Evening star., 1948-02-15
Labor Department Wages
Fight for Its Existence
Future of Truncated Agency at Stake
In Reorganization Controversy
Rv Gerard d. Reilly

By Gerard D. Reilly
Established 80 years ago by one Of the last
acts of Congress signed by President William
Howard Taft the Department Of Labor now
is engaged in serious battle in Congress, upon
the outcome of which its right to any real
existence depends. Should the Senate follow
the example of the House and reject President
Truman's reorganization plan for placing lthe
United States Employment Service and the
Division of Unemployment Compensation under
the supervision of the Secretary of Labor, its
continuance as an agency of cabinet status
would be an anomaly.
BY operation of the termination clause In
the War Powers Act, the Employment Services
would be absorbed by the Federal Security
Agency If the reorganization plan fails. With
out this important unit, the department would
consist largely of two autonomous bureaus, the
Wage and Hour Division, which administers
the Fair Labor Standards and the Walsh
Healey Public Contracts Acts, and the Bureau
of Labor Statistics Each Of these bureaus now
Is headed by an officer appointed by the Presi-
dent with the advice and consent of the Senate
and operates with a minimum of attention
from the Secretarys office.
Three other large bureaus, identified with
the department for quarter of century,
have gone elsewhere. The immigration and
Naturalization Service. transferred to the De-
partment of Justice as wartime expedient,
never has been returned. Under a Truman
reorganization plan in 1916, the Childrens Bu-
reau was liqudated and its functions under
the Social Security Act vested in the Federal
security administrator Then Congress in l947
made the Cancellation Service an independent
establishment
When the Congressional Directory lists the
Department of Labor as including two other
operating agencies, these are SO tiny that they
might more appropriately be assigned to
section of the Wage-Hour Division. One is the
Women's Bureau, whose mission largely was
fulfilled when the Supreme Court upheld the
constitutionality of State minimum wage legis-
lation for women and minors This legislation,
in turn, ceased to be important when Congress
passed the Fair Labor Standards Act in 1888.
..
The other is the Division Of Labor Standards.
Despite its imposing title, this agency has no
organic act' on the statute books. Its primary
assignment has been to promote State legisla-
ton in the field of factory inspection with
particular reference to health and safety. This
function also largely is obsolete by reason of
the broad construction placed by the Supreme
Court in recent years upon the commerce
clause of the Federal Constitution.
1t therefore is vital to the department, If 1t is
not to sink into insignifcance, to have the
authority for co-ordinating the field OF officers
Of the Employment Service with the admins
tratlon of unemployment compensation. The
Senate last year approved the principle Of con-
solidation. The attempt OF the Social Security
Board to bring about this reform before the
war proved dismal failure because OF its will
ingness to let State politicians have free
hand in the spending of Federal funds. Con-
sequently, there was considerable sentiment in
Congress for intrusting this responsibility to
the Labor Department.
Unfortunately, the ultimate success of the
plan now has been jeopardized by penalties.
Beset by some evil genius, Secretary Schwelen-
bach at the very time that the proposed re-
organization was under review by the House
Committee on Executive Expenditures became
ernbroiled in matter wholly beyond the con-
Germ of his department-the strike called by the
CIO in the Government cafeterias. His in
tervention stirred the wrath of Representative
Hoffman, whose labor subcommittee was looking
into the matter. On this particular issue the
Michigan Representative happened to be right.
for the only issue involved arose under the
National Labor Relations Act-a question OF
whether the union still has majority.
Even when the Cancellation Service still was
in the Department of Labor. such controversies
always were considered to lie within the ex-
elusive province of the Labor Board In this
instance, the union under the new labor law
had disqualified itself from using the facilities
of the board.
Had the Secretary's ill-advised venture as
mediator succeeded, 1t would have meant that
Communist dominated unions like the United
Public Workers, CIO, would gain tactical
advantage by defying the law. The right OF
every union to request an employer to enter
into a~contract with it depends upon its repre-
sentation of a majority of the employees.
union which files the requisite documents still
runs the risk of defeat in Labor Board elec-
tion and it would seem absurd to relieve nom
complying union from this danger.
The Secretary's failure to grasp the sgnf-
cance of the issue impaired his standing in the
House. After his testimony before the Hoff-
man subcommittee. the Committee on Expend-
itures, also headed by the Michigan Repre-
sentative rendered an adverse report on the
reorganization plan which the House adopted
Mr.. Schwellenbach is a former Senator and
a former Federal judge. AS was the case with
his predecessor. Miss Perkins, the fact that he
was not selected from the ranks Of organized
labor was based on the intent OF keeping the
department aloof from union politics. 1t is TO
be hoped that in the interest of preserving his
agency from further dismemberment, he will
dspel this impression of partisanship when
the plan is being considered in the Senate,
believed to result from an explosion Of the