RHODE ISLAND SYSTEM OF LABOR

The Rhode Island system of labor was initiated by English-born mechanist and businessman Samuel Slater (1768–1835), who built a water-powered cotton-spinning mill at Pawtucket, Rhode Island, in 1790. The machine, based on a mill invented by Englishman Richard Arkwright (1732–1792), was an immediate and unqualified success—introducing mechanization to manufacturing, which was previously done by hand. A few years after starting his mill, Slater began hiring whole families from the surrounding area, including children, to work the spinning machines. Child labor had long been used in Britain's textile factories and Slater himself had worked in them as a youth. In the Rhode Island mills, the families made up the workforce. Wages were low and the hours were long. But the Rhode Island system of labor worked, and by the 1820s it was firmly established in American industry. In 1832 an estimated 40 percent of all factory workers in New England were between the ages of seven and sixteen.

As the textiles industry grew, the supply of labor did not keep pace with the demands of the industry. Slater hired families who often relocated to be near the factory, giving rise to mill towns. By the late 1830s, factory conditions in New England deteriorated. Increased competition in the textile industry (which was the model for other industries of the day) forced factory owners to cut wages and lengthen hours to stay profitable and keep up with production demands.

The opening of new lands in the west shifted much of the nation's agriculture from New England's coastal states to the interior. As the farming population moved west, it became more difficult to recruit mill hands from the resident farming population. During the 1830s the mill owners turned to the steady stream of immigrants to supplement the factory workforce. Labor systems, such as Slater's and that of Francis Cabot Lowell (who hired farm girls to work in his factories but took care to ensure favorable working and living conditions), were no longer necessary. During the second half of the century, women and children continued to supply much of the factory labor, but without the paternalistic labor systems of Slater and Lowell.