Georgia Rejects

Two states have taken action on the proposed Constitutional Amendment* giving Congress power to regulate or prohibit child labor. Arkansas ratified it, Georgia rejected it. Before the Georgia Assembly went many speakers, among them ex-Senator Hoke Smith/-objecting to the Amendment as an invasion of States' Rights. It was defeated by a vote of 170 to 3. The State Senate acted similarly. In Georgia, 89,000 children between the ages of 10 and 15 years-- 20.8% of that age-group--are workers. Boys of 12, if orphans, are permitted to work in cotton mills. There is a maximum 10-hour day; and night work is permitted. A bill is before the Legislature (and reported likely to be passed) which will prohibit the employment of all children under 14 and forbid night work for those under 16. Nevertheless, Georgia was determined to have no national interference by "long-haired agitatists." Said the Resolution which was adopted :

BE IT RESOLVED, by the House of Representatives and the Senate of the State of Georgia, in general assembly met, that the said Amendment to the Constitution of the United States be not, and the same is hereby not ratified, but is rejected, because said proposed Amendment would destroy parental authority and responsibility throughout America, would give irrevocable support to a rebellion of childhood which menaces our civilization, would give Congress not only parental authority but all State authority over education, would eviscerate the States and change our plan of government from a Federal Union to a consolidated Republic and create a centralized Government far removed from the power of the people.

The State of Georgia has neither the right nor the power to give to Congress the power to limit, regulate or prohibit the labor of Georgians under 18 years of age, or of any age, because such power reestablishes in America a system of slavery with public ownership substituted for private ownership, and would place Congress in control of every home in the land between parent and child. State Representative McCorsey said much the same thing in more vigorous idiom: "I don't want any more monkeying with the buzz-saw by that bunch in Washington. We don't mix nohow. We weren't born under the same regime and don't drink out of the same bottle. We don't want them interfering with our affairs."

*Passed by two-thirds vote of the House, in April; of the Senate, in May; must be ratified by 36 states to become effective. /- Good friends describe Hoke Smith as "tall, well-built, intellectual, forceful, genial, tactful; he does all the things that become a man." He was born at Newton, N. C., 1855, lawyer, journalist, educator, Secretary of the Interior under Cleveland 1893-96, Governor of Georgia 1907-11, U. S. Senator from Georgia 1911-21.