Child labor laws were basically about children working for long hours, given low wage, no education, and no health insurance. The children thought that they were doing the right thing to help their family but they were hardly paid. With child labor laws, some children were forced to work. Children around my age shouldn’t be working. They should be enjoying life, doing extracurricular activities and going to school. I chose this topic because I personally wanted to know how children felt about working in factories and not being able to just have fun and get a good education like our generation.

To research this topic, I consistently looked online for child labor laws then and now. I wanted to know the different jobs children had and what age they had to start working. Then, I looked for the laws for children now. My teacher, Mrs.Cosia, helped us research by going to the library and using the computers or by checking out books. I chose this topic to know how lucky I am for not being forced to work in a crowded dirty factory.

Childhood is a time to play, learn, and grow; a time when all children should have a chance to develop their potential and enjoy bright plans for their future. Child labor laws changed the childhood of many children. In southern cotton mills, 25 percent of the employees were below the age of fifteen, with half of these children below age twelve. In 1924, the United States Congress passed a constitutional amendment, which gave authority to the federal government, so as to regulate child labor laws more effectively. However, this amendment was rejected and not ratified by many states and thus never passed into an act. This attempt failed the second time in 1937, and was left untouched. Now, in general, children of any age are permitted to work for businesses entirely owned by their parents, except those under 16 may not be employed in mining or manufacturing and no one under 18 may be employed in any occupation the Secretary of Labor has declared to be