CHILD SLAVES.

Waikato Times, Volume 121, Issue 20253, 23 July 1937, Page 10

CHILD SLAVES.

AMERICAN SWEATSHOPB, REVELATIONS BY FILMS. (Times Air Mail Service). LONDON. July -2. | Pictures of children of five and up- 1 wards in United States sweatshops for lid an hour are among tfie revelations in the current edition of the American magazine- film “March of Time” in a section dealing with President Roosevelt's new campaign to end the child labour scandal, says the NewsChronicle. Tlie present drive is to secure rati fTcation hv 36 States—the minimum j vote needed for an alteration of the U.S. Constitution—of lMe Child Labour Amendment. Started In 1924. Since 1924, in President Coolldgcs |

time, when the Amendment was first I proposed, its supporters have been ; trying vainly to Induce the States to accept it. Up to 1932 only six had agreed to ratification. Roosevelt under the New Deal, began to clean up industrial areas notorious lor tlie exploitation of children, and i the campaign for the Child Labour ! Amendment has progressed so far now I that its adoption this vear or next is i I regarded as certain. j The film gives a glimpse of the sort | •of opposition the exponents of the Amendment have been and still are encountering. The Conservatives are calling it a “Fascist” measure. They complain that it usurps parents’ nnlhoritA', and gives the Federal Government 100 much control over Hie bringing up of , i American children, and that in some I 1 agricultural districts it could never | he enforced. M Vivid Answer. < Bui shots of work that is being : I done now by children provide a vivid answer to Hie opposition. Hoys and i j girls are shown in wood mills, iu fac- 1

tories among dangerous machinery, working at tables huddled in tenement rooms, doing labouring work in fields and forests. “Nowhere." says the commentary, •-is there any law i • prevent children from helping parents, who. hired to do piece work, are so poorly paid that the whole family must work to eke out a living.”