In an era of limited rights for women and minorities, social worker Florence Kelley delivers a persuasive speech to a live audience at the Philadelphia convention of the National American Woman Suffrage Association. Through repetition of important details, along with harrowing examples of awful working conditions, the author brings to light the issues of child labor and invites listeners to empathize. She then employs rhetorical questions to deliver a scathing critique of the carelessly permissive labor laws in place. In doing so, she creates a convincing argument that emphasizes the need to change child labor laws in the United States, and beckons the present listener to take action and join her cause.
The author begins with jarring statistics of “two million children under the age of sixteen” who work to earn a living. She
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She criticizes New Jersey, using the oxymoron of “pitiful privilege” to highlight the unfairness and hypocrisy in their law, given that fourteen year olds have the “privilege” of working through the whole night. Furthermore, she uses asks the rhetorical question if the labor laws “in Georgia” and “in New Jersey” would be the same if women had the vote. Kelley should find her audience to easily agree with her overarching goal, since they are specifically at the convention with women’s rights and female suffrage in mind. She uses repetition again at this point in the speech, expect this “we” she speaks of is an audience who should no longer feel powerless or removed from the problem. In a time where women may have felt powerless under the burden of a patriarchal society, Kelley wants them to feel that they can find power through exercising their rights. She enlists them not only for the sake of securing the vote for themselves, but for future generations of children, whom shall not be forced to work in factories as the children of her