Home > West's Encyclopedia of American Law > Hammer v. Dagenhart

At the beginning of the twentieth century, U.S. reformers sought to end the practice of child labor. Young children were sent into factories and mines to work long hours for low wages. Aside from the physical demands placed upon children, labor robbed them of a chance to obtain an education. Some states enacted laws to regulate child labor, but others ignored these efforts and found competitive advantages in having a cheap supply of labor. Congress finally responded in 1916, when it passed the Keating-Owen Child Labor Act, of September 1, 1916, c. 432, 39 Stat. 675. The statute prohibited the use of interstate commerce for goods and materials made with child labor. Congress believed that the Constitution's COMMERCE CLAUSE permitted it to act to regulate child labor, but the U.S. Supreme Court thought differently. In Hammer v. Dagenhart, 247 U.S. 251, 38 S....