![]() Darby (1941), upheld the constitutionality of the Fair Labor Standards Act. ![]() In February of 1941, the Supreme Court reversed its opinion in Hammer v. This time, the movement to end child labor was victorious. Opponents' charges ranged from traditional states' rights arguments against increases in the power of the federal government to accusations that the amendment was a communist-inspired plot to subvert the Constitution.įederal protection of children would not be obtained until passage of the Fair Labor Standards Act in 1938, which was also challenged before the Supreme Court. But the campaign for ratification of the Child Labor Amendment was stalled in the 1920s by an effective campaign to discredit it. A constitutional amendment was soon proposed to give Congress the power to regulate child labor. The Court reasoned that “The power of Congress to regulate interstate commerce does not extend to curbing the power of the states to regulate local trade.”ĭespite the nation's apparent desire for federal laws against child labor, the Supreme Court's rulings left little room for federal legislation. It too, was soon found to be unconstitutional in Bailey v. It also took an indirect route to regulate child labor, this time by using the government's power to levy taxes. 251 (1918) because it overstepped the purpose of the government's powers to regulate interstate commerce. In its opinion, the Court delineated between Congress's power to regulate production and commerce.Ī second child labor bill was passed in December of 1918 as part of the Revenue Act of 1919 (also called the Child Labor Tax Law). It banned the sale of products from any factory, shop, or cannery that employed children under the age of 14, from any mine that employed children under the age of 16, and from any facility that had children under the age of 16 work at night or for more than eight hours during the day.Īlthough Congress passed the Keating-Owen Act and President Woodrow Wilson signed it into law, the Supreme Court ruled that it was unconstitutional in Hammer v. Beveridge and used the government's ability to regulate interstate commerce to regulate child labor. ![]() It was based on a 1906 proposal by Senator Albert J. Social reformers began to condemn child labor because of its detrimental effect on the health and welfare of children. In 1908, the National Child Labor Committee hired Lewis Hine as its staff photographer and sent him across the country to photograph and report on child labor. The census report helped spark a national movement to end child labor in the United States. The 1900 census revealed that approximately 2 million children were working in mills, mines, fields, factories, stores, and on city streets across the United States. ![]()
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