- Hi, my name's Joe Williams. I'm a historian. And here's what you need to in order to sound smart about child labor. Children have been an important part of the labor force throughout human history. But in the 19th century, this became a problem due to industrialization as children were exposed to dangerous working conditions. Employers, however, saw a huge benefit to the use of child labor. Children were smaller and more nimble, and so therefore could perform functions that would be more difficult for adults. In addition, it was more difficult for children to unionize and employers could pay them lower wages than they had to pay adults.

This, however, was a deep source of concern for reformers who believed that children were not only placed in jeopardy by virtue of this work, but that they also should be receiving an education instead. Reformers pointed to the horrible working conditions, the long hours, and the low wages that children received in the 1840s. Just as American reformers were having some success in limiting child working hours, for native-born Americans, an influx of immigrants from places like Ireland provided a fresh supply of child labor for the burgeoning Industrial Revolution.

Between 1902 and 1905, several organizations committed themselves to seeing an end to child labor in the United States, but it wasn't until the advent of the Great Depression that real change was on the horizon. With so many Americans out of work, labor unions and laborers began to clamor for an end to child labor to ensure that the adult working population would have enough jobs. This proved to be an important development. Lawmakers actually drafted legislation which ended the practice in the United States, limiting working hours and improving working conditions for young people.

One of the lasting legacies of the battle to end the use of child labor is the importance of education. American reformers were able to make the case successfully that young people in a democracy needed to be educated in order to perform their civic duty.

Young people in large numbers came out and joined what became known as the Red Guards. These largely terroristic organizations were used to publicly humiliate, assault, and in some cases even murder political enemies of Mao and the Communist Party.