eight-hour day for those nine to thirteen, and of twelve for those from thirteen to eighteen. This was a very modest beginning, yet BOY WORKING IN A COTTON FACTORY Contrast (1) the mechanical perfection and enormous economy of human energy represented by the machinery with (2) the waste of human development represented by the uneducated boy wearing his life away in the "maddening racket of the machinery" it represented a very great advance on the preceding policy of England. It was the first of a series of acts regulating the conditions of laborers in the interests of society as a whole, acts which have become more numerous, more minute, and more drastic from 1833 to the present day. The idea that an employer may conduct his business entirely as he likes has no standing in modern English law. (6: 441-442) Nine years later Parliament passed similar legislation regulating the employment of women and children in mines. Speaking of this action. Hazen says: One of the most famous parliamentary reports of the nineteenth century was that of a commission appointed to investigate the conditions in mines. Published in 1842, its amazing revelations revolted public opinion and led to quick action. It showed that children of five, six, seven years of age were employed underground in coal mines, girls as well as boys; that women as well as men labored under conditions fatal to health and morals; that the hours were long, twelve or fourteen a day, and the dangers great. They were veritable beasts of burden, dragging and pushing carts on hands and knees along narrow and low passageways, in which it was impossible to stand erect. Girls of eight or ten carried heavy buckets of coal on their backs up steep ladders many times a day. The revelations were so astounding and sickening that a law was passed in 1842 which forbade the employment of women and girls in mines, and which permitted the employment of boys of ten for only three days a week. (6: 449) Broadening elementary education thus rests on broad humanitarian social basis. These quotations concerning English child-labor legislation put us into the social atmosphere of humanitarian effort of the nineteenth century. They help us to view the educational efforts of these same humanitarians as merely one phase of a broad social movement for improving the condition of the masses of the people. They help us to realize the broad basis for social improvement upon which the movement for a broader elementary education rests. In contrast with the narrow otherworldly aim of the Puritans, which resulted merely in training children to read the Bible in order to avoid future damnation, we see modern humanitarians concerning themselves very vitally with the present happiness and development of children for the benefit of society as a whole.. Humanitarianism coöperates with democracy to benefit the masses through broader education.. - Thus we find two powerful lines of influence coöperating to broaden the scope of elementary education; namely, democratic government, by the people and for the people, and practical humanitarianism, which endeavors to improve the lot of the multitudes in all possible ways. Industrial revolution. Increases social interdependence and gives power to organized labor. The third influence which we shall note in the broadening of the purposes of elementary schools is the development of the factory system. The sum total of industrial changes resulting during the nineteenth century from the factory system is known as the Industrial Revolution. We shall emphasize here merely two features of this revolution: first, the increasing interdependence of people and the consequent necessity of organizing SAMUEL SLATER The cotton factory erected by him in Rhode Island in 1790 marks the birth year of the factory system in America. See page 29 a broader elementary education to prepare for this interdependence, and, second, the increasing power of organized labor, which, in its influence, coöperates with democracy and humanitarianism to make elementary education benefit people to the fullest degree. The history of the factory system.-The factory system and the Industrial Revolution grew out of the extensive use of automatic power machinery in manufacturing. It began in England with the invention of auto matic machinery for spinning and weaving (1770-1790). At first this was driven by water power and tended to develop manufacturing centers near waterfalls. Very soon the invention of the steam engine made it possible to locate factories wherever coal could be transported conveniently. As a consequence textile factories developed very rapidly (1792-1830) and resulted in the growth of many large manufacturing cities. The corresponding development of textile factories in America and their effect on home industries is concretely set forth by Tryon in the following paragraphs: While spinning machinery was used in Philadelphia as early as 1775 and the common jenny and stock card were in operation in various parts of the country before 1790, yet this latter date is generally accepted as the birth year of the factory system in the United States. It was in this year that Samuel Slater erected at Pawtucket, Rhode Island, a cotton factory, which was supplied with spinning machinery on the English plan. Soon after the success of this mill had been demonstrated, others were erected in New England and throughout other sections of the country as well. These mills spun yarn and thread for distribution to the families of the neighborhood to be woven into the cloth they needed for themselves or which they desired to sell. If there chanced to be no mill in the neighborhood, a supply could be secured at the store in exchange for cotton, wool, and other farm products. The yarn was not expensive and it proved a great convenience to the housewives, since its use enormously diminished their labors. Spinning mills became so common throughout the country that it is proper to speak of a mill stage in connection with the rise of textile manufactures in any given section. The New England and middle states passed through such a stage between 1790 and 1820, the Southern states between 1812 and 1830, and the Ohio Valley states between 1830 and 1860. The completion of the textile-manufacturing system came with the introduction of the power loom. This important event happened in 1815, at Waltham, Massachusetts, thirty years after its invention by Cartwright. While there had been factories run entirely independently of the homes before this date, yet the introduction of such a tremendous time- and labor-saver, in the matter of cloth-weaving, ushered in a period of independence never before known. The establishments could now individually employ all the various processes in the manufacture of cloth, from the receipt of the raw material to the production of the finished web. Thus the factory system proper came into existence in this country. While it had a hard time during the decade from 1815 to 1825 on account of foreign competition, lack of capital, inferior machinery, lack of skilled labor, and a coarse quality of raw materials, yet at the same time by 1830 the system was sufficiently established in New England, the middle states, and certain centers in the West to assure a future independence of foreign manufactures for the various fabrics in domestic use, and to relieve the housewives of a great deal of the strenuous labor which their foremothers had been obliged to perform. For when the price of the ordinary brown ENGLISH MACHINERY FOR CARDING, DRAWING, ROVING, AND SPINNING AS INTRODUCED IN AMERICA BY SAMUEL SLATER IN 1790 Contrast the mechanical economy of this factory with the slow hand processes shown in the picture on page 14 shirting was reduced from 42 to 7 cents a yard between 1815 and 1830, there was little inducement for one to labor all day at the loom to weave four yards of such cloth. The housewives could no longer compete against a system which made it possible for one man tending three or four power looms to turn out from 90 to 160 yards a day. (8: 274-276) Contrast colonial home-industry situation and modern industrial society. The final sentences of the above quotation illustrate two striking features of the factory system: |