Child Labor In The Victorian Era Essay

Improved Essays
Family, Friends, Health, School, Life, Fun, Work
Malala Yousafzai once stated, “We realize the importance of our voice only when we are silenced”.Child labor is a social issue that has been around for centuries. This social issue was very harsh in the Victorian Era, but it still persists today in different forms. Although there are new laws and consequences regarding child labor, in some countries, the unfair treatment of children today is relatively the same as it was in the Victorian Era, if not more extreme.

The similarities between child labor in the Victorian Era and today are unexpectedly surprising. For example, the parish boys that were being taken care of by Mrs. Mann were fed very little and did not live in a clean area. “For at the very moment when a child had
…show more content…
For example, most child labor is located in Asia and Africa, but in the Victorian Era, it was centered in Europe. Another difference is that the public does not know about child labor. In modern-day circumstances, most people do not know that the cacao beans in their chocolate is being harvested by children with little to no pay. Though, in the Victorian Era, the public knew about child labor and other social issues, but did not care to stop them until later in the Victorian Era. “In 1875, a 12-year-old boy name George Brewster died in an accident after his Master Sweep made him climb the chimney at Fulbourn Hospital to clean it. A man called Lord Shaftesbury was obviously touched by the story and the spattering of public outcry that followed. He proposed a new Act that would supersede the Chimney Sweepers and Chimneys Regulation Act of 1840” (Victorian Child Labor and the Conditions they Worked in, n.d.). Lastly, the social issue of child labor today and in the Victorian Era may share some similarities, but they definitely have changed through the

Related Documents

  • Improved Essays

    Child labor was an immense problem in the world, due to the fact that it puts children in danger. Florence Kelly explains how children six and seven are years of age are working in the cotton mills, and eight nine and ten in the coal breakers. She explains how These children are…

    • 507 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    For children who began work at young ages there were many long term disadvantages and negative outcomes. “Many children who worked in the mines had long lasting health effects such as lung disease and stunted growth.” (Document B). In the 1800s there were few laws that limited the labor of young ones. These kids were forced to commit laborious jobs and the ending product in their lives was negative and all-in-all painful.…

    • 756 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The late 1800’s and the early 1900’s was a time when poverty and growth was at a record high for the American people. America was growing and becoming a force to be reckoned with; but at the same time, some American’s were struggling to make ends meet. Throughout 1877, until the last third of the 19th century farmers and sharecroppers were not profiting from their crops. The deflation of crops made it almost impossible for farmers to own land. Those that didn’t own land became sharecroppers and they did not receive the number of crops they were promised.…

    • 838 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In my community, you must be sixteen years old to get a job, and rarely does a sixteen year old work more than a couple hours a day, a couple shifts a week. However, in the late 1800s and early 1900s, the issue of child labor, awful working conditions, and low wages were major concerns. By using a forceful tone, Kelly argues that child labor laws are important and necessary all around the country for the benefit of all the citizens. Kelly discusses the truth about the negatives of child labor by using specific word choice. In describing the dangers of the work force, she uses words like “deafening” and “toil” to emphasize the appalling conditions that these children were subjected to.…

    • 620 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Labor in the industrial/gilded age was severely harsh and the workers were not treated how they should have been. The first thing that had been used as child labor which they were 16 or less. Second, you had long hours with very little pay, where they even had pay cuts even though they already had the small pay. Third, the working condition was very dangerous and caused a lot of deaths a year.…

    • 883 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    An educator who saw children getting taken out of school to go work once said, “Man is the only animal that lives on its young.” Child labor has been an ongoing debate in American culture. Although there are many reasons why the Child Labor Amendment should be ratified, states were, and are still today, justified in their refusal giving the government too much power, organizations and laws being created , and its decline in popularity over the years. Child labor has been a problem in America since the Industrial Revolution. During this time, going to school was considered a luxury.…

    • 1031 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Child Labor In The 1800s

    • 931 Words
    • 4 Pages

    "The worst thief is the one who steals the playtime of children" WD Haywood. Child labor has made an extremely drastic transition throughout time. In the industrial revolution era it was not rare at all to see a teen working, instead of attending school. In today's society it has almost become rare to see a teenager working. There seems so many differences in teens working since that era.…

    • 931 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    “Child slavery is a crime against humanity. Humanity itself is at stake here. A lot of work still remains, but I will see the end of child labor in my lifetime”-Kailash Satyarthi Child Laborer. The beginning of child labor had a very rough start especially in coal mines. In coal mines The coal was washed and sorted according to the beaker.…

    • 886 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In Elizabeth Bentley’s testimony to end child labour, “C: What were your hours of labour in that mill? B: From 5 in the morning till 9 at night, when they were thronged.” (Document 7) Children worked long hours to support their family and most did not go to school because of work. Too the owners of the factory, it did matter to them that they were working children, they were able to pay them less then both women and men. Another example of poor/horrible working conditions, “Child Labor photograph by Lewis W. Hine shows, children working in a machine bigger than themselves, and in an incredibly unsafe workplace, one of the children balancing on a milk crate while working on the machine.”…

    • 1076 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    “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. ”[1] Businesses wanted to hire children over adults because they knew that they could pay the children less and get the same work from them or more. Children also caught on to tasks quick, they would be taught things faster too. “Progressive Era reformers believed that child labor was detrimental to children and to society.…

    • 230 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The progressive era began in the 1800’s early 1900’s the progressives wanted to weaken business leader’s have to form trusts small group’s of businesses that cut prices to destroy their competitors , the Sherman Antitrust Act is what made trust’s illegal .Muckrakers were people who informed the public about monopolies, corruption in industry, child labor that would or have a negative impact on workers and general public. This era was mainly a period of widespread political reform from 1890-1920 . The main objective of the progressive movement was eliminating corruption in the government , they primarily targeted political machines and their bosses . Child labor is also something that was going on during the progressive era all tho it…

    • 754 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In Chita Divakaruni essay titled “Live Free and Starve”, she smartly uses the audience’s emotions about child labor to first bring the issue into the spotlight, while at the same time presenting her strongest arguments against the bill to ban import items made by children in bondage using personal experiences. Her first argument against the bill is based on economic reasoning. Ms. Chita wills her audience to question their high moral ground in light of extreme poverty and dreadful standard of living which is the foundation of child labor in the first place. Secondly, the article also questions the usefulness of such bills, which in her mind are only passed so that liberals can give themselves a thump on the back rather than to addressing the real issue of child labor. The article, the way it uses emotions, is brilliantly placed in Salon magazine which generally has a large female readership and maybe persuasive to that particular audience,…

    • 637 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Foster Care System Essay

    • 1503 Words
    • 7 Pages

    Children that were between the ages of ten to thirteen were permitted to harvest crops after school hours. The 19th and 20th-century child labor movement laws protected the child’s workers, but were not able to protect the ones that worked in the farms. The orphan train movement emphasized the use of children as farm laborers, which up till now is hard to…

    • 1503 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Great Essays

    This was a very vital enforcement by the government because it not only protected the rights of child workers but also provided them with education. Since the bulk of the child population of Britain worked in factories and mines, over time Britain became more educated and an environment which encouraged innovation and involvement in the country’s industrialization was created. The fruits of this enlightenment…

    • 1773 Words
    • 8 Pages
    • 8 Works Cited
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The role children have played in the history of America has changed drastically over the years. In most cases, for the better, but that is not true for all children. In the early years, children were put to work, some even as indentured servants, others alongside their parents. They were made to work long hours under bleak circumstances. The industrial revolution saw the continued abuse of children.…

    • 717 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays