CHAPTER VIII
THE STRUGGLE FOR REGULATION IN THE UNITED STATES

The economic activities of children in city streets, commonly called street trades, are not specifically covered by the provisions of child labor laws except in the District of Columbia and the states of Massachusetts, Missouri, New York, Oklahoma, Colorado, Utah, Nevada, New Hampshire and Wisconsin. The laws of many other states as well as of those mentioned, however, prohibit children under fourteen years of age from being employed or permitted to work in the distribution or transmission of merchandise or messages. If newspapers are merchandise, then children under fourteen years would not be allowed to deliver newspapers under the provision just stated. This raises a nice question as to what is included in the term "merchandise." That there is any distinction between newspapers and merchandise is practically denied by the street-trades laws of Utah and New Hampshire which provide that children under certain ages shall not sell "newspapers, magazines, periodicals or other merchandise in any street or public place"; the question of delivery, however, is left open by these laws. The Court of Appeals of the District of Columbia, in the case of District of Columbia vs. Reider, sustained the juvenile court of the District in its decision that newspapers are not merchandise and consequently that children under fourteen years of age engaged in delivering newspapers are not affected by the law.[140] The judge of the trial court stated in his opinion, "No one will seriously contend that the nature of the employment in the case at bar is at all harmful to the child." The case at bar was the prosecution of a route agent for a morning newspaper on account of having employed a minor under fourteen years of age to deliver newspapers. This opinion is typical of the misplaced sympathy so commonly bestowed upon these young "merchants" of the street. In the case cited, the court permitted itself to be drawn aside into an interpretation of the letter of the law instead of viewing the matter in the light of its spirit. The purpose of such a law is to prevent the labor of children, not to distinguish between closely related forms of labor. Its object is to afford protection, not to provoke discussion of purely technical points. The labor of delivering merchandise does not differ in any respect from the labor of delivering newspapers (the possibly greater weight of merchandise does not alter the case, inasmuch as it is usually carried about in wagons); and as the child labor law of the District of Columbia forbids the delivery of merchandise by children under fourteen years at any time, it follows that the delivery of newspapers by such children should not be allowed, because the intent of the law is to protect them from the probable consequences of such work. Moreover, the District of Columbia law prohibits children under sixteen years from delivering merchandise before six o'clock in the morning; yet, under the interpretation given by the juvenile court, it is perfectly proper for a child even under the age of fourteen years to perform the labor of delivery before that hour, provided he handles newspapers instead of packages. The inconsistency of this is only too apparent. The spirit of the law is lost sight of in the close interpretation of its wording. This is one of the obstacles always encountered in the movement for child labor reform after prohibitory legislation has been enacted.

American legislation on street trading still clings persistently and pathetically to the theory that uncontrolled labor is much better for children than labor under the supervision of adults, and consequently authorizes very young children to do certain kinds of work in the streets on their own responsibility, while forbidding them to work at other street occupations even under the control of older and more experienced persons. This official incongruity must ultimately be rescinded and replaced by more rational and comprehensive legislation. The fallacy of permitting such a distinction on the ground that the child is an independent "merchant" in the one case and an employee in the other, must also be abandoned in favor of a more enlightened policy.

Present Laws and Ordinances

The following table shows all the laws and ordinances governing street trading by children in existence in the United States in 1911.

The city council of Detroit passed an ordinance in 1877 which forbids newsboys and bootblacks to ply their trades in the streets without a permit from the mayor. No age limit is fixed, no distinction is made between the sexes and no hours are specified. Applicants for the permit are customarily referred to the chief truant officer for approval, and as a rule permits are not issued to boys under ten years of age or to girls. An annual license fee of ten cents is charged, and the license holder is supplied with a numbered badge which must be worn conspicuously. Owing to its manifest weakness, this ordinance is of little avail.

It will be observed from the following table that the common age limit for boys in street trading is ten years. When we pause to reflect on the import of this, it is hard to realize that intelligent American communities actually tolerate such an absurdly meager restriction; yet the movement for reform has progressed even this far in only a very small part of the country—in most places there is no restriction whatever! Some day, and that not in the very remote future, we shall look back upon the authorized exploitation of the present period with the same degree of incredulity with which we now regard the horrors of child labor in England during the early part of the nineteenth century.

In an attempt to minimize the bad effects of street trading most of the communities which have enacted laws or ordinances on the subject provide for the issuance of licenses to boys, and in some cases also to girls, in the belief that in this way the work of the children can best be brought under some degree of control. However, this is merely temporizing, although it affords an opportunity to gather facts and undoubtedly marks a step toward a better solution of the problem. This is brought out clearly by a recent British report on street trading: "Our general impression, gathered in towns in which by-laws had been made, was that, though in exceptional cases much good had resulted from their adoption, on the whole this method of dealing with what we have come to consider an unquestionable evil, has not proved adequate or satisfactory. In many instances it has been pointed out to us that a system of licensing and badging is but a method of legalizing what is indisputably an evil, and that a set of by-laws, however rigorously enforced, can at best only modify the difficulties of the position."[141]

The social workers of Chicago, keenly alive to the menace of the situation, bewail the lack of protection for street workers in the following words: "The child labor law and the compulsory school law and the juvenile court law form the body of protective legislation which has been developing in behalf of the children of Illinois during the past twenty years. By none of the three, however, except in so far as street trading by a child under ten is counted an element in dependency, is the street-trading child safeguarded against parental neglect or greed, the vicious sights and sounds of the city street and the demoralizing habit of irregular employment."[142]

Opposition to Regulation

The opposition to bringing the street trades under some degree of restriction has come, as might be expected, from very interested sources. In Illinois the newspaper publishers figured prominently in the movement to prevent the passage of the street-trades measure introduced in the legislature of that state at its session of 1911. This has not always been the case, however, as the circulation managers of the five leading daily newspapers of St. Louis wrote letters to the legislature of Missouri favoring the passage of that section of the child labor bill of 1911, which provided that boys under ten years and girls under sixteen years should not sell anything in any street or public place within the state. This provision was enacted into law, but it is safe to say that if the rational age limit of sixteen years for boys had been advocated instead of ten years, the newspapers would have been most active in opposing this section. In Cincinnati the circulation managers of the newspapers most affected by the street-trades ordinance passed by the City Council in 1909 agreed to its provisions before the measure was submitted to the Council, and consequently it passed without opposition.

In New Haven and Hartford repeated attempts have been made to secure regulation of street trading by means of city ordinances, and at two sessions of the state legislature bills have been introduced which provided for such restriction, but all these efforts have been persistently fought by a leading newspaper of Hartford in which city it has always been customary to have girls as well as boys selling newspapers on the street. In 1910, a city ordinance was passed in Hartford providing that boys and girls under ten years should be prohibited from trading in the streets and that between the ages of ten and fourteen years they should be licensed and not allowed to sell after 8 P.M. The newsgirls were not banished from the street because it was held that they were "a pretty good sort of girl after all," and that so long as it could not be proved that they were demoralized by the work, they should be permitted to go on with it. In other words, the city clings to the fine old American policy of delaying action until some calamity makes it necessary.

The objections offered by interested parties to the by-laws drafted by the London County Council at a hearing held in 1906, show that the law of self preservation operates in England as in other quarters of the Earth. News agents, employing little boys to deliver newspapers, declared that conditions were not bad; that the work was healthful; that the wages were a great help to poor parents; that they could not afford to employ older boys; that the lads should be allowed to begin at 6 A.M. and work not more than ten hours a day outside of school with a maximum weekly limit of twenty-five hours; that to prohibit the delivery of newspapers before 7 A.M. and after 7 P.M. would be a great injustice to the trade; that boys wouldn't stay in bed even if 7 A.M. were fixed as the hour for beginning work; that such work does not interfere with schooling; that the boys are well looked after; in short, that the by-laws would ruin them and bring starvation to the children. One news agent in declaiming against the hours fixed for the delivery of newspapers, insisted that the restriction would throw boys out of employment and send them to trade in the streets with their undesirable associations, apparently unmindful of the fact that delivery boys themselves worked in that environment. The dairymen were horrified at the limit placed on hours, urging that the little boys in their employ should begin to deliver milk at 5 A.M., as early work was beneficial and the wages useful to poor parents. Shopkeepers denounced the by-laws as too drastic, because they would prevent such light work as errand running at noon and casual employment in the evening after 7, resulting in hardship to both parents and children; one acknowledged that if he were prevented from employing cheap labor his business would suffer; another said that he employed a boy at noon and also from 5.30 to 9 P.M., the work being light and the parents satisfied, and that the training was good for boys. A fruiterer actually declared that the limit of eight hours on Saturday would make a boy valueless to him; another said he employed a boy for one hour in the morning, from 6 to 9 in the evening, and also on Saturday morning and evening, in running errands, and that the work was not heavy; another employed boys after school from 6 to 9.30 P.M., insisting that the work was good for them, as it kept them from the street and gave them an insight into business habits.[143] It should be remembered that all this work was performed by the children in addition to attending school both morning and afternoon.

The testimony given before the British Interdepartmental Committee of 1901 by the secretary of an association representing many thousand retail shopkeepers, would be amusing if it were not so sinister. He presented the subject of child labor in a most favorable aspect, declaring that the wages were needed on account of poverty in the families; that the work was light and had a very beneficial effect on health because it was done in the open air; that good meals were given in addition to cash wages and were very beneficial; that the effect on the boys' character was very beneficial, as the work cultivated businesslike habits and kept the boys from running the streets, frequently affording promotion to the higher grades of shopkeeping.[144] Another British Committee, investigating conditions in Ireland, reported, "We found but one witness (a newspaper manager of Belfast) to testify that the present conditions of selling papers in the street were satisfactory and cannot be improved; and that instead of tending to demoralize, they have the opposite effect."[145]

Ways and Means of Regulating Street Work

As to the control of street trading by children there are two methods by which the desired end may be approached. First, a mutual agreement as to self-imposed restrictions among the managers of all the business interests in connection with which children work on the streets. This method, however, can be dismissed from consideration at once on account of its impracticability. Street work embraces many different kinds of commercial activity, and as one manager is the competitor of all others in the same line of business and is free to adopt such lawful means of placing his wares on the market as he sees fit, it would be clearly impossible to force any one into such an agreement against his will. Moreover, new competitors may enter the field at any time who would not be bound by the agreement of the others, and consequently this would soon be broken by the force of competition following the intrusion of these new parties.

Second, regulation by constituted legislative authority. This is the more feasible method, and such regulation may be obtained from either of two sources—the municipality or the state. There is a question as to which of the two is the better for the purpose. Regulation by the state has the advantage of making the provisions apply uniformly to all cities within its borders and is obtained by no more effort than is required to get an ordinance through the Council of a single municipality. On the other hand, the municipal ordinance has the advantage of being secured by residents of the community who are intelligently concerned in the local problem and who will therefore take an active interest in having its provisions enforced. However, the good features of both these methods are united in the English plan, a modification of which has been adopted by Massachusetts. According to this plan the state fixes a minimum amount of restriction and authorizes local authorities, including boards of education, to increase the scope of restriction, and provides penalties for violation of the same.

As to the degree of regulation, an ultra-conservative measure would prohibit boys under ten and girls under sixteen years from selling anything at any time in the streets or public places of cities, while the age limit for boys is raised to fourteen years for night work. The issuance of licenses to boys ten to fourteen years of age who wish to engage in street trading is the usual accompaniment of such restriction, and while ordinarily of little avail, it could be made of some assistance to truant and probation officers in their efforts to enforce the compulsory education and delinquency laws. The age limit for boys has been advanced to eleven years by the School Committee of Boston, and to twelve years for newsboys and fourteen years for other street workers by the state of Wisconsin. But all efforts to secure such regulation should be based upon the principle that street trading is an undesirable form of labor for children, and consequently should be subject to at least the same restrictions as other forms of child labor.

Probable Course of Regulation in Future

American child labor laws usually contain a provision to the effect that no child under sixteen years shall engage in any employment that may be considered dangerous to its life or limb or where its health may be injured or morals depraved. This is sonorous, but ineffective,—the particular kinds of improper work should be specified. In this list of undesirable forms of labor, street work should be included. Great Britain has had far more experience in the matter of regulating the work of children than any state of this country, and, in the light of all this experience, her departmental committee of 1910 has emphatically declared that street trading by boys under seventeen and girls under eighteen years should be absolutely prohibited. This should be our ideal in America. Commenting on the banishment of young girls from the streets of New York City, Mrs. Florence Kelley says, "If the law against street selling and peddling by girls to the age of sixteen years can be thus effectively enforced in a city in which the depths of poverty among the immigrants are so frightful as they are in New York, there is no reason for assuming that it is impossible to prohibit efficiently street selling by boys."[146] Girls under eighteen years should never be allowed to go out in the streets for commercial purposes, no matter how innocent these purposes may be in themselves. One of the most important features of the movement in America should be the absolute prohibition of such work by minors under eighteen years at night; this is urged because it is in harmony with the provisions of our most advanced child labor laws and is fully justified because of the evil character of the influences rampant in cities after dark, and because such night work affords children a constant opportunity to cultivate their acquaintance with, if not to know for the first time, conditions from which every effort should be made to isolate them. For night messenger service the age limit should be twenty-one years.

The enforcement of such regulation as is now provided by the few states and cities which have given this subject any attention, is variously intrusted to factory inspectors, police, truant and probation officers, but in Boston the school committee has delivered this task into the hands of one man who is known as the supervisor of licensed minors. The Boston plan for enforcement seems to have given better results than the common system of intrusting the enforcement to officers already overburdened with other duties, but it is clearly impossible for one officer to handle the situation unaided in a large city—the plan would be considerably improved by the appointment of several assistants.

"The licensing by the Boston School Committee of minors of school age to trade in the streets of Boston came about through an act of legislature in 1902. The need of supervision of minors licensed under this act became very apparent, as their numbers increased and their street influences reacting on their school life became better understood. To meet this need a supervisor of licensed minors was appointed whose duties are to secure the strict enforcement of the law, regulations governing the various forms of street work of children of school age, also to have general supervision of the details of the licensing department."[147]

Human nature in children is not in the least unlike human nature in adults. Just as we need an interstate commerce commission backed by the federal government to supervise the large business affairs of men, so do we need a supervisor of children's commercial activities in city streets, clothed with authority by the municipal government.

The Boston plan is now being advocated for New York City: "In the street trades the Committee recommends that the principle of supervision of licensed minors, as practised for a number of years in Boston, be adopted, and that an office be created in the Department of Education that shall have supervisory control of all minors engaged in street trades. It recommends furthermore that the minimum age limit for licensing boys be raised from ten to fourteen years, and that the legal limit for selling at night be reduced from 10 to 8, to correspond more nearly with the provisions of labor legislation dealing with children in factories."[148]

The first attempt to control the situation in New York City was intrusted to the police, but the results were not satisfactory, as they looked upon the matter with indifference. Subsequently the truant officers also were charged with this duty, and in 1908 four men were assigned to give their entire attention to this work between 3 P.M. and 11 P.M., and at present eight men are so engaged, but no very marked improvement is noticeable. In Rochester the enforcement of the state law was brought about through the efforts of the women of that city; both business women and shoppers were asked to consider themselves members of a vigilance committee and to notify the board of education and the police department by telephone whenever any violations of the law were observed upon the streets. Within five days so many complaints had been received that both the superintendent of schools and the president of the board of education arranged a meeting at which their attention was invited to the widespread disregard of the law. As a result, steps were taken at once to insure enforcement, and finally the board of education appointed one truant officer, and the commissioner of police detailed a policeman especially for the work of reporting violations.

In addition to providing an improved method of enforcement, efforts have been made in Boston to deal more effectively with the difficult problem of keeping street traders out of saloons, the licensing board having issued an order to all holders of liquor licenses to prohibit minors from loitering upon the licensed premises, more especially newsboys and messenger boys.

The efforts of the school committee to regulate street trading in Boston have been further supplemented by organizing a Newsboys' Republic, which is described as follows: "Perhaps the most important result of supervision so far has been the gradual introduction of a plan for self government among the licensed newsboys through the so-called Boston School Newsboys' Association. This association is pledged to the enforcement of the license rules and the suppression of smoking, gambling and other street vices, more or less common among the street boys of certain neighborhoods. The association is run by the boys themselves, through officers of their own choosing, consisting of one newsboy captain and two lieutenants for each school district; also a chief captain and general secretary and an executive board of seven elected from the ranks of the captains. The general duties of the captains and lieutenants are, first, to see that all licensed newsboys of their respective school districts live up to their license rules, and the principles of the association. Secondly, to see that all boys not licensed shall not interfere with or in any way hurt the business of the licensed newsboys. These duties are performed through weekly inspections on the street, supplemented by monthly inspection at schools, at which time branch meetings of all the boys in each district are frequently held."[149]

CHAPTER IX
DEVELOPMENT OF STREET TRADES REGULATION IN EUROPE

Great Britain

Attention was called to the problem of street trading by children in England for the first time, in a comprehensive way, in 1897. A few close observers of social conditions noticed that the situation was so grave as to demand an immediate remedy, and accordingly, upon their initiative, an organization was effected for the purpose of studying the subject. This organization took the form of a private association known as the Committee on Wage-Earning Children. The committee conferred with the officers of the board of education and succeeded in arousing their interest to the extent of securing a promise for the collection of a return from the elementary schools of England and Wales concerning the labor of public school pupils, their ages, and other relevant information. In 1898, the House of Commons ordered this inquiry to be made, and in June of that year copies of a schedule were sent by the educational department to all the public elementary schools in England and Wales. Many schoolmasters misunderstood the meaning of this schedule and failed to report the children of their schools who were actually engaged in various forms of work outside of school hours. Only about half of the schedules were filled and returned, but these showed that 144,026 children were following some kind of gainful occupation in addition to attending school. Many schoolmasters reported pitiable cases of child exploitation, as, for example, the following: "Boys helping milkmen are up at 5 o'clock in the morning, whilst those selling papers are about the streets to a very late hour at night. During lessons many fall off to sleep, and if not asleep the effort to keep awake is truly painful both to boy and teacher. The educational time, as a consequence, is materially wasted."[150] "These are sad cases, viz. one boy (aged eleven, in Standard III) works daily, as a grocer's errand boy, for 1s. 6d. a week, from 8 to 9 A.M., from 12 to 1.30 P.M., and from 4.30 to 7.30 P.M. On Saturday from 8 A.M. to 10 P.M. Another boy, aged ten in Standard III, works also as a grocer's errand boy for 1s. 6d. per week, from 8.30 to 9 A.M., from 12 to 1.30 and from 5 to 8 P.M., and on Saturday from 8.30 A.M. to 11 P.M." And all this in addition to twenty-seven and one half hours of school every week! A boy who works for 56-3/4 hours a week, selling papers, is employed as follows: "Monday to Friday, from 7 A.M. to 8.45 A.M., from 12 to 1 P.M., and from 4 to 10 P.M., and on Saturday from 7 A.M., to 10 A.M., from 12 to 2 P.M. and from 3 to 11 P.M." "This is a very bad case: called at 2 and 3 o'clock A.M., the boy (aged eight) is so tired that he is obliged to go to bed again, and is often absent from school, and made to work in the evening as well."[151] Many schoolmasters also testified to the need of a remedy; one of these wrote on the schedule: "May I be allowed to express my gratitude to the education department for making this inquiry, and express the hope that the department will be able to frame some regulation to meet and relieve the onerous conditions under which many of the young have to gain education. Without exaggeration I can truthfully assert that there are to-day in our national and board schools thousands of little white slaves."[152]

Nothing more came of the movement until January, 1901, when the Secretary of State for the Home Department appointed an interdepartmental committee "to inquire into the question of the employment of children during school age, and to report what alterations are desirable in the laws relating to child labour and school attendance and in the administration of these laws." After making careful investigation this committee declared: "In the case of street-trading children very strong powers of regulation are required. These children are exposed to the worst influences; they enter public houses to ply their trade, they are kept up late at night and exposed to inclement weather, and the precarious nature of their trade disinclines them to steady work, and encourages them to dissipate their earnings in gambling ... there should be power to prohibit street trading by children; to make regulations as to the age and sex of street traders, and the days and hours on which they may ply their trade; to grant licenses to those permitted to trade and to require the wearing of badges or uniforms; to forbid street traders to enter public houses or to importune or obstruct passengers; and generally to control their conduct and to cope with the evil in every reasonable way."[153] The committee further reported: "Our main recommendation is that the overworking of children in those occupations which are still unregulated by law should be prevented by giving to the county and borough councils a power to make labour by-laws; ... further we suggest that the gaps that may be left by local by-laws should be filled up by a general prohibition of night labour by children and of labour manifestly injurious to health."[154] This committee reported that the number of children in England and Wales attending school and also in paid employment was far greater than as reported by the parliamentary return, estimating that the total number was no less than 300,000 in 1898.[155]

One of the witnesses before this committee was a London truant officer of eighteen years' experience, who testified that every month he met with hundreds of cases of milk boys who "go to work at 5 A.M. and knock off at 8.30 and get to school at 9.45. At twelve they return to work, and after school at 4.30 they go again and wash up. The latest hour they work is about 8 P.M. I have frequently seen these children fast asleep in school. It is a common thing to see children of tender age outside the different theatres trying to sell newspapers at 11 o'clock at night. The percentage of cases in which this work is necessary is very small; it simply means that a little more money is spent in the public houses."[156] The report of this committee contains a great mass of testimony from persons in many walks of life, nearly all of whom declared that street trading by children is bad and should be regulated. They differentiated between the hawking of articles in the streets and their delivery for employers, and one of the witnesses from Liverpool testified that the local regulation of street trading by children in that city did not apply to bootblacks nor to boys who carried parcels because they were not selling anything.[157]

In 1902, an interdepartmental committee was appointed to study the subject in Ireland, and in its report stated: "The principal dangers to which they [street traders] are exposed are those arising from late hours in the streets, truancy, insufficient clothing, entering licensed premises to find sale for their goods, obstructing, annoying or importuning passengers, begging, fighting with other children, playing football or other games in the streets, using bad language, playing pitch and toss (a gambling game), smoking—all of which are matters of common observation, and have been testified to by many of the witnesses. In our opinion these evils can be lessened, if not entirely removed, by the simple system of regulation, licenses and badges."[158]

The direct result of the reports of these committees was the passage by Parliament of the Employment of Children Act, 1903. Section 3 of this act provides, first, that no child under eleven years shall engage in street trading; second, no child under fourteen years shall be employed between 9 P.M. and 6 A.M.; third, no factory or workshop half-timer shall be employed in any other occupation; fourth, no child under fourteen years shall handle heavy weights likely to result in injury; fifth, no child under fourteen years shall engage in any injurious employment. Sections 1 and 2 of this act give to local authorities power to make by-laws regulating the employment of children. The provisions of Section 2 concerning street trading are in substance as follows: any local authority may make by-laws with respect to street trading by persons under the age of sixteen years and may prohibit such street trading subject to age, sex or the holding of a license; may regulate the conditions on which such licenses may be granted and revoked; may determine the days and hours during which and the places at which such street trading may be carried on; may require such street traders to wear badges and may regulate generally the conduct of such street traders; provided that the right to trade shall not be made subject to any conditions having reference to the poverty or general bad character of the person applying for this right, and provided also that the local authority shall have special regard to the desirability of preventing the employment of girls under sixteen years in streets and public places.

Section 2 b of the Prevention of Cruelty to Children Act, 1904, imposes a penalty upon adults who cause, procure or allow boys under fourteen or girls under sixteen to trade in the streets between 9 P.M. and 6 A.M.

An official report made in 1907 gives the names of all counties, boroughs and urban districts in Great Britain which had up to that time made by-laws to regulate street trading by children. In England and Wales, 2 counties, 60 cities and boroughs and 4 urban districts had done so; in Scotland, 3 burghs and the school board districts of 11 burghs and 12 parishes; and in Ireland, 4 cities and boroughs and 1 urban district had made such by-laws.[159]

By 1910, out of 74 county boroughs in England and Wales, not less than 50 had made street-trading by-laws, and these included most of the larger places; but out of 191 smaller boroughs and smaller urban districts only 41 had done so; while among 62 administrative counties only 3 had made by-laws. In addition to these, 4 county boroughs and 2 of the smaller boroughs had made street-trading by-laws under local acts.

In Scotland, of the 33 county councils empowered to make by-laws, not one had done so by 1910; while of 56 burghs only 3 had passed by-laws; of 979 school boards only 27 had made such regulations. Edinburgh passed by-laws under a private act.

In Ireland, out of 33 county councils not one had made by-laws; of the 43 councils of urban districts with a population of over 5000, only 5 had passed regulations.

In 1909 the Secretary of State for the Home Department appointed a departmental committee to inquire into the operation of the Employment of Children Act, 1903, and to consider whether any and what further legislative regulation or restriction was required in respect of street trading and other employments dealt with in that act. This committee confined its report, which was submitted in 1910, to the subject of street trading; and its great contribution to the cause of child welfare is its recommendation that street trading should be prohibited rather than regulated. The statute of 1903 prohibits all work by children under the age of eleven years, and its restrictions on street employment by children above that limit, out of school hours, are prohibitions of night work after nine o'clock, consequently a child above the age of eleven years who engages in street trading is restrained, during the day, only by such by-laws as may have been adopted by the local authority. The committee found that even in communities where by-laws had been adopted they were not always observed, and also that where no by-laws had been passed the minimum statutory restrictions were frequently ignored. The report declared that: "A considerable amount of street trading is still done by children under eleven. Special censuses taken in Edinburgh revealed the fact that children as young as seven were trading in the streets. The great bulk of the evidence received in and from Scotland points to the conclusion that the Act [of 1903] has been almost a dead-letter in that country.... Infringements of the Act in Ireland are no less common. In Waterford newspapers are sold by children of nine years old up to 11 P.M. and later."[160] The issuance of licenses and badges was denounced as giving the stamp of official approval to what is recognized as an evil, the adoption of by-laws resulting merely in a partial improvement of conditions even when rigorously enforced.

After having devoted several months to the inquiry, during which evidence was gathered in London, Manchester, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Dublin, Belfast, Birmingham and Liverpool in addition to receiving the testimony of witnesses from Sheffield, Nottingham, Bolton and other centers, the committee made this very noteworthy and significant declaration: "We have come to the conclusion ... that the effect of street trading upon the character of those who engage in it is only too frequently disastrous. The youthful street trader is exposed to many of the worst of moral risks; he associates with, and acquires the habits of, the frequenters of the kerbstone and the gutter. If a match seller, he is likely to become a beggar—if a newspaper seller, a gambler; the evidence before us was extraordinarily strong as to the extent to which begging prevails among the boy vendors of evening papers. There was an almost equally strong body of testimony to the effect that, at any rate in crowded centres of population, street trading tends to produce a dislike or disability for more regular employment; the child finds that for a few years money is easily earned without discipline or special skill; and the occupation is one which sharpens the wits without developing the intelligence. It leads to nothing practically, and in no way helps him to a future career. There can be no doubt that large numbers of those who were once street traders drift into vagrancy and crime.... Much evidence was given to the effect that the practice of street trading, even though only carried on in the intervals of school attendance, tends to produce a restless disposition, and a dislike of restraint which makes children unwilling to settle down to any regular employment. So far as girls are concerned, there must be added to the above evils an unquestionable danger to morals in the narrower sense. The evidence presented to us on this point was unanimous and most emphatic. Again and again persons specially qualified to speak, assured us that, when a girl took up street trading, she almost invariably was taking a first step toward a life of immorality. The statement that the temptations are great, and the children practically defenseless, needs no amplification. An occupation entailing such perils is indisputably unfit for girls."[161]

The need for prohibition of street trading was realized by this committee, the change being urged in the following epoch-making statement: "After carefully considering the operation of the by-laws adopted since 1903, and comparing the present state of affairs with that existing before the passing of the act, we have come to the conclusion that the difficulties of the situation cannot be said to have been met, or any substantial contribution to a solution of the problem made, by the existing law and the machinery set up for its enforcement. Regulation, however well organized and complete, will not turn a wasteful and uneconomic use of the energies of children into a system which is beneficial to the community. Consequently we feel that we have no choice but to recommend the complete statutory prohibition of street trading either by boys or by girls up to a specific age. In the case of boys we feel that it would be wise to name an age which would render it likely that they would have had full opportunities of taking to regular work before they could legally trade in the streets. We think the most suitable age would be seventeen, which gives an interval of three or four years after the ordinary time of leaving an elementary school.... So far as girls are concerned, we feel that the arguments in favor of prohibiting trading increase rather than diminish in force as the age of the traders advances. The entire body of testimony laid before us has forced upon us the conclusion that street trading by girls is entirely indefensible, and that no system of regulation is sufficient to rid the employment of its risks and objections. On the other hand, we have not been able to discover any trace of hardship having resulted in any of those towns in which by-laws have prohibited trading by girls, or have restricted the ages during which trading is permitted. We think that the age of prohibition should be higher for girls than for boys, and, while we feel that it should, in any event, not be less than eighteen, we should be willing to see it fixed as high as twenty-one."[162]

As to the administration of the law, the committee declared that this should be delivered into the hands of the education authorities who could charge the regular truant officers with the work of enforcement or employ special officers for the purpose. The placing of responsibility upon the parents of child offenders was indorsed, but the committee criticised administrators because of the small penalties imposed as fines, the amounts being easily covered by the earnings of the traders, and hence an increase of the maximum fine was recommended.

A minority report was submitted by four members of this committee who declined to support the recommendation of the majority that street trading should be immediately and universally prohibited in the case of boys up to the age of seventeen. These members held that the cause of street trading should first be removed by organizing employment bureaus for children, by giving the children the benefit of vocational direction, and by promoting industrial education for boys both while attending the elementary schools and after.

Liverpool

As to local efforts to regulate the street-trading evil, the first steps were taken in Liverpool. In this city the condition of child street traders was particularly bad; half of them were girls, and the stock in trade was usually newspapers and matches—the children were dirty, ragged and running the streets at all hours of the night, the apparent trade in newspapers and other articles being frequently used to cover up much worse things; in fact, many of the girls were practically prostitutes. Quite a number of these children were nothing more or less than beggars, and deliberately appeared in ragged clothing for the purpose of exciting sympathy. A local association undertook to supply them with clothing, but many refused this aid "because it would interfere with their trade." Commenting on similar practices among the street traders of Dublin, Sir Lambert H. Ormsby, M.D., said in 1904: "They sell other things besides ... matches principally. Of course the selling of matches is merely a means of evading being taken up by the police for begging. The matches are only humbug; they do not want to sell them ... they do it for begging purposes."[163] In 1897 the Liverpool Watch Committee appointed a subcommittee to consider the question of children trading in streets, and this subcommittee reported that: "The practice is attended, first, with injury to the health of the children; second, with interference with the education of such as are of school age; third, with danger to the moral welfare of the children inasmuch as the practice frequently leads to street gambling, begging, sleeping out and other undesirable practices, and in some cases to crime." They were of opinion—in which the inspector of reformatories concurred—that much of the money earned by the children went to indulge the vicious and intemperate propensities of parents and guardians.

By the Liverpool Corporation Act, 1898, Parliament gave the city power to regulate street trading by children, and accordingly the following provisions were made by the city council: (1) no licenses to any child under eleven; (2) boys eleven to thirteen and girls eleven to fifteen inclusive, to be licensed if not mentally or physically deficient, with consent of parent or guardian; (3) licenses good one year; (4) badges also to be issued; (5) no charge for license or badge; (6) licenses may be revoked by Watch Committee for cause; (7) no licensed child to trade after 9 P.M., nor unless decently clothed, nor without badge, nor in streets during school hours unless exempted from school attendance, and no licensed child may alter or dispose of badge, or enter public houses to trade, or importune passengers. These regulations took effect May 31, 1899, and marked the formal beginning of the movement against street trading by children.

In 1901 the Liverpool subcommittee reported that it was "of opinion that the application of the powers conferred by the Act has had the effect of greatly reducing the number of children trading in the streets, especially during school hours and late in the evenings, and of improving the condition, appearance, and behaviour of those children who still engage in street trading." This subcommittee recommended raising the boys' age limit for licenses from fourteen to sixteen years, and was inclined to advise the total prohibition of street trading by girls.[164]

London

Under the powers conferred on local authorities by the Employment of Children Act 1903, the London County Council framed in February, 1905, a set of by-laws, the provisions of which seemed quite innocuous. Nevertheless a considerable outcry was raised by persons whom they would affect, and thereupon the Secretary of State withheld his confirmation and authorized Mr. Chester Jones to hold an inquiry at which complaints could be heard as well as arguments in favor of the by-laws. This inquiry was held in June and July of 1905, and schoolmasters, attendance officers, police inspectors, news agents and others testified. Mr. Jones held that it was his duty "to endeavour to discover where the line should be drawn, and that it was not open to argument either that child labour should entirely be prohibited or that it should be unregulated."[165]

In his report Mr. Jones took up each by-law separately and discussed it, recommending that it be either confirmed or rejected in accordance with his findings. He also drafted a set of by-laws and submitted them with the recommendation that they be adopted instead of the ones originally passed by the London County Council. Referring to these, he says: "An important respect in which my suggested by-laws differ from the County Council by-laws is in differentiating between employment in connection with street stalls and other forms of street trading. It seemed to be the general opinion [of witnesses] that the former employment, being under the supervision of some adult person, probably the parent, is not so harmful in its effects on the morals of the child as the latter, and it must be remembered that the main objection to street trading was on the ground rather of its affecting the morality than the health and education of the children."[166] The regulations drafted by Mr. Jones were not even so drastic as those proposed by the London County Council, and in recommending milder restrictions Mr. Jones says: "A set of by-laws should not err upon the side of overstringency, nor should they be in advance of public opinion; the first, because taking a step more or less in the dark might cause hardships impossible to avoid, and the second, because any by-laws of this sort, being most difficult of enforcement, will certainly be evaded unless backed up by the weight of public opinion."[167]

The County Council, however, did not follow Mr. Jones's recommendations in their entirety, but adopted a more stringent set of by-laws which were put in force in October, 1906. In December, 1909, the County Council again amended the by-laws, and an inquiry relative to these changes was held by Mr. Stanley Owen Buckmaster in October, 1910. Mr. Buckmaster recommended a number of changes of minor importance which were adopted by the Council, and accordingly the new by-laws were adopted and took effect on June 3, 1911. This set of by-laws will be found in the Appendix, page 264. The most significant feature which they present is the raising of the age limit for boys to fourteen years and for girls to sixteen years without exemption. The old by-laws prohibited street trading by children under sixteen years between the hours of 9 P.M. and 6 A.M., and this provision was retained in the new by-laws, applying, however, only to boys, inasmuch as girls under that age are prohibited from trading in the streets at any time. These London by-laws on street trading are identical with the provisions of the most advanced American child labor laws on factory employment, and consequently they blaze the way for the application of these provisions in the United States to street trading as well as to employment in factories, mills and mines.

Manchester

Although the British departmental committee of 1910 was not favorably impressed by the results of regulation as a cure for the evils of street trading, nevertheless it gave due credit to the city of Manchester for what had been accomplished there under the license system. Referring to this city, the report says: "In Manchester such good results as can be arrived at by the method of regulation were, perhaps, more apparent than anywhere else. In that city the entire evidence testified to the fact that the regulation of street trading is very highly organized; a special staff of selected, plain-clothes officers, giving their whole time to the work, knowing the traders personally, visiting the homes, advising the parents, clothing the children and apparently exerting a most beneficial influence. All that can be done through the instrument of regulation seems to be done there, the various authorities working together to that end."[168]

An English writer says that regulation in Manchester "has greatly improved the conditions of the newspaper boys and others who earned their living by hawking goods in the streets. It is something to the good at any rate that a boy should be compelled to be decently dressed and so avoid the obvious temptation of appealing to the sympathies of the public by the picturesque raggedness of his clothing. At the same time one cannot help feeling that halfway legislation of this sort is only playing with the problem and that the only really satisfactory law would be one which prohibited street trading by children altogether."[169]

New South Wales

The British Colony of New South Wales has adopted some mild restrictions under the Employment of Children Act, 1903, and the president of the State Children Relief Board for New South Wales states in his report for the year ending April 5, 1910, that "the Board is not favorably impressed with the principle of street trading by juveniles, realizing that even under the most careful administration children, when once licensed to engage in street trading, are exposed to great temptations."

Canada

The province of Manitoba, Canada, forbids children under twelve years from trading in the streets at any time; licenses are issued to boys twelve to sixteen years old, who are not allowed to sell after 9 P.M. Some boys have been denied licenses because of their poor school record, others because of lack of proof as to age, others on account of not being physically qualified, and still others because there was no need for their earning money in this way. The licensed boys are kept under supervision; their attendance at school is watched; and if they persist in selling after 9 P.M. or disobey instructions, their licenses are revoked.[170]

Germany

The Industrial Code of Germany prohibits children under fourteen years from offering goods for sale on public roads, streets or places, and peddling them from house to house. In localities in which such sale or peddling is customary, the local police authorities may permit it for certain periods of time not exceeding a total of four weeks in any calendar year. "Under this provision there was considerable street trading, especially in the larger cities. In Berlin, for instance, during the weeks preceding Christmas, numerous children under fourteen were thus employed. Protests against the practice were made by the Consumers' League and similar organizations, and resulted in the passage of a police regulation, for its restriction; and in 1909 a further step was taken by providing that no exceptions of this sort be thereafter permitted, so that now the employment of children under fourteen years of age in street trading is absolutely forbidden in Berlin."[171]

The Industrial Code forbids children under twelve years to deliver goods or perform other errands except for their own parents. Children over twelve years may so engage for not more than three hours daily between 8 A.M. and 8 P.M., but not before morning school nor during the noon recess nor until one hour after school has closed in the afternoon; on Sundays and holidays such children may do this work only for two hours between 8 A.M. and 1 P.M., but not during the principal church service or the half hour preceding it. Such children must first obtain the Arbeitskarte from the local police authority, which is issued upon request of the child's legal representative. Employers must notify the police authority in advance of the employment of such children.

France

The labor of children in France is regulated by the law of November 2, 1892, as amended by the act of March 30, 1900. This law applies to factories, workshops, mines and quarries, exempting home industries, agricultural work and purely mercantile establishments.[172] The work of children in city streets is not even mentioned. New legislation has recently been proposed to regulate the employment of minors under 18 years of age and of women in the sale of merchandise from stands and tables on sidewalks outside of bazaars and large stores. According to its provisions, the work of such persons would be prohibited for more than two hours at a time and for more than six hours a day, while seats and heating facilities would have to be supplied the same as for employees inside the large establishments.[173]

In Paris, newspapers are sold almost exclusively at kiosks on street corners, presided over by middle-aged women.