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Republican Sets Out To Repeal The Ban On Child Labor
As part of the New Deal in 1933, Congress passed the National Industrial Recovery Act (NRA) that outlawed child labor in the United States. The child labor prohibition was ruled unconstitutional, but was passed again in 1938 and has protected children from forced labor and unfair working conditions in all industries since its inception. Republicans have tried to repeal every law in the New Deal since its beginning, and today’s corporate-driven conservatives are making it their goal to finish off the provisions of the New Deal once and for all. There has been a call to either end or privatize Social Security, and Republicans have attempted to defund or eliminate every safety net and provision for caring for disadvantaged citizens and children; some legislators have claimed Child Labor Laws are unconstitutional. As Draconian as it seems, a Missouri State Senator has proposed legislation to eliminate child labor laws altogether in Missouri.
The State Senator, Jane Cunningham (R-Chesterfield), introduced S.B. 222 last week and gave a litany of reasons why child labor laws are bad for children and parents. The woman is absolutely certain that current restrictions are “implying that government can make a better decision than a parent.” The current law in Missouri bars regular employment of children younger than 14, and imposes strict restrictions on children age 14 and 15, including the hours they are allowed to work and they are required to have signed permits from the school they attend. Cunningham says the law burdens schools with the responsibility of deciding if a child can work or not, but it is not a responsibility issue. Schools have a responsibility to the student to give them the best opportunity to succeed and if a child is failing or struggling to keep up with their studies, it doesn’t make sense to allow them to work when they should be studying.
Cunningham’s bill is more about providing cheap, slave-like labor than protecting a parent’s right to control their child. Some of the provisions in S.B. 222 are: eliminating the restriction on the number of hours or when a child is allowed to work, eliminates work permits, removes the authority of the state Labor Division to inspect records on child employees, allows children to work in any industry, and eliminates the age requirement for child labor. Every one of the provisions of her bill are to help businesses and nothing to help children or parents. There is no minimum wage provision for children under Cunningham’s legislation and if there were, the Division of Labor will never be able to verify the minimum is being met because the new law forbids inspectors from looking at employment records.
Cunningham’s bill also removes safe working conditions for children because if no records are kept or available for inspection, any injury is not covered because technically, the business did not have a child in their employ. It is the best of all worlds for any business looking for slave labor because a business can pay dirt wages, work the child as many hours as possible, and pay no overhead such as Worker’s Compensation insurance in case of workplace accidents. It is the archetype of Republican goals for all workers in America, and taking advantage of children is just the beginning.
Cunningham’s most absurd argument is that children do not learn a work ethic unless they are allowed to work at any age, any hours, and as often as the business requires them to work. It is a remarkable argument because the child labor laws have been in existence since 1938 and generations of Americans have an incredible work ethic. Cunningham may have had problems teaching her own children what a good work ethic is, but most parents do a fine job without subjecting their children to performing slave labor.
There have been more than a couple of Republicans who have suggested that child labor laws are unconstitutional and it is just another example of conservatives and businesses attempting to undo the New Deal that has been successful in protecting workers since 1933. Republicans have been attempting to eliminate the Social Security Administration since its inception, and every election cycle they get a little closer to convincing stupid greedy voters to eliminate the system completely. Republicans are still attempting to break unions like they did at the start of the New Deal even though they are responsible for worker’s rights, decent living wages, and protection from unfair labor practices. It is no coincidence that the corporatists and Republicans who opposed labor reform, union organizing, and child labor laws since the New Deal are the same people opposing them today. The companies and politicians may have different names, but the tactics, arguments, and complaints are exactly the same. Republicans want to give businesses the ability to use slave labor until a worker has outlived their usefulness, and then they want them to die. No retirement, no health insurance, and no compensation for on the job injuries or death.
Republicans hate Americans and since they have taken control of the House, they are on a rampage to eliminate any and all programs that help the American worker whether it is retirement savings or unemployment insurance. The new Republican Congress promised jobs, but they have only set out to punish women, and now children. How any man could vote for a Republican is a mystery because the vile cowards are going after and punishing women and children, and they are doing it at the urging of Christians and corporatists.
At some point, Americans must stand up to the corporatist Republicans and protect our women and children. Slavery was abolished by Abraham Lincoln, and it is certain that the biggest opposition came from large plantation owners because their profit margin was jeopardized. Whether it is calling the minimum wage unconstitutional or eliminating child labor laws, Republicans will, if given the opportunity, bring slavery back to increase corporate profits. If they can take Americans’ retirement savings and give it to Wall Street, they will do it tomorrow. If they can take our children and make them work for free and deprive them of an education, they will do that as well. If Americans cannot protect their women and children, all is lost. In Missouri, a senator named Cunningham is taking the first step to fulfill every conservative’s wish of undoing the New Deal and sending Americans back to the 18th century. Who will stop them?
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27 Responses to Republican Sets Out To Repeal The Ban On Child Labor
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Maxine
Feb. 16th, 2011 at 10:05 am
Let’s get those zygotes out there working for their own pre-natal insurance.
lynn
Mar. 5th, 2011 at 6:35 pm
That would be why they are dead set against abortion.
Hrafnkell Haraldsson
Feb. 16th, 2011 at 10:14 am
Great job, Rmuse. It’s almost as though they sit back and say, “how can we be truly reprehensible today?” And they find a way to do it. Every time. There are always deeper depths of moral depravity the family values party can plumb.
Shiva (Moderator)
Feb. 16th, 2011 at 10:16 am
I quite frankly agree that it is the Republican agenda to return the United States to a time where corporations determine your lives. Who on earth could ever hire a child in so many different places. I worked in a factory most of my life and I cannot imagine for a heartbeat a child being in any of those positions. It doesn’t matter if it’s unconstitutional or not, it should be a matter of common sense.
I don’t know if schools still have work placements, they did when I went to school. If you are planning on going towards a certain subject such as law, my school would try to find you a position with a law firm a few hours a week in order to familiarize you with the operations of a law office.there were also other fields that they tried to find people jobs in such as doctors offices. I have no problem with that, but I do have a problem with higher in children as a routine and putting them in dangerous situations. Not to mention mixing them with adults. I have known people in factories that I would not saddle an 18-year-old was let alone a 14-year-old.
I can only say once again, and I know many of us have said this before. The Democrats better be documenting all this and be prepared to use it against them. But I know they won’t.
Sarah Jones
Feb. 16th, 2011 at 10:17 am
OK, so we already have a job shortage. From a purely economic standpoint, flooding the market with more potential workers who do not have any standard of minimum wage is only going to lessen the chances of adults with families to support getting a chance at a job.
And then there’s the morality of this………..which you already discussed so well.
And the general war against humane conditions. They want America to be a third world country. They keep attacking our rights and the progressive things America stands for, things she is admired for, the world wide! They think America is great because their buddies can get rich here, not because there is equal opportunity for all. Education, etc. I am shocked each day by how blatant they are in their attacks. They ran on the economy and then as soon as they got into power they made it about taking rights away from Americans. “They hate us for our freedoms.” Yes, indeed.
Rmuse
Feb. 16th, 2011 at 11:49 am
That is a good point Sarah. It is another article. There is a finite number of jobs and if we raise the retirement age AND make children work, the unemployment rate will rise exponentially. Republicans will not spend one penny for infrastructure or jobs bills. Their budget is going to kill a million jobs. But hey, they are doing bible work against women and apparently, that is what the American people want.
I am just sick to death of them. Like Hraf said, they sit and think “how reprehensible can we be today.” I keep waiting for them to max out on the disgusting metre. I am afraid they are just getting started. Is it time to expatriate yet?
Sarah Jones
Feb. 16th, 2011 at 12:01 pm
Oh, never fear – soon it will be illegal for women to work, seeing as the Republican nanny state will be dictating that we carry feti to term for their armies.
Max Reddick
Feb. 16th, 2011 at 10:22 am
As usual, the motives driving the Republicans are completely and utterly transparent. I cannot believe people don’t turn away in disgust. In decent person would be appalled at this bill.
John
Feb. 16th, 2011 at 10:23 am
” So what if a black teenager wants to work for less then minimum wage”
Formed vice president George H. W. Bush in the 1984 debate with v.p. nominee Geraldine Ferraro.
( and I recalled this from memory )
Hrafnkell Haraldsson
Feb. 16th, 2011 at 11:03 am
And here is one that puts it in perspective (from 2005):
“Since 1997, the last time we raised the minimum wage, members of Congress have raised their own pay seven times, by $28,500. Think about that: we vote to raise our pay seven times in eight years by $28,500, but for minimum-wage workers earning $10,700 a year, we can’t vote to raise their minimum wage. Shame on the Senate.”
Senator Tom Harkin
American Prospect
gsb
Feb. 16th, 2011 at 2:40 pm
Lets not forget the fact, senators can retire with$1200 per month.While trying to rescind or repeal unemployment, and Soc Sec. To say nothing of the medical coverage they receive repug’s are representable people. This I learned from the news piece I read about Sen Kyl retiring.
Cut everyone but myself is the mantra of the republicans
laingirl
Feb. 16th, 2011 at 8:35 pm
I believe Congress retirement benefits average a lot more than $12oo.oo per month. Of course, it depends on how long they served, but I understand it is fairly generous.
Elemenohpee
Feb. 16th, 2011 at 10:32 am
I really wish a liberal politician would be brave enough to stand up and say loudly “Yes, in many instances, gov’t CAN do a better job of making decisions regarding children.
Some parents have violent tendencies and beat their kids, sometimes killing them.
WE NEED LAWS AGAINST THAT.
Some parents molest their own children.
Elemenohpee
Feb. 16th, 2011 at 10:35 am
Somehow my comment got posted before I was finished.
Some parents would gladly keep their children out of school altogether and put them to work to supplement family income.
WE NEED LAWS AGAINST THAT, TOO.
Great post Rmuse. I hope this story really gets legs.
Reynardine
Feb. 16th, 2011 at 10:36 am
If you look at a certain book written by Rick Santorum a few years ago, you will be enlightened about this scheme of anti- enlightenment. Soccer moms must be required to stay home with their (white, upper- middle- class, destined for finer things) children and make sure they stay in school and behave properly. All those icky poor mothers, however, should be required to engage in full- time menial labor, because their children don’t need an education. All they need to do is work, without minimum wage, as soon as they are big enough. I kid you not. I believe this thing was called, “It Takes a Family.”
Hrafnkell Haraldsson
Feb. 16th, 2011 at 10:58 am
Here’s a link to the Washington Post article (a discussion with Santorum) about his book: www.washingtonpost.com/wp...
Eykis
Feb. 16th, 2011 at 5:19 pm
So poor widdle Santorum is too busy these days complainint about the Google and the wonderful nick-name of Santorum.
Gotta love it. Santorum is………..well Santorum.
Google: Santorum if you have no idea what this about – nasty, but hilarious.
Anne
Feb. 16th, 2011 at 11:33 am
There is no rational reason for any thinking person to vote for the Party of No. Every day they say or do something that reveals their desire to reverse the progress that movements of the past have provided in order to level the playing field. If their shameful words and actions don’t motivate people to get out and vote them out of office at the first opportunity, I wonder what will.
Reynardine
Feb. 16th, 2011 at 12:09 pm
Basically, it is they who engage in class warfare, as evidenced by their constant attempts to deprive the “little people” of their homes and farms, dismantle public education (a couple of states are trying to remove the upper two years of high school from the public education system), and pack the unprivileged children off to completely unprotected labor. If anyone tries to call them on it, though, that person is accused of playing the class warfare card.
By the way, I object to calling these people either conservatives or Republicans, which used to mean stuffy, culturally unimaginative, not too venturesome, but basically not malignant towards fellow Americans – Dwight Eisenhower, say, or Chuck Hagel. A Joseph McCarthy was an exception. What we have now is a pack of bodysnatchers that has taken possession of the former stuffed shirt wing. What do we call them? Dissocialists? Snotzis? In any case, it is wrong to let them impersonate what was once a respected segment of American politics, even if not always by you or me.
Reynardine
Feb. 16th, 2011 at 2:30 pm
Why, no. It will only be prohibited for married women of the more “desireable” ethnographic strata to work; the unmarried ones will be allowed to be secretaries, nurses, librarians,tellers, teachers, and cashiers, so long as their wages don’t permit them to escape marriage and they are prevented from engaging in sex outside it. All the female ethnic undesireables, however, should be coerced into being cleaning women, beanpickers, and the like (with no minimum wage or working conditions, no maximum hours, and no overtime) so they can be stressed into miscarriages, thus decreasing the undesireable population, while their children who do survive are shunted into unprotected labor at the smallest usable size, thus eliminating the need to provide them with schooling, which might make them uppity. Of course, no female can choose to prevent or terminate a pregnancy, but her politically prominant father or married lover, or the hubby she is putting through school with her menial labor, can whisk her off against her will to a back alley abortionist who will butcher her so she can never bear again.
This is not far-fetched. New Deal labor laws apart, this is the world I was born into, and when my parents were young, there were not even the labor laws.
Nico
Feb. 16th, 2011 at 2:34 pm
What’s funny about this (not funny haha, but funny stab-stab) is that illegal immigrant farm workers allow their kids to “help them out” under the table (like picking berries), which is illegal but increases their yield and allows them to make more money and continue to live here in America. So by outlawing child labor, the Republicans are only making it easier for illegal immigrant workers to legally use their children as laborers to keep them here illegally in America. DOH!
Nico
Feb. 16th, 2011 at 2:35 pm
Darn it, I meant:
So by making child labor LEGAL, the Republicans are only making it easier for illegal immigrant workers to legally use their children as laborers to keep them here illegally in America. Double DOH!
Reynardine
Feb. 16th, 2011 at 3:43 pm
I knew a lot of migrant labor kids when I first came south (junior high). Some of them were Arkie whites and some Puerto Ricans (thus certainly citizens); some ethnic Mexicans whose ancestors could have been either immigrants or here more generations than yours or mine. In general, the kids helped out their parents on weekends, and the parents tried to keep their kids in school and studying. Nonetheless, a crop failure, a freeze, a flood – any of that – could disrupt the lives of adults and children alike, forcing them to move on to places where there were frequently no schools, at times unforeseen by them. Additionally, the girls, who often took life and education more seriously than their sedentary peers, were nonetheless vulnerable to predation by both itinerant and resident grown men, so they dropped out with early pregnancies, with or without marriage. The cabins they were lodged in were worse than school portables, so that it was common for whole families to be burnt or stifled to death during cold snaps by their heaters. I understand it hasn’t changed much. It’s rumored that in Seville and Pierson, whole such communities have been held incommunicado by the growers who employ them, unable to either attend school or vote. As I said, most of these people, whatever their last names, are our fellow Americans, and they deserve our help, not our persecution and scorn.
Patricia
Feb. 16th, 2011 at 4:00 pm
The Republicans are so transparent. There is an array of reasons the R’s want to pass something like this. There are of course, the ones stated in the article; Union busting, cheap labor, less children in school, etc,. But to me, the most glaring reason is to edge out visitors who hold a work visa, and the more citizens who go to work will beef up the jobs numbers and make the Republicans look they are creating jobs. This must not happen.
Kunosoura
Feb. 19th, 2011 at 2:58 pm
F.D. Roosevelt’s New Deal brought years of economic growth without accelerating the inequality between rich & poor. Many accepted the general consensus that federal government, and other collective institutions, like labor unions had an important role to play in shaping economic life and helping to redress the ordinary inequalities of a capitalist economy. Many in business supported the New Deal order as it fostered relative prosperity & peace, i.e., Keynesian economics, that government spending could help counterbalance destructive recessions. However others were outraged as they saw it as fundamental challenge to their power & aristocratic place in american society. And they began a impassioned effort to resist the ideals & institutions of the New Deal until it began to falter and they could bring about the slow and pervasive revoluton that would culminate in union-hater Reagan’s victory in 1980. They had worked more than fourty years to undo the system of labor unions, federal social welfare programs, and government regulations of the economy that came into existance during and after the Great Depression of the 1930s. Thus,Reagan’s shining statute in “the people’s house” in Washington stands as symbol of the final victory of the very rich over the very poor. Read “Invisible Hands”, by Kim Phillips-Fein, ISBN-978-0-393-33766-2 pbk.
Isaac
Feb. 22nd, 2011 at 4:44 pm
I love how “allow” gets changed to “make” from the very beginning of the article. I’ve seen smoother spin before, but not often.