Later a similar arrangement was made with the Department of Agriculture, using its county agents as points of contact between workers and jobs. This was of course definitely a "mail order" service, and suffered from all the handicaps and ills inherent in that system. Nevertheless it accomplished much, especially in the distribution of farm labor. And it served as a training ground in employment work which was of material advantage later. Functioning merely as a clearance medium, it achieved some notable successes, particularly in the matter of the Salem, Mass., fire in 1914, when the machinery proved effective in meeting a serious emergency. The fire destroyed the manufacturing and tenement sections of Salem and threw about 3,500 workers out of their employment and their homes. Most of them were textile operatives and boot and shoe workers. Through the division of information of the Bureau of Immigration, the Secretary of Labor got in touch with manufacturers in those two industries in all the States within reasonable distance. With the help of the Massachusetts State employment service, practically all of the workers who were willing to leave Salem were placed in other plants. War Organization of the United States Employment Service THE employment service machinery of the Bureau of Immigration had been in operation about three years when the United States entered the war, and at that time consisted of offices in 41 cities and branches in 52 cities, extending over 37 States. In 1917 the Secretary of Labor asked for an appropriation of $750,000 with which to establish and operate a national employment system which would be adequate to meet war needs. Congress granted only $250,000 for employment work, but shortly after the employment bill was passed the President allotted an additional $825,000 from the security and defense fund for the reorganization and expansion of the employment service. With effective organization thus made possible, the United States Employment Service was separated from the Immigration Bureau in January, 1918, and established as a distinct unit, administered by the Department of Labor through the assistant secretary. The headquarters office in Washington was organized under a director and two assistant directors, one for administration and one for the field, with an auxiliary planning and policies board composed of the chiefs of the various divisions of the department. One of the first things undertaken after the organization of the employment service * * * was to establish offices in the several States. Fifteen or 20 men possessing Government experience and some acquaintance with employment business were selected and detailed to the various States for the purpose of expanding the existing offices and organizing additional ones wherever necessary. This work was accomplished with such dispatch that at the end of the fiscal year there were in existence more than 400 employment offices throughout the entire United States. Hand in hand with this undertaking was the organization of the United States into 13 employment districts and the selection and appointment of superintenddents of those districts, as well as the appointment of a Federal director in each State. 12 12 United States Employment Service. Annual report of the director general for fiscal year ending June 30, 1918, p. 6. In addition to the State branches, nation-wide divisions were established-the Public Service Reserve, the Boy's Working Reserve, the Farm Service Division, the Women's Division, and the Negro Division. Local volunteer advisory bodies known as community labor boards were also created. These were composed of two men, one representing employers and one the employees; two women, one representing working women and the other representing management, and a fifth member, the local agent of the United States Employment Service, who acted as chairman. The Public Service Reserve was a recruiting medium which functioned locally through 15,000 enrollment agents. These agents, acting under direction of a Federal director for each State, seek out workers in less essential occupations and through the employment offices distribute them at the points where they are most vitally needed to bring about maximum production. The enrollment agents of the Public Service Reserve aid in the recruiting of labor for the employment districts in which they operate. They also act as agents of the community labor boards in stimulating and supervising the moving of workers from less essential to more essential occupations; in moving male workers into war work from occupations that can be readily filled by women, and in making industrial and man-power surveys. 13 The Boys' Working Reserve, engaged chiefly in agricultural work, will be taken up later in discussing the handling of farm labor. The Women's Division served two purposes: One was that of making surveys to determine where and to what extent the work of women could be substituted for that of men. The other was actual placement in essential and related industries of large numbers of women who had been affected by lessened production in nonessential industries. War Labor Recruiting As THE director of the United States Employment Service expressed it, the service "was called upon to perform the very remarkable feat of building a machine and operating it at the same time." In June, 1918, the War Labor Policies Board adopted a resolution declaring that: All recruiting of industrial labor for public or private work connected with the war shall be conducted through or in accordance with methods authorized by the United States Employment Service. * * * The full power of the Government shall be exercised through such agency to supply all the labor requirements of war industry and by means of volunteer recruitment to transfer men to such extent as may be necessary from nonwar to war work. An immediate campaign to secure the unskilled labor needed in war work shall be made by the United States Employment Service.14 * * * This was followed immediately by a presidential proclamation which pointed out that "a central agency must have sole direction of all recruiting of civilian workers in war work; and in taking over this great responsibility must at the same time have power to assure to essential industry an adequate supply of labor, even to the extent of withdrawing workers from nonessential production." The President therefore urged "all employers engaged in war work to refrain after August 1, 1918, from recruiting unskilled labor in any manner except through this central agency." 15 13 United States Employment Service. Annual report of the director general for fiscal year ending June 30, 1918, p. 9. 14 Idem, p. 31. 18 Idem, p. 33. In order to perform the enormous amount of work involved in program of controlled recruiting and placement, some reorganization of the service was necesssary. A policy of centralized administration and decentralized operation was adopted, by which the district organi zation was eliminated and the State made the administrative unit with full power and responsibility placed upon the Federal directo of employment in each State. Federal directors for the State wer instructed to cooperate with existing State and local employmen services. While such cooperation was greatly desired and was ob tained in most cases, some friction developed; but the position taker was that the national interest as interpreted by the United State Employment Service was paramount and "must at all times prevail.' Regulations governing employers engaged in war work were adopted by the service, which prohibited advertising and the use of private employment agencies to obtain unskilled labor, but allowed employ ers to hire workers who applied directly to the plant, and permitted the use of scouts under the direction of the local employment office. Interstate transportation of workers was permitted only under regulation and control of the service. No restrictions were placed upon individual recruiting of skilled labor, beyond warning against "labor stealing" and practices which might cause "restlessness among men who are already engaged in other war work." Federal directors were instructed to give every possible assistance in obtaining skilled labor for employers engaged in essential industries and on war contracts. Local placement offices were organized and opened as necessity arose, and reached a maximum of nearly 500. Special services were developed to handle shipyard, marine, and mine labor. This undertaking, in the case of workers in the Puget Sound shipyards and longshoremen on the Atlantic seaboard, broke up the practice in those industries of drawing labor from the waiting lines, or "shapes which congregated at the various shipyard gates and on the docks, and organized central labor pools from which workers were drawn as needed. The mining division helped to meet the shortage of mine labor by establishing contact with practical miners who had left the mines and were engaged in nonwar work, and inducing them to return to the mines. On the whole the entire program of centralized labor recruiting was carried out in a thorough and practical manner, and the results accomplished amply justify the wisdom of establishing it. Its benefits were seen in the reducing of labor turnover, in the transferring of unskilled labor from nonwar work to war work, and in the directing of unemployed or partially employed wage earners to industries closely allied with the prosecution of the war. All of these measures were important factors in adding to the number of laborers steadily engaged in war work.16 Farm Labor ONE of the most difficult tasks, in view of the universal shortage of common labor, was to find enough men to take care of the harvest in the western grain fields. The Employment Service opened a field office in Kansas City, Mo., to recruit and distribute harvest labor, and to obtain data on acreage, dates of cutting, and the labor demand. These data were secured through the cooperation of county agents 16 United States Employment Service. Annual report of the director general for 1919, p. 8. of the Department of Agriculture, the rural telephone offices, and the farmers' organizations. Recruiting was facilitated by publicity contributed by motion-picture producers, newspaper stories and advertisements, and the distribution of posters to the post offices and railroad stations. Field representatives of the service were stationed at various centers to handle mobilization and distribution to strategic points, from which allotment to the farmers within the community on the basis of need or previous requisition was usually made by county agents and local community boards. Operations started in Oklahoma and Kansas and moved north as the grain ripened, with representatives of the service routing and directing the army of harvesters as they were needed. The demand for labor on truck and fruit farms was met in large part by the United States Employment Service through the Boys' Working Reserve. This body was made up of boys between 16 and 21 years of age, organized primarily to help in maintaining food production. During 1918 it enrolled approximately 250,000 boys of high-school age, nearly all of whom went from cities and towns to work on farms. Some of the notable mobilization records are as follows: In Illinois 21,000 boys worked on the farms; in Connecticut 10,000 boys helped care for the largest acreage of food crops in the history of the State; in New York State 12,000 members rendered invaluable service on the farms; in Indiana 15,000 boys were sent to the farm.17 In some States farm training camps or demonstration farms were established in conjunction with the State agricultural college, where the boys were given short intensive instruction in farm work before they were put to work; in other States the boys were sent without preliminary instruction directly to the farms where their services were most needed. Postwar Activities AFTER the armistice, the work of the United States Employment Service bearing directly upon war production was immediately discontinued. Recruiting and distribution of unskilled labor were stopped, and the regulations concerning the hiring of workers were withdrawn. Also the special organizations, such as the Public Service Reserve, Boys' Working Reserve, and others, were dropped. Very soon the problem became not one of finding workers but of finding jobs for the demobilized service men and the workers thrown out of employment by the sudden stoppage of war production. The War Department and the War Industries Board called upon the United States Employment Service for information absolutely necessary in order that contracts for war materials might be curtailed or canceled and the Army demobilized with the least possible danger of serious unemployment during the period of reconstruction. To that end, instructions were issued on November 20, 1918, to all Federal directors of the employment service, under the terms of which a survey in about 122 selected industrial centers was undertaken in cooperation with the community labor boards, and a statement of labor conditions in those industrial centers telegraphed each week to the War Industries Board. The information contained in these telegrams was of value in the determination of questions relating to the effect of cancellation of war contracts upon the labor market.18 17 United States Employment Service. 18 United States Employment Service. Annual report of the director general for 1918, p. 11. To meet the actual problem of placement "bureaus for returning soldiers and sailors" were established locally through joint action of the Federal, State, and municipal employment services, the Federal Departments of War, Navy, and Agriculture, the Red Cross, the Council of National Defense, and the many public service and welfare agencies. Over 2,000 of these bureaus were founded and through them placement was carried on locally. This work was progressing satisfactorily when, in March, 1919, the failure of a deficiency appropriation bill left the United States Employment Service practically without funds. Immediate reduction to to a skeleton organization took place, but through private contributions and the cooperation of organized forces already engaged in placement work, most of the offices were maintained until the end of the fiscal year, on June 30. The appropriation granted the United States Employment Service for the fiscal year 1919-20 was insufficient to maintain any field organization. Accordingly, on October 10, the employment offices up to that time operated by the service were turned over to the several States and municipalities in which they had been maintained, or, where this was not possible, they were abandoned. The system of cooperation with the States and municipalities which had been established was, however, maintained and developed. The official head of the State employment service, or, where a State service did not exist, the authorized representative of a local employment bureau, became the Federal director of the United States Employment Service at the nominal salary of a dollar a year; the employment offices successively turned over to the control of the State or local authority carried with them the furniture and equipment, together with the franking privilege and such blanks and forms as were deemed necessary to facilitate the transmission to the Washington office of uniform reports; and finally, a sum of money was allotted to each of the States in which a cooperating service was maintained to provide for the additional clerical service which such cooperation entailed.19 With the addition of its harvest labor and juvenile placement work, that statement covers the status of the United States Employment Service since that time. Of the significance of the war-time organization in the development of the public employment office movement, the Russell Sage Foundation says: Notwithstanding the gigantic handicaps which the service encountered, it has not been without its positive contributions. In the first place, it has given to the people of this country something of an insight into the function and possibilities not only of local employment offices but also of a nation-wide service. * * * Particularly to the employees engaged in the State and city offices has the experience of the United States Employment Service given a broader vision of their work. It has instilled in them new ideals and aspirations. In the second place, the service has done much to point the way toward better administration of public employment offices.20 Present Organization and Activities of State Services CONTROL and direction of the employment service throughout the State are lodged in a special bureau administered by a superintendent or a director in four States: California, Illinois, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. Administration of the employment service is assigned to 19 United States Employment Service. Annual report of the director general for 1920, p. 6. 20 Harrison, Shelby, and associates: Public Employment Offices. New York, Russell Sage Foundation, 1924, p. 134. |