would like to know what the women back home think and say. When I was asked if I would make a statement here, I said I would if requested, and I want to say that in all that travel, and I have been speaking to different kinds of groups and I have been in consultations and in executive sessions, I do not remember of being in a single State, and I think I might say in a single town, and I might possibly say that I do not remember being in a single meeting, in which some woman has not asked me what the prospect was of the passage of this child labor amendment. I thought that was very significant. Every one of them is interested in it. I never heard a word from anybody fearing that anything would come from the passage of such an amendment except something good. Now, whether that is of any value to the men on the committee I do not know. I know that as a rule Congressmen say that they do not attach much significance to the women's vote. But I do think that they do respect the women's vote and opinion, because individual men respect their own women and they can not help respecting their opinions on matters of this kind. Now, I think that the women have been very patient in pressing this matter, because we have let two or three Congresses try to pass a bill on this child labor matter rather than to try to do anything about a constitutional amendment. We are not especially in favor of paternal government; we would not care for that if we could do this in any other way. But now a person has not a great deal of intelligence who proceeds or attempts to proceed dozens of times along the same lines. We have certainly felt that by legislative action we could accomplish our result, but there appears to be no way to do it except by a constitutional amendment. I am more opposed now to constitutional amendments than I was before, because my big job is done, the job of enfranchising women. We are all selfish, and we like to get the thing done our way and to say that we are very much in favor of it, but we do not want to put every little thing up to Congress through a constitutional amendment. But there is one thing that seems to me to be vitally important, and that is that we have tried every other means. On this question of child labor, I think that I can speak perhaps better than some of the other speakers, because I live in a State where the child labor laws are said to be the best of any in the world. That is the State of Ohio. I do not know that that is true, but they say it is so. A great many things are said to be true which are not true; but I do know that it is generally conceded; people really say that our laws are as good and perhaps better than any in the world. Mr. FOSTER. With characteristic modesty, we admit it, do we not? Mrs. UPTON. Yes; we do. Mr. HICKEY. I believe the law of Indiana is better. [Laughter.] Mrs. UPTON. Well, what I say is hearsay, but I do not find anybody questioning it. If the Indiana law is better, I am glad it is. The only thing I want the States to have is as good laws as Ohio has. Mr. DYER. There is nobody in Ohio who doubts that they have the best of everything. Mrs. UPTON. We do not think that. Mr. SUMNERS. Do you think the Ohio law is sufficient to take care of the protection of children? Mrs. UPTON. I should think maybe it is, for the State of Ohio, but I do not think it is for the State of Texas. Mr. SUMNERS. But for your State you think it is sufficient. Mrs. UPTON. Now, of course, it is perfectly ridiculous to say that the Texas law for child labor is the same as the Ohio law, because it is not the same. If the people of Texas do not want to pass a right law for child labor, and can not pass it, and we can not get it in any other way, then I think we ought to try to get it through the constitutional amendment, because to my mind there is nothing before the people at this time and there is a great deal before the people at this time-that is any more important than to start aright the children of our people in living and education and every other thing. Children who work for the mills can not have what they ought to have, and nobody denies that. I know what you are thinking of, but to me that is an unimportant thing as far as the main question is concerned. If nobody else wants to cross-examine me, I will retire. I am not afraid of this committee, and it is the only committee of the House that I am not afraid of. It is because my father was chairman of this committee and I was brought up in the committee room. Mr. BOIES. Is Miss Regan here? STATEMENT OF MISS AGNES G. REGAN, EXECUTIVE SECRETARY NATIONAL COUNCIL OF CATHOLIC WOMEN, WASHINGTON, D. C. Miss REGAN. On behalf of the National Council of Catholic Women, I beg leave to submit the following resolution concerning child labor, which was unanimously adopted on October 3, 1923: Whereas the inveterate refusal of some States to enact laws for the prohibition of child labor inflicts injury upon tens of thousands of young children in these States and causes unfair hardships to employers in States which have good child labor laws, and whereas the only way in which this evil can be remedied within a reasonable time lies through national legislation: Therefore be it Resolved, That the National Council of Catholic Women favors an amendment to the Federal Constitution which will empower Congress to enact such legislation, but which will not prohibit any State from enacting a law of higher standard than required by the Federal legislation enacted subsequent to the passing of such a constitutional amendment. I wish to say in connection with this that everything that Mr. Sumners has said appeals very strongly to me. I recognize that one of the greatest evils is the building up of a big, central government and getting Congress through organized majorities to do that which the States should do for themselves. However, I think this map on the cover of the publication gotten out by the organizations favoring the better regulation of child labor answers the questions that have been asked, the black representing the States whose child labor laws are not up to the standard of those of the two Federal laws which were declared unconstitutional. Now, as Americans, can we afford to let this go on, and to wait? The conditions in certain States are very serious and I think it is a great injustice to the employers in the States where there are good child labor laws to make them compete, in manufacturing, for instance, with other employers in States that have not good child labor laws. I think that the only question which parallels this is slavery. That is the only thing which makes me feel justified in asking for a constitutional amendment. Child labor is a greater menace than slavery, because in child labor the children who are to be our future citizens are practically slaves under certain conditions. We can not hesitate to set a Federal minimum. I think, Mr. Chairman, that once a Federal minimum is established, there will be ample for the States to do in the enforcement of their own child labor laws and in the enactment of better laws on the parts of the State themselves. The weakness in most of the States which have good child labor laws is that they are not enforced. I went into a certain city not long since between 2 and 3 o'clock in the morning and saw two little shivering boys, one 10 and the other 11 years old, without overcoats and with their little bare arms exposed to the elements. They were delivering the morning papers of one of our great cities. That was in a State where there are child labor laws but no laws applying to the street trades. There is progress to be made in the States where there are good child labor laws, and the matter is one of sufficient interest to justify the enactment of Federal laws. To-day we have many laws that are not enforced. When we have a minimum standard established by the Government which will say that it applies to the United States of America, child labor will be blotted out. Then we can depend on the States to make their laws what they should be. STATEMENT OF MR. E. 0. WATSON, SECRETARY OF THE FEDERAL COUNCIL OF CHURCHES OF CHRIST IN AMERICA, WASHINGTON, D. C. Mr. WATSON. From the standpoint of the churches there is no social issue before the public to-day that demands more general support throughout the churches of all denominations than the efforts to secure the abolition of child labor; and the evidence of that is to be found not only in the individual actions of denominations but also in the united actions that have been taken by the Federal Council of Churches, composed as it is of officially appointed representatives of 29 of the leading protestant denominations of the United States. As far back as 1908 the Federal Council of Churches, in that united capacity, expressing the voice of the united churches of this country, adopted its official platform known as "social ideals of the churches,' and embodying 16 proposals for advance in social welfare. Two of these 16 had to do with child labor and the full development of the opportunities of childhood. The "Social ideals of the churches" declared that the churches stand "for the fullest possible development of every child, especially by the provision of education and recreation," and "the abolition of child labor." That platform has been repeatedly indorsed by one denomination after another, notably among the larger denominations-the Methodist Episcopal, Congregational, Northern Baptist Convention, Presbyterian, Disciples, and the Reformed Church in the United States. The various denominations have also, time and time again, adopted special resolutions insisting that the teachings of the church require the abolition of child labor. As recently as last November the bishops of the Methodist Church, meeting in Brooklyn, declared in favor of such, and still more recently the women's division of the Social Service Commission of the Congregational Churches. Still more significant is the action of the executive committee of the Federal Council of Churches held in Columbus, Ohio, in December last. This meeting, which was attended by the official representatives of the 29 Protestant denominations that comprise the Federal Council of Churches, voted without a dissenting voice in favor of an amendment to the Constitution which would permit Congress to legislate against child labor. I might call your attention to the fact that we have been carefully studying the religious press on this matter and find it insistent and practically unanimous. Now, I would call your attention to the fact that the churches are concerned primarily, of course, with the great moral and spiritual principles which are at stake in child labor and not with the particular method by which the evils are to be removed. We ordinarily do not presume to suggest by what particular form of legislation the desired ends may be reached. We feel that the legislators themselves, whom we have elected, are the ones who should answer the question as to what is the most effective method of carrying out in practice the moral and humane principles of the churches. But, we all thought, we find ourselves insisting unequivocally that this thing has not gone on as it should with reference to child labor, and the churches are showing that they are restive and tired of piecemeal attacks upon the evil of child labor, which may in the lapse of many years result in the cessation of child labor throughout the country. This is too big a question to wait for that. We are therefore insisting that the way must be found by which the evil as a whole should be speedily abolished throughout the land. After having waited for many years for the evil to be abolished through other methods, the churches are now beginning to insist that the problem must be dealt with in a more thorough-going fashion. It certainly is significant that all the church actions taken during the last three months, namely that of the Congregationalists, the Methodist bishops and the Federal Council of Churches referred to above have gone on record specifically in favor of a constitutional amendment which will give Congress the power to act. I have here a resolution passed at a meeting of the women's division of the Social Service Commission of the Congregational Churches, which I shall be glad to file. (The resolution referred to is printed below:) RESOLUTION PASSED AT MEETING OF WOMEN'S DIVISION OF SOCIAL SERVICE COMMISSION, CONGREGATIONAL CHURCHES. Resolved, That we, the members of the women's division of the Social Service Commission of the Congregation Churches of the United States, urge upon our Senators and Representatives in Congress assembled the immediate adoption of the McCormick resolution designed to prohibit child labor in the United States by an amendment to the Constitution of the United States as follows: SECTION 1. The Congress shall have power to prohibit the labor of persons under the age of 18 years and to prescribe the conditions of such labor. SEC. 2. The reserve power of the several States to legislate concerning the labor of persons under the age of 18 years shall not be impaired or diminished except to the extent necessary to give effect to legislation enacted by the Congress. STATEMENT OF MR. OWEN R. LOVEJOY, EXECUTIVE SECRETARY, NATIONAL CHILD LABOR COMMITTEE, NEW YORK, N. Y. Mr. LOVEJOY. Mr. Chairman, the most of what I want to say can be said in one sentence; that is, a hearty approval and indorsement of the testimony given yesterday by Miss Abbott, representing the Children's Bureau. She has set forth the results, or what corresponds to the results, of our own observation and experience. There are two or three questions that have been repeatedly asked by members of the committee that, if you will permit, I should like to discuss for just a moment. The first question that has been asked a number of times is whether the enactment of this amendment would tend to retard or stimulate better laws and better conditions in the various States? That seems to me a very fair and necessary question to be discussed, and I should like to say frankly for the committee I represent that if we believed that it would hinder or retard or discourage State action we should be opposed to any such movement. The committee has been at work attempting to improve State laws, or helping to improve State laws and State administration for 20 years, and we should be opposed to any step that might endanger the results of that work. There seem to me three reasons for believing that this would not be the case. In the first place, in the experience that we have had under the operation of the two Federal child labor laws-the interstate commerce law and the tax law-the results were exactly in the other direction. That is a matter of history, and the testimony of the officials in charge of these laws in the various States, so far as I know, has all been in favor of the advantage which accrued to the States from the cooperation of the Federal Government. The first aspect in which this seems to us to work in this direction is that it sets a minimum standard which is definite and to which State legislators can refer or be referred as a basis for action. One of the difficulties we have found most frequently is the feeling on the part of State legislators that there is not any definite standard. It is all indefinite. One State has treated it in one way, and another in another, and there is a sense of insecurity, of indefiniteness, which is removed by the placing of a minimum standard. Mr. HERSEY. Some States do not have any standard? Mr. LOVEJOY. Every State has some kind of law, although some are very antique. Now, in the second place, the policy that was adopted by the Children's Bureau under the first law and by the tax department under the second was that of cooperation with rather than substitution for State agencies, and our observation, as well as the testimony of State officials, has been that it stimulated and aided a better enforcement of the law, not only in cases where actual enforcement had to be applied, for it reached very much farther than that. We need to remember that most employers are very glad to comply with the law, if they know what it is. The officials in charge of these State laws have testified time after time that the work of enforcing the law was very greatly simplified and facilitated by the fact that the existence of this Federal law gave employers knowledge that a certain law existed, that certain requirements were there, and they |