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Child Labor Label Campaignwriting

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1994-04-22 · 6 min read · Edit on Pyrite

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Child Labor Label Campaign

``` Date: Thu, 21 Apr 1994 09:23:37 +0800 From: Jeffrey.Johnson@FirstPerson.COM (Jeff Johnson)

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ACTION ALERTACTION ALERTACTION ALERTACTION ALERT*

PLEASE RE-POST AND FORWARD AS APPROPRIATE

Child Labor Label Campaign, April 22, 1994 - May 9, 1994

BACKGROUND

In 1938, Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed the Fair Labor Standards Act banning child labor in the U.S. However, child labor continues abroad. Americans unknowing support international child labor, including child slavery, by buying imported products made by children. American adults and children wear clothes made by child laborers, and walk and play on carpets knotted by children's small hands. American children play with toys made by children abroad. A U.S. ban on importing products made with child labor has often been proposed, but has always run aground based on opponents' arguments that it would adversely impact trade. The U.S. is also the only industrialized country that has not signed the Convention on the Rights of the Child, adopted by the United Nations in 1989.

The Senate is now preparing once again to consider banning the import of products made with child labor. A bill is currently taking shape in the Senate Finance committee. The bill would require importers to certify that their products were not made with child labor, and would require that the country-of-origin label say: "Not made with child labor." Typically, such bills are "killed" in committee, before they reach the full Senate. The Child Labor Label Campaign is a grass-roots effort to convince the Senators on the Finance committee to finally bring this bill to the full Senate for a vote.

A U.S. ban on products made with child labor would cause foreign manufacturers using child labor to lose their largest market, making the exploitation of child labor unprofitable. Americans deserve to know that the products they buy are not made with child labor.

For more background, see the editorial in the Christian Science Monitor, Tuesday, April 19, 1994, page 18.

ACTION REQUIRED

The Child Labor Label Campaign runs from now to May 9, 1994. If you are in a state that has a Senator on the Finance committee (see below), your participation is needed immediately to help put pressure on your Senator. If you are not in one of these states, you can help to raise the consciousness of others near you (see below) so that you will be ready to act when your Senators do consider the bill (either in another committee or in the full Senate). You can also write to your Senators, to tell them that you want to know that the products you buy aren't made with child labor.

Membership of Senate Finance committee:

Arkansas: Senator David Pryor Delaware: Senator William Roth Iowa: Senator Charles Grassley Kansas: Senator Robert Dole Louisiana: Senator John Breaux Maine: Senator George Mitchell Michigan: Senator Donald Riegle Minnesota: Senator Dave Durenberger Missouri: Senator John Danforth Montana: Senator Max Baucus New Jersey: Senator Bill Bradley New York: Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan North Dakota: Senator Kent Conrad Olkahoma: Senator David Boren Oregon: Senator Bob Packwood Rhode Island: Senator John Chaffee South Dakota: Senator Thomas Daschle Utah: Senator Orrin Hatch West Virginia: Senator John Rockerfeller Wyoming: Senator Malcolm Wallop

How to participate in the Child Labor Label Campaign:

1. Cut labels showing country-of-origin from products you own. 2. Put them in an envelope along with a note saying that you support federal legislation requiring U.S. importers to expand country-of-origin labels to indicate whether or not products were made with child labor. 3. Mail the envelope to the Child Labor Label Campaign (see address at end of this Alert). The Child Labor Label Campaign will hand deliver the envelopes to the Finance Committee Senators in Washington D.C. 4. Tell your friends and co-workers about the campaign.

Please do NOT contribute money to the Child Labor Label Campaign. This is an ad-hoc grass-roots campaign, run entirely by volunteers across the U.S. The Campaign is not prepared to handle money contributions. If you have extra money, use it to run an ad about the Campaign in your local newspaper, or turn this Alert into a pamphlet and distribute it in your community.

OTHER WAYS TO TAKE ACTION

  • Invite your children to find country-of-origin labels on their clothes,
    • rugs, and toys.
  • Suggest to your child's teacher a social studies project to have kids
    • collect labels from imported products and write letters to Senators about international child labor.
  • Organize a project in your church, workplace, apartment building, or
    • neighborhood to collect country-of-origin labels and take or send them to your Senator's office.
  • Talk to the news desk of local newspapers and TV and radio stations, and
    • suggest that they run a story on international child labor or about the Child Labor Label Campaign.
  • Write letters to editors of local newspapers and national magazines
    • advocating legislation banning the importation of products made with child labor.
  • Turn this Alert into a pamphlet and distribute it in your community.

    • ANSWERS TO FREQUENTLY-ASKED QUESTIONS ABOUT INT'L CHILD LABOR:

    Q: In what countries are children laboring? A: Children are put to work in many countries. Those with the most child laborers are Indonesia, India, Egypt, and China. Others are Bangladesh, Pakistan, and countries in Africa and South America. Also see the State Department 1994 Report on Human Rights, available via listserv. Send a message to almanac@ra.esusda.gov containing only the content line "send state-hr catalog" to receive an overview of the contents of the report and instructions on how to send for specific parts of it.

    Q: What products do children make? A: Shirts and other clothing, children's clothing, rugs and carpets, matches, toys.

    Q: Under what conditions do they work? A: Long hours confined indoors with inadequate food, rest, or ventilation, rarely (if ever) going to school or playing.

    Q: Why do the children work? A: They work to earn money to feed themselves. Many work because they are captive and have no choice.

    Q: If we end child labor, how will these children earn money to eat? A: As long as it is profitable to use the cheaper labor of children, factory owners will do so. If we make that practice unprofitable by closing the U.S. market to goods made with child labor, then factory owners will employ adults, who will then be able to feed their children.

    Q: How does child labor in the third-world countries affect economies there? A: Child labor depresses the standard of living in developing countries, for when they are paid anything at all, children earn only a fraction of the wages that otherwise would be paid to emancipated adults.

    Q: How will the labelling requirement for imported products be enforced? A: As their products enter the U.S., importers will sign affidavits that their products are not made with child labor, just as they currently must declare that their products do not contain parts of endangered species and are not made in slave labor camps. Fines and prison terms for falsifying the reports would be stiff, so few legitimate importers would risk bringing child-labor products into the U.S.

    Q: Is this a labor issue or a trade issue? A: This is neither a labor issue nor a trade issue. This is a children's issue. Children should play and grow and go to school. They should not work in factories.

    CHILD LABOR LABEL CAMPAIGN c/o Michael Bush P.O. Box 702 Denver, CO 80201 ```

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