Harry L. Lurie (February 28, 1892-June 25, 1973): Social Worker, Author, Researcher and Administrator

Harry L. Lurie, First Executive Director of the National Council of Jewish Federations and Welfare Funds

Introduction: Harry L. Lurie made an historic contribution to the advancement of social welfare in America in administration, research, teaching and writing.  His career spanned more than a half century of service, dealing with an exceptional range of needs: with the Industrial Removal Office of the Federated Jewish Charities of Buffalo in 1913-1914, as Research Director of the Detroit Associated Charities in 1915-1920, Secretary of the Budget Committee of the Detroit Community Fund – 1917, Director of Relief and Social Service of the Detroit Department of Public Welfare in 1920, Superintendent (Executive Director) of the Chicago Jewish Social Service Bureau-1925, member of the Illinois Board of Public Welfare Commissioners-1929, Director, Bureau of Jewish School Research (national) 1930, Executive Director, Council of Jewish Federations and Welfare Funds 1935-1954.  In these various responsibilities Lurie gave outstanding leadership to voluntary social welfare, both sectarian and non-sectarian, and to the development of governmental programs.  In addition to his employment, he chaired and served on the boards and committees of many voluntary and public agencies.  His teaching career started as a lecturer in sociology in the Merrill-Palmer School in 1921; Instructor in Economics at the University of Michigan in 1922; Graduate School of Social Service Administration of the University of Chicago-1925; University of California-1927; and Columbia University School of Social Work-1931 and 1957.

Early Years: Harry Laurence Lurie was born in Goldingen, Latvia to S. Heiz and Lina (Blumenthal) Lurie on February 28, 1892.  The family immigrated to the United States in 1898 and settled in Buffalo, New York.  Lurie attended public schools and in 1909 he taught English to other more recent immigrant children in classes sponsored by the Jewish Federation of Buffalo. In 1913 he was employed as an assistant to the Executive Director and in charge of the Industrial Removal Office assigned to help resettle immigrants sent to Buffalo from New York City. In 1915 he was employed as director of research for the Associated Jewish Charities of Detroit, a position he held until 1920.  From 1917-1920, Lurie served as Secretary of the Budget Committee, Detroit Community Fund. Director of Relief and Social Service, Detroit Department of Public Welfare, 1920-1922. His teaching career began as a Lecturer in Sociology, Merrill-Palmer School, Detroit, 1921-1922. Also in 1922, Lurie married Bernice Stewart and they had two daughters.

Professional Career: In 1925, Lurie was appointed Superintendent of the Jewish Social Service Bureau in Chicago. During this period he was also involved in surveying Jewish communal welfare agencies in Detroit, Baltimore and Grand Rapids, Michigan.  In 1930 he became executive director of the national Bureau of Jewish Social Research, which conducted research on the needs and services of the Jewish community throughout the nation.  The Bureau established the National Council of Jewish Federations and Welfare Funds in 1932 and, cooperatively, the two organizations developed services to communities all around the country.  In 1935, the Bureau was incorporated into the Council and Lurie was appointed executive director, a position he held until his retirement in 1954.

Under Lurie’s leadership, the Council grew from an initial organization with 15 federations to 260, raising and allocating funds of over #100 million annually for programs and activities such as services for families and children, vocational services, hospitals, homes for the aged, Jewish education, recreation and community relations.  In a 1961 book he wrote, A Heritage Affirmed, Lurie  presented a history of Jewish federations in the United States and his professional participation over several decades.

In addition to his leadership of the National Council, Lurie devoted time to writing and publishing articles that advanced guidelines for service delivery in such areas as family life, community programs for Jewish children and Jewish social work. His extensive writings appeared in the Jewish Social Service Quarterly, Social Service Review, Child Welfare and Social Work Today.  He was also editor of the first edition of the Encyclopedia of Social Work (1965).

His contributions to Jewish social welfare were recognized by his election as President of the National Conference on Jewish Social Welfare, 1945-46. He also received the Distinguished Service Award, the National Conference on Social Welfare’s most prestigious award in 1969.  The citation read: “For his dedicated effort and inestimable contribution in assisting social work “to come of age” by means of his excellence in writing and his genius in editing… and For his courageous leadership in the effort to secure social legislation, and for a lifetime of accomplishment as a citizen of his day and time… The National Conference on Social Welfare pays tribute to Harry L. Lurie.”

Sources:

Social Welfare Archives, University of Minnesota Library — www.special.lib.umn.edu/swha

Walter I. Trattner, Ed., Biographical Dictionary of Social Welfare in America, (1986), Greenwood Press, New York, Westport, CT.

PART I — Four Decades Of Action For Children (1912-1952)

By: Dorothy E. Bradbury, Assistant Director, Division of Reports Children’s Bureau

PROLOGUE: THIS is the story of the Children’s Bureau of the U. S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare from the idea in 1903 to its founding in 1912 and on through the years to the present time.

The Bureau’s establishment by the Congress was an expression of a belief on the part of many people that children are the most important of the Nation’s resources and that the Government should foster their development and protection by setting up a center of research and information devoted to their health and welfare.  From this center would flow knowledge of conditions surrounding children’s lives, ideas on how to improve these conditions, and plans and programs for action in their behalf.

The roots of the Bureau go far back into the Nation’s history.  It drew some of its strength from the early maternal and child health programs beginning in cities. It followed the development of juvenile courts and paralleled mother’s aid in the States.It received strong support from those struggling to protect dependent and neglected children.   In its vanguard were the forces opposing child labor. Some of its vitality came from the fertile soil of the settlement house movement.

Jane Addams, Founder of Hull House

In a way, the Bureau represented the first stirrings of the people of the Nation in recognizing and seeking ways for the Federal Government to assume some responsibility for the welfare of its citizens. Before the turn of the century workers in settlement houses in crowded cities had been struggling to meet the social problems growing out of industrialization.   Women like Jane Addams, Florence Kelley, Lillian Wald, and Julia Lathrop were keenly aware of what these conditions meant to families and to children for they knew first hand the teeming tenement districts of our great cities.  They became adept at making clear concise statements of facts, of arousing communities and States to unwholesome conditions, of making specific proposals for action.

Slowly the conviction came that the problems with which they struggled were not confined to large communities or even to States. They became imbued with the idea that these problems were nation-wide and required a nationwide approach.  Consequently the early nineteen hundreds saw privately financed national organizations, such as the National Consumer’s League and the National Child Labor Committee, established to do something about these problems.

The idea for the Children’s Bureau was a logical outgrowth of these developments.  The Federal Children’s Bureau would provide an avenue of action on a nationwide base for the welfare of the Nation’s youngest and most vulnerable citizens-the children.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

By Katherine A.  Kendall, Honorary President, International Association of Schools of Social Work: March 1988

Katherine A. Kendall

Friends and Colleagues, Male and Female: You are facing a formidable quartet—survivors of the first stock market crash, the Great Depression, World War II, the Korean and Vietnam lunacies, the generic curriculum, the 13-volume curriculum study, the do whatever you like curriculum, and now the special interest group curriculum.  We have lived through countless unsolved problems of graduate-undergraduate relationships.  We helped to birth the CSWE and have seen t wax and wane.  We shepherded six specialized membership groups into on voracious membership association which now wants to devour the Council.  We are the past and you are the future.  So, what can we tell you in twenty minutes so to inform that future that you may rectify our mistakes and perhaps even learn from our achievements?  I wonder.  I have chosen a rather personal topic – an account of three quite extraordinary women who influenced my career in quite different ways.  To some extent they were role models although there was that in their live I would not wish to emulate.  What they said to me about social work, social work education, and, women as leaders, however, has been of immeasurable and lasting value.  May they also say something of value to you.

When I entered the field in the late 30s, women ran the show, at least in the south and middle west where I began.  There were men in the field – even some very good men, but it was a woman’s world.  Many, if not most, of the great deans in that period were women.  Private agencies were run by women, even when they were headed by men, and women emerged as leaders in the public field.  In other words, for reasons with which all of us are familiar, there was no dearth of female leadership.  But the leadership I want to describe was not just great.  As I said, it was extraordinary.

The first of my three woman at the helm was Dr.  Alice Solomon of Germany, a leader whom I never met but whose work paved the way for my international career.  She was a committed feminist, a social work pioneer, one of the founders and for many years the volunteer President-Secretary of the International Association of Schools of Social Work.  Her productive years were filled with international honors and acclaim but, as a refugee from Nazi Germany, she died along and pretty much abandoned in New York City in 1948.  Talking to you about her is a form of reclamation of Alice Salomon as a forebear of whom we can be very proud.

The second is Dr.  Edith Abbott, who surely needs no introduction to this audience.  If she does, let me say in capsule that Edith Abbott was the founder of social work education as a university professional discipline, perhaps not equal to medicine or law or theology, but having the same need for research-based knowledge and intellectual rigor while retaining its mission for compassionate service.  Do read Costin’s biography entitled Two Sisters for Social Justice.  It is a superlative account of the lives of Edith and Grace Abbott.

The third is Dame Eileen Younghusband of Great Britain, who was my very close friend as well as British colleague of world-wide fame.  Like Edith Abbott, she changed the character of social work education in her country and, as a consultant and author of the third United Nations international survey of social work education, she contributed enormously to the development of schools of social work around the world.  Abbott rescued the profession in the United States from agency-dominated apprenticeship.  Dame Eileen rescued the profession in Britain from academic sterility within the universities and fragmented specialized training outside the universities.

Let us now get to the heart of this enterprise.  What made these women memorable and in what ways are they significant to our future as a profession?  They had much in common, which I shall underline, but there were also understandable differences influenced by the times in which they lived and the special circumstances of their lives.

All three came from privileged homes where intellectual pursuits were valued.  In the more democratic climate of middle west America, Edith Abbott and her sister, Grace, were not excluded form opportunities to seek higher education.  Both, after some detours, earned doctorates at the University of Chicago.  Dame Eileen was the product of governesses and tutoring at home by an illustrious father, who opened her mind to wide areas of knowledge.  Formal education came late at the London School of Economics which she entered as a student and where she remained as a tutor in the Department of Social Sciences.  Alice Salomon, to a considerable extent self-educated was determined to enter the University of Berlin.  She encountered such strong opposition to the admission of women that she almost gave up but finally, at the age of 34, she achieved the degree of Doctor of Philosophy with honors.  All three thirsted for learning and were committed to education as the route to any kind of achievement, personal or professional.

What to do with the benefits of higher education was the problem faced by all women in the period in the period bridged by my three leaders.  A suitable marriage was the expected career for women of their social class.  I don’t know about Alice Salomon, but early portraits of Edith Abbott and Eileen Younghusband show that they were truly beautiful young women who would have done well in the marriage market, if that had been their choice.  Costin, in her description of Edith Abbott’s early years, makes it clear that a worthwhile career was what she wanted, not marriage.  And it was common knowledge at the School of Social Administration of the University of Chicago that you didn’t invite Edith Abbott to your wedding if you were a woman student.  In fact, you went to great lengths to keep that dreadful knowledge from her.  Dame Eileen did go through the mating ritual of “coming out”, complete with ostrich feathers in her hair and presentation at Buckingham Palace, but hated it and complied only at the insistence of her titled mother.  Alice Salomon expected to marry and had suitors.  Her unpublished autobiography suggest that she may have been disappointed in love.  When asked during her period of fame why she had not married, she always replied: “Because I could not get the men I wanted, and did not want the men I could get.” (Character s Destiny:  An Autobiography, Alice Salomon, pp 39-40)

So what to do instead?  The road to liberation turned out to be charitable work and like so many of our pioneers, each on discovered social work as her vocation through the settlement and charity organization movements.  In addition, Abbottt and Salomon in researching inhuman working conditions for women made important connections with the trade union movement.  All three were alike in not accepting the inevitability of poverty and all three believed that appealing social conditions could be changed by the application of research-based knowledge.  They were indebted to friendly visiting as a way of individualizing the poor, but rejected the demeaning philosophy behind it.

Their cry was for social justice, not charity, and they strongly supported the idea of governmental responsibility for those in need.  No one who attended the National Conference on Social Welfare in 1951 where Edith Abbott was given an award will ever forget the picture of this 75 year old woman, frail but indomitable, calling to us in a voice that remained strong and clear:  “Abolish the means test and establish children’s allowances.”

It was this joining of intellect with compassion and hands-on experience with poverty and the poor that led them to search out what was needed to give charity workers an educational preparation that would combine social investigation and reform with individual help to people in need.  Edith Abbott, as a Hull House resident, was involved in the independent School of Civics and Philanthropy associated wit it.  She was a lecturer at the University of Chicago.  Her conviction that preparation for social work required intellectual rigor and research as well as agency training motivated her, against the wishes many f the social work leaders of the time, to move heaven and earth to get the School of Civics and Philanthropy into the University of Chicago.  This she accomplished in 1920.  As the Dean of the graduate School of Social Service Administration with programs leading to an M.A. And a PhD. D., she embarked on her successful mission to develop and define social work as a university professional discipline.

Eileen Younghusband, as a tutor in the social science department of the London School of Economics, also had great respect for intellectual rigor and recognized the value of the British social science courses as an academic base for social work.  She saw clearly, however, that much of the training available in Britain, even as late as the 1940′s, was deficient in the teaching of professional methods, in field work, in social work literature, and in research.  Time does not permit a detailed account of what went into and resulted from a series of reports on the employment and training of social workers for which she was responsible as author or as the chair of prestigious ministerial committees.  It is enough to say that she changed the face and character of social work education in the United Kingdom.  Quiet separate specialties were replaced by a generic curriculum approach that integrated dynamically oriented social work methodology with supervised practice.  The generic approach in still in effect.

Alice Salomon came to social work education through the women’s movement.  She was not primarily an educator as were the other two.  Rather, she was a missionary or a visionary, wanting to lead young women into a useful life.  In the early 1900′s, education for girls in Germany was limited to grade school followed by finishing schools, with a total curriculum of only ten years in duration.  In 1899 Salomon started a one-year full-time course to train charity workers and from that small beginning she developed a course at the junior college level for young women that stressed education for citizenship and provided what she saw as a systematic foundation for professional social work.  The curriculum combined lectures and classes with supervised field work.  The lectures were described as directed toward the field of practice and practical experience was to be tested and used in class discussions, with all subjects arranged in logical sequence.  Thus, the first School of Social Work, later called the Alice Salomon School, was born in German in 1908 and Alice Saloman was on her way to becoming the matriarch of the European and international social work education.

Of the three women, Salomon was the outstanding feminist.  Her life was devoted, nationally and internationally, in about equal parts to social work and to extensive work with councils of women.  She pioneered the women’s movement in Germany, served as an officer and leader in the International Council of Women, joined Jane Addams in  promoting the peace movement through the International League for Peace and Freedom.  In addition to her school of social work, she founded in 1925 a Women’s Academy to prepare women, preferably qualified social workers, to undertake research and hopefully replace unqualified men as administrators in the social welfare system.

Her descriptions of the status of women in the various countries she visited is fascinating to read and I must give you her impression of the place of women in the U.S. on her first visit to New York n 1909.  She said: “I went home convinced that the United States is the paradise for women.”  She noted how generous men were in giving women material things and could hardly believe her eyes when a husband of a friend went with other male guests to wash the dishes while his wife entertained the women guests.  She wrote “I have never seen anything life this before.  It would have shocked a strong German male!”  She admired American women for their air of freedom their intelligence, political knowledge, etc. and told her friends in Berlin that in case she should be reborn once more as a woman, her only wish would be to be born an American.  (Autobiography, p.p. 116-117)  All of this while Jane Addams, the Abbott sisters, and their comrades were struggling to keep alive the cause of women’s suffrage!

There is no question about Edith Abbott’s or Eileen Younghusband’s commitment to women’s rights, but neither one was of the temperament to participate in demonstrations or climb the ramparts.  It is interesting to note, however, that Abbott and Younghusband did a great deal more than Salomon to attract me to social work as a profession.  Their reasons were fairly obvious.  The recruitment of men would lead to higher salaries an an improved stats for the profession.  Their reasons were fairly obvious.  The recruitment of men would lead to higher salaries and an improvement status for the profession.  Dame Eileen, wrote, with some asperity: “There is a deplorable tendency to think that, though a woman social worker needs training, a man has acquired all he needs to know through some all- sufficing experience of life which is a substitute for and not an enhancement of training.”  (Quoted in Jones, p. 51)  When men did come into the profession in considerable numbers after World War II, salaries were indeed improved, but I gather that the extent to which women have benefited on equal terms with men remains a sore point.

The final note on my three leaders, as I am sure you would guess, tells of their commitment to social work internationally.  There was nothing parochial about them as individuals or about their vision of social work and social work education.  They were concerned with the welfare of people world-wide.  Every graduate of SSA at the University f Chicago in Edith Abbott’s day was exposed to a view of the field and the profession that encompassed history and comparative study.  A social work curriculum that says nothing about our origins, our heritage, and seminal research form other lands wold have been inconceivable to her as I must say, parenthetically, it is to me.  Not long ago, in talking with a student about to graduate from one of our most prestigious schools of social work, I mentioned the Beveridge Report and discovered to my dismay that she had no idea what I was talking about.

Salomon and Younghusband were more directly involved than Abbott in the international field and made immense contributions to social work education around the world.  Alice Salomon chaired the Committee on Social Work Training at the first International Conference on Social Work held in Paris in 1928.  This lead to the establishment in 1929 of what is now the International Association of Schools of Social Work.  Dr. Salomon was the first President-Secretary and remained the leading figure in the growth of international social work education until her flight from Nazi Germany in 1937.  After World War II, Eileen Younghusband took up the baton, serving first as Vice-President and then as President of the IASSW.  From both, this was volunteer service of a higher order, requiring hours and years of unpaid work, miles of non-reimbursed travel, but the satisfaction of watching social work develop an an international discipline, with schools of social work producing qualified social workers in every continent was worth whatever the personal cost in time, energy, and money.  I shared in that satisfaction as the volunteer Secretary of the IASSW from 1954 to the establishment of a paid Secretariat in 1971.

Let me now sum up why I think these three women were great and, as or forebears, worthy of admiration and emulation.  First, a caveat.  They were not great because they were women.  We can be proud they were women, but the qualities that marked them for greatness are not sex related.

They were great because they had powerful minds, which they never ceased to sharpen with new knowledge and new experiences.  They were insatiably curious and they were scholars, always searching for better solutions to seemingly intractable social problems.  They believe, perhaps naively, that solid facts, carefully amassed and analyzed, would yield rational answers to troublesome questions and would, therefore, be heeded.  All produced landmark studies and reports that did, in fact, produce constructive action.

They were great because they cared about what happened to people and they believed in the worth and dignity of ever living creature.  They rejected the prevailing Lady Bountiful approach in favor of social justice for people in need.  In embracing the necessity to join social reform with individual help, they long ago settled the question of whether social work should be equally concerned with both therapeutic action and social action.

They were great because they were fighters.  They preserved against great obstacles – obstacles they faced as women and obstacles generated by their advanced ideas.  Sometimes, as fighters, they lost, but more often they won simply because they refused to give up.  Demanding much from themselves, they expected – even demanded – much from others.  They were obstinate.  It was not easy to challenge their views, but aren’t all great leaders touched by what we would now describe, perhaps erroneously, as authoritarianism?  Whatever it is called, the quality of being in command of oneself, of demanding and living up to high standards and being decisive in dealing with issues is, in my view, essential to leadership.

Source: Social Welfare Archives, University of Minnesota Library — www.special.lib.umn.edu/swha

Note: At the end of this narrative, there is a complete resume of Dr. Kendall’s illustrious career.

Introduction:  Katherine A.  Kendall has been closely identified with major developments in social work education in the United States and internationally over the past four decades.  As Executive Secretary of the American Association of Schools of Social Work in 1951 and 1952, she played a major role in bringing the Association and its graduate school membership into the Council on Social Work Education (CSWE).  The Council was launched in 1952 as a result of a merger of three organizations and Dr.  Kendall became its first Educational Secretary with responsibility for curriculum consultation and all related educational services.  As Associate Director, Executive Director, and Director of International Education, she remained with the Council until 1971.  While with the Council, she also served from 1954 as the elected volunteer Secretary of the International Association of Schools of Social Work (IASSW).  From 1966 to 1971, she moved entirely into international work, with shared responsibilities as Director of International Education for the Council and Secretary General of the IASSW.  When the IASSW established and independent Secretariat in 1971, Dr.  Kendall became its first full-time paid Secretary-General.  Although retired from this position in 1978, she continued to give volunteer service to the Council as an honorary life member of the Board of Directors and to the IASSW as an Honorary Life President and member 0f its Executive Committee and Board of Directors.

Dr.  Kendall served on the faculties of the School of Social Service Administration, University of Chicago, the Richmond School of Social Work, the School of Social Work of Howard University, andin 1960-61  she was granted a sabbatical by CSWE to accept a Carnegie Visiting Professorship at the University of Hawaii School of Social Work.  Following her retirement, she was recruited by Hunter College for the 1983-84 academic year to inaugurate the first Henry and Lucy Moses Distinguished Visiting Professorship at the School of Social Work.  She then accepted a part-time position of Executive Secretary, Council of Advisers to Hunter College, its School of Social Work, and the Lois and Samuel Silberman Fund which she held until 1987 when she decided to leave New York to live in a retirement community in Mitchellville, MD until her death in 2010.

Professional Career: Born in Muir-of-Ord, Ross-shire, Scotland on September 8, 1910, Katherine Kendall came with her family to the United States in 1920.  Kendall returned to Europe in 1933 where she lived in London, Oxford, and Madrid until 1936.  She became a naturalized U.S. Citizen in 1940.  She earned the following degrees:  Bachelor of Arts, 1933, University of Illinois;  Master of Arts in Social Work, 1939, Louisiana State University; and Ph.D. from School of Social Service Administration, 1950, University of Chicago.

Prior to joining the Council she served from 1947 to 1950 as Social Affairs Officer with the United Nations where she produced Training for Social Work:  An International Survey, the first in a U.N.  series on this subject.  She went to the United Nations from the U.S.  Children’s Bureau where from 1945 to 1947 she was Assistant Director of the Inter-American Unit and Training Supervisor for the International Service.  During the years of World War II, she worked for the American Red Cross as Assistant Director for Training, Home Service, in the Eastern Area Office.  Her previous positions included direct service and supervisory responsibilities in both public and private agencies.

Katherine Kendall’s responsibilities at the Council enabled her to work closely with schools of social work, agencies, and government officials throughout the United States where her leadership on al aspects of social work education was recognized.  In 1966, she was presented with the Council’s Distinguished Service Award; in 1971 she was awarded the Coucil’s gold medal; and in 1991 she was the first recipient of the Council’s Significant Lifetiem Achievement Award.  She has been recognized at the University of Chicago with a Professional Achievement Award from the University  Alumni Association and a Distinguished Alumni Citation from the School of Social Service Administration.  Louisiana State University has given her a number of awards, including an honorar doctorate.  She has also received honorary doctorates from Syracuse University, the University of Pennsylvania, and the University of Illinois.  A scholarship in her name has been established by the George Warren Brown School of Social Work of Washington University.

Her work with the IASSW together with a number of foreign assignments led through the four decades to extensive travel and consultation with educational institutions and governments in every continent.  She worked closely with the United Nations, UNICEF, and the Organization of American States, undertaking special missions and leading or participating in numerous seminars and expert working groups.  She continued to serve as an official non-governmental represenntative for the IASSW at both U.N. and UNICEF.  In 1991, the IASSW established the Katherine A.  Kendall Award for Distinguished Service in International Social Work Education which was presented for the first time in 1992 at the 27^th International Congress of Schools of Social Work held in connection with the World Assembly in 1992.

Source: NASW Social Work Pioneers — www.naswdc.org

Biographical Highlights of Mrs.  Katherine A.  Kendall, Ph. D., A.C.S.W.

Date & Place of Birth: September 8, 1910: Muir of Ord, Ross-shire, Scotland: Naturalized- 1940

Higher Education:

Ph. D. (Social Service Administration) University of Chicago, 1950: M.A. (Social Work) Louisiana State University, 1939; B.A. (Liberal Arts) University of Illinois, 1933

Positions Held:

Executive Secretary, Council of Advisors to Hunter College, its School of Social Work, and the Lois and Samuel Silberman Fund 1985-1987

Henry & Lucy Mose Distinguished Visiting Professor, Hunter College School of Social Work 1983-1984

Secretary General, International Association of Schools of Social Work, full-time 1971 until retirement 1978; part-time 1966-1971 (also with CSWE); volunteer elected Secretary & member of Executive Board 1954-1966

Council on Social Work Education: Director of International Education (part-time IASSW) 1966-1971; Executive Director 1963-1966; Associate Executive Director 1958-1963; Educational Secretary 1952-1958

Executive Secretary, American Association of Schools of Social Work 1951-1952

Social Affairs Officer, United Nations Secretariat 1947-1950

Assistant Director, Inter-American Unit and Training Supervisor, International Service, U.S. Children’s Bureau 1945-1947

Lecturer (doctoral student), School of Social Administration, University of Chicago 1944-1945; Lecturer, School of Social Work, Howard University 1946-1947

Assistant Director, Home Service, American Red Cross, Virginia Regional Office 1942-1944

Assistant Professor, Richmond School of Social Work, Virginia 1941-1942

Caseworker and Supervisor, various public and private agencies, in Virginia 1942 and in Louisiana 1938-1940

Special Assignments:

Consultation & Volunteer Activities:  International Association of Schools of Social Work 1981-to date; Council on Social Work Education 1981-to date; Silberman Fund 1981; Family Service Association of America 1980-1981

Official IASSW representative at the United Nations and UNICEF 1954 – to date

Consultation visits to schools of social work throughout Asia, Africa, Latin America, and selected schools in Europe 1971-1978

United Nations meetings of international experts on social welfare, social development, social work education, population and family planning 1954-1977

Brookings Institution and U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, International Symposium on Social Welfare Research 1973

Director, International Expert Group on Social Work Education and Family Planning, East-West Center, University of Hawaii, 1970

Co-Chairman, U.S. Delegation, Pan American Congress of Social Service, Venezuela 1968

Director, First Seminar for School of Social Work in Central America, El Salvador 1963

Carnegia Visiting Professor, University of Hawaii, 1960-1961

Missions as consultant on social work education (U.S. Or U.N. Auspices) Guatemala 1949; Brazil 1952; Paraguay 1954

Officer, trustee or member, numerous councils, committees and boards, international and national organizations, schools of social work and other educational institutions

Publications:

Editor, Eileen Blackey-Pathfinder for the Profession (NASW 1986)

Editor, World Guide to Social Work Education (CSWE for IASSW 1984)

Compiler, Social Casework: Cumulative Index 1920-1978 (Jat Press 1982)

Author, Population Dynamics and Family Planning:  A New Responsibility for Social Work Education (CSWE 1971)

Editor, Social Work Values in an Age of Discontent (CSWE 1970)

Author, United Nations report:  Training for Social Work:  First International Survey (1950); International Exchange of Social Welfare Personnel (1949)

Editor & Co-Editor, International Social Work (quarterly) 1956-1968

Numerous articles in professional journals in U.S. and various countries in Asia, Africa, Europe, and Latin America

Summary of Foreign Assignments and International Activities

Author (as staff member) or contributor to most major United Nations studies on social work education and social welfare training; special mission for U.N. To Guatemala; special mission for U.S. International Cooperation Administration to Paraguay; consultation on advanced training for social work in Brazil at invitation of a private Brazilian social service organization, member of a series of international working parties on social work education organized by the U.N.; frequent participant in seminars and expert groups in Europe, Asia, Africa, Latin American and the Caribbean sponsored by the U.N. And its Economic and Social Regional Commissions and European Office, by UNICEF, the Organization of American States, Pan American Union, and the IASSW; official representative of the IASSW at meetings of ministers of social welfare and other governmental bodies sponsored by the Economic and Social Commissions of Latin America, Africa, Asia and the Pacific; director of the International Conference on Social Work Education, Family Planning and Population, East-West Center, Hawaii; frequent keynoter, speaker, or program participant at International Congresses of Schools of Social Work, International Conference on Social Welfare, and Pan American Congresses of Social Service; annual trips (1954 to date) to various parts of the world to attend business meetings of the IASSW; frequent trips (from 1971 to 1978 for or five year) to consult with schools of social work overseas, particularly in the developing world.

Honors:

Doctor of Social Work, Honoris Causa, Louisiana State University, 1987.

Doctor of Social Welfare, Honoris Causa, University of Pennsylvania, 1985

Doctor of Public Service, Honoris Causa, Syracuse University, 1981

University of Chicago awards:  Professional Achievement Award, University Alumni Association, 1981; Distinguished Alumni Citation, School of Social Service Administration, 1971

Louisiana State University awards:  Honorary degree, 1987; Alumna of the Year, University Alumni, 1972; Distinguished Service Citation, School of Social Welfare, 1962

Council of Social Work Education awards: Gold Medal, 1971; Distinguished Service Award, 1966; Outstanding Service Award, Conference of Schools and Departments, 1964

University of Illinois: Phi Beta Kappa (junior year); Mortar Board and various honor societies

Lifetime Honorary President, International Association of Schools of Social work, 1978

Diploma of Honor, Republic of Paraguay, 1960

Lifetime Honorary President, Pan American Congress of Social Service, 1958

Biographical Data available in following Directories:

Who’s Who in the World- from 1980

The World Who’s Who of Women- from 1975

Who’s Who in the United Nations- from 1975

Who’s Who in America- from 1966

Who’s Who in the East- from 1964

Who’s Who in American Women- from 1958

Dictionary of International Biography- 1966

Languages: English, Spanish, French

Foreign Travel and Assignments

1933-1936- Resided in Europe with time divided about equally between London, Oxford and Madrid

1944- Six weeks in Mexico City studying newly established social security organization

1948- Summer assignment as member of the United Nations Secretariat for meeting of the Economic and Social Council, Geneva

1949- United Nations mission to provide consultation to Guatemalan Government on special problems related to social work training.

1950- July, 1950, keynote speaer at International Congress of Schools of Social Work, Paris

1952- Consulation on social work training at request of Servicio Social de Comercio, Rio de Janero, Brazil

1952- Summer- Speaker at International Congress of Schools of Social Work, Stockhold, and member of faculty of United Nations seminar on casework held in Keuuru, Finland

1954- Assignment by the U.S. Foreign Operations Administration to Paraguay to provide consulation on social work training and to conduct a seminar on the social services.

1954- Summer-International Conference of Social Work and Congress of Schools of Social Work, Toronto.  Elected Secretary, International Committee of Schools of Social Work

1955- Summer- Meeting of Executive Board, International Committee of Schools of Social Work, Brussels

1956- Summer- International Congress of School of Social Work and International Conference of Social Work, Munich.  Delegat and recorder for United Nations’ International Working Party on Social Work Training, Munich

1957- Summer- Meeting of Executive Committee of International Conference of Social Work, Vienna, and, in Zurich, meeting of Executive Board, International Association of Schools of Social Work

1957- November- Plenary speaker at Third Pan American Congress of Social Service, San Juan, Puerto Rico,  Named Honorary President.

1958- November and December- International Congress of Schools of Social Work and International Conference of Social Work, Tokyo

1959- Summer- Speaker, European Regional Conference of Schools of Social Work, Strasbourg, France

1960- Winter- International Working Party, International Conference of Social Work, Milian

1960-1961- Carnegi Distinguished Visiting Professor, University of Hawaii, Honolulu

1961- January- International Congress of Schools of Social Work and International Conference on Social Work, Rome.  Consulation visits in Greece, Iran, India, and Hong Kong

1962-Summer- International Congress of Schols of Social Work and International Conference on Social Work, Brazil.  Consulation visits in Paraguay, Argentina, Chile, Peru, and Jamaica

1962- Fall- Director, First Central American Seminar on Social Work Education, El Salvador.  Consulation visits in Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama

1963-Summer- Meeting of Executive Board, International Association of Schools of Social Work, London

1964- Summer- International Congress of Schools of Social Work and International Conference on Social Work, Athens

1964-Fall- Survey of conference facilities in London as guest of the London Tourist Board and BOAC.

1965-Summer- Meeting of Executive Board, International Association of Schools of Social Work, Zurich, and Executive Committee, International Conference on Social Work, London

1966-Winter- International and Intercultural Seminar on Social Work Values, Function and Practice, East-West Center, Hawaii

1968-Spring- Seminar of the Latin American Association of Schools of Social Work, Maracay, Venezuela; Co-Chairman, U.S. Delegation to the vlth Pan American Congress of Social Service, Caracus

1968- Summer- International Congress of Schools of Social Work and International Conference on Social Welfare, Helsinki

1969-Spring- Survey of international conference facilities in Holland as the guest on the Netherlands Tourist Bureau and KLM

1969-Summer- ICSW European Regional Seminar, Berne; ICSW Executive Committee, Dijon; IASSW Executive Board, Londonl and consultation, Zurich

1969- Consulation with national associations and individual schols of social work in Japan, Hong Kong, and the Philippines

1970- Spring- International Conference on Social Work Education, Population, and Family Planning, East-West Center, Hawaii

1970- Summer- Travel with consultation to Hawaii, Tehiti, Guem, New Zeeland, Australia, Indonesia, Singapore, Bangkok, Hong Kong

1970- Summer- International Congress of Schools of Social Work and International Conference of Social Welfare, Manila, Philippines

1971- Spring- London & Amsterdam to plan 1972 International Congress.

1971- Summer- Seminar, University of Edinburgh, Scotland, & meeting of IASSW Executive Board.

1971- Fall- Consulation with government officials & schools of social work in Turkey, Iran, Israel, India, Korea, Thailand, Singapore, Indonesia, Hong Kong, Philippines, & Japan.  Speaker at First Asian Regional Seminar, University of Bombay.

1972- Spring- Holland to finalize plans for the 1972 International Congress of Schools

1972- Summer- International Congress of Schools of Social Work, The Hague, Holland & consultation Zurich, Switzerland

1972- Fall- Consultation with government officials & schools of social work in Iran, Pakistan, & Turkey

1973- January- San Jose, Costa Rica, attendance at Central American seminar sponsored by Organization of American States & Pan American Health Organization.

1973- Spring- London, Addis Abada, Ethiopia to plan 1974 Congress (later relocated); Visits to Greece & Switzerland

1973- Summer- London, Trondheim & Oslo, Norway- consultation & meeting of IASSW Executive Board, Trondheim

1973- Fall- Consultation with schools of social work, Hong Kong & Thailand & organization of Second Asian Regional Seminar, Singapore

1974- Spring- London- European expert working group on population & family planning, & Addis Abada, to relocate the International Congress of Schools of Social Work

1974- Summer- Nairobi, Kenya- International Congress of Schools of Social Work & IASSW Executive Board meeting

1974- Fall- Mexico City, Guadalajara & Monterrey, Mexico to plan 18^th International Congress of Schools of Social Work (later transferred to Puerto Rico).

1975- February- Puerto Rico & Jamaica -to organize International Congress in San Juan and plan an international workshop in Jamaica.

1975- Summer- Paris & Montrouge, France- meeting of IASSW Executive Board, consultation Bombay & New Delhi, India, & organization of Third Asian Regional Seminar, Hong Kong

1976- February- Jamacia, consulation University of West Indies & planning Jamaica workshop

1976- late Spring- Vancouver- North American Regional Seminar & U. N. Conference on Human Settlements

1976- Summer- San Juan, Puerto Rico- International Congress of Schools of Social Work, IASSW Executive Board meeting, & workshop on paraprofessional training, Kingston, Jamaica.

1977- January- Cairo & Alexandria, Egypt – Consulation schools of social work, U.N. Expert group meeting & delegate to Second Conference of African Ministers of Social Affairs, co-sponsored by U.N. Economic Commission for Africa, UNICEF, other specialized U.N. Agencies, & IASSW. Consultation Kenya, Greece, Israel & Iran.

1977- June- Brussels & Charleroi, Belgium- meeting with Inter-University European Institute on Social Welfare

1977- August- Vienna- IASSW Executive Board meeting & consulation with government officials on relocation of IASSW Secretariat.  Visit to Zurich & Lugano, Switzerland

1978- Summer- Jerusealem, Isreal- 50^th Anniversary International Congrss of Schools of Social Work & Kendall retirement festivities

1980- Summer- Visits to London, Zurich, Lugano, Bombay, Singaport, Bangkok en route to meeting of IASSW Executive Board & International Congres of Schools of Social Work, Hong Kong.

1981- Summer- Consultation IASSW Secretariat, Vienna, & Athens, Greece, meeting of IASSW Executive Board.

1981- Fall- London to represent IASSW at memorial service for Dame Eileen Younghusband.

1982- Spring- Consulation IASSW Secretariat, Vienna & visit to Amsterdam

1982- Summer- Visit to Iceland, Scotland, Brighton, England, to attend meeting of IASSW Executive Board & International Congress of Schools of Social Work,

1982- Fall- Visit to Zurich, Lugano, & London

1983- Summer- Vienna to attend meetign of IASSW Executive Board & visits, Budapest, Hungary, & London

1984- Summer- Montreal to attend IASSW Executive Board meetings & International Congress of Schools of Social Work

1984- Fall- Visits to various points in Scotland and England

1985- Spring- Vienna to attend meeting of IASSW Executive Committee & visits to Amesterdam & London

1985- Summer- Vienna to attend meeting of IASSW Executive Board

1986- January- Vienna to attend meetinf of IASSW Executive Committee

1986- Summer- Hawaii to attend an International Symposium; Seoul, Korea, to attend IASSW Expert Working Group; and Tokyo, to attend IASSW Board meetngs & International Congress of Schools of Social Work

Source:  Social Welfare Archives, University of Minnesota Library — www.special.lib.umn.edu/swha

By Michael Barga

Introduction: The Noble and Holy Order of the Knights of Labor were the most prominent labor organization of the 1880’s.  Specifically, the organization grew between the end of the Depression and the beginning of the Great Upheaval (roughly 1879-1886) under the tenure of Grand Master Workman Terence V. Powderly.  By the end of the 1880’s, their influence and membership dropped dramatically, and the last remnants of the Knights disbanded in 1949.  Characterized by its oath-bound secrecy, its emphasis on autonomy of local Knights and non-violence, and its broad sense of solidarity, it is considered by many to be a failed experiment in the labor movement which did not capitalize on the action-mindedness of the Great Upheaval moment.

Background: The Knights of Labor were formed in 1869 by eight garment cutters in Philadelphia to replace the local union by Uriah Stephens.  At the time, they were just a small part of the young modern labor movement which had materialized only within the last fifty years.  The earliest unions were before industrialization and formulated out of the increasingly strained relationship between journeymen and masters in the skilled or artisan labor sector, a system reminiscent of the guild system.  In the mid-1830’s, the General Trades’ Union allowed these wage earners to identify their shared grievances.  As collective action picked up, employers felt the groups held too much power over individuals and maintained that economic demand, not employers themselves, truly decided wage levels.

The distinction between skilled and unskilled laborers was still made in the early 1870’s, yet changes created by industrialization placed the groups in greater contact, often in the factory.  This opportunity to bridge the divide of the workers was part of the reason the Knights of Labor formed.  The craft unions of previous times, composed almost solely of skilled workers, were ineffective.  He saw the arrangement of labor and capital as a systemic problem that resembled the slavery of the past, and Stephens hoped for a brotherhood to provide education, mutual aid, and cooperation for challenging the labor-capital arrangement.  Others, like the National Labor Union, had tried to organize a similar national and political movement starting in 1866, but the organization lost prominence after a number of disastrous political setbacks and the economic downturn of 1873.

Formation and Early Years: The secrecy of Knights of Labor membership was considered a positive feature of the group by some and only something to be tolerated by others.  The union also banned politicians, lawyers, and physicians since they were considered of low moral character or at high risk of breaking secrecy.  The lack of distinction between skilled and unskilled workers departed from the early labor models in hopes to take advantage of the new industrialized arrangement.  The Knights, originally a local Philadelphia union, had spread throughout the area in its initial few years, especially in New Jersey and the coal-mining regions of Pennsylvania.  After the 1873 Depression subsided and unemployment declined, previous unions were re-created under the auspices of the Knights of Labor.

In 1878, it was deemed necessary to have a General Assembly which invited representatives from all the local assemblies.  Stephens was at the helm at this first General Assembly, but he resigned within two years.  Interestingly enough, the general principles of the Knights had not been explicitly declared despite its structural formation.  The secrecy of the organization was the main reason for this slowness to communicate the mission of the union.  The initiation practices and secrecy of even the name of the Knights of Labor were altered by 1879 to eliminate some of the religious overtones partly to accommodate Catholics.  While this was a step towards reconciliation, the tension between the Catholic hierarchy and the Knights would significantly persist for almost another decade.

By 1879, Terence V. Powderly took over the position of Grand Master Workman with a membership of 9,300 workers who were diverse by trade including garment-cutters, miners, shoemakers, machinists, locomotive engineers, stationary engineers, glass-workers, moulders, printers, coopers, blacksmiths, boiler-makers, nail-packers, teachers, and carpenters.₁ Powderly had helped found the Knights of Labor in the Scranton area in 1876.

After the Knights lifted a ban on political discussion following a railroad strike in 1877, Powderly helped organize the “Greenback-Labor Party” in hopes of contending for local political offices.  He quickly rose to Master Workman for the Scranton Knights and successfully navigated a period of severe divisiveness due to members’ differences in ethnicity and religion.  In 1878, he was elected mayor of Scranton for the Greenback-Labor party.

Powderly was not the only political success for the Knights of Labor.  The organization, which now had spread to other regions of the United States, took a handful of other political offices in places like Maine and Massachusetts.  Still, Powderly had made contact with many local assemblies and stood out to Knights of Labor leadership through his many various organizing activities.  Such demonstrated commitment to the Order, even when his own local assembly membership had limited growth in 1879, complimented the recognition of Powderly’s other skills in writing and oration.

Under Grand Master Workman Powderly, the general assembly declared strikes an option of last resort and that the name and objects of the Order were made public in the early 1880’s.  One of the more progressive moves of the Order at this time was declaring women to be admitted with equal standing as men.  The ritualistic aspects of the Knights were also revised in hopes of increasing membership.  The unexpected factor that appears to have boosted membership significantly was the strike victories in 1882 and 1885 that became associated with the Knights of Labor.

The Union Pacific Railroad had cut wages, yet through the aggressive leadership of Joseph R. Buchanan the original wages were restored.  Buchanan reproduced the success in a number of other railroad strike incidents, all of which became associated nationally with the Knights of Labor despite their mostly local nature.  The Knights of Labor had an explicitly anti-strike mentality, but the local autonomy of assemblies had allowed their name to become known as a powerful and assertive group, including financially, which could create sensational successes in assertive worker action.  This hyped image was reinforced when local Knights called for help in an effort against notorious and unscrupulous railroad financier Jay Gould.

The national Knights of Labor leaders, including Powderly, recognized that the existence of the Order may be in danger if the 1885 strike was not supported.  Despite the hope to keep the anti-strike mentality, Knights of Labor had been steadily laid off by Baron’s railroad companies in a seemingly deliberate effort to disband the local assemblies.  The executive board called for Knights to strike and trains were stopped and the cars uncoupled, engines were “killed,” and widespread sabotage, in some cases leading to disorder and violence, spread throughout the Southwest.₂ Gould realized the immediate threat to his entire transportation system and accepted a series of negotiations with the Knights of Labor’s national leadership.  Such a demonstration of labor’s power had never occurred in the U.S., and the already inflated prestige of the order became all-the-more sensationalized.

Newspapers across the country covered the story, and people of all trades were inspired by an immense confidence in the organization.  Rumors ran wild that the membership was 2.5 million people and the treasury held 12 million dollars, and consequently, the number of new local assembly initiations was overwhelming to the national Knights of Labor.  These new groups sang combative songs and hazardously took part in strikes, thinking the national organization could fuel a victory.  Gould regrouped and easily defeated the largely unorganized strikes and assertive actions by local Knight assemblies.  These failures were credited as defeats for the Order nationally even when no encouragement or approval had been given by Powderly or others in the executive board.

By 1886, there were an estimated 700,000 members in the Knights of Labor.  While defeats had already begun, the Knights ultimate let-down to overenthusiastic supporters occurred in relation to the Haymarket Affair in Chicago.  After a group of demonstrators were falsely convicted of setting of a bomb, many called for Powderly to challenge the authorities and assert the Knights of Labor power.  Powderly had actually written to local assemblies to avoid the May 1^st strikes and actions which had led to the Haymarket Affair disaster.  Both those who disagreed with Powderly about the strikes beforehand and those who called for support after the actions became detractors of Powderly and the Knights of Labor leadership.

While in the South there was still great numbers of the Order, many defected to more radical labor elements and groups which appealed to their skill more specifically, like the American Federation of Labor.  Similar to the 1873 Depression, the Great Upheaval of 1886 brought in a period of declining employment stability for wage earners which had a negative effect on workers’ willingness to risk losing their jobs by joining or maintaining union membership.  When Powderly lost re-election as Grand Master Workman in 1893, the Knights had fallen to a membership of roughly 75,000 and would never recover.  By 1949, the last remnants of the Order would disband, and the Noble and Holy Order of the Knights of Labor would only have a presence in the history books.

Looking back on the mix of local autonomy and progressive solidarity which were staples of the Knights of Labor, a particularly significant moment was the 1886 General Assembly in Richmond, VA.  A black delegate of District Assembly Number 49, Franklin J. Ferrell, introduced Powderly to the convention.  In Richmond, the local assemblies were separated by color, despite the fact that there was an official ban on color discrimination by the Knights of Labor.  District Assembly no. 49 was needed support for Powderly, yet earlier in the convention local hotels and other institutions had given Ferrell trouble.  This created a tension which Powderly could have dealt with in many ways and for many reasons.

It is debatable if the true motivations for having Farrell involved significantly in the assembly were for Powderly’s political expediency or on principle.  Some believe Powderly and the Knights practiced a disguised discrimination model.  Still, the incident was certainly a unique moment in the history of the Knights, a movement of tenuous solidarity for people of all backgrounds.  Unfortunately, there was very little progressivism in terms of inclusion of Asian immigrants, and Powderly was in favor of closing the borders in this regard.

Another significant moment for the Knights of Labor was the 1888 reconciliation between the Knights of Labor and the Catholic Church.  The ritualistic and masonic-like elements, in addition to the radical nature of the group, were met with great suspicion by the Roman Catholic Church.  While measures were taken to lessen the measures offensive to Catholics, most clerics were opponents of the Order, especially in Canada where an official stand was taken against the organization.  Through work with Cardinal Gibbons, Powderly got Vatican approval for membership by Catholics.  While the Knights were on the decline at this point, it was an important step for friendly relations between the Catholic Church and the labor movement as a whole, setting the stage for the next generation of labor-priests and religious.

Conclusion: The Knights of Labor rose to prestige quickly in the 1880’s, and Powderly was considered the voice of labor, the head of an organization that could deal blows to even the likes of Jay Gould.  While the reasons for the decline of the Order are debated, the economic conditions of the time, like for the National Labor Union, appear to be a factor.  Also, the high level of local assembly autonomy appears to be a major contributing factor to both the union’s increased and eventual decreased membership.

The Knights are considered a failed experiment in the labor movement and yielded very few lasting contributions, yet defection to other unions, like the American Federation of Labor, may suggest that the energy of the labor movement was shifted rather than lost.  In any case, the Noble and Holy Order of the Knights of Labor stand as a significant organization in a unique moment in the young history of the labor movement in the United States.

Sources: 1.  “An Historical Sketch of the Knights of Labor” by Carroll D. Wright, The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Vol. 1, No. 2 (Jan. 1887): 149.  2.  Labor in America, Fourth Edition, by Foster Rhea Dulles & Melvyn Dubofsky, Heights, IL: Harlan Davidson, Inc., 1984., 133.  Grand Master Workman: Terence Powderly and the Knights of Labor by Craig Phelan, Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2000.  “Terence V. Powderly and Disguised Discrimination” by Herman D. Bloch, American Journal of Economics and Sociology, Vol. 33, No. 2 (April 1974): 145-160. American Catholic History Classroom – http://cuomeka.wrlc.org/exhibits/show/knights/kol-intro/kol-intro3, The Making of American Exceptionalism: The Knights of Labor and Class Formation in the Nineteenth Century by Kim Voss, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1993.

Photo Sources:

Knights Founded – http://gallaghergblockgroup1.wikispaces.com/The+Great+Railroad+Strike+of+1877

Knights of Labor insignia – http://afge1504.org/page6.php

Railroad Strikes – http://romitasx.tripod.com/id1.html

For More Information: Visit the American Catholic History Classroom online at http://cuomeka.wrlc.org/exhibits/show/knights/kol-intro/kol-intro3 or see “An Historical Sketch of the Knights of Labor” by Carroll D. Wright, The Quarterly Journal of Economics, Vol. 1, No. 2 (Jan. 1887): 137-168.

By: Michael Barga

Introduction: Terence V. Powderly was a man who captured the public eye as a politician and labor organizer at the turn of the 20^th century, particularly as three-term mayor of Scranton, PA and member of the Knights of Labor leadership.  Throughout his career, he hesitated to call for strikes and more dramatic labor activities, feeling they were unproductive and made enemies with law, police, and media.  Instead, Powderly saw the labor movement not as a revolution but a cooperative brotherhood of workers.  As a Catholic, his ideas lined up in many ways with the teaching of the time, yet many clergy rejected the Knights of Labor, the labor organization with which he is most associated.

Education and Career: Terence V. Powderly had a rudimentary education of about six years and began working at age 13.  By age 17, he became an apprentice machinist and eventually found work in Scranton, PA, joining the International Union of Machinists and Blacksmiths five years later in 1871.  Even at his young age, he was recognized for his writing and speaking abilities and became local Grandmaster Workman and Corresponding Secretary of the union a year later.  In 1873, he lost his job and was only able to secure employment as a machinist again in 1875, leaving the field for good in 1877.

After this early working experience, his career became focused mainly on Pennsylvania politics and the Knights of Labor.  He held the position of Mayor in Scranton, PA from 1878-1884.  Powderly progressed from member to Master Workman of Scranton, then Corresponding Secretary of District Assembly, and eventually Grand Master Workman in the Knights of Labor from 1874-1893.  Always one who held varied interests, he would also study law and become a practicing lawyer, serve as a county health officer, and become part owner and manager of a grocery store.  Finally, he ended his career working for the federal government in immigration policy, enforcement, and inspection.

Terence V. Powderly was born to Terence and Madge (Walsh) Powderly in the industrial community of Carbondale, PA, where his father had established his own coal mine.  Young Terry was a near-sighted child who got ill often and was deaf in one ear due to yellow fever.  Incompetent in sports and often wearing hand-me-downs, the young Powderly had to fend for himself against local bullies.  He believes that being part of a large Irish family, seven brothers and four sisters, helped alleviate his childhood difficulties, as well as his avid reading habits.  While it is unclear how Powderly’s Catholic faith affected his early life, he reportedly learned tolerance and sympathy for those in need from his close relationship to his mother, an abolitionist.

During his early years of employment, Terence V. Powderly developed a great deal of confidence and took his wit and charm into social circles.  While he enjoyed playing cards and attending saloons, Powderly restricted himself to harmless mischief, avoided bad company, and was uninterested in alcohol.₁ It was here in Scranton that he met Hannah Dever, daughter of a Scranton mine worker, and her brothers Johnny and Ed.  Hannah and Terence married on September 19, 1872 and would be together until her death in 1907, while Johnny and Ed would become Powderly’s friends during this period of young adulthood and beyond.

The Depression of 1873 hit the U.S. economy very hard, and Powderly was one of the countless workers laid off that year.  He resolved to travel and get a job, but Powderly had become president of the local Machinists and Blacksmiths International Union shortly after he joined in 1871.  He was unsuccessful in making any money since his name was blacklisted, and he became depressed as his wife endured extended periods of separation and a move from their own apartment to her mother’s place.  His demoralized return to Scranton was followed by a personal tragedy; Hannah nearly passed away delivering who would be their only child, a baby girl who died a few days later.

In 1876, Terence V. Powderly joined the Knights of Labor in Scranton.  Like with his previous union experience, Powderly quickly raised in the ranks to the position of local Master Workman and was in close coordination with the Philadelphia Knights.  Many of his fellow workers saw the decentralized nature of the organization as an asset compared to the factional and declining Machinists and Blacksmiths International Union, which Powderly ultimately left in 1877.  On the other hand, many found the rituals and initiation rites of the Noble and Holy Order of the Knights of Labor difficult.  In addition, the brotherhood was challenged by internal religious and ethnic prejudice.  In fact, these divisions led Powderly to resign briefly from his position as Master Workman until his leadership as a member exposed the bigotry through repeated calls for unity, at which point he was reinstated.

Just a year after he joined, Powderly quit his job as a machinist and became a full-time organizer for the Knights, a pay cut of $110 a month.  His commitment to the organization was matched by a vision of establishing worker collectives achieved through avoiding strikes when possible and violent action at all times.  When a set of significant Pennsylvania strikes occurred in the summer of 1877, Powderly set himself to more constructive tasks, such as raising funds for the families of the dead men, boycotting merchants who opposed the continuing miners’ strike, establishing a cooperative grocery store to assist the strikers, organizing the outraged into local assemblies, and, above all, setting the wheels in motion to defeat employers and their political henchmen during the next elections.₁ Such tactics, especially the boycott, were his hope for the future role of Knights across the country.

Stemming from the 1877 incidents, many realized the depth of the state-corporation alliance and held a new-found enthusiasm for a third party in politics.  The Knights lifted their ban of political discussion by creating a Committee on Progress meeting to be held immediately after the assembly’s regular meeting.  Powderly coordinated the first meeting of the “Greenback-Labor party” soon after political discussion by the Knights began.  He invited each local chapter of the Knights of Labor to send a representative of the Committee on Progress.  The gathering set a platform whose message deemed the two predominant parties deplorable for wage workers to support, and they also decided on candidates for the party.

Powderly led various efforts of outreach to constituents and “poll-watching” to ensure election accuracy, and the party secured victory in all five offices for which they ran in county elections.  In response to his efforts and his local influence, Powderly was chosen by the party as Scranton’s mayoral candidate for the Greenback-Labor party.  Running a campaign which promised reduction of debt and government efficiency, Powderly was simultaneously considered a working-class challenger to the status quo.  His opponents joined forces and took part in reprehensible efforts to undermine his credibility.  Some highlighted his Catholicism as a threat, while others emphasized how the Catholic Church did not approve of the Knights of Labor.  Their negative campaigning efforts were unsuccessful, and Terence V. Powderly was elected mayor of Scranton in February of 1878, joined by a significant Greenback-Labor presence in the city council and other offices.

Upon taking office, Mayor Powderly immediately set out his plan to create a modern city: a board of health, an investigation of fraud, the building of an adequate sewage system, and paved roads.  Despite never having a majority in the city council, many of his initiatives were passed by the city councils by the end of his three terms.  Within 6 months of taking office, he overhauled law enforcement and chose men of integrity to serve, mostly from the Greenback-Labor party or the Knights of Labor.  The Scranton Newspaper, Daily Times, later referred to the city as the model of order.₂ His final act in 1878 was establishing a system of inspecting food that included stiff enforcement and severe penalties.

In 1879, Powderly set a proper fire-fighting force on the agenda, while his ever-increasing recognition as a labor politician outside of Scranton finally caught up to him.  The successful introduction of politics into the Knights had occurred in a number of locations, but Powderly was the clearest example.  When it was decided to create a national organization for the union, Powderly was first elected Grand Worthy Foreman, second-in-command, then assumed the top position of Grand Master Workman after the resignation of Uriah Stephens.  He was re-elected to this highest position of union leadership for ten consecutive terms, and most observers interpreted his every utterance on the problems of the day as labor’s official position, as they read his articles and listened to his speeches.₂

After a narrow election victory of ninety-nine votes over his Republican challenger, Powderly’s work as mayor continued in the early 1880’s with three major pieces of legislation.  First, a board of appeals was set up for those who disagreed with tax assessment.  The second legislation continued his work on the sewer system, and the third established licenses for merchants and businesses in Scranton which is seen as a small step towards more equitable distribution of wealth.  As re-election season came, his greatest asset was the credit received for his health reforms.  Local newspapers did reports on how measures he had enacted limited the outbreak of diseases like smallpox, yet the Democratic Party had absorbed or defeated most of the Greenback-Labor party by 1882

Powderly brokered a deal to accept the Democratic nomination out of political expediency which was successful in winning him the election, despite opponents’ high criticism of the move.  In his last term, he continued to work on government efficiency, especially regarding tax assessment, and he made constructive proposals like building a hospital and a public building for the future.  He spent a considerable amount of energy in a losing effort for the Democratic nomination in 1884 against a career politician, which critical historians are quick to point out in lieu of his responsibilities as leader of the Knights of Labor.

Critiques and supporters of Powderly’s leadership role in the Knights of Labor have called him idealist, reformer, humanitarian, windbag, renegade, crook, imposter, agitator, introvert, self-seeker, charlatan, cheap politician, turncoat, rabble rouser, and drippy sentimentalist.₃ Others have said that the qualities which made him a great mayor were the same that made him an inept labor union leader, mainly his unwillingness to delegate responsibility.  In any case, Terence V. Powderly was recognized nationally by many as the voice of labor during his time, as mentioned previously.  In addition, the Knights of Labor became the premier union during his era growing to 700,000 members in 1886 from a mere 9,300 members when Powderly took the reins in 1879.

Factors other than Powderly are important to consider in judging the success of the Knights of Labor, most notably the end of the Depression and a local Knights of Labor victory against notorious robber baron Jay Gould.  Still, Powderly provided meticulous administrative attention to detail as a leader.  He also continued to discourage the Knights of Labor from unnecessary involvement in strikes or violent action and avoid a dominant school of thought in the union, limiting with some success the damaging perception of the union as an anarchist, socialist, and radical group during the period when it grew the most.  At his prime, workers were naming their children after Terence V. Powderly and cheering his arrival.

While he limited negative perceptions, Powderly simultaneously worked hard to accommodate working people from almost every conceivable background; he was a charismatic endorser of solidarity.₁ He encouraged inter-racial and inter-gender assemblies while suggesting separate assemblies if the obstacles were too great to integrate different groups.  Powderly’s approach of keeping the Knights of Labor with a high degree of local autonomy is another element of his leadership looked upon favorably, which is a structure rarely used in labor unions since the 1930’s.

The year 1886, particularly after the Haymarket Affair incident in Chicago, marks a turning point for the Knights of Labor and Powderly’s leadership.  Anarchists were unjustly convicted in relation to an explosion that happened at the Haymarket demonstration, but Powderly hesitated to call the organization into more strikes or speak out fervently against this injustice.  With the arrival of the Great Upheaval in 1886 and worse economic conditions, the Knights’ newer members took actions that were poorly planned and funded, especially large-scale strikes.  The Grand Master Workman hoped to establish greater oversight to avoid overextending the Knights, but employers took advantage of these conflicts and eradicated the Knights from their industries before such changes could be made.

The solidarity which Terence V. Powderly spent years building was now falling apart and defecting to other organizations, especially skilled workers to the American Federation of Labor.  Historians suggest a number of explanations.  One is that the local structure and de-centralized decision-making put too much faith in workers to determine when there was no other option but a strike available to them; this structure did not work in times of economic crisis when there always seemed to be no other option than a strike.

Within a decade of the Great Upheaval, the Knights of Labor’s membership dropped down to 20,000.  Internal and external rivals to Powderly’s leadership in the labor movement brought out the worst and most suspicious inclinations in him, and the previous democratic and tolerant undertones of the movement were increasingly absent in Powderly’s leadership.  This second period of serving as Grand Master Workman, which ended in 1893 with the succession of internal opponent John Hayes, was marked with only one bright spot.  In 1888, Powderly worked with Cardinal Gibbons to ease tensions between the Catholic Church and the Knights of Labor, including Papal approval for Catholics to join the union.

One writer identified four specific characteristics of the Knights that made the Catholic hierarchy suspicious and even formally denounce the organization in certain regions before 1888: its oath bound secrecy, Masonic aspects, its resemblance to the Molly Maguires, and its apparent socialistic or radical character.  The church recognized workers’ rights to self-organize, but the oath to absolute secrecy and ritualistic nature of the Knights of Labor could not be accepted and seemed to require a quasi-religious commitment to the union.   The Molly Maguires and radical elements of the group Powderly suggested were due to its decentralized nature, yet most clerics misunderstood the organization, some until its eventual collapse.

Once Terence V. Powderly lost his position in the Knights, he moved on to studying law and was admitted to the Pennsylvania Bar in 1894, later arguing before both the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania and the United States.  He strongly felt the justice system was bias and overly technical.  In 1896, he came back to politics and was appointed Commissioner General of Immigration by President William McKinley, for whom he had helped campaign.  Powderly investigated Ellis Island which led to numerous firings; however, these former employees used slander to get him fired when Theodore Roosevelt stepped into the presidency in 1902.  Within a few years, Powderly was reinstated as Special Immigration Inspector, then Chief of the Immigration bureau’s Division of Information from 1907-1921, and finally Commissioner of Conciliation of the U.S. Labor Department.  He died on June 24, 1924 in Washington, D.C.

Terence V. Powderly’s final years were spent with friends, like frequent house guest Mary Harris “Mother” Jones and John B. White.  Many of these friends he would join in the United States Department of Labor’s Hall of Fame, to which he was given the honor of membership in 1999.  His autobiography was posthumously released, The Path I Trod.  While a number of critiques about Powderly have already been mentioned, one which is generally accepted is his view that immigration should be closed to Chinese individuals and other Asians which was a widely accepted view for his time.  While officially there was a ban on discrimination by color, some scholars suggest the Knights of Labor were not as inter-racially progressive as they appeared to be and practiced disguised discrimination and/or desired social control of potential black strike-breakers.

While treated harshly and dismissed as insignificant by many historians, Terence V. Powderly has more recently received greater attention, even by those who consider the Knights of Labor a failed experiment or missed opportunity of the labor movement.  As Grand Workman, he exhibited the way solidarity and a decentralized approach can work in a labor union given the right conditions.  He planted seeds for greater acceptance of the labor movement by the Catholic Church, setting the stage for other Catholics like Dorothy Day.  Finally, Terence V. Powderly provided an example of how a politician can achieve broad appeal by campaigning on a mix of labor and other policy positions, like fiscal responsibility. Terence V. Powderly was a talented and charismatic man who earned the national spotlight in the American labor movement of the late 19^th century and left a legacy to debate for historians.

Sources: 1. Grand Master Workman: Terence Powderly and the Knights of Labor by Craig Phelan, Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2000: pp. 14, 27, 271. 2.  “Terence V. Powderly: Politician and Progressive Mayor of Scranton, 1878-1884,” Vincent J. Falzone, Pennsylvania History, Vol. 41, No. 3 (July, 1974): p. 294.  3.  “Terence Vincent Powderly—An Appraisal” by Harry J. Carman, The Journal of Economic History, Vol. 1, No. 1 (May, 1941): pp. 83-87.  The Catholic University Archives Website, http://archives.lib.cua.edu/findingaid/powderly.cfm . Labor in America, Fourth Edition, Foster Rhea Dulles & Melvyn Dubofsky, Heights, IL: Harlan Davidson, Inc., 1984.  “Terence V. Powderly and Disguised Discrimination by Herman D. Bloch, American Journal of Economics and Sociology, Vol. 33, No. 2 (April 1974): pp. 145-160.

Photo Sources:

Powderly in earlier years – http://6hourday.org/powlabor.html

Ferrell Introduces Powderly – http://www.corbisimages.com/stock-photo/rights-managed/IH024307/engraving-of-knights-of-labor-assembly

Powderly and Jones – http://archives.lib.cua.edu/avcol.cfm (The Catholic University Archives)

Powderly’s tombstone – http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=pv&GRid=39416822&PIpi=19662396

For More Information: Visit the American Catholic History Classroom online at http://cuomeka.wrlc.org/exhibits/show/knights or Contact the American Catholic History Research Center and University Archives at archives@mail.lib.cua.edu or Phone: 202-319-5065

The Concluding Section of Abe Bortz Lecture on the History of Social Security

Note: This lecture, by the first SSA Historian, Dr. Abe Bortz, was developed as part of SSA’s internal training program. Up until the early 1970s new employees were trained at SSA headquarters in Baltimore before being sent to assume their new duties in offices around the country. As part of this training, Dr. Bortz presented a curriculum on the history of Social Security. This lecture, developed in the early 1970s, was the core of that curriculum. It features an extensive overview of social policy developments dating from pre-history up to the passage of the Social Security Act in 1935.

Concluding Thoughts -A few random thoughts: Special note, too, should be taken of the difference between public assistance in Title I of the Act and Federal Old Age Benefits in Title II. The latter is social insurance (which is work-related and a contributory program, and because of the contributory feature carried a contractual right.) The principle; that an insurance benefit is a contractual right and obligatory and does not require evidence of need — which is unqualifiedly true of private insurance and was carried over into the field of social insurance. And unlike public assistance, it was also designed to prevent dependency before it happened. In contrast, public assistance involved neither contributions nor labor force participation, and was and is contingent upon need as determined by a means test. The crucial difference between the two techniques of income maintenance concerned the degree of administrative discretion which governed eligibility and benefits– minimal in social insurance, but paramount in public assistance.

Remember, that monthly maximum benefits in the original Social Security Act were set at $85.00, the minimum of $10. A lump-sum payment equal to 3 1/2% of the employee’s total wages was to be paid to those reaching 65 without qualifying for monthly benefits. A death payment of a similar amount was provided subject to deductions of any benefits the worker might have received during his lifetime.As you know, the 1939 Amendments changed the benefit formula by substituting average earnings for lifetime cumulative earnings and weighting it somewhat in favor of lower income groups and most of all provision was made for dependent and survivors allowances which materially changed the Act altogether.

NOTE: Of considerable importance was Section 702 -”The Board shall have the duty of studying and making recommendations as to the most effective methods of providing economic security through social insurance, and as to legislation and matters of administrative policy concerning old age pensions, unemployment compensation, accident compensation and related subjects.”

Historians have called the Social Security Act “a new landmark in American history, a tremendous break with the inhibitions of the past.” One historian has called it “revolutionary.” F.D.R. himself, called it “the supreme achievement of his administration.”

The Social Security Act provided coverage to replace reliance upon charity and public relief. It was thus more orderly, dignified and reliable. Here, of course, we are speaking of old age benefits through contributions by the beneficiaries.

At the same time, it may well be asked — did the Social Security Act retard, set back or kill off the development of an old age movement, one that would have moved off with considerable — and growing strength — to new and more radical nostrums?

Yet Social Security was also a weak and hesitant piece of legislation in many ways:

1. It relied on regressive taxation. Yet, perhaps, there was something more to this: As F.D.R. put it some years later: “I guess you’re right on the economics. But the taxes were never a problem of economics. They are politics all the way through. We put the payroll contributions there so as to give the contributors a legal, moral and political right to collect their pension and their unemployment benefits. With those taxes in there, no politician can ever scrap my social security program.”

2. It withdrew vast sums to build up reserves.

3. It denied coverage to numerous classes of workers, including those who perhaps needed it most – farmer laborers and domestics, most or all of whom have since been provided coverage or the chance to do so.

4. The full impact of old age benefits was not even to begin to be felt for more than 6 years; contributions were to begin in 1937, with monthly benefits not until January 1942– a long time considering the obvious needs.

5. Health insurance was ignored.

6. The unemployment insurance system was not provided with adequate national standards.

Thus the Social Security Act was really a compromise. It reconciled the philosophy of individualism with the facts of economic interdependence. It involved acceptance of the premise that a Government has a certain responsibility for the welfare of its people –one consistent with humanitarian principles and with the tradition of democratic Government. It would have been more radical had the Government assumed responsibility to assure continuity of income and a minimum level of economic well being to those citizens whose income had been interrupted or curtailed by certain risks or events. This, as you know, is under serious consideration today.

The Social Security Act only slightly modified the distribution of wealth and it did not alter at all the foundations of our capitalistic and individualistic economy. Nor does it relieve the individual of primary responsibility for his own support and that of his dependents. It does not dampen initiative nor render thrift outmoded. Eligibility and benefits both in the contributory old age and unemployment insurance titles were closely work-related, Government contributions were omitted, and fiscal conservatism prevailed in the emphasis upon reserves and the equity principle of private insurance.

The concept of differential benefits related to wages and the duration of earnings is essentially a conservative element in our social insurance philosophy. In America we still believe that a man should be rewarded for his own efforts. An established differential in one’s earnings and living standards is a precious asset, not only to the individual, but to the society in its progress toward a better world. Perhaps this attitude is changing, perhaps not.

To conclude, we have seen how social welfare responsibilities passed into the hands of Federal and State Governments. Private organizations still have a function to perform, but principally to supplement Governmental services. This was a complete change for the United States. Yet it was more democratic than the old approach; it lifted the financial burden from philanthropy and distributed it equitably among all tax paying citizens. This is an earmark of a maturing society — no longer leaving things to chance generosity — but doing them in the boldest humanitarian ways.

October 25, 1923

Department of Legal Measures

Not more than fifteen years ago a social hygiene survey of almost any one of our larger communities would not doubt have revealed conditions contrasting sharply with those which we find to-day.

Legislative and law enforcement machinery were almst non-existent.  Prostitution was rampant in the streets and public places, and a section of the city was dedicated particularly to it, which was popularly called the “segregated” or red-light district.

There was little or no public health machinery for the combating of venereal diseases.  Virtually nothing was being done to determine their prevalence or to prevent their spread.  Facilities for scientific diagnosis and treatment were either very limited or nonexistent.

In the field of protective measures there was little organized effort toward preventing girls and boys from becoming recruits for the underworld.  There were no women police.  The parks were unpatrolled and badly lighted.  Places of commercialized amusement were unsupervised.  Delinquents convicted of crimes, victims of hereditary and environmental handicaps, received punitive instead of rehabilitative treatment.

In recreation, community activities were largely undeveloped.  Community houses, organized play, and similar recreational measures would doubtless have been regarded as curiosities.

In education there was no national organization devoted largely to the promotion of sex education, or to the dissemination of information to the public with reference to social facts and conditions bearing on social hygiene.  Neither had this become a concern of the government nor of any state department.

The outstanding thing, however, which would have been revealed by such an investigation is the prevalence of prostitution and the increasing dissemination of the venereal diseases.  Facts such as those were disclosed by the thirty or more vice commissions which were organized during the past decade. (Ed. Note: The March Against Commercialized Prostitution: 1886-1949

In addition to the disclosures of these commissions during that period, many other significant events occurred in the field of social hygiene.  Such were the organization of the American Social Hygiene Association and the well known activities of the government in social hygiene during the war, which were continued thereafter to some extent by the U.S.  Inter-departmental Social Hygiene Board and the U.S.  Public Health Service.  As a result of all these activities, much improvement has occurred in community conditions with reference to social hygiene.

The example may be cited of a city in which the social hygiene machinery has been gradually improved during the past ten years.  The court records of this city show the number of arrests for

Men who fail to develop self-control sometimes yield to sex temptation to indulge in sexual intercourse with immoral girls and become infected with a venereal (sex) disease. The chief venereal diseases are syphilis (pox) and gonorrhea (clap).

prostitution in 1911 to have been approximately 5,600, and in 1921 to have been 1,680; the number of convictions in 1911 to have been 4,928, and n 1921 to have been 1,190:  whereas the enforcement of measures affecting these results was tightened (not relaxed, as the figures might indicate) through an intensive program of repression of prostitution.

An authoritative estimate of the number of prostitutes in that city in 1911 place the same number at 25,000; an intensive investigation of conditions in the same city at the present time indicates that the number of prostitutes operating in 1921 did not exceed 3,000.  In 1911 this city had a large red-light district, and in 1921 investigation failed to reveal a dozen open houses of prostitution.  To put this comparison between the conditions during the days of the red-light district and the present concretely:

If we consider a minimum of 10,000 prostitutes during the earlier the policy of repression.  This policy which began as an experiment ten years ago, may now fairly be described as a successful demonstration.  Progress has also been made in the other measures of the social hygiene program, which, it has been demonstrated, must be carried forward along with that of the repression of prostitution, since permanent progress rests fundamentally upon an improvement in community standards of sex conduct.

This improvement depends primarily upon information and education – information which shows the relation of prostitution and the venereal diseases to the wrecking of the family and the deterioration of the race; and education which formulates and promotes the adoption of sex habits and customs in the interest of the individual and society.

It must also be supplemental by medical, rehabilitative, protective and recreational measures: to salvage those who, when they leap the barriers of restraint, become diseased, and to protect the public health; rehabilitative measures to provide a new outlook, a different environment, and honest work for the delinquent; protective measures directed toward the prevention of delinquency; and recreational measures to provide for the wholesome use of leisure as a substitute for vice.

The only national voluntary agency which is at present promoting these activities is the American Social Hygiene Association.  It is a membership, nonprofit-sharing corporation, and is entirely dependent upon voluntary subscription for funds.  It extends its service to individuals and to private and public organizations interested in any phase of social hygiene work.   For practical administration, it is divided into five departments: legal measures, medical measures, protective measures, recreational measures, educational measures, and public information.

Its Department of Legal Measures, with its staff of trained investigators, diagnoses community with reference to prostitution, and finds a remedy through the medium of the law, the police, and the courts.  It demonstrates to communities how commercialized prostitution can be completely suppressed and its other aspects greatly diminished.  It assists communities and states in the drafting of laws and ordinances, and advises in matters pertaining to their enforcement as well as to the enforcement of all laws which fall within the field of social hygiene.

Its Department of Medical Measures acts as a clearing house for doctors, clinic directors, hospital superintendents, public health officers, and other interested in the medical phases of the venereal disease problem.  It cooperates with health authorities in encouraging communities to establish model venereal disease clinics as part of their public health administration.

This girl may become an invalid for life if she marries a man who has had gonorrhea not entirely cured. Gonorrhea causes: 1. Many surgical operations upon women; 2. Much invalidism among innocent wives; 3. Many childless marriages.

Its Department of Protective Measures studies and promotes methods of determining causes of sex delinquency in individuals and in communities.  It promotes measures for safeguarding young people from activities and environments conducive to sex delinquency.  It also studies and promotes methods for rehabilitation of sex offenders.

Its Department of Recreational Measures studies the influence of existing recreation and entertainment facilities, and encourages communities to provide suitable measures for the wholesome use of leisure time as a substitute for vice.

Its Department of Educational Measures endeavors to stimulate education of both young and old to the true purpose of sex in life – to displace the old myths and falsehoods with authoritative information on the subject.

Its Department of Public Information informs the public on social hygiene topics, with a view to creating an enlightened public opinion and to securing favorable action on legislative measures and all other measures having to do with social hygiene.

Progress in social welfare has not been spontaneous.  If it is desired to correct or improve a social condition by the formulation of a law, something more must be done that the mere enactment thereof.  Laws will not enforce themselves.  If a cure is discovered for a disease, something more must be done than its inscription in a medical textbook to make it a factor in the improvements of public health.  The same may be said of other social activities.  In order to secure effective progress, activities or private and voluntary groups are necessary to supplement and fill in the gaps left by official agencies.  The American Social Hygiene Association is organized and equipped to do just this.  It is apparent that the activities of the American Social Hygiene Association toward the conservation and protection of the family as a basic social unit is of vital importance to the welfare of any community.

Source: American Social Hygiene Society files — Social Welfare Archives, University of Minnesota — www.special.lib.umn.edu/swha

An informal chronicle of national and international events contributing to progress in this field of social hygiene effort during the past sixty-two years.

1886:   Contagious Diseases Act is repealed in England.  This meant the overthrow of state regulation in that country, and did much to influence the United States against licensing prostitution.

1899:   First International Conference for the Suppression of Traffic in Women convenes in England.   At this Conference it first became generally known as a fact that a national and international traffic in women existed.

“Greed of gain was its motive and the helplessness of the victims furnished the ground of exploitation.  It was not a mere question of supply and demand, but one of a stimulated supply and demand…”

1902:   First Official International Conference for Suppression of White-Slave Traffic meets in Paris to draft treaty embodying measures for suppressing international traffic in women.

1904:   International agreement adopted by thirteen nations –Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Great Britan, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Russia, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland –recognizing the imperative need to combat traffic in women and children.

1906:   Ratification of above treaty by United States Government. Congress appoints the National Immigration Committee. Study of the question of importation of women for immoral purposes, leading to passage later of Mann and Bennet acts.

1910:   Second International Conference for Suppression of White-Slave Traffic adopts convention requiring the nations represented to pass and enforce legislation to punish procuring minors under twenty-one for immoral purposes, even with their consent, and of adults by force or fraud.

United States Congress adopts Mann Act (prohibiting interstate and international traffic in women)  and Bennet Act (penalizing those who import aliens for immoral purposes, and providing for deportation of aliens engaging in the business of prostitution).

Chicago Vice Commission makes exhaustive study of commercialized prostitution and reaches unanimous conclusion:

“Constant and persistent repression of prostitution the immediate method; absolute annihilation the ultimate ideal.”

Thirty other cities established vice commissions and make similar studies, all arriving at practically the same conclusion.

1914:   National Vigilance Association merges with the American Federation for Sex Hygiene to form the American Social Hygiene Association.

Promotion with the Association’s encouragement, of widespread enactment of law against commercialized prostitution, including laws against “white slavery,” injunction and abatement acts, laws for the establishment of reformatories for women, and such statutes as venereal disease reporting laws and laws against advertising of veneral disease remedies.  The laws against traffic in women and girls aimed at prosecution of procurers and promoters of vice; injunction and abatement laws authorized suppression of disorderly houses as public nuisances.  The enactment and enforcement of disorderly houses as public nuisances.  The enactment and enforcement in subsequent year of both types of laws in many states resulted in the closing of numerous houses of prostitution and “red light districts” marking the beginning of the end of these districts as an institution.  Flexner’s Prostitution in Europe and other Bureau of Social Hygiene studies were published.

1917:   (1) Draft Act passed by Congress, including Section 13 which prohibited prostitution in the vicinity of military or naval camps.

(2)  War and Navy Departments’ Commissions on  Training Camp Activities are formed with programs of law enforcement, education and recreation, and cooperation in medical measures  with the activities of the Surgeons General of the Army, Navy and Public Health Service.

(3)  Pronouncement by the American Medical Association that “Sexual continence is compatible with health and is the best prevention of venereal infection.”

(4)  United States Army and Navy adopt policies recognizing sexual continence as a practical factor in venereal disease control.

These combined efforts strengthened the rising tide of determination throughout the country that all toleration and segregation of commercialized prostitution must go, and promoted an uncompromising warfare against prostitution.  During 1917-18, upwards of 200 red light districts were closed, leaving hardly half a dozen by the close of the War.

1918:   Chamberlain-Kahn Act passed by Congress, creating the United States Interdepartmental Social Hygiene Board and establishing the Division of Venereal Diseases as part of the United States Public Health Service.

Source: American Social Hygiene Association files — Social Welfare Archives, University of Minnesota — www.special.lib.umn.edu/swha

SOME NOTES ON THE HISTORICAL BACKGROUND, DEVELOPMENT AND FUTURE OPPORTUNITIES OF

THE NATIONAL VOLUNTARY ORGANIZATION FOR SOCIAL HYGIENE IN THE UNITED STATES

WILLIAM F.  SNOW, M.D., Chairman of the Board of Directors, June 1946

Historical Notes

The American Social Hygiene Association, now in its thirty-fourth year of national and international service, grew out of a merger of national and international service, grew out of a merger of national voluntary medical, educational and law-enforcement agencies which had been attempting separately to do something about the problems now generally grouped together under the heading “social hygiene”.*  The agencies which joined in 1914 to form the new national voluntary social hygiene association were:

The American Vigilance Association, which had been organized in 1906 through the effort of such pioneers as James Bronson Reynolds, Grace Dodge, Dr. O. E.  Janney and Anna Garlin Spencer, for the purpose of attacking what was then known as “the white slave traffic”.

The American Federation for Sex Hygiene, organized in 1901, and comprising social hygiene societies in twelve states.

The first of these state and community groups was the New York Society for Sanitary and Moral Prophylaxis, organized by Dr.  Prince A. Morrow in 1905.

The other societies, some of which are still active under their original charters, were: Organized in:

1906 Pennsylvania Society for Prevention of Social Diseases

1907 Chicago Society of Social Hygiene (now the Illinois Social Hygiene League

1907 Milwaukee Society of Sanitary and Moral Education

1908 Spokane Society of Social and Moral Education

1908 Maryland Social Hygiene Society

1908 Connecticut Social Hygiene Society

1909 St. Louis Society of Sanitary and Moral Prophylaxis (now the Missouri Social Hygiene Association)

1910 California State Society for the Study of Prevention of Syphilis and Gonorrhea

1910 Oregon Social Hygiene Society

1910 Colorado Society for Social Health

*So far as is known, this term was first used to describe activities in this whole field, in a newspaper article which appeared in Chicago.

At a meeting held in Buffalo in September, 1913, these two main groups voted to consolidate their efforts in a unified national, campaign.  Two years later the American Purity Alliance merged its interests and resources with those of the new national agency.

Incorporation of the American Social Hygiene Association as “a national voluntary non-profit membership organization” took place under the laws of the State of New York in March, 1914.  The Constitution adopted at that time reflected the far-seeing vision of the men and women who framed it.  Consisting of only two Articles, this documents so broadly and competently stated the problem and opportunities ahead, that no change has ever been found necessary.

The Constitution reads:

Article I

The name of the Association shall be The American Social Hygiene Association.

Article II

The purpose of this Association shall be to acquire and diffuse knowledge of this established principles and practices and of any new methods which promote, or give assurance of promoting, social health; to advocate the highest standards of private and public morality; to suppress commercialized vice, to organize the defense of the community by every available means, educational, sanitary or legislative, against the disease of vice; to conduct on request inquiries into the present condition of prostitution and the venereal disease in American towns and cities; and to secure mutual acquaintance and sympathy and cooperation among the local societies for these or similar purposes.

The Officers and Board of Directors elected for the new Association furnished an equally wide range of background, interests and experience.  They were:

President: Charles W. Eliot, Cambridge, Massachusetts

Vice Presidents:  Active:

David Starr Jordan,  Stanford University, California

William T. Foster, Reed College, Portland, Oregon

Felix M. Warburg, New York, N.Y.

Rt. Rev. Walter T. Sumner, Chicago, Illinois

Honorary:

Jane Addams, Chicago, Illinois

R. Fulton Cutting, New York, NY

James Cardinal Gibbons, Baltimore Maryland

Treasurer: Henry L.  Higginson, Boston, Massachusetts

Secretary: Donald R. Hooker, M.D., Baltimore, Maryland

Board of Directors

Chairman: Charles W. Eliot

Thomas M. Balliet, New York                                                           Henry James, Jr., New York

Hugh Cabot, M.D., Boston                                                                Edward L. Keyes, Jr., New York

Mrs. Martha P. Falconer,                                                                   Lawrence Litchfiedl, M.D.,

Darlington, Pennsylvania                                                                    Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

Jerome D.  Greene, New York                                                            James Bronson Reynolds, New York

Rev. William A. Greer, New York                                                       Mrs. Raymond Robins, Chicago

Wirt W. Hallam, Chicago                                                                    E.R.A. Seligman, New York

Robert W. Hebberd, Albany, N.Y.                                                       William F. Snow, M.D. New York

Thoma N. Hepburn, M.D.,                                                                Mrs. Anna Garlin Spencer

Hartford, Connecticut                                                                         Meadville, Pennsylvania

Donald R. Hooker, M.D., Baltimore                                                  Percy Werner, St. Louis

Edward Jackson, M.D., Denver, Colo

Executive Officers

James Brownson Reynolds                                                                William Freeman Snow M.D.

Counsel, Law Department                                                                  General Secretary Education, Dept

Bascom Johnson                                                                                 James H. Foster

Assistant Counsel                                                                                Assistant Secretary

National headquarters were at 105 West Fortieth Street, New York and two branch offices were maintained: Walter Clarke, Field Secretary, was in charge of the Central States Division office in Chicago, and Thomas D. Eliot, Field Secretary in charge of the Western States Division office in San Francisco

HOW THE ASSOCIATION’S PROGRAM HAS DEVELOPED

The American Social Hygiene Association’s program as it was mapped by the founders to implement the Constitution, as it has progressed through the years, as it stands today, is an example of many roads taken towards a common destination.  It has been marked by flexibility of method, by adaptation to circumstances, and by consistent readiness to take hold wherever has appeared at any given time the greatest opportunity for service, the ultimate goal being illumined meanwhile by unchanging ideals.

1914-1920.  Getting Started.  World War I.

Thus, while the organization was n its infancy, with World War I beginning in Europe, the broad program which had started so promisingly in all fields of social hygiene work had to be adapted to our participation in the education and maintenance of our military forces at home and abroad.  All of the officers and staff were assigned to active duty with the War or Navy Departments; or with the Commission on Training Camp Activities, during the entire War Period.  Despite the urgent demands of this emergency job, progress continued on the long-range program, and before the First World War was over the Association’s program had become widely recognized internationally as the “Four-fold American plan”

Medical and Public Health Measures-

-

A man may transmit syphilis to his children. His children's children may pay the penalty of his mistake.

to combat syphilis and gonorrhea as dangerous communicable diseases, and hazards to family and personal health and happiness.

Legal and Protective Measures

- to repress prostitution as an organized business; to safeguard youth from conditions leading to sexual promiscuity and sex delinquency, and to aid victims of such conditions in restoring themselves to normal lives.

Educational Measures

- to provide sound character-training in childhood and youth, as a major influence in the promotion of high moral standards of sex conduct; to furnish accurate and suitable sex instruction as a part

The sex instinct in a boy or man makes him want to act, dare, possess, strive. When controlled and directed, it gives ENERGY, ENDURANCE, FITNESS.

of human relations education and of training for marriage and parenthood.

Public Information and Community Action

- to enable the people to take full advantage of the protection and safeguards provided against venereal diseases, prostitution and promiscuity; and to build informed and favorable public opinion  leading to community social hygiene action as needed.

Since young people between the ages of 15 and 30 are the chief victims of venereal diseases, since they are also the age-group most constructive social hygiene efforts in home, school, church and community, it goes without saying that social hygiene from the beginning has been a program for and of youth.

The Chart (Page shows how further program adaptations have occurred through the years, to meet other national emergencies or to permit joining in special projects which have promised –and achieved –greatly-to-be-desired results.

1921-1925 Postwar Period

Following World War I, in the critical period of transition to peacetime conditions, Association efforts had to be largely focused on helping the States and communities facing curtailment of necessary Federal and other official funds, to hold the gains made during the War period, especially in regard to efforts to prevent the return of flagrant commercialized prostitution and red light districts.

Source: American Social Hygiene Society files — Social Welfare Archives, University of Minnesota — www.special.lib.umn.edu/swha