Consumers' League of New York City

The Consumer's League of New York City was formed in 1891 as a result of a report made in 1890 by Alice Woodbridge, secretary of the Working Women's Society, the forerunner of the Women's Trade Union League. This report enumerated the deplorable working conditions and long hours under which women engaged in the retail trade had to work. A small group of women proceeded to organize the league, whose first activity was to prepare a white list of shops paying minimum fair wages and having shorter hours and better sanitary conditions. In 1899, other leagues formed in Boston, Philadelphia, and Chicago united to form the National Consumer's League. Mr. John Graham Brooks was elected president and Florence Kelley, who had worked with Jane Addams at Hull House, Chicago, was made executive secretary.

Investigations were undertaken by the Consumer's League in many areas. The first concerned the conditions of manufacture and sale of women's and children's stitched cotton underwear, and was soon extended to other branches of the needle trades. Investigations were conducted into the conditions of unsanitary tenement homework and sweatshops, laundries, restaurants, textile mills, canneries, and candy factories. Reports of the Consumer's Leagues were usually pioneer revelations of undesirable working conditions and were accepted as authoritative by legislators and educational institutions.

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