In recent times, however, a huge company has been accused of illegal child labor in oversea countries. Apple affirmed the accusation of allegedly illegal practice in such factories which make your iPods, iTouches, and now, iPads. This was not for Apple’s blame, though. A single factory in China went so far as to produce fake documentation of workers and to actually hide their illegal and overworked child laborers.

Apple had 0 tolerance and fixed the situation immediately.

Children normally worked long hours in factories during the Industrial Revolution; it was not uncommon for a person to die below the age of twenty, due to infection/machine accidents, just because someone may have been working since they were six.  People during this time may have been desperate for the money, yet they were still working for what would be less that minimum wage today.

Children were used for the jobs that older men were physically unable to do. It was easier for a child to collect cotton under a running machine, as appposed to a larger person, because there was less of a risk for the smaller child to get injured.  Children were needed and played a large role in factory life of the time.

I believe that factories today should stray away from using children for labor. There should not be a single reason for a child to absolutely have to work. Blame the economy if the parents cannot support their kid, and blame greed for a factory owner wanting an extra few dollars that come along with hiring an illegal child laborer. There is not a designated job for children today, nor should there be. During the Industrial Revolution, however, it was not a taboo for a child to work. Under the conditions, I think that the impact of child labor was negative . Although some jobs were easier for children, it was harmful for one to stay in a factory for sometimes up to nineteen hours at a time.

Child Labor will never disappear completely. It has almost 200 years since the first reformation, yet there are even traces of this right now. It would be virtually impossible to find and stop every single case.

During this era, France was organized by the estates system. King Louis was brought into this, making it extremely difficult to actually do good for the country. King Louis XVI wasn’t a bad leader at all, it just seemed so because of the disorganization and the offset of power created chaos throughout France. In the event that there were not estates and everyone was equal, would King Louis still have been executed?

There were essentially 3 estates, led by a monarchy. The First Estate was composed mostly of clergy, the Second of nobles, and the Third was non-nobility (everyone else). The First Estate had the fewest amount of people, yet they owned  10 % of France’s land; the Third Estate, 97 % of the people, out of which 80% were urban workers, literally had no land, freedom or education. The only supporters of The Enlightenment, of course, was the Third Estate because they were the only estate to benefit from this movement, and The Bourgeois. The Bourgeois were leaders of The Enlightenment, they were the smartest, and yet still had no privileges to hold office, making them essentially powerless.

As you can imagine, with only the poorest, most powerless people supporting King Louis XVI’s reign, no matter what he did, somebody would hate him.

It was in 1787  that the king decided to take action and hired Jacques Necker to help make a balance in power. He supported the third estate and helped the king think through choices he made. The king was greatly influenced by Jacques. It was in 1789, when Jacques was fired, that total havoc was spread throughout France. The Third Estate was enraged. They seized gunpowder and armed themselves. They only stopped after they were released from the contracts that made them less than any other estate. 

This revolt sparked The Declaration of Rights of Men. This new constitution made all people equal. Women of this time were pleased, along with the Third Estate. But all this happened without a king that helped, at all. If everyone was equal now, people realised that the king was not necessary. Even though the problems were not entirely his fault, the king was taken prisoner and executed a few days later.

Imagine if France was not organized with estates during the beginning of The Enlightenment. If it was maybe a democratic state, the king may have developed a version of The Declaration of Rights of Men on his own, making peace and equality something not so alien to the people. The Enlightenment may have been more successful by greatly reducing the amount of lives lost through the hardships to create France as it is today.