File:Social problems, a study of present-day social conditions (1916) (14781139855).jpg

Identifier: socialproblemss00town (find matches)
Title: Social problems, a study of present-day social conditions
Year: 1916 (1910s)
Authors: Towne, Ezra Thayer, 1873-
Subjects: Social problems
Publisher: New York : Macmillan Co.
Contributing Library: University of British Columbia Library
Digitizing Sponsor: University of British Columbia Library

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underconditions which are a serious menace to their physical andmoral well-being. History of child labor. — In England.^ ^ — A little morethan a century ago, Sir Robert Peel and some of the othergreat humanitarian leaders in England became aroused tothe terrible conditions under which children were employed,particularly in the cotton factories. Such factories had butrecently been estabUshed, and as they rehed mainly uponwater power they were located along streams, often quiteremote from the more populous centers. The new mechan-ical inventions of this period made possible the employmentof young children, and to secure such labor the factory o^vnerswent to the orphan asylums. Large numbers of orphanswere bound out to the employers for a period of years.These pauper apprentices, some of them not more than fiveor six years of age, were housed in great barrack-like build-ings, were often compelled to work twelve, fourteen, and evensixteen hours a day, underfed and underclothed, and in
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Child Labor 6i factories whore little attention was given either to theirhealth or to their morals. Accidents were numerous and theranks of these puny laborers were decimated by disease. Such conditions as these eventually attracted publicnotice. The Board of Health of Manchester in 1796 calledattention to the effect upon the children of unhcalthfulconditions, night work, and long hours, and also to the effectthat a continuance of such exploitation of childhood musthave upon life and industry in future years. After consider-able agitation the first legislation looking to the protectionof the child worker was passed. This first factory act waspassed in 1802. Its aim was to protect the health and themorals of the pauper children in the cotton factories. Itprohibited night work, and limited the hours of labor totwelve per day. Although the law was of httle effect, be-cause of inadequate provisions for its enforcement, it isof importance as marking the beginning of a series of factoryacts

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