In the document “The March of the Mill Children” by Mother Jones, she explains and describes events that took place during the early 1900’s dealing with child labor and how these events affected lives in America. Mother Jones fought for workers rights and to abolish child labor. Throughout the article, Mother Jones takes a stance to get her voice heard and to help create better lives and opportunities for the children in America. Mother Jones argued that she had “stocks in the children”, so she was going to go public with child labor issues. One morning in Independence Park, a meeting and parade was organized for the city to show the public what child labor has done to young boys and girls. Mother Jones had young boys stand on platforms to show the crowd their crushed hands and missing fingers. After the meeting in the park, the town started talking and discussing the issues concerning child labor. Mother Jones led the children from Philadelphia to New York in the march, and hoped for Congress to pass a law protecting children in the workforce. President …show more content…
He describes three different “modes” that the wealthy can spend their money. The first “mode” is to leave your wealth to your decedents. The second “mode” would be to leave your wealth for public purposes. The third “mode” is to use your wealth during your life. Carnegie believes that leaving your wealth for public purposes would be the best use to benefit many people in the community. With free libraries, parks, and museums the poor would have the opportunity to better themselves. This would create an ideal state where the surplus wealth of the upper class would become “the property of many”. However, Carnegie does emphasize that charity should be provided as a means for those to help themselves become financially independent and not to rely upon
The Gilded Age started after the civil war and was an economic powerhouse. Once the war ended, many companies started to prosper, small businesses grew larger and larger. Many of these companies that prospered were owned by powerful individuals who ruled the nation's economy. In order to succeed in this era, you must provide the best product at the cheapest price, if unable to you were simply driven into bankruptcy or were bought up by hungry, successful industrialists. The Gilded age was a period where many people were prospering but the system was corrupt.
In the gilded ages dating back to the nineteenth century both Andrew Carnegie and Henry George were known as very influential men of their time both striving towards the common goal of deflating poverty in hopes to diminish it as a whole. Though both Andrew and Henry shared a similar feat they had very different approaches and ideas of methodizing the overall goal. Carnegie was a shrewes businessman who viewed it to be acceptable for very rich and very poor people to co-exist as long as the rich provided that their surpluses aspired the community with parks or libraries for example to better themselves known as the "lasting good," and
By 1910, over 2 million children were employed in the United States, some as young as the age of three. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_labour#Early_1900s) This photo of Addie Card working at a cotton mill, successfully appeals to the emotional and empathetic side of Americans. Hine’s involvement in the National Child Labor Committee and the numerous photos he took of children laboring, directly explains why Addie Card was the perfect candidate to be captured in this snapshot. Before child labor became a wide spread issue in America, wealthy middle and high class Americans had not been exposed to this side of the country, and photographs like this were used by Hine to convey his message to end this phenomenon. This photograph brought to light the tremendous issue of child
From the intro of the book, Carnegie clearly explains that there should be a divide in social class and shows no sign of wanting to eliminate poverty. In addition to that, he somewhat belittles previous civilizations in which everyone was equal. Carnegie states, “The conditions of human life have not only been changed but revolutionized, within the past few hundred years. In former days
As young as 33, Carnegie was pulling in an annual income of $50,000 a year, a huge amount at that time, and this was enough for him. Carnegie was a firm believer that anyone could make it to the top, and that it was the wealthys’ duty to help the poor work towards a more comfortable life. Carnegie said that “the man who dies rich, dies disgraced.” This is a greedy, unselfish philosophy that a robber baron could not conceive.
He discusses all that is wrong with the wealthy individuals and how they are spoiled. He makes his argument by revealing how wealth is disposed of, “There are but three modes in which surplus wealth can be disposed of. It can all be left to the families of the descendants; or it can be bequeathed for public purposes; or, finally, it can be administrated during their lives by its possessors” (3). The author is Andrew Carnegie and intended audience is the general public but more specifically are those of wealth and make them conscious of how surplus wealth is disposed of. This is a primary source and reveals that even though this was how the world was a decade ago, it is quite similar and not much has
Mother Jones made an impact on child labor because she persevered to protect children. They way down to the White House just to protect kids. According to Josephson in Mother Jones: Fierce Fighter for Workers’ Rights, “She and the textile union leaders would stage their own tour. They would march the mill children all the way to the president of the United States—Theodore Roosevelt.” This shows how she got her idea to try to persuade not only the President but make this issue publicly known. Josephson states, “Mother Jones had seen how dangerous their jobs were. Barefooted little girls and boys reached their tiny hands into the treacherous machinery to repair snapped threads or crawled underneath the machinery to oil it.” Josephson has a heart for kids, and she just can’t stand to see them being tortured like this. Josephson says, “The next night, the marchers slept on the banks of the Delaware River. In every town, Mother Jones drew on what she did best—speaking—to gather support for her cause.” Mother Jones had to be strong to carry out her task, and to get her point across to the people. Mother Jones had to be strong in order to carry out her tasks.
Social classes have different standards of living. By properly administering wealth, Carnegie becomes the trustee of his poorer brethren’s funds. He believes the wealthy man, with his superior knowledge and experience in financial matters, is better suited to administer these funds. Carnegie says he would be “doing for them better than they would or could for themselves” (399). A wealthy person could buy a few acres of land, build a hospital, and create a hundred jobs in the hospital while creating affordable or free health care. The wealthy do not have to worry about how much it would cost if they were diagnosed with pneumonia. They simply take the diagnosis, pay for the treatment, and move on with their lives. A diagnosis of the same magnitude to a poor person could be life threatening. When Carnegie talks about
Nonetheless, the third mode is which Carnegie beckons as the start of a great evolutional growth in the distribution of wealth amongst classes. Carnegie believes that the rich must supply the poor with not money directly to their pockets, which would coax temptations. Rather, the rich must supply the less fortunate with the means to grow as people, to heighten ambitions, and raise the level of class. This is done through, for example, the construction of a public library. Carnegie, in fact, tells a tale of Mr. Tilden. Mr. Tilden, a wealthy man, builds a large public library in New York City. This distributes more than a couple quarters could ever, the ability for any man to enhance his learning and opportunities for free.
The Gospel of Wealth is primarily about the dispersion of wealth and the responsibilities of those who have it. Carnegie thinks that inheritance is detrimental to society because it does not do any good for the
Throughout history, children have always worked, either as apprentices or servants. However, child labor reached a whole new scale during the time period of the Industrial Revolution. Throughout the time frame of late 1800s-early 1900s, children worked long hours in dangerous factory conditions for very little wages. They were considered useful as laborers because their small stature allowed them to be cramped into smaller spaces, and they could be paid less for their services. Many worked to help support their families, and by doing so, they forwent their education. Numerous nineteenth century reformers and labor groups sought to restrict child labor and to improve working conditions.
Throughout the 1700’s and the early 1800’s child labor was a major issue in American society. Children have always worked for family businesses whether it was an agricultural farming situation or working out of a family business in some type of workplace. This was usually seen in families of middle or lower class because extra help was needed to support the family. Child labor dramatically changed when America went through the Industrial Revolution. When America’s industrial revolution came into play, it opened a new world to child labor. Children were now needed to work in factories, mills, and mines. These were not ordinary jobs for young children, these jobs required much time, effort, and hard work. “American
“The right to a proper childhood is considered a human right, but it wasn’t always like that.” Child labor was a major problem during the Gilded Age. It was a disgrace seeing mostly all of the children from the United States working under very poor conditions. Children who were born into a second or third class family were subjected to work in very dangerous jobs, which included many health hazards. Most of these children looked way older than they really were because they were treated that way. All but the smallest babies worked. The children acted like adults instead of the children they were. They were forced to work because if they had the choice to go to school and learn they would’ve chosen that option instead of having to work all day.
Woman along with the children were affected while working during the industrial revolution. During 1834 and 1836 Harriet Martineau, a British feminist and abolitionist, visited America and enthusiastically embraced the social implications of the Industrial Revolution, (DTA, 223). Martineau compared the lifestyle of women to slaves and said the United States contradicted the principles of the Declaration of Independence. She did believe though with some progress that it could become New England’s new industrial order. One of the Mill factories Martineau visited, Waltham Mill, was a prime example of the scheduled lifestyle of women mill workers. Women Mill workers of all ages worked at Waltham Mill, which I compared to a boarding school because of their strict schedules. The ladies had a time to wake up, to be at work, to eat, and to go to school. A lot of women did not mind the harsh conditions they lived and worked in because they fought for their equality of rights for a long time now.
Mother Jones encouraged children to join her in a march to see the President and protest a lack of child labor laws. She saw, firsthand, the terrible working conditions that young children were sometimes forced into to provide money for their families, and she wanted to do something about it. This is further explored in the Studysync article, “Mother Jones: Fierce Fighter for Workers’ Rights”: “Images of the child workers Mother Jones had seen stayed with her- the torn, bleeding fingers of the breaker boys, the mill children living on coffee and stale bread”. It is obvious that Mother Jones was deeply affected by these painful images, and she felt compassion for the poor children. This is why she resolved to march to Sagamore Hill and speak with the president about putting in place stronger child labor laws. A few times, Jones was stopped by the police, who were trying to prevent her from seeing the president: “At first, police told the group they couldn’t enter (Trenton). Mill owners didn’t want any trouble”.