Part 27 (1/2)
CONNECTICUT LEGISLATION.
In matters of educational reform Connecticut is always the leading State of the Union. On this subject of children's overwork, and consequent want of education, she has legislated since 1842.
The original act, however, was strengthened and, in part, repealed by another law pa.s.sed in July, 1869 (chapter 115), which is the most stringent act on this subject in the American code. In all the other legislation the law is made to apply solely to manufacturers and mechanics; in this it includes all employment of children, the State rightly concluding that it is as much against the public weal to have a child grow up ignorant and overworked with a farmer as with a manufacturer. The Connecticut act, too, leaves out the word ”knowingly,”
with regard to the employer's action in working the child at too tender years, or beyond the legal time. It throws on the employer the responsibility of ascertaining whether the children employed have attended school the required time, or whether they are too young for his labor. Nor is it enough that the child should have been a member of a school for three months; his name must appear on the register for sixty days of actual attendance.
The age under which three months' school-time is required is fourteen.
The penalty for each offense is made one hundred dollars to the Treasurer of the State. Four different cla.s.ses of officers are instructed and authorized to co-operate with the State in securing every child under fourteen three months of education, and in protecting him from overwork, namely, School-Visitors, the Board of Education, State Attorneys, and Grand Jurors. The State Board of Education is ”authorized to take such action as may be deemed necessary to secure the enforcement of this act, and may appoint an agent for that purpose.”
The defects of the law seem to be that it provides for no minimum of age in which a child may be employed in a factory, and does not limit the number of hours of labor per week for children in manufacturing establishments. Neither of these limitations is necessary in regard to farm-labor.
The agent for executing the law in Connecticut, Mr. H. M. Cleaveland, seems to have acted with great wisdom, and to have secured the hearty co-operation of the manufacturers. ”Three-fourths of the manufacturers of the State,” he says, ”of almost everything, from a needle up to a locomotive, were visited, and pledged themselves to a written agreement,” that they would employ no children under fourteen years of age, except those with certificates from the local school-officers of actual school attendance for at least three months.
This fact alone reflects the greatest credit on this intelligent cla.s.s.
And we are not surprised that they are quoted as saying, ”We do not dare to permit the children within and around our mills to grow up without some education. Better for us to pay the school expenses ourselves than have the children in ignorance.”
Many of the Connecticut manufacturers have already, at their own expense, provided means of education for the children they are employing; and large numbers have agreed to a division of the children in their employ into alternate gangs--of whom one is in school while the other is in the factory.
The following act was drawn up by Mr. C. E. Whitehead, counsel and trustee of the Children's Aid Society, and presented to the New York Legislature of 1872. It has not yet pa.s.sed:--
AN ACT FOR THE PROTECTION OF FACTORY CHILDREN.
SECTION 1.--No child under the age of ten years shall be employed for hire in any manufactory or mechanical shop, or at any manufacturing work within this State; and no child under the age of twelve years shall be so employed unless such child can intelligibly read, under a penalty of five dollars for every day during any part of which any such child shall be so employed, to be paid by the employer. Any parent, guardian, or other person authorizing such employment, or making a false return of the age of a child, with a view to such employment, shall be liable to a penalty of twenty dollars.
SEC. 2.--No child under the age of sixteen years shall be employed in any manufactory, or in any mechanical or manufacturing shop, or at any manufacturing work within the State, for more than sixty hours in one week, or after four o'clock on Sat.u.r.day afternoon, or on New-year's-day, or on Christmas-day, or on the Fourth of July, or on the Twenty-second of February, or on Thanksgiving-day, under a penalty of ten dollars for each offense.
SEC. 3.--No child between the ages of ten and sixteen years shall be employed in any manufactory or workshop, or at any manufacturing work within this State, during more than nine months in any one year, unless during such year he shall have attended school as in this section hereinafter provided, nor shall such child be employed at all unless such child shall have attended a public day-school during three full months of the twelve months next preceding such employment, and shall deliver to its employer a written certificate of such attendance, signed by the teacher; the certificate to be kept by the employer as hereinafter provided, under a penalty of fifty dollars. _Provided_ that regular tuition of three hours per day in a private day-school or public night-school, during a term of six months, shall be deemed equivalent to three months' attendance at a public day-school, kept in accordance with the customary hours of tuition. And provided that the child shall have lived within the State during the preceding six months. And provided that where there are more than one child between the ages of twelve and sixteen years in one family, and the commissioners or overseers of the poor shall certify in writing that the labor of such children is essential to the maintenance of the family, such schooling may be subst.i.tuted during the first year of their employment by having the children attend the public schools during alternate months of such current year, until the full three months' schooling for each child shall have been had, or by having the children attend continuously a private day-school or public night-school three hours a day until the full six months' schooling for each child shall have been had.
SEC. 4--Every manufacturer, owner of mills, agent, overseer, contractor, or other person, who shall employ operatives under sixteen years of age, or on whose promises such operatives shall be employed, shall cause to be kept on the premises a register, which shall contain, in consecutive columns: (1st), the date when each operative commenced his or her engagement; (2d), the name and surname of the operative; (3d), his or her place of nativity; (4th), his or her residence by street and number; (5th), his or her age; (6th), the name of his or her father, if living; if not, that of the mother, if living; (7th), the number of his or her school certificate, or the reason of its absence; and (8th), the date of his or her leaving the factory. Such register shall be kept open to the inspection of all public authorities, and extracts therefrom shall be furnished on the requisition of the Inspector, the School Commissioners, or other public authority. Any violation of this section shall subject the offender to a penalty of one hundred dollars.
SEC. 5.--Every such employer mentioned in the last section shall keep a register, in which shall be entered the certificates of schooling produced by children in his employ; such certificate shall be signed by the teacher, and shall be dated, and shall certify the dates between which such scholar has attended school, and shall mention any absences made therefrom during such term, and such certificates shall be numbered in consecutive order, and such register shall also be kept open to inspection of all public authorities, as provided in the last section; and all violations of this section shall subject the offender to a penalty of one hundred dollars.
SEC. 6.--Any teacher or other person giving a false certificate, for the purpose of being used under the provisions of this act, shall be liable to a penalty of one hundred dollars, and be deemed guilty of misdemeanor.
SEC. 7.--The parent or guardian of every child released from work under the provisions of this act shall cause the said child to attend school when so released, for three months, in accordance with the provisions of section three of this act, under a penalty of five dollars for each week of non-attendance.
SEC. 8.--All public officers and persons charged with the enforcement of this law can, at all working-hours, enter upon any factory premises, and any person refusing them admittance or hindering them shall be liable to a penalty of one hundred dollars.
SEC. 9.--Every room in any factory in which operatives are employed shall be thoroughly painted or whitewashed or cleaned at least once a year, and shall be kept as well ventilated, lighted, and cleaned as the character of the business will permit, under a penalty of ten dollars for each week of neglect.
SEC. 10.--All trap-doors or elevators, and all shafting, belting, wheels, and machinery running by steam, water, or other motive power, in rooms or places in a factory in which operatives are employed, or through which they have to pa.s.s, shall be protected by iron screens, or by suitable part.i.tions during all the time when such doors are open, and while such machinery is in motion, under a penalty of fifty dollars, to be paid by the owner of such machinery, or the employer of such operatives, for each day during which the same shall be so unprotected.
SEC. 11.--This act shall be printed and kept hung in a conspicuous place in every factory, by the owner, agent, overseer, or person occupying such factory, under a penalty of ten dollars for each day's neglect.
SEC 12.--All suits for penalties under this act shall be brought within ninety days after commission of the offense, and may be brought by the Inspector of Factory Children, by the District-Attorney of the county, by the School Commissioners, by the Trustees of Public Schools, or the Commissioners of Charities, before any Justice of the Peace, or in any Justice's Court, or any Court of Record; and one-half of all penalties recovered shall be paid to the school fund of the county, and one-half to the informer.
SEC. 13.--The Governor of this State shall hereafter appoint a State officer, to be known as the Inspector of Factory Children, to hold office for four years, unless sooner removed for neglect of duty, who shall receive a salary of two thousand dollars a year and traveling expenses, not exceeding one thousand dollars, whose duty it shall be to examine the different factories in this State, and to aid in the enforcement of this law, and to report annually to the Legislature the number, the ages, character of occupation, and educational privileges of children engaged in manufacturing labor in the different counties of the State, with suggestions as to the Improvement of their condition.