Define Child Rights

At what stage in life should a child be given personal rights?

Until the twentieth century a child´s rights were based upon local customs. Infanticide in Polynesia for example is speculated to have existed as a way to keep the population in check even though the island inhabitants had ample food supply and lived in a tropical paradise. Deformed children were routinely killed in ancient civilizations instead of providing care for the handicapped like we do today through social services. Human sacrifice is well documented in different countries around the globe specifically in the Atacama Desert region in South America where mummified remains of Inca children are routinely discovered.

The rights of children were practically inexistent until missionaries traveled the earth in an attempt to make the world "civilized" through Christianity. Once a primitive society was refined child mortality from infanticide and human sacrifice declined in most cases. It was not until separation of church and state that many of the ideals for human preservation are being reversed specifically in child abortions.

Many suggest a child´s rights should be defended immediately after fertilization of the egg. Others propose a child be protected by law once a separate heartbeat is detected in the womb. Some people believe a mother should have the absolute right to decide her child´s fate just before cutting the cord.

Since the 1973 Roe v. Wade verdict we have a set precedence brought forth by The Supreme Court in the Untied States that ruled women have a constitutionally protected right to decide a child´s fate in the early stages of pregnancy and free from government interference. But the law will be perpetually challenged by individuals who believe the "right to choose" should be extended up to official separation from birth. This is a question that our recent Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor and other appointees in the future will have to decide as the 1973 verdict is perpetually challenged by activists for and against the ruling.

We take most of our rights for granted. You get up when you want, have a leisurely breakfast, work anywhere from 8 to 10 hours then hopefully enjoy a nice dinner before watching the television and going to bed. Imagine having no rights for a moment. Could you stand being told when to get up, eat, go to work and sleep? That is what happens to children around the globe every day. They are bought, sold, traded, over worked, abused and treated like a commodity. The children have no rights.

It wasn´t until the Industrial Revolution that children were given specific rights to protect them from unfair labor practices. In my upcoming Novel titled American Hero children in Manhattan after the Civil War are treated like expendable machines. With very few social programs to assist the exploding population, orphans are bought and sold to conduct dangerous occupations from dawn to dusk or trafficked for profit. In the early 1900´s before The National Child Labor Committee in 1904 worked diligently to end child labor in America and provide education in its place. It was not until the Fair Labor Standards Act in 1938, which set federal standards for child labor in the United States.

Today, many countries still employ child labor at enormous profits. Guilty countries like India have an estimated 70 million children as young as 11 working in sweatshops for less than a dollar a day. According to a recent investigation from the BBC reports indicate that in Bangladesh, one in 10 children is presently working in the country which legally permits child labor to exist.

Fortunately thanks to several organizations unfair child labor practices are being exposed. It was not until after WWII that a United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund was founded to assist the homeless children in war ravaged cities and towns. Today the organization is known officially as UNICEF which started a convention on the rights of children worldwide. The organization provides protection against human trafficking, offers educational programs and other necessities to children who cannot provide for themselves. The pictures you see in this article were taken over a span of one hundred years but the abuse and neglect still persists.

The Convention on the Rights of the Child was ratified in 1990 and under the Declaration of Human Rights, the United Nations proclaimed that children are entitled to special care and assistance and should be offered necessary protection and assistance so they can grow up and assume responsibilities within the community. The premise is to provide dignity, tolerance, freedom, equality and solidarity to children in all countries around the world. However, without a justice system in countries like India to uphold the proposed declaration we shall never put an end to the exploitation of children on a global basis.

In America, legal rights for children are provided by the United States Bar Association and the Children´s Rights Litigation Committee that was initiated to address a child´s rights in all aspects of the judicial system. The Committee provides pro bono (free) attorneys to represent children in the United States who seek legal counsel. Children who need assistance in child abuse and neglect cases are provided with legal counsel and help protect the child´s right to an education.

What global standards should be put in place to give a child the right to eat, sleep, play and develop into a young adult instead of being forced into slavery or worked for over 14 hours a day?

We must expose countries with speculative child labor laws or there will never be an end to such maltreatment. Children will continue to be bought and sold for profit like animals at auction until the world decides to put an end to such immorality.