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Senator THOMPSON. You spoke of providing facilities for schooling for the children?

Mr. SMYTH. Yes, sir.

Senator THOMPSON. What time or opportunity do those children between 14 and 16 have to attend?

Mr. SMYTH. There are a great many children in our village between 14 and 16 who go to school and who do not work in the mill. They are alternating to a large extent. One of them will go to school and the brother will work in the mill, and vice versa.

Senator THOMPSON. These are all day schools, are they?

Mr. SMYTH. They are day schools, but we have night schools, toodifferent schools. The day schools run nine months in the year, and when the schools shut down there is a rush to get into the mill on the part of the children who have been going to school.

Senator THOMPSON. Is there an opportunity for children between 14 and 16 to go to school, who work in the mills?

Mr. SMYTH. Yes, sir; they go to night school. We have a night school that is open five nights in a week.

Senator POMERENE. Has your State labor department or any other department of your government any available statistics showing the number of children who are employed between 12 and 14 and between 14 and 16, in your State?

Mr. SMYTH. I have the report of the commissioner of labor right here.

Senator POMERENE. I would be very much pleased if you would insert, as part of your testimony, whatever statistics you have.

Mr. SMYTH. I shall give you the full report if you would like to have it.

Senator POMERENE. No: I just want the tables with respect to the matter to which I have called your attention.

Mr. SMYTH. Commissioner Watson said: In regard to the labor situation, as shown by census, there are now more people employed in the textiles than at any time in the past four years, the total number being 50,597, representing a mill population of 126,746. I am happy to note that 1,171 of this increase is represented by males over 16 years of age, while 593 are by women and girls over 16 years of age. In the matter of child labor, there are 121 less males under 16 years old employed this year than last year, and only 37 more girls under 16 than were employed in 1914. This makes a total working force under 16 in the textiles of only 7,328, which is considerably less than in any year in the last four years. The figures show that only 3,518 of these children are between the ages of 12 and 14. and the bulk of this number is represented by children very nearly 14 years of age.

As I stated last year, the tendency in all the textile plants is away from the employment of the child between 12 and 14, and, in my opinion, these 3,500 children between 12 and 14, out of a total of 50,597 employees, could be easily eliminated without damage to employer or employee by the enactment of a flat 14-year-old child labor provision.

Mr. Smyth was thereupon excused.

The CHAIRMAN. The committee will now take a o'clock to-day.

recess until 3

(Accordingly the committee, at 12 o'clock m., took a recess until 3 o'clock p. m.)

AFTER RECESS.

The committee resumed its session at 3 o'clock p. m. pursuant to the expiration of the recess.

The CHAIRMAN. Senator Clapp, I believe you have something you desire to insert in the record?

Senator CLAPP. I desire, if you please, to insert the table found on page 9 of Report No. 46, House of Representatives, Sixty-fourth Congress, first session.

(The table referred to by Senator Clapp is as follows:)

TABLE I.--States having standard provisions without exemptions.

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(b) Sixteen-year limit for night work in factories and canneries: All States listed under I (a) except Maine, and, in addition—

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(c) Eight-hour day under 16 in factories and canneries:

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(NOTE.-Montana forbids the employment of children under 16 in factories.)

(d) Sixteen-year limit in mines and quarries:

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The CHAIRMAN. Gov. Kitchin, whom will you introduce now? Mr. KITCHIN. We should like to have Mr. Hope address the committee.

STATEMENT OF DR. W. D. HOPE, LOCKHART, UNION COUNTY, S. C.

The CHAIRMAN. Doctor, please give your name, residence, and occupation to the stenographer.

Dr. HOPE. My name is W. D. Hope; residence, Lockhart, Union County, S. C. I am a practicing physician and have practiced medicine 28 years, being a graduate of the University of Maryland.

The CHAIRMAN. Dr. Hope, you may proceed with your statement. Dr. HOPE. I have practiced medicine in the country districts prior

to 17 years ago and have practiced in the mill town of Lockhart for 17 years. I have been associated with the mill people and the surrounding country districts for 17 years. I have observed the health. growth, and the development of mill children, in comparison with the country children. I have practically seen no difference. I have observed children who have worked in the mill as early as 12 years of age who have now developed into manhood and womanhood and who, as fathers and mothers, have produced healthy offspring. That is practically as far as I care to go, unless there are some gentlemen who would like to ask questions.

Senator BRANDEGEE. Did you state what town you are from. Doctor?

Dr. HOPE. From Lockhart, Union County, S. C. Our population varies from 1,500 to 1,700 people; and 60,000 spindles in the mills. Senator BRANDEGEE. Did you hear the testimony of Mr. Smyth this morning before the committee?

Dr. HOPE. Yes; I heard it this morning.

Senator BRANDEGEE. Have you any information about how the health of the children employed in the mills of which he spoke compares with that of the health of the children in the same town not engaged in the mills?

Dr. HOPE. I have no statistical report from any other mills.
Senator BRANDEGEE. Do you speak of the mills he spoke of?

Dr. HOPE. No, sir; I am speaking of the mills of the town at which I am located.

Senator BRANDEGEE. How is it with the mills where you are located? I understand you to say the health of the children from 12 to 16 years who are employed in the cotton mills there is as good as it is of the children who are not employed in the cotton mills.

Dr. HOPE. Employed in the surrounding country districts. It is a small mill town, and I am connected with the country districts. Senator BRANDEGEE. In your opinion, is the cotton industry especially deleterious to the health of children?

Dr. HOPE. It is not, sir.

Senator BRANDEGEE. Are the mills that you speak of well ventilated?

Dr. HOPE. Yes, sir.

Senator BRANDEGEE. Is the manual labor required of these children of the kind that, so far as being a tax upon their physiques, is deleterious to their health?

Dr. HOPE. I would not think so. I am not familiar with the work in the mills. The appearance of the children does not indicate it.

Senator BRANDEGEE. Have you been through these mills frequently? Dr. HOPE. Yes, sir; I go through them.

Senator BRANDEGEE. Are you familiar with the condition of ventilation and sanitation in them?

Dr. HOPE. Yes, sir.

Senator BRANDEGEE. In your opinion, are they insanitary?

Dr. HOPE. No, sir; they are not insanitary. The sanitary conditions are good.

Senator BRANDEGEE. What sort of ventilation have they?

Dr. HOPE. They have the skylight above and then the rolling windows with transoms.

Senator BRANDEGEE. Have you not seen the children at work at many of these looms or spindles as you went through?

Dr. HOPE. Yes, sir.

Senator BRANDEGEE. I understood you to say you did not know anything about the kind of work required of them?

Dr. HOPE. I am not familiar with it. I have merely seen them at work.

Senator BRANDEGEE. That is what I mean; you observed the kind of work they do. Did it seem to you to be a kind of work that would affect their physical condition badly?

Dr. HOPE. No, sir.

Senator BRANDEGEE. It is not hard work?

Dr. HOPE. No, sir.

Senator BRANDEGEE. It is light work, the shifting of bobbins and spools?

Dr. HOPE. Yes, sir.

Senator BRANDEGEE. And there is no heavy work required of them?

Dr. HOPE. No, sir.

Senator BRANDEGEE. That is all I care to ask.

The CHAIRMAN. What chances have they for recreation during these hours?

Dr. HOPE. During what hours?

The CHAIRMAN. During the working hours.

Dr. HOPE. You mean with respect to the smaller children?
The CHAIRMAN. Yes.

Dr. HOPE. They have the noonday recess, of course, for their meals. I do not understand the mill work, but the children doing the spinning have a period in between while they do what they call doffing." As I say, I am not familiar with the mill work. I am located in the mill town, and I only go through the mill. But there is a period when those children oftentimes go out in the mill yard and play a half-hour at a time, and by a whistle they call them back in. They have different signals to call them in. I am not familiar with just what the period is between the recreations.

You go in a mill and you will observe the children are talking and laughing, congregated together in different places in the mill. The CHAIRMAN. Does the work in the mill involve any great tendency toward disease?

Dr. HOPE. No, sir; we have only had a vital-statistics law in our State about a year.

Mr. KITCHIN. I wish you would direct his attention particularly to tuberculosis. That is one of the charges against mill work. The CHAIRMAN. How about that, Dr. Hope?

Dr. HOPE. We have some tubercular trouble at the mills, but it is not out of proportion to the population. I do not know the percentage; I have not the statistics. I have been in there about 17 years, and we have possibly had 10 or 12 deaths, or maybe more, from tubercular trouble at Lockhart; but it is not anything like an epidemic in the mills. It does not spread among the employees. We have possibly as much tuberculosis through the country districts as we have in the mills. The population which came to the town in which I am located when the mill first started consists of at least

three-fifths of the original population that came when the mill first began. They have made their homes there and have grown up there. The CHAIRMAN. Have you observed any deterioration in the mill employees?

Dr. HOPE. No, sir; I have not. Last year the death rate was a little less than 2 per cent in Lockhart, acording to the statistical report by our State board of health. I sent those figures out last year myself. We run a little lower than that sometimes, and have run a litle higher when we have had epidemics. The mortality among children is not any greater in the town than it is in the country districts, from 1 to 2 years old, during the second summer, which is known as the hard period on children. The children of all mill people seem to resist the diseases as well as any children.

Senator POMERENE. What portion of these 17 cases were mill employees?

Dr. HOPE. Well, I was speaking of the mill village proper when I said 10 or 12 cases.

Senator POMERENE. I know; but you made the statement that there were 10 or 12 cases of tuberculosis?

Dr. HOPE. Probably that many; yes, sir. I have not the statistics. Senator POMERENE. What proportion of them were mi employees?

Dr. HOPE. What proportion of them worked in the mills?

Senator POMERENE. Yes.

Dr. HOPE. They were all at work. I was speaking of that town; but some of them, as I recall one or two-came to the mill infected. The heads of the families became infected with the tuberculosis, and the family worked in the mill. Then they would die there from the results of tubercular trouble.

Senator POMERENE. What portion of these 10 or 12 were children in the employ of the mill?

Dr. HOPE. I can not recall.

Senator POMERENE. Did any of them contract this tuberculosis while working in the mill?

Dr. HOPE. That is a pretty hard question to answer, sir, as to where they contracted it. I do not know of a single child that has contracted tuberculosis in the mill.

Senator POMERENE. What is the effect of the breathing of this lint, dust, etc., in the mill?

Dr. HOPE. With good ventilation they will throw it off.
Senator POMERENE. How is that?

Dr. HOPE. When they have good ventilation they throw it off. Senator POMERENE. And when they do not, of course, the child is affected somewhat?

Dr. HOPE. If they have not sufficient oxygen they are liable to. As long as they have sufficient oxygen in which to combat the germs, and the individual has good resisting powers, then he can throw off any disease. It is only the want of resisting power that causes the people to become infected with any disease.

Senator POMERENE. Would you like to have your own children engaged in the mill in this kind of employment? Would you regard it as conducive to their health?

Dr. HOPE. Let me understand your question exactly. You mean, would I object if they had to labor at this employment?

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