We agree with child safety advocates who have called for a stronger federal law to make agricultural jobs for youths safer. But sadly, strengthened laws are too late to protect the two Whiteside County 14-year-old girls who suffered a wrongful death in a Whiteside County, Illinois, cornfield last week when they were electrocuted while detasseling corn.

The Child Labor Coalition, based in Washington, D.C., announced in June 2011 that it supported a bill introduced in the House to amend the Children’s Act for Responsible Employment (CARE Act). Currently, the law permits young teens to work in a cornfield at a younger age and for longer hours than other youths, though they are unable to work at jobs deemed “hazardous” such as driving a combine or working around stud horses.

The Fair Labor Standards Act became law in 1938, yet relatively few changes have been made since then. It is unconscionable to think that children in the U.S. can work in cornfields in unsafe conditions. The proposed law would require the U.S. secretary of labor to determine if specific farm tasks like detasseling corn are too dangerous for children as young as 14.

Detasseling corn is big business in Illinois. Each summer, thousands of teens go into the cornfields to perform a task that essentially prepares corn plants for cross-pollination. The greatest threats are typically the heat and allergies, but last week’s tragic accident proves that serious injuries and even death can occur. Agricultural jobs are ranked among the three most dangerous industries in the U.S.

The accident is being investigated by OSHA, ComEd and the Whiteside County Sheriff’s Department. The 81-year-old farmer who owns the land where the accident occurred believes the deaths are related to a recent lightning strike that struck part of the electrical system linked to the irrigation equipment.

In the wake of the accident, Monsanto, which leases the cornfield where the teens worked, has issued new guidelines calling for such irrigation systems to be de-energized before the detasseling process begins.