children dominated pre-Civil War manufacturing; however, the low volume of manufacturing caused the number of children employed to remain at low levels. The advances in manufacturing techniques in the post-Civil War years increased opportunities for children and led society to take advantage of this productive capacity. Similarly, some of the productive capacity that had been met by the use of slaves was met by women and children in the years following emancipation.

However, in the period immediately following the Civil War, "free labor" was not always clear when recently freed slave children and some immigrant youths were considered. In many cases, former slave children were functionally reenslaved through apprentice agreements, which bound the child to the former slave master. In these agreements, the parent exchanged the labor of the child in return for "training" provided by the former slaveowner. These agreements were frequently seen by courts as beneficial to the child because the slave master was in a better position to teach the child "the habits of industry" than were the recently freed parents. Although these situations were eventually remedied in the South during the Reconstruction period, similar abuses of the apprentice system occurred elsewhere. In New York City, in the 1870s, the operation of Italian "padrones" (persons who secured employment especially for Italian immigrants) bordered on child slavery under the guise of apprenticeship. The padrones often deceived Italian children and parents (those residing in Italy) into apprentice arrangements, purportedly for teaching the child how to play a musical instrument. Once agreements were signed, the children were swept off to America where they were forced to become street performers with all of their earnings provided to the padrone. Children who failed to comply with the demands of their padrone master were frequently beaten. As the New York Times put it in 1873, "The world has given up on stealing men from the African coast, only to kidnap children from Italy."

Although the situations involving former slaves and the Italian padrones were egregious, they were a small percentage of the overall number of working children. As child labor expanded through the end of the 19th century, these practices diminished. The 1870 census found that 1 out of every 8 children was employed. This rate increased to more than 1 in 5 children by 1900. Between 1890 and 1910, no less than 18 percent of all children ages 10‒15 worked. Age was only one consideration in deciding whether a child was ready for work. Being "big enough to work" was usually not a metaphor about reaching a certain birthday; rather it was often about the physical size of the child as well as the acumen the child appeared to have in performing the labor required. Age and size, however, were not the only factors that determined whether a child worked. Distinctions between children expected to work and those not expected to work made on the basis of family income became increasingly evident. Children from families at the lower end of the class spectrum were frequently employed, whereas the concern about idle youths did not appear to be one shared by the upper classes. As one well-to-do father explained in 1904, "We work for our children, plan for them, spend money on them, buy life insurance for their protection, and some of us even save money for them." At the lower end of the income scale though, families were forced to use their children for their labor without the luxury of saving for their futures.

At the turn of the 20th century, children were working in various industries. The discussion that follows highlights some of the occupations in which children labored and examines the employment conditions children faced in detail.

Street trades

As the story of the chieftain illustrates, working children were a widespread presence in urban areas because of the number of occupations they performed. Most visibly, many engaged in occupations working on city streets. These children sold newspapers, shined shoes, and carried messages. In the days before the Internet, texting, and even the telephone, these messengers provided the easiest way for people within an urban area to communicate. In this role, they became essential to daily commerce for banks, factories, and offices. At night, they provided these same essential services to brothels and those enterprises conducting other unlawful activities. Similar, less tawdry courier services were provided within department stores. Children known as "cash" boys and girls carried money, sales slips, and items purchased to store inspectors. The inspectors wrapped the goods and verified the amounts paid. The children then returned the change and the items.

While courier boys were common, newspaper boys, popularly known as "newsies," worked in the most visible of the street trades and were the face of child labor for most urban Americans. According to author Hugh Hindman, saying that most urban kids worked as a newsboy for at least a short period is no exaggeration. After buying their papers from the publisher, the newsies would hawk papers on street corners. This arrangement meant that the carriers only profited when they sold a paper. This situation led to fierce competition between the carriers for the best locations. On big news days, a flashy headline helped drive sales of papers; however, on other days, the newsboys needed to use more nefarious means to profit from sales. These techniques included shouting out false headlines and shortchanging customers, particularly during the late-night hours. During World War I, the shouting of false headlines was such a nuisance that Cleveland, Ohio, threatened to prosecute boys who shouted "false and amazing" statements. In New York City, an October 1917 New York Times article outlined the efforts of police to stop carriers from shouting baseless headlines of war calamities to spur sales. Yet, the same article noted that when these enterprising youngsters were hauled before the judge, the police officers were likely lectured for not devoting their time to more serious crimes.

The newsies also frequently took advantage of the kindness of strangers through their use of the "last-paper ploy." In such a ploy, the youngster feigned cold, exhaustion, or hunger saying that he or she could go home only by selling the last paper. Once a sympathetic purchaser left with the paper, the newsie pulled out another paper from a hidden stash and used the ploy again. Despite devious schemes like these, among themselves, the newsies generally developed a cohesive culture. Rather than picking on the youngest carriers, the older and larger lads frequently looked out for their younger competitors.

Mines

Cotton mills

Although the coal industry was vital in many sections of the country, perhaps most prominent among the child-labor-intensive industries was the cotton mill. In 1900, 25,000 of the nearly 100,000 textile workers in the South were children under 16. By 1904, overall employment of children had increased to 50,000, with 20,000 children under 12 employed. The family, particularly the women and children, was central to mill operation. The Southern mill and the labors associated with it are iconic. Pictures of young girls in the mill are likely those most identified with child labor in America.

The unfortunate families back in the backwoods drifted to the cotton mills. When they drifted to the cotton mills, what was to be done? It is not possible for a man who has been working on a farm, who is an adult-after the age of 21 years, for instance-to become a skilled employee in a cotton mill. His fingers are knotted and gnarled; he is slow in action whereas activity is required in working in the cotton mills. Therefore, as a matter of necessity, the adult of the family had to come to the cotton mill as an unskilled employee, and it was the children of the family who became skilled employees in the cotton mills. For that reason, it was the children who had to support the families for the time being. I have seen instances in which a child of 12 years of age, working in the cotton mills, is earning one and one-half times as much as his father.

Through this logic, mill owners rationalized that the employment of children was supporting the entire family, even if the child was the only family member employed.

Factories

Home workshops

While many children found employment in the mill, in the factory, or on the streets, others worked in the home. Rather than being a respite from the toil of school, home for some children meant labor. As one 7-year-old told a child-labor investigator, "I like school better than home. I don't like home. There's too many flowers." Flowers, brushes, and clothing were the sorts of goods that began to be produced through home production in the late 19th century. Concentrated around New York's garment factories, home workshops gave manufacturers an inexpensive alternative to factory labor when looking to produce easily assembled goods. A middleman known as "a sweater" frequently secured the home-based laborers and provided their produce to the manufacturers. These manufacturers benefited from this arrangement, under which these workers were paid an estimated one-third the wages of those in factories. These home-based businesses provided additional productive capacity to industry and were convenient for women caring for small children and did not desire to leave the home. Once those same children reached a productive age, they could easily assist with the work and help the family increase its earnings, which were commonly based on the number of items produced. This practice also let children work under the watchful eye of a parent without the children having to venture outside the home.

Farms

Legal foundation-the child as property

Although children in the post‒Civil War United States labored in a variety of occupations, the legal foundation that allowed parental control was unwavering, regardless of the field of employment. The right of parents to take advantage of the productive capacity of their children was long recognized both in the United States and abroad. William Blackstone, an 18th-century English jurist, noted that a child is the property of his father. The toil of children during the Industrial Revolution was consistent with this belief. Seldom were questions raised about the right of the father to benefit from the labors of his offspring. This practice was simply seen as one of the natural privileges of parenthood. The perceived value of the child can be viewed through how the legal system treated the wrongful death of a child and the damages the parents could hope to recover. Courts of that period usually found that the proper amount due was "the probable value of the services of the deceased from the time of his death to the time he would have attained his majority, less the expense of his maintenance during the same time." These awards often involved testimony from child employers who outlined the wages commonly paid. These courts recognized what was well understood: the parent naturally benefited from the productive labors of his child until the child reached the age of majority.

Although the belief was widespread that the parents should have complete control over the economic affairs of the child, not everyone agreed with this logic. For some, this control reduced the child to a creature with only economic value. This concern was even shared by a few in the legal system who spoke out against valuing the life of a child on the basis of expected monetary contributions to the family. For example, in Schendel versus Bradford, a 1922 case involving the death of a child, the presiding judge protested, "This cold-blooded calculating measure of human life . . . . Awarding pecuniary damages to the next of kin of a child six years of age is merely making a business commodity out of the child and subjecting the loss of that child's life to a dollars and cents argument."

Conclusion

Thinking of the children as more than just their economic value eventually helped change the role of the children of the working class in American society. In combination with a greater awareness of the exploitive practices of some employers, this change in thinking helped propel reform efforts that, in time, led to an end of widespread child labor in the United States. However, reformers faced a long, uphill battle against employers, parents, and the legal system in securing nationwide reform. The legal system, primarily the Constitution and the limited scope of powers it granted to the federal government, proved to be a primary challenge to reform. By the end of the 19th century, the Supreme Court had not heard a single case about child labor. Child labor was a matter for the states to deal with under their own laws, which, in many cases, did not regulate (or barely regulated) child labor. As a result, decades would pass before an observant chieftain would be able to express his surprise at the newfound lack of working children in New York and throughout United States. Part II of this article will detail how the reformers, after decades of struggle, finally succeeded in bringing about this decline in child labor.

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History of child labor in the United States-part 1: little children working

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There was a time in this country when young children routinely worked legally. As industry grew in the period following the Civil War, children, often as young as 10 years old but sometimes much younger, labored. They worked not only in industrial settings but also in retail stores, on the streets, on farms, and in home-based industries.

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One of the many tasks children could be assigned was tobacco picking.

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Picking cotton in the fields during the day exposed them to the sun, causing eye problems.

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A seven year old boy once hooked his knee while topping beets.