I know how these labor guys work. It happened to us once and now we don’t allow women to bring their children. It isn’t against the law if the children are on the perimeter of the field but if they enter it for any reason you can get fined.
So what happened was a kid was following his mother and they were going to fine us. My husband refused and they said we had to file reports every month and my husband refused and they eventually went away and left us alone.
Just recently they showed up again. Their complaint is that the crew that is working for us is coming in a van and there are too many people riding in the van and if they get in an accident on the way to work we are going to be responsible. My husband said that we would then see them in court.
I well remember when babies and young kids were pulled on cotton sacks as their mothers picked.
As kids we got out of school in the spring to work until crops were laid by. Went back to school until the fall, then back out to gather the crops in before winter.
And, it was not just for family farms, during cotton chopping, the contractor trucks would pick us up at 5 am. We worked ten hour days swinging a hoe for 50 cents an hour. It was just the way of life for us back then and was no big deal, didn’t like it, but we did what was expected of us to help out.