"The law enacted in 1901 in substance provides that no child under the age of twelve years shall be employed in any manufacturing establishment or in any mechanical, mercantile or other employment; that no child under the age of fourteen shall be so employed while the public schools are in session; that no child under the age of sixteen shall be so employed unless he can produce a certificate from the local superintendent of schools certifying his ability to read and write legibly simple sentences in the English language, accompanied by an affidavit sworn before that officer that the child is of the age represented; and, further, no minor may be employed who cannot read and write legibly simple sentences in English unless he attends an evening or other school in which such branches are taught. The law gives the state superintendent of schools joint authority with the local school boards in enforcing the law, and authorizes him to employ deputies for that purpose."

"The distinctive feature of the law is its educational test, both because its enforcement rests upon an educational test primarily, and because the certificate of educational fitness is left by law in the board, or other local authority, can take away this authority from their superintendent and bestow it upon some other person. An exception to this rule is found in the city of Manchester, in which the statute specifically authorizes the city truant officer to issue age and literacy certificates, but his office is at the school department, and his work is under the oversight of the local superintendent of schools."

"The state has no accurate data available to show the number of children employed in our manufacturing establishments prior to the enactment of the existing law. We know that immediately after its enactment there was a great influx of children into the public schools, so much so that it became necessary to increase school accommodations in nearly all our manufacturing towns. A considerable number of children annually are illegally employed and escape detection. From the information which the department has been able to secure we feel pretty confident that in the state at large the percentage of these children is well within 10 per cent., and we propose to keep on whittling that down."

"Industrially, our problem is almost entirely with textile manufacturers, and chiefly with the cotton industry. About one-third of our people live in towns whose chief industrial basis is textile work. In dealing with the situation in these towns, both state and local authorities have accomplished vastly more by what might be called a campaign of education among employers than by prosecution. A great majority of the overseers in our mills are disposed to obey the law."

"So long as there are people who raise children as they do cattle - for the money return - there will be a child labor problem. The National Child Labor Committee has undoubtedly done a great deal of good in this very direction. But it can never hope adequately to cover this ground. It can render its best service, as it is doing, by awakening people to an understanding of the situation and thus securing enactment of progressively more adequate laws."

"More than by any other one factor is the enforcement of the law made possible by an informed and enlightened public opinion. Many people think they are so far doing God and the country a service in raising a large family of children that they are entitled to lie back and let the children support them as soon as the oldest one can work. We all, no doubt, know men of entirely right lives and generous impulses, and even love for children, who believe that child labor agitation is not only cranky but pernicious. Such men honestly believe it is a good thing for a boy to go to work and earn some money. They do not differentiate as to age, sex and bodily condition, but in general their argument is this: ‘Some of our ablest and most successful business men, and some of our greatest statesmen began that way. Let the child go to work if he wants to.' You must overcome that attitude of mind before your child labor law will do its work as you want it done, and when you have succeeded in educating these two classes of people and others so that they will see the iniquity and enormity of the industrial exploitation of little children, then there will not be very much need of anti-child labor laws. That is what your National Child Labor Committee is doing and is the direction in which it can do its best work." -Child Employing Industries; Proceedings of the Sixth Annual Conference, Boston, Massachusetts, January 13-16, 1910, by Henry C. Morrison, State Superintendent of Public Instruction, New Hampshire.