Editing National Child Labor Committee

{{Short description|Defunct American nonprofit organization}}
[[Image:AddieCard05282vLewisHine.jpg|thumb|250px|right| "Addie Card, 12 years. Spinner in Cotton Mill. Vt." by [[Lewis Hine]].]]
The '''National Child Labor Committee''' ('''NCLC''') was a private, non-profit organization in the United States that served as a leading proponent for the national [[child labor]] reform movement. Its mission was to promote "the rights, awareness, dignity, well-being and education of children and youth as they relate to work and working."<ref name="About NCLC">{{cite web|url=http://outreachscience.tumblr.com/post/107689350421/the-national-child-labor-committee|title=About NCLC|date=January 2015 |access-date=2015-01-10|publisher=Out Reach Science}}</ref><ref name="Contrera"/>

NCLC, headquartered on [[Broadway (Manhattan)|Broadway]] in [[Manhattan, New York]],<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.nationalchildlabor.org/contact.html|title=Contact NCLC|access-date=2008-11-25|publisher=National Child Labor Committee|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080917220715/http://www.nationalchildlabor.org/contact.html|archive-date=September 17, 2008}}</ref> was administered by a [[board of directors]], with the last chair head being Betsy Brand.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.nationalchildlabor.org/board.html|title=Board of Directors|access-date=2008-11-25|publisher=National Child Labor Committee|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090207205531/http://www.nationalchildlabor.org/board.html|archive-date=February 7, 2009}}</ref>

==Formation==
[[File:Midnight at the glassworks2b.jpg|thumb|right|250px|Child labor in [[Indiana]] glassworks. (Hine, 1908)]]
[[Edgar Gardner Murphy]], an American clergyman and author, is credited with proposing the National Child Labor Committee following a conference between Murphy's Alabama Child Labor Committee, and the New York Child Labor Committee.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.faqs.org/childhood/Me-Pa/National-Child-Labor-Committee.html|title= National Child Labor Committee|access-date=2008-11-25|publisher=Encyclopedia of children and Childhood in History and Society}}</ref> The conference culminated on April 25, 1904 at a mass meeting held in [[Carnegie Hall]], New York City. At the meeting, both men and women concerned with the plight of working children overwhelmingly supported the formation of the National Child Labor Committee, and [[Felix Adler (professor)|Felix Adler]] was elected its first Chairman.<ref name="History of NCLC">{{cite web|url=http://www.nationalchildlabor.org/history.html|title=History of NCLC|access-date=2008-11-25|publisher=National Child Labor Committee|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080621055250/http://www.nationalchildlabor.org/history.html|archive-date=2008-06-21}}</ref>

The new organization moved swiftly in procuring the support of prominent Americans. In November 1904, barely half a year after its conception, the NCLC boasted the membership of leading politicians, philanthropists, clergymen, and intellectuals including: former president [[Grover Cleveland]], Senator [[Benjamin Tillman]] of [[South Carolina]], and the president of [[Harvard University]], [[Charles W. Eliot]].<ref>{{cite news|url=https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1904/11/27/101350251.pdf|title=National Effort to Solve Child Labor Problem|access-date=2008-11-25|work=New York Times|date=1904-11-27}}</ref>

In 1907, the NCLC was [[charter]]ed by an [[act of Congress]] with a board of directors originally including prominent Progressive reformers such as [[Jane Addams]], [[Florence Kelley]], [[Edward Thomas Devine]], [[Deborah Donalds]], and [[Lillian Wald]]. With the leadership of such prominent reformers, the organization quickly began to attract additional support and moved towards action and advocacy.<ref name="National Child Labor Committee">{{cite web|url=http://www.faqs.org/childhood/Me-Pa/National-Child-Labor-Committee.html|title=National Child Labor Committee|access-date=2008-11-25|publisher=Encyclopedia of children and Childhood in History and Society}}</ref>

==Exposing child labor==
[[Image:Young worker in Merchants Mill.jpg|thumb|Young worker in a Merchants Mill]]
According to the [[1900 US Census]], a total of 1,752,187 (about 1 in every 6) children under the age of sixteen were engaged in "gainful occupations" in the United States. This number represents a fifty percent increase from the 1,118,356 children working for wages in 1880.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1904/11/27/101350251.pdf|title=National Effort to Solve Child Labor Problem|access-date=2008-11-25|work=New York Times|date=1904-11-27}}</ref> This trend alarmed Americans who, while supporting the traditional role of children in agriculture, found the idea of American youth laboring for meager wages in industrial factories appalling. From 1909 to 1921 the NCLC capitalized on this moral outrage by making it the focal point of the NCLC campaign against child labor.<ref name="National Child Labor Committee"/>

==Lewis Hine and the National Child Labor Committee==
[[File:John-howell.jpg|thumb|left|260px|Lewis Hine's shadow appears in his portrait of newsboy John Howell, working the street corner in Indianapolis in 1908.]]
In 1908 the National Child Labor Committee hired [[Lewis Hine]], a teacher and professional photographer trained in [[sociology]], who advocated photography as an educational medium, to document child labor in American industry. Over the next ten years Hine would publish thousands of photographs designed to pull at the nation's heartstrings.<ref name="History of NCLC"/>

Hine's subjects included both boys and girls employed by mills and factories and other occupations all over the United States. For the average American, Hine provided an otherwise unavailable window into the somber working conditions facing America's youth. When asked about his work on the subject Hine simply stated that he "wanted to show things that had to be corrected." Hine's work resulted in a wave of popular support for federal child labor regulations put forward by the NCLC. In effect, Hine's photographs became the face of the National Child Labor Committee, and are among the earliest examples of [[documentary photography]] in America.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.getty.edu/art/gettyguide/artMakerDetails?maker=1601|title=Lewis Wickes Hine|access-date=2008-11-25|publisher=The Getty|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070710140436/http://www.getty.edu/art/gettyguide/artMakerDetails?maker=1601|archive-date=2007-07-10}}</ref>

[[Lewis Hine]] was an influential photo journalist in the years leading up to the First World War. It was during those years that the American economy was doing well, and the need for labor was at an all-time high. Cheap labor was necessary, and American businesses were not only looking for immigrant workers but also child labor as well. The factory-oriented jobs were very specific, and a child was a perfect candidate for the work that was necessary. Their small hands and energy were beneficial to the assembly line.<ref name="Freedman, Russell 1998">Freedman, Russell. Kids at Work Lewis Hine and the Crusade Against Child Labor. New York: Clarion Books, 1998. Print.</ref>

There was a shift in thinking in the early 1900s towards an end to child labor. The argument from reformers, as they were called, was that child labor was a sick cycle that was inevitably going to end in a future of poverty for the children in the work force. The long hours were robbing children of not only an education but a childhood as well.<ref name="Freedman, Russell 1998"/>

Lewis Hine became an investigative photojournalist for the National Child Labor Committee in the early 1900s.<ref name="Freedman, Russell 1998"/> Hine took many pictures of workers under the age of 16 in the field. His pictures are the ones that appear in many books on the history of child labor. His photographs were taken in high risk situations in order to capture the negative side of child labor. His photographs also helped make the National Child Labor Committee investigate the child labor that was taking place in many of America's factories. "Hine was clever enough to bluff his way into many plants. He searched where he was not welcome, snapped scenes that were meant to be hidden from the public. At times, he was in real danger, risking physical attack when factory managers realized what he was up to…he put his life in the line in order to record a truthful picture of working children in early twentieth-century America".<ref name="Freedman, Russell 1998"/> Today, there is a Lewis Hine award that awards 10 honorees in their outstanding work in servicing young people. Each winner wins 1,000 dollars and a trip to New York to attend the awards ceremony.<ref>{{cite web|last=Newman|first=Jeffrey|title=NCLC|url=http://www.nationalchildlabor.org/history.html|publisher=Erik Butler|access-date=March 29, 2012}}</ref>

==Fighting against child labor==
[[Image:Child coal miners (1908).jpg|thumb|Photo of child coal miners in [[West Virginia]] by Lewis Hine (1908)]]
Immediately after its conception in 1904, the National Child Labor Committee (NCLC) began advocating for child labor reform on the state level. A number of state- centered campaigns were organized by the NCLC's two regional leaders, [[Owen Reed Lovejoy|Owen Lovejoy]] in the northern states and [[Alexander McKelway]] in the southern states. Both Lovejoy and McKelway actively organized investigations of child labor conditions and [[lobbied]] state legislatures for labor regulations.<ref name="National Child Labor Committee"/>

Although the NCLC made some strides in the north, by 1907, McKelway and the NCLC had achieved little success in enlisting the support of the southern people and had failed to pass any far-reaching reforms in the south's important mill states. Consequently, the NCLC decided to refocus its state-by-state attack on child labor and endorsed the first national anti-child labor bill, introduced to congress by Senator [[Albert J. Beveridge]] of Indiana in 1907.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Doherty, Jr. |first1=Herbert J. |title=Alexander J. McKelway: Preacher to Progressive |journal=The Journal of Southern History |date=1 May 1958 |volume=24 |issue=2 |pages=177–190 |doi=10.2307/2208872 |publisher=Southern Historical Association |language=en |jstor=2208872 }}</ref> Although the bill was later defeated, it convinced many opponents of child labor that a solution lay in the cooperation and solidarity between the states.

In response, the NCLC called for the establishment of a federal children's bureau that would investigate and report on the circumstances of all American children.<ref name="National Child Labor Committee"/> In 1912 the NCLC succeeded in passing an act establishing a [[United States Children's Bureau]] in the [[United States Department of Commerce and Labor|Department of Commerce and Labor]]. On April 9 President [[William Taft]] signed the act into law, and over the next thirty years the Children's Bureau would work closely with the NCLC to promote child labor reforms on both the state and national level.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.nationalchildlabor.org/history.html |title=History of NCLC|access-date=2008-11-25|publisher=National Child Labor Committee|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080621055250/http://www.nationalchildlabor.org/history.html|archive-date=2008-06-21}}</ref>

In 1915, the NCLC, facing the varied success and inherent limitations of its efforts at the state level, decided to move its efforts to the federal level. On its behalf, Pennsylvania Congressman [[Alexander Mitchell Palmer|A Mitchell Palmer]] (later Attorney General) introduced a bill to end child labor in most American mines and factories.<ref>Stanley Coben, ''A. Mitchell Palmer: Politician'' (NY: Columbia University Press, 1963), 884-7</ref> President [[Woodrow Wilson|Wilson]] found it constitutionally unsound and after the House voted 232 to 44 in favor on February 15, 1915,<ref>''New York Times'': [https://www.nytimes.com/1915/02/16/archives/child-labor-bill-passed-house-republicans-help-defeat-a-southern.html "Child Labor Bill Passed," February 16, 1916], accessed January 20, 2010</ref> he allowed it to die in the Senate. Nevertheless, Arthur Link has called it "a turning point in American constitutional history" because it attempted to establish for the first time "the use of the [[Commerce Clause]] commerce power to justify almost any form of federal control over working conditions and wages."<ref>Arthur Link, ''Wilson: The New Freedom'' (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1956), 255-7</ref>

In 1916, Senator [[Robert L. Owen]] of [[Oklahoma]] and Representative [[Edward Keating]] of [[Colorado]] introduced the NCLC backed [[Keating-Owen Act]] which prohibited shipment in interstate commerce of goods manufactured or processed by child labor.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1G2-3468300486.html|title=Child Labor|access-date=2008-11-25|publisher=encyclopedia.com}}</ref> The bill passed by a margin of 337 to 46 in the House and 50 to 12 in the Senate and was signed into law by President [[Woodrow Wilson]] as the centerpiece of [[The New Freedom]] Program. However, in 1918 the law was deemed unconstitutional by the [[United States Supreme Court]] in a five-to-four decision in [[Hammer v. Dagenhart]]. The court, although acknowledging child labor as a social evil, felt that the Keating-Owen Act overstepped [[Commerce Clause|congress' power to regulate trade]]. The bill was immediately revised and again deemed unconstitutional by the Supreme Court.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.answers.com/topic/keating-owen-act|title= Act of Congress: Keating-Owen Act of 1916|access-date=2008-11-25|publisher=answers.com}}</ref>

The NCLC then switched its strategy to passing of a federal [[constitutional amendment]]. In 1924 Congress passed the [[Child Labor Amendment]] with a vote of 297 to 69 (with 64 abstaining) in the house and 61 to 23 (12 abstaining) in the senate. However, by 1932 only six states had voted for ratification, while twenty-four had rejected the measure. Today, the amendment is technically still-pending and has been ratified by a total of twenty-eight states, requiring the ratification of ten more for its incorporation into the Constitution.

In 1938 the National Child Labor Committee threw its support behind the [[Fair Labor Standards Act]] (FLSA) which included child labor provisions designed by the NCLC. The act prohibits any interstate commerce of goods produced through oppressive child labor. The act defines "oppressive child labor" as any form of employment for children under age sixteen and any particularly hazardous occupation for children ages sixteen to eighteen. This definition excludes agricultural labor and instances in which the child is employed by his or her guardians.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.osha.gov/pls/epub/wageindex.download?p_file=F15794/FairLaborStandAct.pdf|title=The Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938, as Amended|access-date=2008-11-25|publisher=US Department of Labor}}</ref> On June 25, 1938, after the approval of Congress, President [[Franklin D. Roosevelt]] signed the bill into law; the FLSA remains the primary federal child labor law to this day.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.continuetolearn.uiowa.edu/laborctr/child_labor/about/us_history.html|title=Child Labor in U.S. History - The Child Labor Education Project|access-date=2012-08-28|publisher=Continue to Learn - University of Iowa|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120720045149/http://www.continuetolearn.uiowa.edu/laborctr/child_labor/about/us_history.html|archive-date=2012-07-20|url-status=dead}}</ref>

For the entirety of World War II, the NCLC served as a watchdog to ensure that employment shortages caused by the war did not weaken the newly passed and implemented child labor laws, and that children were not drawn back into the mines, mills and streets.<ref name="History of NCLC"/>

==Promoting vocational skills and workplace education==

After WWII, the National Child Labor Committee significantly broadened its scope of involvement by placing a new emphasis on the importance of educating children about the working world as well as advocating programs designed to advance the education and health of migrant farmworkers throughout America. Today the NCLC's four main goals include:<ref name="About NCLC"/>
* Educating children about the world of work
* Preventing the exploitation of children and youth in the labor market
* Improving the health and education opportunities for the children of the migrant farmworkers
* Increasing public awareness of the work done day-in and day-out on behalf of the nation's children

During the 1950s and 60s the NCLC advocated and contributed to the various bills including the [[Manpower Development and Training Act]], the [[Economic Opportunity Act]] and the Vocational Education Act.<ref name="History of NCLC"/>

In 1979 NCLC collaborated with the [[Opportunities Industrialization Center]]s of America to found the National Youth Employment Coalition (NYEC). The NYEC was formed in order to provide support to organizations that help youth become productive private citizens. The NCLC provided the original housing for the NYEC and shared an Executive Director from 1983-1987.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.nyec.org/page.cfm?pageID=173|title=NYEC History|access-date=2008-11-25|publisher=National Youth Employment Coalition|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090119053114/http://www.nyec.org/page.cfm?pageID=173|archive-date=2009-01-19|url-status=dead}}</ref>

In 1985 the NCLC introduced the Lewis Hine Awards for Service to Children and Youth, which honor unheralded Americans for their work with young people, and give special awards to better-known leaders for their extraordinary efforts. Over the past two decades the awards have developed into an annual event of national notoriety with awards given out to a diverse range of professionals and volunteers.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.nationalchildlabor.org/lewishine.html|title=Lewis Hine Awards|access-date=2008-11-25|publisher=National Child Labor Committee|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080917220729/http://www.nationalchildlabor.org/lewishine.html|archive-date=September 17, 2008}}</ref> Some past recipients include Gene Bowen of [[Warwick, New York]], in 2008 who co-founded Road Recovery, a clinically acclaimed skills program designed for teens recovering from drug addiction<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.roadrecovery.org/|title=Who are we?|access-date=2008-11-25|publisher=Road Recovery}}</ref> and Stacy Maciuk of [[Brentwood, Tennessee]] in 2007 for her relentless advocacy of kids in foster care and organizing a suitcase collection drive to provide foster children with a place to pack their clothes and possessions other than a garbage bag.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.nationalchildlabor.org/hine_2007_maciuk.html|title=Volunteer Stacy Schumaker Maciuk|access-date=2008-11-25|publisher=National Child Labor Committee|url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080821103804/http://www.nationalchildlabor.org/hine_2007_maciuk.html|archive-date=August 21, 2008}}</ref>

From 1991 to today, the National Child Labor Committee created and expanded the Kids and the Power of Work (KAPOW) program. KAPOW exists as a network of private business and elementary school partnerships which introduces students to the world of work through lessons taught by private sector volunteers. Today, KAPOW serves as a model for similar programs, runs operations in over thirty communities from Florida to California, and serves over 50,000 students.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.kapow.org/|title=Kids and the Power of Work KAPOW|access-date=2008-11-25|publisher=National Child Labor Committee|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081026083850/http://www.kapow.org/|archive-date=2008-10-26|url-status=dead}}</ref>

==Demise==
During its final years fundraising failed to produce the income it needed, and it finally ran out of money. The social ill it had been funded to combat, had ended. The NCLC is a rare example of an organization which succeeded in its mission and was no longer needed. After more than a century of fighting child labor—in fields, in sweatshops, and in well-known corporations—it shut down in 2017. There was no announcement of its end. Jeffrey Newman, the last president of the New York-based committee, said the NCLC board decided to "declare victory and just move out."<ref name="Contrera">{{cite news |last1=Contrera |first1=Jessica |title=The searing photos that helped end child labor in America |access-date=30 September 2018 |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/retropolis/wp/2018/09/02/the-incredible-photos-that-inspired-the-end-of-child-labor-in-america/ |newspaper=The Washington Post |type=newspaper |date=3 September 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180930123031/https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/retropolis/wp/2018/09/02/the-incredible-photos-that-inspired-the-end-of-child-labor-in-america/|archive-date=30 September 2018 |language=en |quote=The searing photos that helped end child labor in America By Jessica Contrera September 3}}</ref>

==Notable people==
* [[Jane Addams]]
* [[Felix Adler (professor)|Felix Adler]]
* [[Grover Cleveland]]
* [[Ann Washington Craton]]
* [[Edward Thomas Devine]]
* Deborah Donalds
* [[Charles William Eliot]]
* [[Florence Kelley]]
* [[Owen Reed Lovejoy]] 
* [[Edgar Gardner Murphy]]
* [[Benjamin Tillman]]
* [[Loraine Bedsole Bush Tunstall]] 
* [[Lillian Wald]]

==See also==
* [[Seebert Lane Colored School]]
* [[Timeline of children's rights in the United States]]

==References==
{{reflist|colwidth=30em}}

==Further reading==
* Hindman, Hugh D. ''Child labor: an American history'' (Routledge, 2016).

==External links==
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20090207060957/http://kapow.org/nclc.htm Kids and the Power of Work (KAPOW)]
* [https://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2004674308/ Library of Congress NCLC Prints & Photographs]
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20081218052217/http://www.continuetolearn.uiowa.edu/laborctr/child_labor/about/us_history.html Child Labor Public Education Project]
* [https://kapowlfs.com/ KAPOW in South Florida]
*[https://rmc.library.cornell.edu/EAD/htmldocs/KCL05242.html Guide to the National Child Labor Committee Publications, 1907-1967. 5242. Kheel Center for Labor-Management Documentation and Archives, Cornell University Library.]
*[https://findingaids.library.columbia.edu/ead/nnc-rb/ldpd_4079147 Finding aid to National Child Labor Committee records at Columbia University. Rare Book & Manuscript Library.]

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[[Category:Child labor in the United States]]
[[Category:Organizations based in New York City]]
[[Category:Children's rights organizations in the United States]]
[[Category:Political advocacy groups in the United States]]
[[Category:Progressive Era in the United States]]