After the war, at Frankfurter's request, the Bureau prepared reports on the labor situation in foreign countries for the use of the U.S. delegation to the Peace Conference. Early in 1919, Meeker went to England as economic adviser to a group of employers for a study sponsored by the Department of Labor on the British reconstruction experience. Ethelbert Stewart was also sent to England to help prepare for the Washington meeting of the International Labor Conference.

The U.S. contribution to the quasi-official International Association for Labor Legislation and its Labor Office through a congressional appropriation to the Bureau for the purpose was continued throughout the war. However, with the establishment of the League of Nations and its International Labor Office, Congress discontinued the subvention. 112

Resignation

On May 5, 1920, Meeker wrote President Wilson of the "flattering offer" he had received to head up the Scientific Division of the International Labor Office to perform work similar to that of the Bureau. He felt that this was a fine opportunity to help organize the new ILO, a major office in the League of Nations. At the same time, he recommended Allan H. Willett of the University of Pennsylvania, who had directed the industrial survey, as his successor. In his formal letter of resignation to the President a month later, Meeker expressed his commitment to the Wilsonian ideal of a League of Nations. "I regret very much to sever myself from your Administration, but it seems to me that I can best serve the ideals for which you stand by accepting this position."113

President Wilson supported Meeker's decision to go to the ILO but reserved his decision on his successor. The President wrote that, after consultation with Secretary Wilson, he had "come to agree with him that a better appointment would be Mr. Ethelbert Stewart of Illinois." He went on to say, "I know you would be gratified by the terms in which the Secretary of Labor speaks of your own work at the head of the Bureau."114

In commenting on Meeker's resignation, Secretary Wilson described him "as an exceptionally efficient administrator of the Bureau of Labor Statistics." He cited as Meeker's accomplishments, in addition to the Bureau's regular fact-gathering, which "he has handled

with sound judgment and quiet determination," first, coordination of the Bureau's work with that of the States and standardization of industrial terminology and methods; second, reorganization of the cost-of-living work on a family budget or market basket basis; and, third, his wartime studies of wages and living costs, accepted by all the wage boards. The Secretary concluded that, while Meeker's sympathies "were always with the workers, he never allowed these sympathies to distort the facts."115

Later years

Meeker continued his activities in social and labor economics for the next quarter century. From 1920 to 1923, he served as Chief of the Scientific Division of the International Labor Office of the League of Nations in Geneva. He returned to the United States to serve as Secretary of Labor and Industry for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania under the Republican progressive Gifford Pinchot from 1923 to 1924. In 1924 also, he went to China under the auspices of the Institute of Social and Religious Research of New York as a member of the Commission on Social Research in China. In 1926 and 1927, he was a professor of economics at Carleton College in Minnesota. In 1930, he became associated with Irving Fisher as president of the Index Number Institute in New Haven, a position he held until 1936. During this period, he also directed a survey of aged persons for the State of Connecticut and became a special agent of the Connecticut Department of Labor. In 1941, he was named Administrative Assistant and Director of Research and Statistics of the Connecticut Department, from which he retired in 1946. He died in New Haven in 1953.

Chapter V.

Ethelbert Stewart:
Holding the Fort

E

thelbert Stewart, appointed in June 1920, was the first Commissioner of Labor Statistics to come from the ranks. Carroll

Wright had hired him as a special agent 33 years earlier, and

he had served the Bureau in increasingly responsible positions for most of the period. Although he was 63 when he became Commissioner, he devoted 12 more years to the Bureau, serving during the administrations of Woodrow Wilson, Warren Harding, Calvin Coolidge, and Herbert Hoover.

During these years, the political climate was not a favorable one for the Department of Labor or the Bureau. Congressional and administration policies encouraged business interests, and the Department of Commerce, for 8 years headed by Herbert Hoover, grew in influence. Congress also gave some attention to the needs of farmers, who were suffering from depressed prices, by granting the Department of Agriculture additional funds, mainly for agricultural statistics. Other agencies, however, were subject to economy drives.

Following the brief recession of 1921, there was relative prosperity during much of Stewart's tenure, except in agriculture and in such "sick" industries as coal and textiles. The growth of the consumer

durable goods industries—automobiles, radios, refrigerators, and electric and gas stoves-contributed substantially as mass production, low prices, and installment credit brought these products increasingly into American households. Even with prosperity, however, there was constant unemployment, attributed largely to technological change.

For the first time in a period of prosperity, organized labor was unable to increase its membership or influence. A combination of factors contributed, including antiunion policies in the growing mass production industries, the continuing craft orientation of the American Federation of Labor, conservative Federal labor policies, and court decisions unfavorable to labor.

While Stewart fought for funds to modernize the Bureau's statistical and analytical work, he was usually rebuffed. Only when concern over unemployment mounted in the late 1920's did Congress provide additional funds. Under difficult circumstances, Stewart maintained the Bureau's independence and objectivity, standing firm against misuse of its reports for political purposes. He broke new ground in the field of productivity measurement and, with the encouragement and advice of the professional organizations, achieved some gains in the coverage and reliability of the Bureau's traditional employment, wage, and occupational safety programs.

The fourth Commissioner

Born in Cook County, Illinois, in 1857, Stewart spent his early years on the family farm. Because of a stammer, he was "practically barred" from any formal schooling, but he read voraciously and received some private tutoring. At 20, he moved to Lincoln, Illinois, to publish the Lincoln County Republican, but later sold his interest. After trying several jobs, he went to work at the Decatur (Illinois) Coffin Factory. While at the factory, Stewart joined a "workingmen's club" in Decatur and became involved in politics. In 1885, he ran for city clerk on a workingmen's ticket and served as an officer at the Illinois State Trades and Labor Convention; he was blacklisted by the coffin company for his activities.1

In 1885, Governor Richard J. Oglesby appointed Stewart Secretary to the Illinois Bureau of Labor Statistics, apparently at the suggestion of Henry Demarest Lloyd, financial editor of the Chicago Tribune. Stewart had visited Lloyd, impressed by his attacks on the

monopolistic power exercised by the giant oil and railroad corporations, and they had formed what was to be a lifelong friendship.

Also in 1885, Stewart became editor of the Decatur Labor Bulletin, having joined the Knights of Labor a few months earlier. For several years to follow, he held positions with various labor papers.

Stewart was reappointed as Secretary of the Illinois Bureau of Labor Statistics in 1887 and for successive 2-year terms through 1893. In this capacity he participated in a number of investigations of labor conditions in the State.

In 1887, he obtained a position as a special agent for the new Federal Bureau of Labor. In 1889, he wrote Wright about the possibility of securing a permanent position, but the Commissioner apparently demurred then because of Stewart's speech problem. He continued to do fieldwork for the Bureau in the Midwest until 1910. Among other major studies, he worked on Regulation and Restriction of Output with John R. Commons. Under Neill, he planned and conducted the fieldwork for studies of the telephone and telegraph industries and the Bethlehem Steel Corporation.

In 1910, Stewart transferred to the Tariff Board and in 1912 to the Children's Bureau, serving as statistician of each agency.

He returned to the Bureau of Labor Statistics in 1913 to function simultaneously as Chief Clerk, Chief Statistician, and Deputy Commissioner, Meeker's second in command. In addition to his extended Bureau responsibilities, he served the Department in a variety of capacities. Between 1913 and 1916, Secretary Wilson called upon him to investigate and mediate strikes in coal mining, the garment industry, and street railways. In 1917, the Secretary appointed him to a board of arbitration for wage adjustment in New York Harbor. During the war he served as chief of the Department's Investigation and Inspection Service, part of the War Labor Administration, conducting a number of brief surveys. In 1919, he went to London to help plan the League of Nations Labor Conference that met in Washington later that year. On returning from London, Stewart served as a technical adviser to the Bituminous Coal Commission. In 1920, as the special representative of the Secretary, he investigated deportation cases and, in that connection, advised on bail policy.2

In June 1920, the Secretary recommended Stewart to President Wilson for the position of Commissioner of Labor Statistics to succeed Royal Meeker. Stewart had not been Meeker's first choice, but