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"NCLR" redirects here. For other uses, see NCLR (disambiguation).

National Council of La Raza

Abbreviation	La Raza
Formation	1968
Headquarters	Washington D.C.
President/CEO	Janet Murguía
Website	http://www.nclr.org

The National Council of La Raza (NCLR) is a non-profit and non-partisan advocacy group in the United States. It is not to be confused with La Raza Unida. Its stated focus is on reducing poverty and discrimination, and improving opportunities for Hispanics. According to the organization's website, it is "the largest national Hispanic civil rights and advocacy organization in the United States" and "serves all Hispanic subgroups in all regions of the country". NCLR receives funding from philanthropic organizations, such as the Ford Foundation, and corporations such as Citigroup and Wal-Mart. NCLR serves its constituency by means of its Affiliates, nearly 300 community-based organizations. The NCLR is headquartered in Washington, D.C. and maintains eight regional offices in Atlanta, Chicago, Los Angeles, New York, Phoenix, Sacramento, San Antonio, and San Juan, Puerto Rico. The current president is Janet Murguía.

Work

NCLR works on a variety of different issues affecting the Latino community in the U.S. such as health, housing, education, workforce development, and youth leadership. NCLR’s Institute for Hispanic Health works to reduce the incidence, burden, and impact of health conditions such as diabetes, heart disease, cancer, and HIV/AIDS. The NCLR Homeownership Network operates in 20 states and provides counseling on purchasing a home and managing the investment after purchase. NCLR also has both early childhood and secondary education programs which stress literacy, college preparation, and parent involvement. The organization’s education programs also address the needs of Latino and English language learner students through a network of community-based charter schools. In addition, NCLR works to increase employment opportunities for Latino youth through its Escalera program. Youth leadership is also stressed in the Líderes initiative that links youth development organizations around the country into one national network. Through all these programs, NCLR provides technical assistance to its network of community-based organizations around the country working on the same issues.

NCLR’s policy team also works on a range of similar issues including civic engagement, criminal and juvenile justice, wealth-building, housing, education, health, and that for which they are most well-known, immigration. The organization advocates on behalf of Hispanics in the United States by conducting research and informing policy-makers about how proposed or existing legislation affects the Latino community.

History

The NCLR grew out of efforts to form a national civil rights organization that would advocate for Mexican Americans. In the early 1960s, the National Organization for Mexican American Services (NOMAS) persuaded the Ford Foundation to fund a study of Mexican Americans. The Foundation went further, hiring Herman Gallegos, Dr. Julian Samora, and Dr. Ernesto Galarza to consult with other leaders on ways to improve conditions for Mexican American communities.

As a result of these discussions, Gallegos, Samora and Galarza founded the Southwest Council of La Raza (SWCLR) in Phoenix, Arizona, in 1968. Financial support from the Ford Foundation, the National Council of Churches, and the United Auto Workers allowed the SWCLR to get off the ground, and the organization received 501(c)(3) status later that year.

In 1973, the SWCLR became a national organization, changed its name to the National Council of La Raza, and moved its headquarters to Washington, D.C. Early disagreements among the leadership led the Ford Foundation to threaten to withhold funding, resulting in President Henry Santiestevan's resignation and the election of Raul Yzaguirre.

In 1973, the NCLR bylaws were amended to require equal representation of women on the board of directors.

Beginning in about 1975, the NCLR began expanding its focus to include the issues of non-Mexican American Latinos. This policy was made official in 1979. By 1980, the NCLR was funded almost entirely by the federal government. When the Reagan Administration slashed social funding, the NCLR was forced to cut back the scale of its operations. As a result, the organization began focusing on national policy and concentrating its efforts in Washington, D.C. After the 1996 Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act, state governments exerted more control over the disbursement of welfare funds, which led to the development of the NCLR's Field Advocacy Project to influence decisions at the state and local levels.

Definition of the phrase "La Raza"

The exact, and most accurate, translation of the term, 'La Raza', is, 'the race', meaning the race of Hispanics, Natives, Mestizos in the Americas . In the context that NCLR uses it, “La Raza” it means “the people,” or “the Hispanic people of the New World” — people of Chicano (i.e. Mexican American) and Mexican descent and the Hispanic world, as well as mestizos who share Native American or national Hispanic heritage.

Controversy

Anti-illegal immigration websites, such as American Patrol and The American Resistance (which have both been accused of promoting white supremacism by the Anti-Defamation League and SPLC), accuse NCLR of encouraging illegal immigration to the United States, and the latter hosts an exhaustive list of companies and organizations that donate to the NCLR.

Some critics, including conservative talk radio host George Putnam, consider NCLR exclusionary in its approach to civil rights. Also to criticize NCLR was Republican congressman Charlie Norwood of Georgia's ninth district. In a December 2005 edition of the conservative publication Human Events, Representative Norwood criticized congressional earmarking of four million dollars for NCLR housing initiatives. He said that "we ought not to send taxpayer's money to people who absolutely advocate perhaps using that money for the country not to follow the law of the land and not to secure our country's borders." NCLR wrote a letter to Rep. Norwood explaining that funding is given to a subsidiary of the organization called the Raza Development Fund which provides funding for affordable housing, health care centers and educational facilities.

NCLR responded by defending its policies and demanding an apology from Norwood . It claims has never been racially or ethnically exclusionary, has never supported the notion of a “Reconquista” or “Aztlán”, has never used, and unequivocally rejects, the motto “Por La Raza todo. Fuera de La Raza nada" [which is often translated as "For the Race, everything, outside the Race, nothing"], has supported numerous measures to ensure that all Americans have the freedom to choose where to live, and that its programs are covered by civil rights laws administered by independent agencies at the federal, state, and local level. It also disputed the charge that it supports illegal immigration, reiterating its support for effective and reasonable border security and immigration-law enforcement.

Its website states that it “has repeatedly recognized the right of the United States, as a sovereign nation, to control its borders. Moreover, NCLR has supported numerous specific measures to strengthen border enforcement.” In a speech in San Diego, NCLR CEO Janet Murguía stated: "First, as a sovereign nation, the United States has the right to determine who comes and who stays. . . [It also] has a right to consider enforcement at a variety of levels, including border enforcement, interior enforcement, and workplace enforcement. . . We support enforcement...[because] as Americans, we recognize it's the right thing to do."

See also

• Esteban E. Torres NCLR-Harvard Mid-Career Fellowship Program
• LNESC
• Latino
• American GI Forum
• SVREP
• LULAC
• MALDEF
• La Raza
• The Bronze Race
• MEChA

External links

• Official site
• NCLR Q&A
• Video Documentary on the National Council of La Raza (Voices of Vision)