Introduction
The history of child labor across the globe, especially in America is unacceptable at best. Most children work or take on extra shifts to support their parents and families at large. However, this is a saddening state of affairs as such kids are lagging behind their age peers in so many aspects. This could be educational, psychological, or physiological needs, are they equally met to that of privileged kids who do not have to work a day in their lives until college? In addition to this, are there any other policies that are followed when such an employer employs underage children? Are the conditions and environment safe? Technology has made the workplace more efficient with it is also dangerous, especially for children and youth. What are the criteria that need to be taken into consideration when drafting child labor laws? Should there be an age criterion? Should there be benefits allowed? What should be the minimum wage for these children and at different workplaces, the same in my opinion should differ. Let us discuss the same, with the help of this article.
“Child labor first became a federal legislative issue at least as far back as 1906 with the introduction of the Beveridge proposal for regulation of the types of work in which children might be engaged. Although the 1906 legislation was not adopted, it led to extended study of the conditions under which children were employed or allowed to work and to a series of legislative proposals—some approved, others defeated or overturned by the courts—culminating in the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) of 1938. The latter statute, amended periodically, remains the primary federal law dealing with the employment of children.”[1]
Normally, children under the age of eighteen (18), are in factories and hazardous places like the mines. The Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 (FLSA), allows minors to work in certain places, for example: newspaper delivery and or sales. Usually, decisions like these are made by the Secretary of Labor. Under Section 204. (d) (3) of the FLSA Act, states that:
“(3) The Secretary shall conduct a continuing study on means to prevent curtailment of employment opportunities for manpower groups which have had historically high incidences of unemployment (such as disadvantaged minorities, youth, elderly, and such other groups as the Secretary may designate). The first report of the results of such study shall be transmitted to the Congress not later than one year after the effective date of the Fair Labor Standards Amendments of 1974. Subsequent reports on such study shall be transmitted to the Congress at two-year intervals after such an effective date. Each such report shall include suggestions respecting the Secretary’s authority under section 214 of this title.”[2]
New York labor activist Samuel Gompers championed child labor reform during the late 19th century and later, as president of the American Federation of Labor (AFL), used his influence to improve the lot of working children.[3] Workers advocate “Mother” (Mary Harris) Jones brought added visibility to the plight of child workers and to that of their parents as well.[4] After its organization in 1899, the National Consumers League (NCL), under the leadership of Florence Kelley, took up the campaign against child labor, as did a significant body of social workers, clergy, and concerned individuals.[5] In 1904, these forces were drawn together with the establishment of the National Child Labor Committee (NCLC) which, thereafter, would remain a central force in the movement to end the exploitation of children in the workplace.[6]
In 1906, Senator Albert Beveridge (R-IN) and Representative Herbert Parsons (R-NY) introduced legislation to prevent the employment of children in factories and mines.[7] Ironically, although this initiative was created at a federal level. It never went on to become a law and therefore, did not hold any legal weightage to it. However, with the work of the various reform groups, the proposal raised the visibility of child labor as a public policy issue.[8] Southern manufacturers viewed child labor restrictions as an “effort of northern agitators to kill the infant industries of the south.”[9] The Owen-Keating Act (1916), based on the commerce clause of the U.S. Constitution, sought to ban the movement in interstate commerce of certain products of child labor. In June 1918, however, the U.S. Supreme Court declared the act unconstitutional (Hammer v. Dagenhart, 247 U.S. 251), and reformers searched for a new approach.[10]
Congress next turned to its taxing power as an indirect method for controlling child labor. Senator Atlee Pomerene (D-OH) proposed to levy a 10% tax “on the annual net profits of industries” that employed children in violation of certain age and hours standards.[11] This was clearly a sly way to bring in a child labor legislation and there were also expectations that this provision would also get judiciary’s approval. Although the measure was in reality child labor legislation, it was hoped that it might secure Court approval. However, the Supreme Court declared the Pomerene Act (child labor tax) of 1919 unconstitutional in May 1922 (Bailey v. Drexel Furniture Company, 259 U.S. 20).[12] The Fair Labor Standards Act sets forth general policies and, at the same time, may specify in precise detail, either in the statute or through implementing regulations, how coverage is to be applied: namely, who is covered and who is exempt.[13] Youth and child employment in agriculture is treated somewhat differently from nonagricultural employment.[14] For instance, children working for their family members would not be covered by the FLSA Act.
The most sweeping federal law that restricts the employment and abuse of child workers is the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 (FLSA), which came into force during the Franklin D. Roosevelt administration.[15] For non-agricultural jobs, children under 14 may not be employed, children between 14 and 16 may be employed in allowed occupations during limited hours, and children between 16 and 17 may be employed for unlimited hours in non-hazardous occupations.[16] The United States Department of Labor lists the minimum requirements for agricultural work in each state.[17] Where state law differs from federal law on child labor, the law with the more rigorous standard applies.[18] By 2023, states such as New Jersey and Arkansas had loosened child labor restrictions following the lessening of the COVID-19 pandemic severity, with violations increasing nationwide as a tight labor market increased worker demand. Modifications included lowering the age in which children could work certain jobs, expanding the number of and timing of hours they could be required to work, often to include school time, and shielding businesses from civil liability for work-related injuries, illnesses, or deaths sustained by such workers.[19] [20]
The federal legal system had limited powers to pass child labor laws primarily due to the constitution that gave parents the right to raise their children as they pleased.[21] For regular, full-time work, “age and schooling certificates”, “work permits”, or “employment certificates” were issued in States to children, usually 14 or 15, before they may go to work in certain occupations, generally manufacturing, and mercantile.[22] No certifications were required for agriculture, street trades, and work in private households.[23] The start of the 20th century was the time when reform efforts became widespread.[24] These laws were often paired with compulsory education laws which were designed to curtail child labor to an extent, keep children in school, and out of the paid labor market until a specified age (usually 12, 14, or 16 years).[25] Congress passed the Fair Labor Standards Act in 1938 regulating the employment of those under 16 or 18 years of age, and the Supreme Court upheld the law.[26] After this shift, the amendment has been described as “moot”[27] and effectively part of the Constitution.[28]
“In February 2023 the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) issued new findings on an ongoing investigation of Packers Sanitation Services, Inc. (PSSI) for illegally employing over 100 children between the ages of 13 and 17 in hazardous occupations at 13 meatpacking facilities owned by JBS, Cargill, Tyson, and others (DOL 2023). These children worked illegally on overnight shifts cleaning razor-sharp saws and other high-risk equipment on slaughterhouse kill floors. At least three of them suffered injuries, including burns from caustic cleaning chemicals. The Department of Homeland Security has announced a parallel investigation into whether these young workers, many of whom may be unaccompanied migrant children, were connected to illegal employment by traffickers who profited from their labor (Strickler and Ainsley 2023).”[29]
Other Trends:
One bill introduced in Minnesota would allow 16- and 17-year-olds to work on construction sites.[30] Last year, Iowa enacted a law that allows 16- and 17-year-olds to care for school-age children in child care centers without supervision.[31] In Arkansas, Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders has signed into law a 2023 bill repealing restrictions on work for 14- and 15-year-olds.[32] Under the new law, children under 16 will no longer need to provide an employment certificate from the Division of Labor that verifies proof of their age and parental consent to work.[33]
Read More – The Equal Pay Act of 1963
[1] Child Labor in America: History, Policy, and Legislative Issues, Feb 9th, 2005, Every CSR Report. Retrieved from: Child Labor in America: History, Policy, and Legislative Issues - EveryCRSReport.com [2] 224-120 final Pdf.pdf (dol.gov) [3] Robert H. Bremner, From the Depths: The Discovery of Poverty in the United States (New York: New York University Press, 1964). Page 218 notes: "The labor unions had been active in the [child labor] movement since the days of the Knights of Labor in the 1880's, and Gompers only slightly exaggerated the facts when he declared [in 1906]: 'There is not a child labor law on the statute books of the United States but has been put there by the efforts of the trade-union movement.'" But, he added: "It is unlikely ... that the campaign against child labor would have made such rapid headway after 1900 had it not been for the pressure brought to bear on both public opinion and legislatures by voluntary groups such as the consumers' leagues, state charities aid associations, federations of women's clubs, and the child-labor committees." See also Samuel Gompers, Labor and the Common Welfare (New York: E. P. Dutton & Company, 1919), p. 129; Jeremy P. Felt, Hostages of Fortune: Child Labor Reform in New York State (Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 1965), pp. 10-13, 60, and 196-197; and Roger W. Walker, "The A.F.L. and Child-Labor Legislation: An Exercise in Frustration," Labor History, summer 1970, pp. 323-340. [4] Mary Field Parton (ed.), The Autobiography of Mother Jones (Chicago: Charles H. Kerr Publishing Company, 1980), pp. 71-83, 118-131. [5] Concerning the work of the National Consumers' League, see Josephine Goldmark, Impatient Crusader (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1953), a biography of Florence Kelley; Kathryn K. Sklar, Florence Kelley and the Nation's Work, (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1995); and Landon R. Y. Storrs, Civilizing Capitalism: The National Consumers' League, Women's Activism, and Labor Standards in the New Deal Era (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2000). (Hereafter cited as Storrs, Civilizing Capitalism.) [6] Walter I. Trattner, Crusade for the Children: A History of the National Child Labor Committee and Child Labor Reform in America (Chicago: Quadrangle Books, 1970). (Hereafter cited as Trattner, Crusade for the Children.) For a discussion of the politics of child labor reform during this early period, see Hugh C. Bailey, Edgar Gardner Murphy: Gentle Progressive (Coral Gables: University of Miami Press, 1968), pp. 65-108; and Herbert J. Doherty, Jr., "Alexander J. McKelway: Preacher to Progressive," Journal of Southern History, May 1958, pp. 177-190. [7] Id 1. [8] John Braeman, "Albert J. Beveridge and the First National Child Labor Bill," Indiana Magazine of History, March 1964, pp. 1-36. [9] Grace Abbott, "Federal Regulation of Child Labor, 1906-1938," The Social Service Review, September 1939, p. 411. (Hereafter cited as Abbott, Federal Regulation of Child Labor.) [10] Trattner, Crusade for the Children, pp. 119-138. See also Edward Keating, The Gentleman from Colorado: A Memoir (Denver: Sage Books, 1964), pp. 349-355; Lawrence R. Berger, and S. Ryan Johannson, "Child Health in the Workplace: The Supreme Court in Hammer v. Dagenhart (1918)," Journal of Health Politics, Policy and Law, spring 1980, pp. 81-97; Arden J. Lea, "Cotton Textiles and the Federal Child Labor Act of 1916," Labor History, fall 1975, pp. 485-494; and Walter I. Trattner, "The First Federal Child Labor Law (1916)," Social Science Quarterly, December 1969, pp. 507-524. [11] Abbott, Federal Regulation of Child Labor, p. 416. [12] Trattner, Crusade for the Children, pp. 138-142. [13] See Title 29 C.F.R. Part 570 for a more complete explanation of child labor regulation in general. In addition, DOL may have issued "opinion letters" that apply a provision of the FLSA to specific workplaces. [14] The Department of Labor estimates that, during the late 1990s, about 7% of all farmworkers were between 14 and 17 years of age: that is, about 126,000 children in that age group were employed on American farms. However, an unknown number of youth younger than 14 years of age are also employed in agriculture. See U.S. Department of Labor, Report on the Youth Labor Force, pp. 52-53. [15] United States. Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938. Pub. L.Tooltip Public Law (United States) 75–718 Approved June 25, 1938. [16] "Child Labor Provision for Nonagricultural Occupations Under the Fair Labor Standards Act" (PDF). U.S. Department of Labor, Wage and Hour Division. July 2010. [17] "State child labor laws applicable to agricultural employment". Wage and hour division. United States Department of Labor. December 2014. [18] Ibid 16. [19] "Arkansas Gov. Sanders signs law loosening child labor protections". WaPo. Mar 8, 2023. [20] "In a tight labor market, some states look to another type of worker: Children". Washington Post. ISSN 0190-8286. [21] Schuman, Michael (January 2017). "History of child labor in the United States, Part 1: Little children working". Monthly Labor Review: 20. [22] McGill, Nettie P (April 1921). "Trend of Child Labor in the United States, 1913 to 1920". Monthly Labor Review: 1–14. [23] "CHILD LABOR". Monthly Labor Review: 1361–1373. December 1933. [24] Schuman, Michael (January 2017). "History of child labor in the United States—part 2: the reform movement". Monthly Labor Review: 23. [25] Ibid 24. [26] "Four amendments that almost made it into the constitution". Constitution Daily. Philadelphia: The National Constitution Center. March 23, 2014. Archived from the original on March 5, 2017. [27] Vile, John R. (2003). Encyclopedia of Constitutional Amendments, Proposed Amendments, and Amending Issues, 1789-2002. ABC-CLIO. p. 63. ISBN 9781851094288. [28] Strauss, David A. (2010). The Living Constitution. Oxford University Press. pp. 125–126. ISBN 9780195377279. [29] Child labor laws are under attack in states across the country, Report By Jennifer Sherer and Nina Mast, March 14th 2023. Retrieved From: Child labor laws are under attack in states across the country: Amid increasing child labor violations, lawmakers must act to strengthen standards | Economic Policy Institute (epi.org) [30] 23-00019 (mn.gov) S.F. 375, 93rd Sess. (Minn. 2023). [31] H.F. 2198, 89th Gen. Assemb. (Iowa 2022). Iowa Legislature - BillBook [32] Id 29. [33] H.B. 1410, 94th Gen. Assemb. (Ark. 2023). HB1410 as engrossed on 02-20-2023 11:59:59 (state.ar.us)
