Background
Ernest Kent Coulter was born on November 14, 1871 in Columbus, Ohio, United States. He was the son of James Hervey and Emily J. Erwin Coulter.
(Excerpt from The Children in the Shadow Hen a child is a...)
Excerpt from The Children in the Shadow Hen a child is arraigned in Court, there are always three delinquents, the child, the parent and the community. And the last is the worst sinner, for it let the slum grow, that wrecked home and child alike. 'that is the answer that comes from the Chil dren's Court to the cry, What of the night? About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.
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Ernest Kent Coulter was born on November 14, 1871 in Columbus, Ohio, United States. He was the son of James Hervey and Emily J. Erwin Coulter.
He attended local schools, eventually graduating with the B. A. degree from Ohio State University in 1893. Coulter then attended the New York Law School, completing its course by 1894. Continuing his studies at the New York Law School he received the LL. B. degree in 1904.
In 1893 he worked as a journalist for the Dispatch in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, for which he became tri-state editor.
He worked in the editorial department of the Telegram and in 1897 joined the Herald. He became its correspondent when the Spanish-American War began, covering events in both Cuba and Puerto Rico.
In 1900 Coulter was appointed assistant city editor of the New York Evening Sun and worked there until 1902, when he left journalism to assist in the operations of the Children's Court. It was one of a number of agencies that concerned citizens, cooperating with interested judges and others, had initiated, notably in Chicago, Philadelphia, and Providence, Rhode Island to foster the procedure of distinguishing juvenile delinquents from more mature transgressors of the law.
Coulter served as clerk of the New York Children's Court until 1912, when he formed the private law firm of Coulter and Bond. Coulter was not so outspoken a reformer as his contemporary Benjamin Barr Lindsey of Colorado, who stirred up political battles by making accusations that special interests exploiting labor passed on harmful heritages of poverty and crime to children.
He observed many juvenile delinquents, often among immigrant families, and viewed them as products of disorderly homes and as influenced by their association with other delinquents or adult offenders.
Over the years Coulter was responsible for many ordinances in defense of children's rights. He sought protection for children jeopardized by labor and work conditions unsuitable to their ages. He kept alert to the delinquency of adults and parents who abandoned the young or contributed to their law-breaking.
Coulter noted that many social violations by children resulted from distorted efforts to create play conditions, and he urged the need for facilities that would give disturbed children the opportunities of which they previously had been deprived. Coulter noted that wayward children were often positively motivated as a result of the aid or understanding provided by his friends.
In 1904 Coulter spoke before the men's club of his church, declaring that the tenement child was their neighbor and responsibility.
The forty men who offered to answer Coulter's appeal became the nucleus of what became the Big Brother movement. In 1946 the organization became the Big Brothers of America. Coulter later joined to his association a Big Sister movement, which grew to become the Big Brother and Big Sister Federation, of which he himself became honorary life president.
In 1914 he added to his causes that of the New York Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. He became its manager and assistant to the president and remained in that capacity until his retirement in 1936. Coulter wrote articles for magazines praising the children's courts.
He lectured widely on his favorite theme, urging, for example, the suppression of films concerned with crime because he considered that they encouraged children in dissolute ways.
In 1917 Coulter joined the Plattsburg (New York) Training Camp, which was set up in anticipation of American intervention in World War I. Commissioned a major in the United States Headquarters Reserve, he was later made a colonel and served with the American Expeditionary Force in General John J. Pershing's entourage. As historical officer of the AEF, Coulter saw action at Aisne-Marne, Oise-Aisne, and Meuse-Argonne, where he took photographs and motion pictures and prepared official accounts for the Army War College.
He later headed the historical section of the Office of the Quartermaster General. Coulter continued in his concern for children, emphasizing the need for them to be raised in a healthy environment. In one of his articles, "Psychiatric Bunk, " published in the October 7, 1931, issue of Outlook, he expressed his scorn for those behaviorists who transgressed common sense.
In 1934 he was a featured speaker, along with the archbishop of Canterbury and the lord mayor of London, at the fiftieth anniversary jubilee meeting of the National Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Children of England.
He died in Santa Barbara, California.
Coulter helped to organize the Boy Scouts of America and was on its national council. At various times he also helped direct the Campfire Girls and the Federated Boys Clubs, working with such patrons as Mrs. William K. Vanderbilt, whose particular interest was helping delinquent girls. He helped found the first clinic in New York for studying the behavior of delinquents.
(Excerpt from The Children in the Shadow Hen a child is a...)
He contributed legal as well as administrative expertise in pressing Congress for an antinarcotics law, which in 1914 passed as the Harrison Act; the law made it a crime to buy certain drugs, the purchase of which had been a matter of individual choice. Coulter's book The Children in the Shadow (1913) summed up his program and experiences and was endorsed by Jacob A. Riis, who contributed a preface.
Quotations: "If each man here will take an interest in just one boy, who has been the victim of bad environment, and will be a sort of big brother to him, that will be a real service. "
He was a strong, conservative and compassionate man.
In 1946 he married Ora May Malone, a widow.
