You may put an inner div in the container that is enough wide to hold all the floated divs.
#container {
background-color: red;
overflow: hidden;
width: 200px;
}
#inner {
overflow: hidden;
width: 2000px;
}
.child {
float: left;
background-color: blue;
width: 50px;
height: 50px;
}
<div id="container">
<div id="inner">
<div class="child"></div>
<div class="child"></div>
<div class="child"></div>
</div>
</div>