Page:Solution of the Child Labor Problem.djvu/96

89 children services for which, he gives no adequate return; which allows parents, often through blind greed, to live from the work of their children; which allows the child, the future mainstay of civilization, to enter upon a life that may lead to physical, mental, and moral decay or ruin?

Which one, or which combination of these factors is sending children to work?

Greed means a desire for appetite satisfaction. Defined thus, how extensively does it enter as a cause of child labor?

"They most all leave after their First Communion. The boys want to gamble, and some of the girls want to buy fancy ribbons, so they go to work, and in a short time you tell them by the 'factory voice,'—all the factory children have it,—especially the girls." In these words the principal of a large parochial school portrayed the greed of the child, and it is a very real factor in the situation. From many homes children go out to work, not because there is any necessity nor even