Florence Kelley: Championing Against Child Labor

655 Words2 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Arguments about child labour

During the late 1800’s and early 1900’s the fight for equal and just treatment for both women and children was one of the most historically prominent movements in America. Courageous women everywhere fought, protested and petitioned with the hope that they would achieve equal rights and better treatment for all, especially children. One of these women is known as Florence Kelley. On July 22, 1905, Kelley made her mark on the nation when she delivered a speech before the National American Woman Suffrage Association, raising awareness of the cruel truth of the severity behind child labor through the use of repetition, imagery and oxymorons. There are several examples of repetition present throughout her argument, but there is one phrase in …show more content…

Kelley describes working all night long as a “pitiful privilege” in lines 44 and 45. In addition to yielding such a sarcastic tone, this rhetoric device also shows how pitiful it is that children see their 14th birthday not as a happy milestone that is normally expected, but as an opportunity, like Kelley said, a privilege to start working. This pushes her audience to consider that though this may indeed be a beneficial privilege to some, it is a great injustice in the eyes of another. This injustice is later reiterated by the comparing child labor to “great evil” when she states no one will be able to free their consciences from participation in such injustices until women are given the right to vote. Not only does this intensify the leading purpose of her speech, but further motivates her audience to take action in fighting for her cause. Florence Kelley’s speech enlightened her audience, the National American Woman Suffrage Association, along with all other Americans, of the severity of child labor, convincing them to take action and fight for a change. In conclusion, the use of repetition, imagery and oxymorons in such a well-constructed speech is what enabled her to effectively communicate this message and heavily influence the ending of child labor laws and the beginning of a more honorable

Show More
Related

  • Hypocrisy and Religious Confusion: Nora's Impact on Jackie

    473 Words  | 1 Pages

    Nora’s and her hypocrisy, confusion about religion, and his Gran unbalancing the family lead to Jackie’s trap. Nora’s hypocrisy is shown throughout the story. Nora would show her devilish tormenting side to just Jackie because she could use her advantage in knowledge of everything especially religion and confession to torment Jackie. When nobody is around watching her and Jackie walk to the chapel for confession “Nora suddenly changed her tone, she became the raging malicious devil she really was”(178). Then when Nora is in public she shows her angelic side “she walked up the aisle to the side altar looking like a saint”(178). Even though everyone else sees the angelic part of Nora, Jackie “remember[s] the devilish malice with which she had

    Read More

  • Locavore Movement Outline

    704 Words  | 2 Pages

    In Florence Kelley’s 1905 speech to the Philadelphia convention of the National American Women Suffrage Association, she accentuates the obligatory need to reform the working conditions for young children.

    Read More

  • Florence Kelley Child Labor

    532 Words  | 2 Pages

    Throughout Kelley’s speech, she utilizes imagery to help prove her view that child labor is wrong. She points out that while “we sleep” there are “several thousand little girls… working in the textile mills, all the night through, in the deafening noise of the spindles and the looms spinning and weaving cotton and wool.” The listener of the speech can visualize the dreadful scene in which thousands of little girls are working in the textile mills. This imagery evokes a sense of sorrow from the listener. Also, the word “deafening” adds to the listener’s understanding that not only are young children working, but they are working dangerous and dreadful jobs. She also depicts an image of a girl who “ on her thirteenth birthday” could work from “ six at night until six in the morning.” This detail suggests that there is little happiness in the lives of these young children

    Read More

  • Essay On Florence Kelley Speech

    605 Words  | 2 Pages

    On July 22, 1905, social worker and reformer, Florence Kelley, stood in Philadelphia before an audience and presented a speech about the idea of combing the women’s suffrage and child labor issues in order to make more probable advantages in both departments. Her speech was given in away to entice the crowd and motivate them to fix the issues at hand. She was able to effectively able to give her speech by appealing to the crowds emotions and by using ironic diction and syntax to engage the crowd into the words she was saying and backing them up with substantial evidence.

    Read More

  • Organizing Women Workers ( 1887 )

    1594 Words  | 4 Pages

    Leonora M. Barry was born in County Cork, Ireland, on August 13th, 1849. She was raised by her parents, John and Honor Granger Kearney (en.wikipedia.org). Leonora lost her mother at an early age and faced many family hardships. But, she persevered and became a school teacher at the age of 15. In 1880, Leonora’s husband died and she was left to raise three children alone. Leonora needed money so she got a job in a factory where she worked for two years. The factory was a miserable place to work with terrible hourly wages. However, she needed the money to support her family. In 1884, Leonora Barry joined the Knights of Labor and campaigned to abolish child labor. Leonora was elected to travel to different factories and record her observations of poor working conditions in factories for women. She traveled to the biggest industrial cities. This task prompted Leonora to write “Organizing Women Workers.” () Leonora was also prompted to write the article by her personal beliefs and views. She had worked in a factory for two years making no more than 65 cents in her first week but she pushed through and stuck with that factory job for two years (www.patheos.com).

    Read More

  • Kelley Rhetorical Analysis

    518 Words  | 2 Pages

    In the first paragraph, Kelley explains the ages of these labor-bearing children by saying that “they very in age from six...sixteen in more enlightened states.” The use of “enlightened” is purely sarcastic, and the speaker does not have any respect for those states that allow sixteen year old girls to do heavy-labor. For anyone in the audience that knows the literal definition of “enlightened,” they, too, would be squirming in their seats at the thought of child labor, even at sixteen years of age, being “enlightening.” In her fourth paragraph, she touches more on “enlightened” states by talking about Alabama. She uses “child[ren] under sixteen.. shall not work in a cotton mill at night longer than 8 hours,” and then says that Alabama “does better... than any other southern state,” to again show her sarcasm towards these states...

    Read More

  • Rhetorical Strategies in Advocacy Against Child Labor

    633 Words  | 2 Pages

    She shows the jobs young girls do in the factories, “They spin… they weave… They stamp” By showing a list of work the young girls do, Kelley appeals to her audience’s emotional sense in order to deliver message of dissolving child labor. She also uses rhetorical questions followed by solutions in order to question what must be done and how to do it. She states, “what can we do to free our consciousness?... we can enlist the workingmen… to free the children”. By doing this, Kelley forcefully suggests that her audience consciousness are enslaved with the idea of child labor. She states her and her audience must solve the problem with unity to enlist the workingmen on the jobs. This gets back to to Kelley’s purpose of destroying child labor. By offering

    Read More

  • Biography of Florence Kelley

    1600 Words  | 4 Pages

    One of the most effective reform techniques is to “investigate, educate, legislate, enforce” (Fee/Brown, 2). This straightforward manner of rectification was summarized and utilized by Florence Kelley during the Progressive Era in the United States. During a period where women lacked suffrage, and most didn’t have steady jobs, Kelley was the head of the National Consumer’s League and had a resume that boasted affiliation with various other esteemed organizations (Verba, 1). She epitomized independence and confidence through both her civil activism and in her personal life. Florence Kelley’s resolve, willpower, and determination set a precedent that is still followed today- nearly 90 years after her death. She was truly a trailblazer of the first generation of modern women.

    Read More

  • Florence Kelley Rhetorical Strategies

    285 Words  | 1 Pages

    Florence Kelley used rhetorical strategies in her message. She uses them to make logical statements in an argument, to make credible statements showing what is morally correct, and to make statements that appeal to the reader's emotions.

    Read More

  • Florence Kelley's Speech On Child Labor

    740 Words  | 2 Pages

    Kelley uses an anaphora to illustrate the harsh working conditions the laborers deal with. “The children make our shoes…robbed them” (lines 66-77). By description of children having to experience dreadful working all night, and how her audience is allowed to sleep, she creates a feeling of guilt for the children that are forced to work. The anaphora narrates the struggle that the children were experiencing. Right after she uses the anaphora , Kelley explains that the burden of factory work has robbed the children of their school life, using sympathy and guilt to establish that children are suffering in order to persuade Americans to vote for the purpose of modifying laws. Lines 18-22, Kelley emphasizes this, “Tonight while we sleep, several thousand little girls will be working in textile mills, all through the night…..ribbons for us to buy.” she also hints that the lack of sleep young worker receive has a high possibility of causing developmental problems that will affect them for the remainder of their lives. Kelley asks if mothers and teachers voting would make a difference (lines 55-59), she asks this because she implies that their votes can make the intense child labor come to a permanent halt. Her speech serves its purpose and is effective because of her examples she uses and the pathos she establishes by making her audience feel guilty.Kelley applies logos into her

    Read More

  • Rhetorical Analysis On Florence Kelley

    441 Words  | 1 Pages

    In the body of her speech, Kelley uses parallel structure to start each paragraph, emphasizing the similar injustice of the laws in “in Alabama,” “in Georgia,” and “in Pennsylvania.” This notion of unfairness is furthered by her diction when she simultaneously praises the Unites States as a “great industrial” country while condemning many state laws as a “great evil.” Additionally, Kelley uses the oxymoron of “pitiful privilege” to describe the hypocritical nature of New Jersey’s laws. Finally, she calls her audience into action with a transition from narration into firm assertion. After describing the horrible nature of legislation “enabling girls of fourteen years to work all night” and little girls and boys of “under twelve years of age” to spend their developing years in factories, Kelley ties her ample evidence to her concrete goal: women’s rights. Including her audience in her discussion, Kelley affirms that both the audience and she are in agreement together on the issue when she asserts they “do not wish

    Read More

  • Rhetorical Analysis Mabel

    661 Words  | 2 Pages

    In this passage Mabel compares herself and others to flies struggling for milk in a saucepan. The author uses figurative language to portray the insecurity Mabel feels as well as her desire to fit in with society. “We are all like flies trying to crawl over the edge of the saucer,...” Through the use of a simile, Mabel compares herself, as well as everyone else at the gathering, to flies. This is significant because it allows Mabel to see herself as equal to everyone else. “and repeated the phrase as if she were crossing herself, as if she were trying to find some spell to annul this pain, to make this agony endurable.” This significance is further evidenced by the equalizing thought being compared to the sign of the cross through a simile,

    Read More

  • Women's Right Movement

    837 Words  | 2 Pages

    In the mid nineteenth century America was going through an age of reform. The person who would be the center of these reforms would be the women in society. Women soon realized that in order to make sure that all the reforms went through they would need more power and influence in society. The oppression and discrimination the women felt in this era launched the women into create the women’s right movement. The women fought so zealously for their rights it would be impossible for them not to achieve their goals. The sacrifices, suffering, and criticism that the women activist made would be so that the future generations would benefit the future generations.

    Read More

  • An Analysis of ?The Meanings of Seneca Falls, 1848-1998?

    658 Words  | 2 Pages

    While being born in the modern times, no woman knows what it was like to have a status less than a man’s. It is hard to envision what struggles many women had to go through in order to get the rights to be considered equal. In the essay The Meanings of Seneca Falls, 1848-1998, Gerda Lerner recalls the events surrounding the great women’s movement. Among the several women that stand out in the movement, Elizabeth Cady Stanton stands out because of her accomplishments. Upon being denied seating and voting rights at the World Antislavery Convention of 1840, she was outraged and humiliated, and wanted change. Because of Elizabeth Cady Stanton’s great perseverance, the Seneca Falls Convention of 1848 was a success as well as a great influence on the future of women’s rights.

    Read More

  • Gender Inequality in Literature

    1190 Words  | 3 Pages

    The first women’s rights convention was organized by 68 women and 32 men in 1848. As a result, a document titled “The Declaration of Sentiments” was created, fighting for the quality of women (Zink-Sawyer). Based on the format of the “Declaration of Independence”, Elizabeth Cady Stanton created a document with the primary goal of securing equal rights for women and how these women would gain these rights. The 1848 Declaration...

    Read More

More about Florence Kelley: Championing Against Child Labor

Open Document