Child Labor in City Streets

by Edward Nicholas Clopper

Broader Aspects of the Problem

Let us consider the matter from another point of view and discuss the opportunities for constructive work rather than confine our attention to the need of the merely negative remedy of restrictive legislation.

The street is painted as a black monster by some social workers, who can discern nothing but evil in it. Nevertheless the street is closely woven into the life of every city dweller, for his contact with it is daily and continuous. If it is all evil, it ought to be abolished; as this is impossible, we must study it to see what it really is and what needs to be done with it. It is the medium by which people are brought into closer touch with one another, where they meet and converse, where they pass in transit, where they rub elbows with all the elements making up their little world, where they absorb the principles of democracy,—for the street is a great leveler.

Dr. Delos F. Wilcox, in speaking to the subject "What is Philadelphia Doing to Protect Her Citizens in the Street?" recently said: "The street is the symbol of democracy, of equal opportunity, the channel of the common life, the thing that makes the city.... I fancy that the civic renaissance which must surely come, ... will never get very far until we have awakened to a realization of the dignity of the street—the common street where the city's children play, through which the milk wagon drives, where the young men are educated, along which the currents of the city's life flow unceasingly."[10]

An English writer has expressed a similar thought: "We have spoken of the street as a dangerous environment from which we would gladly rescue the children if we could, and so it undoubtedly is in so far as it supplants the influence of the home, tends to nullify that of the school and lets the boys and girls run wild just when they most need to be tamed.... It is, in fact, so strange a mixture of good and evil, so complex an influence in the growth of boy and girl, of youth and man, among our great city population, that it is necessary to attempt to analyze it a little more exactly. It is for the majority the medium in which the social conscience is formed, and through which it makes its power felt. In it the all-powerful agents of progress, example, imitation, the spread of ideas and the discussion of good and evil are incessantly at work."[11]

It is only natural that such a general agency for communication should have been abused. Its popularity alone would inevitably lead to such a result, with no restrictions imposed upon street intercourse. The very popularity of the games of billiards, pool and cards and of dancing led to their abuse and consequent disrepute in the eyes of many persons who were blinded to their intrinsic worth as diversions, by the abuses to which they were subjected. The marked success attending the proper use of all these amusements in social settlements and parish houses stimulates the imagination as to what might be accomplished with the street if its abuses also were eliminated.

It is of course absurd to pass judgment summarily upon the street, for the street can exert no influence of itself; the evil issues from its abuse by those who frequent it, and it is this abuse that should be suppressed. This immediately raises the question as to what constitutes this abuse. We must bear in mind that the real purpose of the street is to serve as a means of communication, a passageway for the transit of passengers and commerce. It was never intended for a playground, nor a field for child labor, nor a resort for idlers, nor a depository for garbage, nor a place for beggars to mulct the public. These fungous growths from civic neglect ought to be cut away. "A place for everything and everything in its place" would be an efficacious even if old-fashioned remedy: playgrounds for the children, workshops for the idlers, reduction plants for the garbage and asylums for the beggars. With these reforms effected and carefully maintained, the street would soon become much more wholesome and attractive.

These considerations have been advanced to indicate the intimate relation which exists between the problem of the child street worker and many other problems with which social workers are now struggling. Child labor in city streets must be abolished, but at the same time coöperation with other movements is necessary before a satisfactory solution of the problem can be assured.

For example, it would be a short-sighted policy to prohibit young children from selling goods in home market stands without reporting to the housing authorities cases in which large families live in one or two filthy rooms, displaying and selling their wares in the doorway and from the window. Our Italian citizens are not committing race suicide, but in spite of their numerous progeny they crowd together in extremely limited space, combining their home life with the customary business of selling fruit. Their young children assist in tending the stands on market days and nights or sit on the sidewalk selling baskets to passers-by; at closing time their goods are often stored in the same room that serves for sleeping quarters, cots being brought out from some dark hiding place. In such circumstances the mere prevention of child labor is not sufficient—the housing conditions also should be remedied so as to give the children a more suitable place in which to play, study and sleep, a better home in which to use their leisure.

Again, a movement to prohibit street work by children should give impetus to that which seeks to make the public school a social center, and especially to that for public vacation schools. Many of the homes of city children very largely lack the element of attractiveness which is so essential in holding children under the influence of their parents, and this want must be filled as far as possible by making the school an instrument not merely for instruction, but also for the entertainment and socializing of the entire neighborhood.

Again, the regulating of street trading should be undertaken jointly with the movement to supply adequate playground facilities. Playgrounds are not a municipal luxury, but a necessary. Children must have some suitable place for recreation. It is not a function of the street to furnish the space for play, and as children cannot and should not be kept at home all the time, it follows that ground must be set apart for the purpose. On these points a British report says: "We have no doubt that insanitary homes and immoral surroundings, with the want of any open spaces where the children could enjoy healthy exercise and recreation, are strong factors in determining towards evil courses in the cases of the children of the poor."[12] The need for more playgrounds in Chicago was partially supplied by having one block in a congested district closed to traffic during August, 1911, so that children could play there without risking their lives, from eight in the morning to eight in the evening. In providing this emergency playground, Chicago has set an example that will undoubtedly be imitated by other cities.

In this way the abolition of child labor in city streets would result in benefit not only to the children, but to the entire community as well. It would promote a general civic awakening that would make each town and city a better place to live in, a better home for our citizens of the future.

[CHAPTER II]
EXTENT TO WHICH CHILDREN ENGAGE IN STREET ACTIVITIES IN AMERICA AND EUROPE

There are no reliable figures either official or unofficial showing the number of children engaged in street activities in any city of the United States or in the country at large. The figures given by the United States Census of 1900 are so inadequate that they can hardly mislead any one endowed with ordinary powers of observation. It solemnly declares that in that year there was a grand total of 6904 newspaper carriers and newsboys, both adults and children, in the entire United States, of whom 69 were females.[13] In all probability there was a greater number at that time in some of our larger cities alone. In the group called "other persons in trade and transportation" only 3557 children ten to fifteen years of age are reported, although this group embraces nine specified occupations, of which that of the newsboy is only one. Besides these, many other occupations (in which 63 per cent of the total number of persons reported are engaged) are not specified.[14] Consequently the number of newsboys ten to fifteen years old reported by the enumerators for the entire country must have been ridiculously small.

Again, the total number of bootblacks ten years of age and upwards in the country was reported as 8230, they being included in the group called "other domestic and personal service." Only 2953 children ten to fifteen years of age were reported in this group, which includes five specified occupations, of which that of the bootblacks is only one, and many others (in which 67 per cent of the total number of persons reported are engaged) which are not specified.[15]

The inadequacy of these figures to convey any idea whatsoever as to the extent of child labor in street occupations in this country is painfully apparent; they are quoted here merely to show the poverty of statistics on this subject. Their inaccuracy is practically conceded by the report itself in the following words: "The limitations connected with the taking of a great national census preclude proper care upon the question of child employment. There is great uncertainty as to the accuracy of a mass of information of this character taken by enumerators and special agents, who either do not appreciate the importance of the investigation or find it impracticable to devote the time to the inquiry necessary to secure good results."[16]

There is reason to hope for more reliable data from the 1910 census; but unfortunately the figures will probably not be available until 1913. The enumerators employed by the Federal government for the Census of 1910, were instructed to make an entry in the occupation column of the population schedule for every person enumerated, giving the exact occupation if employed, writing the word "none" if unemployed, or the words "own income" if living upon an independent income. It was stated positively that the occupation followed by a child of any age was just as important for census purposes as the occupation followed by a man, and that it should never be taken for granted without inquiry that a child had no occupation.[17]

However, upon inquiry by enumerators at the time of the census taking as to the occupation of children, many parents undoubtedly replied in the negative, even though their children may have been devoting several hours daily outside of school to street work, under the impression that this was not an occupation. Consequently it is safe to assume that the figures for street-working children in the United States according to the Census of 1910 when published will be under the true number. Nevertheless, they can hardly fail to reflect conditions far better than did the figures for 1900.