Fighting for Equal Rights and Opportunity at Home and Abroad
The Declaration of Independence nobly asserts that "we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." These truths may be self-evident and God-given, but Americans have had to struggle heroically to make them a concrete reality. Beginning with the American Revolution and continuing through the Civil War, the women’s and civil rights movements of the 20th century, and up to our current day, we have fought to extend equal rights and equal opportunity to all of our citizens, regardless of race, gender, religion, disability, or sexual orientation. Today, this unfinished struggle continues here at home. It also continues abroad, where we confront the evils of abusive child labor, human trafficking, and slavery.
Most recently, I have cosponsored the Civil Rights Act of 2008, which restores some of the protections that have been eroded by courts, and ensures that employers and others can be held accountable for discriminatory actions; the Local Law Enforcement Enhancement Act, also know as the Hate Crimes bill, which says a person should not be a victim of violence because of who they are; and the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, which builds upon the Iowa law protecting workers from employment discrimination due to their sexual orientation, and extends existing protections against discrimination based on age, race, ethnicity, disability, national origin, religion and gender. Below, I have highlighted several additional areas in which I have tried to make a personal contribution to our ongoing fight for equality, especially with regard to the rights of people with disabilities, achieving fair pay, and eradicating the worst forms of child labor around the world.
Realizing the Full Promise of the Americans with Disabilities Act
My brother, Frank, lost his hearing at a very young age. Watching the daily challenges - and discrimination - he faced, I witnessed the many ways that people with disabilities are prevented from fully participating in activities that most Americans take for granted. That is why the 1990 signing of my bill, the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), remains one of the proudest days of my life. This landmark civil rights law seeks to ensure equality rights and opportunities for the more than 54 million Americans with physical and mental disabilities.
America has made great strides thanks to the ADA, but our work is not done. In fact, in several areas we are going backward. A series of federal court decisions have interpreted the ADA in bizarre ways, for instance, ruling that people with obvious disabilities - including diabetes, epilepsy, muscular dystrophy, mental retardation or even an amputation - may not be considered legally disabled and may not qualify for the protections of the ADA. That is why I have introduced the Americans with Disabilities Restoration Act, to make certain that all Americans with disabilities, including hundreds of thousands of Iowans, are fully protected by the ADA as Congress originally intended. Passage of this bipartisan legislation is a top priority for me in the period ahead.
The principles of the ADA - equality of opportunity, full participation, independent living, and economic self-sufficiency - provide the foundation for all of my work on disability issues. I have always believed that it is important to ensure that individuals with significant disabilities have the choice of living in their own community, among family and friends, instead of being institutionalized. No individual should have to forfeit their ability to live in the community because he or she needs help getting out of the house in the morning or assistance with personal care or other basic requirements. That’s why I am the chief sponsor of the Community Choice Act, which would increase the availability of personal attendant services for persons with significant disabilities and for older Americans.
In addition, I am pleased that the provisions of my bill, the Money Follows the Person Act, have become law, and many states, including Iowa, are receiving grants to help people who wish to transition out of institutions and nursing homes.
I also continue to champion the need for improved emergency services for people with disabilities. Many provisions of my Emergency Preparedness and Response for Individuals with Disabilities Act - including those requiring a national disability coordinator, accessible housing and transportation, as well as the consideration and inclusion of persons with disabilities in the emergency planning process - were incorporated into recent homeland security legislation. Finally, I continue to champion efforts to improve mental health services and to require insurance plans to adequately cover mental health treatment; and I look forward to serious progress on this issue soon.
The Fair Pay Act
Today, more than 60 percent of women are in the workforce, with women serving as the sole breadwinner in 10 million American households. Yet women today still make only 77 cents for every dollar that the average man makes. In other words, each year, it takes until April 22nd for women to finally reach the earnings mark that their male counterparts achieved by December 31st of the prior year. That such pay discrimination persists in the 21st century is unbelievable - and unacceptable. Yet it is often excused under current law. Even when women can prove instances of pay discrimination, a recent Supreme Court ruling may prevent them from filing suit. Last year the Court held that a woman who had been a victim of pay discrimination over a 20-year period could not sue because she had failed to file suit within six months after her first unfair pay level was set. As a practical matter, this standard makes is virtually impossible for a woman to prove discrimination. That’s why I am sponsoring a bill, the Fair Pay Restoration Act, to clarify that every act of discrimination, or each paycheck received, resets the clock for bringing suit. I have also introduced a separate bill, the Fair Pay Act, to address the broader issue of the wage gap. This bill requires that, where working conditions are similar, men’s and women’s wages should also be similar.
Combating the Worst Forms of Child Labor
I am proud to be a leader in the growing movement to end abusive child labor, both within the United States and in countries around the globe. Worldwide more than 200 million children between the ages of five and 17 are engaged in the worst forms of child labor. They work in fields with pesticides and machetes, on the streets as child prostitutes, on battlefields as child soldiers, in mines, and as domestic servants. Millions of these children never see the inside of a classroom. The good news is that a recent report shows that progress is being made in reducing the worst forms of child labor, with 20 million fewer children being exploited. But much more work remains to be done.
This is a cause I have championed since 1992. I have vigorously supported efforts to ban the import of goods made by forced child labor, and to institute a voluntary labeling system that would empower American consumers to know that the products they purchase have not been made with the worst forms of child labor. Not only is child labor reprehensible in its own right, but it also plays a role in placing U.S workers at a disadvantage. I believe that the federal government should lead by example and, therefore, I worked to put in place the current ban on the U.S. government’s purchase of any product made with forced and indentured labor.
In 2001, I tackled one of the worst problems in international child labor, the use of young children to harvest and process cocoa beans for chocolate, primarily in West Africa. Together with Representative Eliot Engel, I negotiated a major protocol that created a public-private partnership with the cocoa industry to combat abusive child labor overseas. The Harkin-Engel protocol has forced chocolate companies to give an accurate accounting of conditions on some 600,000 small cocoa farms across the most isolated parts of West Africa, and it will enable us to begin getting these children out of the fields and into schools.
This protocol follows up on the 1998 treaty, the International Labor Organization's (ILO) Convention 182 on the Worst Forms of Child Labor. Ratified by the Senate in a record six months under my leadership, and signed by 173 countries, the ILO Treaty requires all signing countries to eliminate the practice of child labor, and requires the United States to forfeit any trade benefits with countries that fail to meet or enforce the treaty. I continue to work to ensure that the obligations of the ILO Treaty are met by providing adequate funding for the Office of Child Labor within the Department of Labor. Over the past 10 years, $363.5 million has been allocated to support the ILO Treaty’s International Program on the Elimination of Child Labor as well as the U.S. government’s Child Labor Education Initiative, both aimed at eliminating the worst forms of child labor.
The Harkin-Engel Protocol
In September 2001, chocolate and cocoa industry representatives signed an agreement, developed in partnership with Senator Harkin and Representative Eliot Engel, to eliminate the worst forms of child labor in the growing and processing of cocoa beans and their derivative products wherever cocoa is grown. This agreement was precipitated by news reports that same year which described the abusive conditions in which children were forced to work in West Africa.
The agreement, known as the Harkin-Engel Protocol, laid out a series of date-specific actions -- including the development of credible, mutually acceptable, voluntary, industry-wide standards of public certification by July 1, 2005 - to give a public accounting of labor practices in cocoa farming in West Africa.
The Harkin-Engel Protocol marked an important first: an entire industry, including companies from the United States, Europe and the United Kingdom, taking responsibility for addressing the worst forms of child labor in its supply chain.
Since the Harkin-Engel Protocol was signed, some positive steps have been taken to address the worst forms of child labor in cocoa growing. These include the creation of the International Cocoa Initiative foundation, which is now beginning to form partnerships with non-governmental organizations to provide social protection programs in West Africa. Also, small pilot projects have been initiated, which will be assessed and used to develop a child labor monitoring system. Though the July 1, 2005 deadline was not fully met, the cocoa industry representatives have assured Sen. Harkin and Rep. Engel that they are fully committed to achieving a certification system, which can be expanded across the cocoa-growing areas of West Africa and will cover 50 percent of the cocoa growing areas of Cote d'Ivoire and Ghana by July 1, 2008.
The Department of Labor's Annual Findings on the Worst Forms of Child Labor
In 2000, when Congress passed the Trade and Development Act (TDA), the United States affirmed its commitment to eliminate the worst forms of child labor by adopting an amendment I offered adding a new requirement to our trade preference programs for developing nations. The new eligibility criteria included a requirement that countries take steps to implement ILO Convention 182,"On the Elimination of the Worst Forms of Child Labor," in order to continue receiving US trade preferences.
Additionally, the amendment required the President to submit an annual report to Congress on the status of the beneficiary country's implementation of its international commitments to eliminate the worst forms of child labor.
The countries referenced in the legislation are those countries that receive trade benefits under the U.S. Generalized System of Preferences (GSP), and includes GSP countries designated to receive additional benefits under the Caribbean Basin Trade Partnership Act and the African Growth and Development Act. In addition, the 2004 report includes information on former GSP recipients that have negotiated free trade agreements with the United States over the last two years. View these reports
