This paper examines ideological themes present in movements for child labor reform and in literature in 19th century France. Separate sections cover early industrialization and child labor reform, the image of the romantic child in French literature, and ideology and reforms. By the mid-19th century, England, America, and France all had their versions of the image of the sensitive, innocent, vulnerable child juxtaposed with that of a harsh, corrupting, damaging world. France had its version of this image, although French romanticists generally were neither as anti-industry or as child-centered as their English counterparts. A second French motif was that of the coddled bourgeois child sent off to the strict environment of the lycee (school). The name most commonly associated with such permissive childrearing practices in France is Jean Jacques Rousseau. His synthesis of already-existing practices into a systematic philosophy of the nature of the child contains themes which only began to be incorporated into French law over 100 years after the 1762 publication of "Emile." (IS)