Rhetorical Analysis Of Speech By Florence Kelley

Florence Kelley is a reformer who fights for child labor laws and better working conditions for women. At the National Assembly Women Suffrage Association in Philadelphia on July 22,1905, Kelly recites a speech talking about the issues of child labor laws. When talking to her audience, she uses rhetorical strategies such as repetition of the many negative aspects of child labor through specific examples, criticism of states regarding their policies, and emotional appeal. By using a combination of factual evidence and emotional appeal, Kelley hopes to get her point across by convincing her audience of the problems with child labor. Kelley utilizes factual information along with criticism of various policies to assert her authority of having

To build on her argument further, Kelley brings in specific details about how various states are treating the children. She says, “They vary in age from six and seven years(In the cotton mills of Georgia) and eight, nine and ten (in coal-breakers of Pennsylvania), to fourteen, fifteen and sixteen in more enlightened states.” By bringing in the policies of certain states into her argument, Kelley shows that this issue is not a small matter, but yet is affecting the lives of so many children who are forced into hard labor. Her usage of the cotton mill work and coal breaking in Georgia and Pennsylvania respectively, shows that the workload children have is not light, but very severe. Kelley moves forward in her argument when talking about state policies on child labor. Kelley provide Georgia as an example and a comparison to how other states try to handle child labor. Kelley says, “In Alabama the law provides that a child under sixteen years of age shall not work

Her goal is to influence the people by having them sympathize with the children who are doing hours of work. She criticizes Georgia for allowing people to work at night for many hours. She says, “And they will do so tonight, while we sleep.” Kelley is trying to make the people who allow this to happen to feel bad. By making them feel bad, she creates a feeling of guilt which influences the them to support her cause. Kelley makes her claim even more powerful by introducing the feelings of a mother towards her child. Mothers would not condone their offspring working for so long. Kelley question the policies set by various states, and if the mothers had a say, then child labor would not be such a problem. Kelly continues her argument by making the people feel worse by bringing in the idea of the children doing all the labor