The study is based on the records of 900 families known to the University of Chicago Settlement for a number of years, and from which was selected a group of 500 girls from whom it was possible to secure the most reliable information.
Taken all in all, it is an indictment of an educational system which fails to provide a practical education for these restless young daughters, and of an industrial system which permits their employment in industries where they “grow dull with a routine that calls for no exercise of brain power, and where the general stupidity of which many employers complain is increased as the months go by.”
Miss Montgomery contends that the labor of girls under sixteen is not necessary to the continuation of any business, and, as a buttress for her position, quotes one of the largest employers of child labor as saying: “If we could not by law employ the girl under sixteen years, we should find some way to make the machine do her work,” and points to the frank declaration of another, that: “As an employer, I can and do make money out of the work of little girls. As a man, I know it would be better for them and for the state if I were forbidden by law to employ them.”
The author, however, recognizes the problems of constantly changing and inefficient employees with which the employer is faced, and records their “growing sentiment against the employment of children.”
She tells us of the girl who was so “sot” in her mind and so well satisfied with what she was doing that she insisted that “pasting labels was her trade and refused to consider anything else”; while an example of the other type of mind is cited in one of three girls who had held eleven “jobs” in fifteen months, and gave as her excuse for one change: “The new boss may have red hair. Anything to change the scenery!”
The report points out again the well-worn but vital problem of providing normal amusement for the young girl, “carrying the premature responsibility of the wage-earner and asserting her right to a feverish search for evening pleasures,” and urges the city, through the Board of Education, to provide more nearly adequate uncommercialized recreation.
While the study is, of course, of a specialized class and of a community with specialized problems, it includes such a keen and sympathetic analysis of the complex factors which influence the relations between the employer and the child worker as to make it an extremely valuable record.[[28]]
The Jewish immigrant girl in Chicago was studied by Viola Paradise of the Immigrants’ Protective League and her conclusion about the girl whose problems and ideals she has come to know at first hand is this:
Perhaps no other immigrant is so eager to become Americanized as the Jewish girl, and with no other nationality does the Americanizing process begin so soon, and continue so consciously. This is not only because she feels that it is financially advantageous to know the language and customs of her adopted country, but because, notwithstanding the much famed “individualism” of the Jew, there is ingrained in her nature a passion for conformity. She is quick to accept the conventional; she is willing to be better than her neighbor, but she dreads being different. This is of course more or less true of all people, and this is one reason why the Jewish girl accepts so readily the habits and standards of Americans about her. She wants to equip herself with what the American takes for granted, American fashions, American methods, and the language. Having caught up, as it were, with her environment, she is ready to give free rein to her individualistic tendencies.
Perhaps at no time of her adult life is the immigrant girl more impressionable, more sensitive to suggestion, than during her first few months in America. She is in a state of self-consciousness which is propitious or detrimental, as circumstances determine. American life can mold her as it will. She brings as her gifts to America strength, youth, and enthusiasm, an eager and curious mind, longings and ideals, gifts which should be accepted less carelessly and used less wastefully. In exchange should we not give her something better than long, hard hours, low wages, unhealthful homes and neighborhoods, dangerous and vicious recreations? Should we not make an effort to justify and realize her boundless faith in America?[[29]]