Category: Economists

Categories
Economists George Mason Virginia Tech

Virginia Tech. Letter from James Buchanan to Earl Hamilton, 1983

 

Because the papers of the economic historian, Earl Hamilton, are generally an ill-sorted grab bag of documents, I figured the following letter from James Buchanan to Earl Hamilton on the eve of the former’s move to George Mason University had a small probability of being used by future Buchanan scholars if left to lie in a not-elsewhere-classified folder of Hamilton’s papers. 

The meatiest sentence in the letter for historians of economics is probably:

As for economics, I get more and more discouraged at what is being taught for and what passes for our parent discipline. It seems increasingly escapist to me, grown men playing with toys, despite the acknowledged intellectual fascination.

Womp, womp?

______________________

P.O. Drawer G
Blacksburg, VA 24060
20 May 1983

Professor and Mrs. Earl Hamilton
Oak Ridge, TN 37830

Dear Professor Hamilton and Mrs. Hamilton:

We regret very much that we cannot join with you in celebrating the grand occasion of your sixtieth anniversary. It would be very nice to see both of you again after so many years. And Oak Ridge is within reasonable driving distance of Blacksburg. I have on several occasions lectured at the federal executives institute there. If it were not that I had the earlier scheduled commitment at the Pittsburgh conference, we should surely have been in attendance.

Let us wish both of you all that should be wished on such occasions.

I get news from you occasionally when I see George Stigler, who does, apparently, get to his Flossmoor house every now and then. I have been on a Hoover Advisory Committee that George chairs for several years now. And I was at a small meeting with both George and Ronald Coase last fall in Austria.

Our news, which you may have heard, is that our whole Center for Study of Public Choice, is shifting to George Mason University, in Fairfax (the Washington suburbs) after 1 July this year. So we are in the throes of moving. We shall, personally, keep our country place down here in the mountains, but we have already sold off our town property and plan to live in a Fairfax townhouse when up there, at least until retirement when we shall come back to the mountains permanently by current plans.

I find my research and writing interests moving more and more toward political philosophy and ethics (too much Frank Knight I guess), and I have recently been involved in several papers, which will be a book soon, on the basic logic of constitutional constraints. We have a Cambridge Press commitment to publish it under the title, The Reason of Rules.

As for economics, I get more and more discouraged at what is being taught for and what passes for our parent discipline. It seems increasingly escapist to me, grown men playing with toys, despite the acknowledged intellectual fascination.

My gardening suffers terribly in this wettest of all springs, indeed no spring at all. Nothing comes up even when dry enough to plant. Asparagus at least one month late and piddling. Lettuce which should be now ready only commencing to pop out, and too wet to put in any tomatoes as yet. But we hope.

I know that your day will be a grand occasion. Again I sincerely wish that we could join you. It would be very nice to get the opportunity for a visit.

Sincerely yours,
[signed]
Jim Buchanan

/btr

 

Source: Duke University. David M. Rubenstein Rare Book and Manuscript Library. Economists’ Papers Archive. Earl J. Hamilton papers, Box 4, Folder “Correspondence 1920’s-1930’s; 1960’s; 1980’s; and n.d.”

Image Source: PBS webpage “American Nobel Economists”, James Buchanan Image 14

 

Categories
Economists Harvard War and Defense Economics

Harvard. Reactions to Galbraith’s call for students to boycott professors doing classified government research, 1967

 

Looking through my files of material from the Gottfried Haberler papers at the Hoover Institution Archives, I came across an unpublished, heavily sarcastic “letter to the editor” of the Harvard Crimson by the economic historian Alexander Gerschenkron in reaction to John Kenneth Galbraith’s statement at an anti-war event at Radcliffe in which he suggested that students could reasonably consider boycotting the classes of professors engaged in classified research to protest that war. One of Galbraith’s targets was clearly his colleague Arthur Smithies. (“I assume that Professor Smithies would suppress all protest. Many will doubt the wisdom of this course as also, I trust, the wickedness of the secret work on which he is engaged.”) While the rules of English grammar are such that Galbraith did explicitly state “many will doubt…the wickedness of [Smithies’] secret work…”, it is a pretty cheeky way to simultaneously mention that there are indeed some who will see Smithies’ secret work in a wicked light.

The post ends with a later Harvard Crimson article that reports on Smithies’ career, with considerable emphasis on his work for the U.S. government (including the C.I.A.) on South Vietnam’s economy. We also see below that Thomas Schelling was so little amused by Galbraith’s boycott proposal as to have written a letter for actual publication in the Harvard Crimson.

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“Galbraith Asks Campus Blacklist of Recruiters”

The Boston Globe. 14 November 1967 pp. 1,9.

            Harvard economist John Kenneth Galbraith urged Monday that college students oppose the Vietnam War by publicly blacklisting war-linked campus recruiting agencies and by boycotting professors engaged in classified government research.

Speaking at Radcliffe College, Galbraith explained his blacklist as a “proclamation” on which signatories would state their intention to refuse to work for agencies, such as Dow Chemical Co. or the C.I.A.

A boycott of professors engaged in classified research, he said, would be a “particularly effective way of expressing your opposition.”

The former U.S. ambassador to India, publicly backed “moderate” student demonstrations before a packed Harvard Radcliffe group in Hilles Library.

He cautioned the students against protests that are “violent or in egregiously bad taste.”

These, he said, would “provide a welcomed handle for the opposition.”

Galbraith said he had discussed his blacklist and boycott proposals with colleagues and many found them favorable. He called both courses “legitimate means of dissent within the university framework of conduct rules.”

He originated the black-list concept at talks with business and government leaders who indicated that recruiters are “greatly concerned with campus recruiting demonstrations,” Galbraith said.

Turing to anti-war referenda, Galbraith advised they would have more chances of success if they were worded “for political reality rather [than] for candor.”

The San Francisco anti-war referenda would have had a good chance for approval had it been stated in “milder” terms, he said. (This referendum, which asked: ‘should the U.S. immediately withdraw from Vietnam?’ drew a 38 percent affirmative response.)

“It would be an enormous mistake to assume your protest efforts have been futile,” he told students. Only three years ago, he said the State and Defense Departments” would have assumed wide spread acceptance of escalation.

“But now, in the wake of widespread university opposition to the war, there has been a snowballing effect of mounting opposition.”

His talk was sponsored by the Committee for Effective Action, a student group “opposed to the war but frustrated by the means of opposing it,” explained its spokesman. This was the first of an expected four or five meetings with the faculty.

_________________________

Letter from John Kenneth Galbraith

The Harvard Crimson, November 16, 1967

To the Editors of the CRIMSON:

My distinguished colleague may be out of touch with recent discussion, but the issue is probably worth explaining. Students here and elsewhere have been told how they may not react to university involvement in military activities of which they disapprove. With other Faculty members I assume that this carries an obligation to say how they may react. I suggested (initially in Michigan and later here) that they organize to avoid employment in corporations of whose products they disapprove and classes of professors whose secret contracts they deplore. (I also suggested that this last was inapplicable under Harvard policy and that there be combined effort to find other forms of legitimate and effective protest.) I assume that Professor Smithies would suppress all protest. Many will doubt the wisdom of this course as also, I trust, the wickedness of the secret work on which he is engaged.

John Kenneth Galbraith
Paul M. Warburg Professor of Economics

_________________________

Unsent, but circulated, reaction to Galbraith’s proposal
by Alexander Gerschenkron

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMICS

M-7 Littauer Center
Cambridge 38, Massachusetts

Alexander Gerschenkron
Walter S. Barker Professor of Economics

November 16, 1967

The Editor
The Crimson
Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138

Sir,

It is with greatest possible interest that I have read of Professor Galbraith’s suggestion that students should boycott lectures of those members of the Faculty who are known to engage in classified research. This is a most original and stimulating idea, which is not surprising as nothing less novel and exciting could be expected from Professor Galbraith’s fertile mind.

The only thing that disturbs me are problems of implementation. Professor Galbraith abstained from discussing them, probably feeling that what mattered was to cast abroad a fine idea, while the rest could be safely left to more pedestrian minds. May I try to fill out the gap? Obviously, the first thing that is needed is to provide some machinery in order to discover just who is engaged in classified research. I suggest therefore, that the Student-Faculty Committee should immediately establish a special Sub-Committee charged with carrying out the requisite investigations. It should be called “Student-Faculty Sub-Committee on Un-Left Activities.” This Sub-Committee should interrogate members of the faculty. A difficulty to be faced will no doubt stem from the lack of subpoena powers on the part of the Sub-Committee. But the problem should not be insoluble. The Administration should be put under pressure to agree that those members of the Faculty who 1) refuse to appear before the Un-Left Sub-Committee or, 2) if appearing, refuse to name those colleagues whose connection with classified research is known to them, or 3) refuse to answer questions concerning their own classified research, should be informed by the Administration that such refusals constitute contempt of the Un-Left Sub-Committee, and, by the same token, must be regarded as acts of gross misconduct. In all fairness, the offenders should be given a fortnight to reconsider, but should they stubbornly persist in their hostile attitude, their connection with the University should be severed without further delay.

On the other hand, should the Administration hesitate to accede to the Sub-Committee’s fair and reasonable demands, which as Professor Galbraith likes to say are surely justified by the extraordinary situation in which the country finds itself, occupation of University Hall by the students should be the first natural step, if necessary, to be followed by other more stringent measures.

Thus Professor Galbraith’s idea appears to be altogether practicable. In conclusion, I cannot help praising his wise restraint. He could have suggested, for instance, that also lectures of those Faculty members who either themselves express Un-Left opinions or associate with colleagues who have expressed Un-Left opinions should be boycotted by the students. That he failed to make such suggestions agrees well with the sapient counsels of moderation which informed his speech.

Very truly yours,
[signed]
Alexander Gerschenkron

AG:dod

Note: For reasons well within this writer’s control, the foregoing epistle has failed to reach the editorial office of The Crimson.

Source: The Hoover Institution Archives. Papers of Gottfried Haberler, Box 12, Folder “GH—Alexander Gerschenkron”.

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Letter from John Kenneth Galbraith

The Harvard Crimson, November 16, 1967

To the Editors of The CRIMSON:

I am persuaded that at some risk of repetition I should be sure that there is no misunderstanding of my recent remarks on legitimate and non-violent forms of student protest as these concern University involvements with military activities. Two or three weeks ago in Detroit I was asked to comment on prospective efforts to obstruct physically the Willow Run laboratories operated on contract by the University of Michigan and engaged, I am told, on development of highly secret materiel for use in Vietnam. I urged not alone the futility but the adverse public effects of such action; I said that a better remedy lay against the Faculty members who ran this enterprise. Students might organize to avoid their classes, i.e., peacefully to boycott them. Last Monday evening at the meeting in the Hilles Library arranged by [Radcliffe] President Bunting to discuss legitimate forms of protest I repeated (along with others) this suggestion and added that this particular one would not be without effect on those who sponsored such work in a university but that it did not have application at Harvard where, wisely, the Administration frowned on secret contracts. I confess that I did not think of the possible application of my suggestion to confidential or secret consulting work or research by individual Harvard professors. A member of the Faculty has since invited the attention of those who are, with sufficient reason, sensitive to the association between the University Community and this war. Additionally, my reference to boycott, which of course means peaceful abstention, was evidently taken to mean some kind of physical action.

I would like to urge in the most earnest possible fashion that there be no effort by anyone, students in particular, to identify and oppose in any manner the individual participation by Faculty members in confidential or secret tasks of the government. There is a radical difference between this varied and individual work and the classified contracts for weapons development which I had in mind. This individual work covers a wide range of matters and much, or most, has no bearing on military activity. Most of it is the work of those Faculty members with the strongest instinct for public service. An effort to discriminate between approved and disapproved work would import into the academic community an improper concern for the extra-curricular pacifists who are so engaged as to those who are otherwise disposed. It could also be a most disagreeable source of tension and suspicion.

As members of the Harvard community will be aware, I am not indifferent to the Vietnam war. I regard it as an appalling tragedy; to no other matter of my adult life have I devoted more effort than to opposing the war. But I would be profoundly and also greatly embarrassed were anyone to take my remarks at Radcliffe as an invitation to any form of opposition to the participants of individual Faculty members, on a public or confidential basis, in government activities. Needless to say, none of this impairs in any way my promise at the Radcliffe meeting to work with concerned Faculty members and students to devise other effective, legitimate and non-violent forms of protest.

John Kenneth Galbraith
Paul M. Warburg Professor of Economics

_________________________

Letter from Thomas Schelling in response to Galbraith’s boycott proposal

The Harvard Crimson, December 5, 1967

To the Editors of the CRIMSON:

While I’ve seen no indication that Professor Galbraith’s proposed boycott of professors who do classified research for the government is going to stimulate a new movement, it does raise important questions about the personal activities of faculty members and the ways they may be involved with the government, and about the appropriate selection of target for protest. May I explain why I think his proposal is probably not workable and, if not workable, objectionable?

Let me first point out that Professor Galbraith did not propose that students boycott those professors whose research is objectionable, nor did he clarify what research would be objectionable. His reference was merely to “classified” research. I’m sure that by almost anyone’s standards of wickedness (Galbraith’s term) some classified research would be found unobjectionable. People concerned about the dissemination of nuclear technology, about the limitation of weapons, even about ways of ending the war in Vietnam, often require classified information to do their work or, at least, have to be exposed to classified information in doing their work and cannot do it unless they are willing to safeguard what the government calls “security.” Even if the character of everybody’s classified research could be ascertained, drawing the line between the objectionable and the unobjectionable, or between what any reasonable man would consider objectionable and what some reasonable men might consider to be in the public interest, would require subjective judgments. (Most classified research, incidentally, is probably unrelated to Vietnam.)

Second, much of the unclassified research that goes on would be objectionable to people who oppose any kind of war-related research; and to exclude such unclassified research would be arbitrary discrimination.

Third, “research” itself is difficult to define. Many faculty members are occasionally consultants or members of advisory boards in various agencies, or participants in government-sponsored conferences, sometimes classified, sometimes unclassified. Whether their influence is benign or malignant would be hard to judge; so would the degree of support or implied approval in attendance at a meeting at which one criticizes a government program or decision.

And if unclassified contributions had to pass the same strict test as classified work, to qualify for boycott or immunity from it, one would have to ask whether an activity like the Peace Corps is to be treated as a propaganda arm of the Johnson administration or as a benign and constructive activity. Again a judgment depends on a complex evaluation of the different purposes that a government program may serve.

Finally, are Faculty members who are unaffiliated with the government in any fashion, classified or unclassified, but who openly support the administration’s policy toward Vietnam, to qualify for boycott? It seems strange to exclude them; but again the line would be hard to draw for those who neither wholly support the conduct or the war nor are wholly committed to one drastic alternative. (It is unclear to me on which side of the line Professor Galbraith would be placed.)

I could go on multiplying the difficulties of finding a reasonable line to draw between the non-university-administered activities of professors that are objectionable and those that are not, whatever one’s standards of wickedness; and, further, I doubt whether there is enough consensus on standards to make it possible to draw an agreed line, even if some people think they know where to draw it. If I’m right about this, any line has to be arbitrary, as Professor Galbraith’s line was arbitrary. (If Professor Galbraith interprets his original proposal as applying only to university-administered research, the line is clearer but only because more arbitrary.)

If, though, the line is arbitrary–if its purpose just to mark out an identifiable target without regard to the nature of the research itself or of the non-research activity–then, aside from the likelihood that an embarrassingly large number of angels will be caught in the netful of devils, there is the question of what is being objected to and what the purpose of the boycott is. The purpose can no longer be described as bringing pressure to bear to get objectionable activities terminated. Rather, it would look–to me, at any rate–as though a boycott were being used to induce a particular group of professors to join a boycott against the government, or to embarrass them for declining to join a boycott.

Whatever my feelings about Professor Galbraith’s protest movement, I resent his proposal that students organize to coerce me into joining it. And I hope nobody stays away from Professor Galbraith’s classes in a vain organized attempt to embarrass him into changing his politics.

T.C. Schelling
Professor of Economics

_________________________

An Academic [Arthur Smithies] in the War
By Seth M. Kupferberg

The Harvard Crimson, May 23, 1975

Edward F. Chamberlin, superintendent of Kirkland House, tells a story about a Kirkland celebration that took place some years back, when Arthur Smithies was House master. Smithies was pouring drinks for the members of the victorious House crew team, starting with the bow man and working towards the stern of the shell, and as he reached the stroke, someone brought word that he had just become a grandfather.

“He kept right on—he just said, ‘Coxswain!'” Chamberlin recalls, chuckling. ‘”Coxswain, take your wine…’ We almost died.”

Smithies–Ropes Professor of Political Economy and a long-time adviser in the Saigon bureau of the Agency for International Development—gave up his mastership—”certainly Harvard’s best job,” he says—last spring. (“You can stay on past 66 as a professor but you have to retire as a master,” he grouses. “It should be the other way around—the brain deteriorates before the body does.”) But the story of the Agassiz Cup celebration still seems characteristic of him—both in content and in style, for a certain kind of sharp, logical humor as well as, perhaps, a certain cheerful indifference to happenings that would excite or upset or change the attitudes of many people. It’s a style, arguably, that found expression in Smithies’s work in Vietnam as well as his praise of the Agassiz Cup winners—and there, it was likely to have larger effects and meanings, since it served a side in an internecine war instead of an intramural regatta.

At the simplest, most straightforward level, the Agassiz Cup story is characteristic because it’s about crew—the sport that in 1929 helped bring Smithies, a 22-year-old Australian law student, the great-grandson of the first Methodist minister in western Tasmania, a Rhodes Scholarship. Finding England “too structured for my taste,” Smithies went on to discover “the fleshpots of the United States” with a Commonwealth Fellowship and a Model A Ford, earn a quick Harvard doctorate in economics, return to Australia briefly to work in its treasury department, then settle in the United States for good.

Smithies accepted tenure at Harvard in 1949—partly “so I could take up rowing again”—and continued to work at budgetary and fiscal economics. He also demonstrated an idiosyncratic kind of firmness—”I’m a believer in strict academic requirements, but for something important, like seat-races, I would make an exception,” he once told a Kirkland House oarsman. In its more political manifestations, many students came to find Smithies’s firmness objectionable. “People used to go around screaming ‘CIA Agent!’ and things at me,” he recalls. For when anti-ROTC students occupied University Hall in April 1969 and opened the files of then dean of the Faculty Franklin L. Ford, one of the letters they released to The Old Mole, the underground Cambridge newspaper that folded in 1970, was from Smithies. Dated December 7, 1967, it read: “The Central Intelligence Agency has instructed its consultants to inform their official superiors of this connection with the Agency. I hereby inform you of my connection of ten years duration. I wish I could, add that there is something subtly interesting or sinister about it.”

The tinge of self-mockery—the impatience of a person who takes certain things for granted, maybe—was typical: the same slight aloofness you sense when Smithies says he spends his free time “rowing boats and toiling in my garden,” as though the joys of domesticity in Belmont, like England, are a little too structured for his taste. But that didn’t stop the CIA letter from kicking up a minor storm.

“The CIA is divided sharply into two parts—covert and overt,” Smithies—who says he was most recently consulted by the agency, regarding a report on the future of the Vietnamese economy, last year—explains now. “For about ten years I’d go down there and review their papers on national economic matters: I’ve never been the cloak-and-dagger type. But naturally they made a big fuss about it,” he concludes, with something close to approval. “That’s good tactics.”

It was partly an exclusive attention to improving tactics—rather than more fundamental questions about the Vietnam war—that the University Hall occupiers and other Harvard radicals objected to in Smithies, even before they discovered his CIA letter, Smithies traces his service as an Agency for International Development consultant, advising the Republic of Vietnam on its fiscal policy and rates of international exchange, to previous foreign-affairs interests that included involvement in administering the Marshall Plan. He says he was regarded as a liberal both as a young teacher at the University of Michigan, where he defended the Michigan Daily‘s right to take leftist editorial stands, and in his early years in the Harvard Economics Department, where Keynesians like him were still an embattled minority.

And he still offers qualified praise for radical economists like Stephen A. Marglin ’59 or other members of the Union of Radical Political Economists—for aiming at a historical perspective on economic systems. “I think if they’d let me I’d be more of an ally than I am,” he says. “I don’t like a narrow concentration on Marx—I think it should also include Weber and people like that. I also and not a socialist, and URPE people generally are socialists—I firmly believe in the mixed economy.” For his part, Marglin says he agrees with Smithies’s stress on “the historical nature of economic theory and the fact that neo-classical theory is not the pinnacle of economic thought.” But he claims that Smithies shares orthodox economists’ bias toward marginal improvements that don’t call basic assumptions into question—”that perspective divides him pretty fundamentally from most URPE people,” he says.

Even setting aside Smithies’s belief in a mixed economy, Marglin’s criticism isn’t too surprising—budgetary economics by definition focuses on evaluating means, not ends, which it takes more or less for granted. Smithies’s book, The Budgetary Process in the United States, begins by calling a description of the ways the government sets its priorities “quite enough for one volume and one author,” and it offers only one assumption about how the budgetary process should end up—that “government decision-making can be improved by the clear formulation of alternatives.” Like his work on the budget, Smithies’s work on Vietnamese fiscal policy took its basic political framework more or less for granted.

And like the Agassiz Cup celebration, it was carried on with a certain quiet bravado, even in defiance of what many people might think of as reflex reactions to human events. Apart from his consulting work for AID—which kept him in.

During the height of campus anti-war activity, Smithies recalls, “People used to go around screaming ‘CIA Agent!’ and things at me.” Saigon most summers—Smithies wrote several reports, comparable to other American economists’ and political scientists’ attempts to improve the Saigon government’s chances and provide scientific descriptions of its progress.

Like these other writers, Smithies’s descriptions often reflected Saigon’s assumptions and interests, and so worked to limit debate in the United States and thus to keep the Saigon government strong. Not all American analysts acknowledged this political effect of their writing, but to many of their critics. It was its most important aspect. For the politics underlying questions of Vietnamese economic development included more even than questions about who should manage development and profit from it. The human, political context AID economists could all but ignore also included the struggle over these questions that was killing people and making them homeless, the struggle in which the government AID belonged to was playing an increasingly dominant part.

In a 1971 report commissioned by the Institute for Defense Analyses, called “Economic Development in Vietnam: The Need for External Resources,” and based on a “planning assumption” of “military stalemate and withering away of the war, a process that can last for a decade or more.” Smithies called for $500 million a year in American aid to the Saigon government “during the next decade,” and $700 million more in financing, preferably from an international consortium of countries, “for the indefinite future.” And while noting some of the bad effects of the war on South Vietnam’s economy—such as an unfavorable balance of trade, governmental corruption, the destruction of bridges and the defoliation of forests—Smithies also took note of countervailing factors, such as “the increase in the expectations of the Vietnamese people,” which he suggested would remain after “the horrors of war” had faded.

“The war has provided Vietnam with paved highways from end to end, with more airfields than it can possibly use, with spectacular harbors, with an elaborate communications system, with power plants, and with potable water in Saigon,” Smithies wrote.” …While it is impossible to make an accurate inventory of the changes in the infrastructure during the war, the impression is inescapable that the plusses greatly outweigh the minuses.” It was the kind of report that led Frances Fitzgerald ’62 to call AID economics “perhaps the ultimate expression of American hubris.”

Today, Smithies—who says he grew to like Saigon very much, despite a “very rarefied atmosphere” that necessitated weekly trips to the provinces for a reminder that there was a war going on—is naturally less sanguine. “Whatever the merits of the cause. I’m deeply disturbed to see the U.S. forced into a position of unconditional surrender under any circumstances,” he says. “And it’s not clear to me that there is still a clear direction to foreign policy.”

“I wouldn’t have gone there unless I thought the objective of a free and independent South Vietnam was a worthwhile one,” he continues, “and it’s fairly obvious that we didn’t pursue that role at all effectively.” Nevertheless, Smithies stresses American advisers’ accomplishments in such areas as improving rice strains—”whatever side you’re on politically, this was a useful thing,” he says—and the importance of combating “the impression that everyone connected with Vietnam was a scoundrel.”

“I think the economic staff there was really doing a good job,” he says. “In the economic and financial areas there were some very good Vietnamese and some very devoted and sincere Vietnamese—extremely able and also extremely patriotic. I can’t say the same for some of the corps commanders—but in the welter of recriminations there’s a tendency to forget what was good.”

* * *

It took just a few days after the Provisional Revolutionary Government’s victory last month for Smithies’s acquaintances to stop asking him, as at least one had the first day, about “the end of those summers in Saigon.” In the burgeoning New England spring, Saigon seemed very far away. It seemed more appropriate to remember smaller-scale settings for imperturbability in the face of exciting or famous or upsetting people or events—the Agassiz Cup celebration, say, or the Kirkland House dinner two years ago at which Smithies gave President Bok a long, pointed introduction, replete with references to “the days when the University was interested in education—before the present administration took office.” (“These occasions can get very stolid if you don’t liven ’em up a bit,” Smithies explains now. “I think one ought to be mildly provocative—what do you think?”)

At most, it seemed in keeping with the intoxicating spring weather to remember Smithies’s 1969 visit to occupied University Hall—the only one by a master, possibly helping to inspire his belief that by playing a “civilizing role,” “the House system vindicated itself in 1969 as I haven’t seen it do before or since.” Smithies says the visit was mostly a matter of bravado, “rather foolish. I suppose,” but he still seems proud of it—he’s supposed to have informed an occupier who called him an administration spy that he had “rather more right to be here than you do.” The occupiers voted to expel Smithies, but they allowed him to speak first. “It was rather reassuring, in a way,” he said, but the occupiers evidently weren’t sympathetic—”all I remember just what he said, but the occupiers evidently weren’t sympathetic—”all I remember is that it was philosophically weird,” one of them said recently.

Meanwhile, Smithies continued to teach macroeconomic theory, scull on the Charles, lunch in the Kirkland dining hall, even be mildly provocative, if only because senior English majors in the House were taking general exams, on such moderately unlikely subjects as the poetry of T.S. Eliot ’10. “My wife and I used to be very fond of Eliot—I think we still are,” Smithies explained later, but at lunch, he didn’t seem so sure.

“But is it poetry–the broad-backed hippopotamus?” he asked his companions, a little quizzically. Then he proceeded to rattle off three or four stanzas: The broad-backed hippopotamus Rests on his belly in the mud; Although he seems so firm to us He is merely flesh and blood…

“Is that poetry–or is it just a jingle?” he asked again. No one offered an immediate answer: things were back to normal.

Steven B. Geovanis

Image Sources:  Left to right. Smithies and Galbraith from Harvard Class Album 1958; Gerschenkron from Harvard Class Album 1957.

Categories
Boston College Economics Programs Economist Market Economists

Boston College. Annual Economics Newsletters, 1978-2020

 

While preparing the previous post, I stumbled across an old departmental newsletter for Boston College archived at the website of Boston College’s economics department. A little more digging revealed that all departmental newsletters since 1978, when the first newsletter was prepared, can be downloaded from the Wayback Machine internet archive of web.archive.org. Forty-three years’ worth of newsletters provides us a treasure chest of detail. A link to an archived webpage with all the Boston College graduate economics placements from 2002-2019 has been appended to this post.

The inaugural doctoral programs in economics, education and history at Boston College were established in the academic year 1952—1953.

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Economic Newsletters of Boston College’s Department of Economics

 1978 1979a
1979b		 1980a
1980b
1981a
1981b		 1982a
1982b		 1983a
1983b		 1984a
1984b

1985

1986

 1987 1988 1989 1990
1991 1992 1993 1994

1995

1996

 1997 1998 1999 2000
2001 2002 2003 2004

2005

2006

 2007 2008 2009 2010
2011 2012 2013 2014

2015

2016

 2017 2018 2019

2020

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Other stuff

Archived News from the Department of Economics.  From Dec 29, 2002 to September 13, 2007.

Boston College Economics Graduate Placements 2002-2019.

Categories
Columbia Economics Programs Economists Graduate Student Support

Columbia. List of 26 strong candidates applying for fellowships or scholarships, 1954

The following transcribed memo from 1954 was written to the President of Columbia University by Carter Goodrich. It appears to have been sent as evidence of what Goodrich had deemed “the fellowship problem”, i.e. “the inadequacy of our provisions for graduate aid”  resulting in no graduate applicants from the top U.S. and Canadian colleges and universities (excluding Columbia) except for one from Princeton and another from Bryn Mawr. The strongest applicants were “largely foreigners or refugees”. A list of the twenty-six top applicants was provided, with Peter Bain Kenen perhaps the one who was to cast the longest shadow going forward (and who incidentally went to Harvard and not Columbia for his graduate work). Leon Smolinski did obtain his Ph.D. in economics at Columbia and went on to teach at Boston College for thirty years. (A Boston College obituary for Smolinski).

________________________

Columbia University
in the City of New York

[New York 27, N.Y.]
Faculty of Political Science

March 8, 1954

President Grayson Kirk
Low Memorial Library

Dear Grayson:

I am taking the liberty of sending you this note to continue our chance conversation of the other day on the fellowship problem.

After looking over the nearly eighty applications for fellowships or scholarships in Economics, we realized that there was not a single applicant from Swarthmore, Haverford, Amherst, Williams, Wesleyan, Bowdoin, Yale, Stanford, McGill, Toronto, Smith, Wellesley, Mt. Holyoke, or from the undergraduate schools of Harvard or the Universities of California and Chicago. There is one from Princeton and one (French by nationality) from Bryn Mawr.

There are, nevertheless, a number of strong candidates, but largely foreigners or refugees. I am enclosing a copy of a list which I have submitted to the Executive Officer of the Department indicating the origins of the leading twenty-six candidates.

The failure to attract applicants from the institutions from which we might expect the best American and Canadian training appears to me a very serious matter. Part, at least, of the cause must lie in the inadequacy of our provisions for graduate aid.

Sincerely yours,
[signed: “Carter”]
Carter Goodrich

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

NAME

 PLACE OF BIRTH

COLLEGES AND UNIVERSITIES
1. Joseph Raymond Barse Chicago, Illinois Northwestern University
Columbia University
2. Donald Van Twisk Bear New York City Princeton University
3. Robert Classon New York City Brooklyn College
4. Joan E. Belenken Brooklyn, N.Y. Barnard College
Cornell University
5. Narciso Asperin Ferrer Manila Ateneo de Manila (Law School and Graduate School)
6. William Smith Gemmell Schenectady, N.Y. Union College
7. Michele Guerard Le Havre, France Lycee de Seures,
Lycee de Fontaine,
Bryn Mawr College
8. Iran Banu Mohamed Ali Hassani Hyderabad Deccan, India Osmania University (Hyderabad Deccan, India)
Syracuse University
9. Peter Bain Kenen Cleveland, Ohio Columbia College
10. Jerzy Feliks Karcz Grudziadz, Poland Batory Liceum, Warsaw, Poland
Alliance College
Kent State University
Columbia University
11. Gregor Lazarcik Horna-Streda, Czechoslovakia State College of Kosice (Czechoslovakia)
Agricultural University
(Brno, Czech.)
School of Social Studies
(Paris, France)
Institute of International Studies (Paris, France)
Faculty of Law, University of Paris (France)
University Centre for European Studies (Strasbourg, France)
12. Michael Ernst Levy Mainz, Germany Hebrew University (Jerusalem)
13. Ira South Lowry Laredo, Texas University of Texas
14. Samir Anis Makdisi Beirut, Lebanon American University of Beirut
15. Yaroslav Nowak Kieve, Russia J. W. Goethe University (Frankfurt, Germany)
Columbia University
16. Algimantes Petrenas Kaunas, Lithuania Hamburg University
(Hamburg, Germany)
Baltic University
(Hamburg, Germany)
Columbia University
17. Guy A. Schick Aurora, Illinois Purdue University
18. Leon Smolinski Kalisz, Poland School of Economics, Warsaw, Poland
University of Freiburg (Germany)
University of Cincinnati
Columbia University
19. Werner Alfred Stange Berlin, Germany University of Kiel
(Kiel, Germany)
University of Bonn
(Bonn, Germany)
University of Maryland
20. Koji Taira Miyako, Ryukyus (near Okinawa) University of New Mexico
University of Wisconsin
21. Jaskaran Singh Teja Jhingran, Punjab, India Agricultural College (Punjab, India)
University of California
Harvard University
22. Marcel Tenenbaum Paris, France Queens College (Flushing, N.Y.)
23. Nestor Eugenius Terleckyj Boryslaw, Ukraine University of Erlangen (Erlangen, Germany)
Seton Hall University
Columbia University
24. John Jacob Vogel Irvington, N.J. Middlebury College
Columbia University
25. Ludwig Anton Wagner Vienna, Austria University of Vienna (Austria)
Columbia University
26. Theodore Raymond Wilson Baltimore, Md. Johns Hopkins University
University of Paris (France)

 

Source: Columbia University Archives, Central Files 1890-, Box 406, Folder “Goodrich, Carter 9/1953-5/1959”.

Image Source: Low Memorial Library, Columbia University from the Tichnor Brothers Collection, New York Postcards, at the Boston Public Library, Print Department.

Categories
Economist Market Economists Gender Harvard

Harvard. Galbraith suggests Barbara Bergmann for Women’s Studies Professorship, 1983

 

The departments of anthropology, english and psychology at Harvard appear to have been relatively quick to respond to the 1983 opportunity of hiring a professor in women’s studies. The Harvard Dean then wrote a memo to encourage other departments to come up with candidates as well. John Kenneth Galbraith put forward the name of Barbara Bergmann for the serious consideration of the department. Perhaps someone knows whether his suggestion was able to obtain any search traction?

___________________

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
Department of Economics

A. Michael Spence
Chairman

Littauer Center 200
Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138
(617) 495-2144

October 31, 1983

 

TO: Members of the Faculty, Economics Department

FROM: A. Michael Spence [Signed initials: AMS]

The attached is self-explanatory. Does anyone have ideas? Please let me know.

___________________

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
Faculty of Arts and Sciences

Office of the Dean

5 University Hall
Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138
(617) 495-1566

October 4, 1983

TO: Chairmen of the Departments of Classics, Comparative Literature, Economics, Government, History, Philosophy, and Sociology

FROM: Henry Rosovsky

RE: Tenured Position in Women’s Studies

Last spring, the Committee on Women’s Studies informally notified several departments of the opportunity to nominate a distinguished scholar in the area of women’s studies. The appointment would be made entirely within a department with the understanding that the individual would devote at least half of his or her teaching time to Women’s Studies and play an active role in the future development of teaching and scholarly activities in that area.

Several departments (Anthropology, English, and Psychology) have already reported active searches; some have advanced to the short list stage. If your department is interested in pursuing this opportunity, please let my office know as soon as possible. If you wish to nominate a candidate, you should write to me describing the candidate (and the search procedure), and indicating what advantages will accrue to the department and to the Women’s Studies program if the position is assigned to your department. I expect that an assignment will be made by the end of the calendar year unless there is some compelling reason to delay.

dmg

___________________

John Kenneth Galbraith
Harvard University
Cambridge

207 Littauer Center
November 10, 1983

Professor A. Michael Spence
Littauer 200

Dear Michael:

Would you think of Barbara Bergmann, now at University of Maryland? She is one of our Ph.D.s, a brilliant economist, articulate in written and oral expression and both deeply and intelligently concerned with women’s issues. When President of the AEA I established as you know the Committee on the State of Women I the profession. Barbara took an alert and effective part in its work. I have no thought as to her availability; I do urge that she be considered. It would be very good, indeed, to have her back.

Yours faithfully,
[signed]
John Kenneth Galbraith

JG/all

Source: John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum. John Kenneth Galbraith Personal Papers. Series 5. Harvard University File, 1949-1990. Box 526. Folder: “Harvard Department of Economics: General, 1975-1988”

Image Sources:  Barbara Bergmann in a Center for the History of Political Economy at Duke University spotlight web post. John Kenneth Galbraith (22 Feb. 1982) at “Top Management Forum” in Hilton Hotel in Amsterdam. Wikimedia Commons, from the Dutch National Archives.

 

 

 

Categories
Bryn Mawr Columbia Economists Gender Policy Social Work Yale

Yale. Economics Ph.D. Alumna, Kate Holladay Claghorn, 1896

 

Today’s post adds another woman to the series “Get to Know an Economics Ph.D. alumna”. Kate Holladay Claghorn studied political economy under Franklin H. Giddings at Bryn Mawr followed by coursework with William G. Sumner and Arthur T. Hadley at Yale in industrial history, advanced economics, political science, and anthropology. I have not been able to find a digital link to her 1896 Yale Ph.D. thesis “Law, Nature, and Convention: A Study in Political Theory”, but much of her published work is easily accessible now on line.

Fun Fact: Kate Holladay Claghorn was a boarder in the John R. Commons home while she worked for him on the immigration sections of the Final Report of the Industrial Commission, Vol. XIX (1902). (Source: John R. Commons, Myself, pp. 68, 76.)

___________________

Kate Holladay Claghorn
Life and Career

1863. Born Dec. 12 in Aurora, Illinois

Brooklyn Heights Seminary

1892. A.B., Bryn Mawr

1892-93. Graduate work at Bryn Mawr with Professor Franklin H. Giddings, professor of political economy

1896. Ph.D. Yale University. Professors Sumner and Hadley. Studied industrial history, advanced economics, political science, and anthropology

1898 to 1900 she acted as Secretary-Treasurer of the Association of Collegiate Alumnae.

1900-01. Assisted John Rogers Commons in his study of immigration for the United States Census Bureau 1902. Expert in the United States Industrial Commission.

1901-1902 was research worker for the Economic Year Book.

1902. Division of Methods and Results, United States Census.

1902-1905. Assistant registrar. New York City Tenement House Department.

1905. Acting Registrar. New York City Tenement House Department.

1906-1912. Registrar. New York City Tenement House Department.

1909. Claghorn was one of 60 signers, 19 of whom were women, of the “Call for the Lincoln Emancipation Conference to Discuss Means for Securing Political and Civil Equality for the Negro” written by Oswald Garrison Villard, which became the founding document of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.

1912-1932. Instructor and head of the Department of Social Research, New York School of Social Work.

1918. First woman to be elected Fellow of the American Statistical Association.

1932. Retired.

1938. Died of a cerebral hemorrhage May 22 in Greenwich where she was living.
Buried with her parents in Maple Grove Cemetery, Kew Gardens, N.Y.

Source for most items above: Yale University Obituary Record, p. 231.

___________________

Obituary

New York, March 24.—Miss Kate Holladay Claghorn, author and sociologist, who was a member of the faculty of the New York School of Social Work from 1912 to 1932, died Tuesday night at her home in Greenwich, Conn.

Source: The Times-Tribune (Scranton, Pennsylvania), Thursday, May 24, 1938, p. 2.

___________________

Graduate School Alumnae Directory,
Yale University
[1920]

Kate Holladay Claghorn, B.A. Bryn Mawr College 1892.

Miss Claghorn received her Doctor’s degree in 1896. From 1898 to 1900 she acted as Secretary-Treasurer of the Association of Collegiate Alumnae. From 1900 to 1901 she was Expert in the United States Industrial Commission, and in 1901-1902 was research worker for the Economic Year Book. In 1902 she worked in the Division of Methods and Results, United States Census; in 1902-1906 she was Assistant Registrar, and in 1906-1912, Registrar, of the Tenement House Department of New York City. Since 1912 she has been head of the Research Department of the New York School of Social Work.

Her dissertation is entitled “Law, Nature, and Convention: A Study in Political Theory.” She has also written “Juvenile Delinquency in Rural New York,” issued as Children’s Bureau Publication, No. 32.

Source: Alumnae Graduate School, Yale University, 1894-1920. New Haven: Yale University, 1920, p. 46.

___________________

Writers of the Day
[1897]

Kate Holladay Claghorn, whose scholarly paper, “Burke: a Centenary Perspective,” in the July Atlantic [Volume 80, No. 477 (July, 1897), pp. 84-95], shows both breadth of knowledge and maturity of thought, has only recently begun to write for publication, having but lately completed a college course. She graduated from Bryn Mawr College in 1892, spent a year in graduate study at that institution, and then went to Yale, where she entered the graduate school, taking the degree of Ph.D. in 1896. There is an interesting fact connected with this graduation at Yale. Although Yale had granted degrees to women in 1894 and 1895, in 1896 women took part for the first time in the public commencement exercises, walking in the procession about the campus, sitting in Battell Chapel with the other candidates, and going upon the platform to receive diplomas. As Miss Claghorn happened by chance to head the line of women as they passed up to the platform, she was, it turned out, the first woman to receive as a reward for regular academic work done in the university an academic degree publicly from the hand of the president. Miss Claghorn’s particular interests are in the general field of the social sciences. At Bryn Mawr she was under the especial direction of Professor Franklin H. Giddings, then professor of political economy there, now professor of sociology at Columbia University. At Yale she studied under Professors Sumner and Hadley, following courses that they gave in industrial history, advanced economics, political science, and anthropology. Her thesis for the doctorate was a study in political theory, entitled “Law, Nature, and Convention.” While at Yale Miss Claghorn contributed to the Outlook a short article on Bryn Mawr. In the Yale Review for February, 1896 [Vol. IV. No. 4, pp. 426-440], she had an article entitled “The Ethics of Copyright.” Last winter she contributed to the Outlook five articles on “College Training for Women,” and in May she published, through Thomas Y. Crowell & Co., a book under the same title, “College Training for Women,” in which the matter printed in the Outlook is incorporated, in revised form, but which contains so much additional matter as to be practically quite a new production.

Source: The Writer, Vol. 10, No. 7 (July, 1897), pp. 102-103.

___________________

A Card Index That Santa Claus Might Follow
[1912]

Miss Kate Claghorn is holding down a man’s job in the tenement house department because there was no man smart enough to fill it. Twice she stood the test of an examination framed in Columbia University, which was designed, if anything, to eliminate women from the competition, but which in the end eliminated the men. The position of registrar of records is one of the “fat” jobs. It has the handsome little salary of $3,000 attached to it, and it takes the statistical mind of a thinking machine to do the work that goes along with it.

An inkling of the intricacy of Miss Claghorn’s work can be got from the fact that recently she finished, in six months, a complete survey of all the five boroughs of New York City, recording on cards for instant reference the condition of every dwelling and tenement house in the city. Not a roof was passed by. Santa Claus himself might follow Miss Claghorn’s card index and no one would be overlooked at Christmas time.

Source: From Frank Parker Stockbridge. “A Woman Who Spends Over Forty Million Dollars Each Year and Some Others Who Hold Positions of Financial Power and Moral Responsibility in the Government of New York City.” The American City, vol. 6. No. 6 (June, 1912), p.816.

___________________

Woman’s Who’s Who of America
[1914]

Claghorn, Kate Holladay, 81 Columbia Heights, Brooklyn, N.Y.

Lecturer, teacher: b. Aurora, Ill. (came to N.Y. City in infancy); dau. Charles and Martha Holladay; ed. Bryn Mawr, A.B. ’92; Yale, Ph.D. ’96. Engaged in research work for U.S. Industrial Comm’n, 1890-1901; in U.S. Census Office, 1902; ass’t registrar of records, 1902-06; registrar Tenement House Dep’t, City of N.Y., 1906-12; lecturer on permanent staff N.Y. School of Philanthropy, 1912—. Author: College Training for Women, 1897; also contributor to magazines. Mem. Women’s Political Union, N.Y. Mem. Am. Economic Ass’n, Am. Statistical Ass’n, Soc. For Italian Immigrants, Little Italy Ass’n, Women’s Univ. Club. Recreation: Music.

Source: Woman’s Who’s Who of America, 1914-1915, John William Leonard, ed. New York: American Commonwealth Company (1914), p. 178.

___________________

DEPARTMENT OF SOCIAL RESEARCH
[1923-1924]

Miss Claghorn

The task of social research is to collect and arrange the facts needed as a basis for dealing with social problems either of the individual or the group.

Opportunities for Employment

  1. Field investigators and research workers in the Federal Service, as for example in the Bureau of Labor Statistics or in the Children’s Bureau of the Department of Labor, in State or Municipal Service, in organizations interested in housing or Americanization, or in some one of the various investigations or surveys undertaken under the direction of private individuals or committees, or foundations.
  2. Statisticians, in the Federal, State or Municipal Service, or in private organizations engaged in social work.
  3. Teachers of social statistics.

The demand for trained workers in this field is not yet so strong or so steady as in some others, but there are indications that the demand is growing and that students with special qualifications for this kind of work and special interest in it may be encouraged to prepare for it.

Requirements for the Diploma in this Field

Methods of Social Research (Soc. Res. 1, 2 and 3), The Method of Social Case Work (S.C.W. 1), field work in the Department of Social Case Work (S.C.W. 301) 2 days a week for one Quarter. Social Work and Social Progress (S.C.W. 3), Vocational Course in Social Research for 3 Quarters (S.C.W. 201), and additional course to total 84 points.

Soc. Res. 1. Methods of Social Research, 2 points, Fall Quarter. Miss Claghorn.

The planning of an investigation, the framing of schedules or questionnaires, the construction of statistical tables and simple diagrams.

Soc. Res. 2. Methods of Social Research, 2 points, Winter and Spring Quarters. Miss Claghorn.

Simple forms of analysis of statistical material, graphs, ratios, averages, measures of dispersion.

Soc. Res. 3. Methods of Social Research, 2 points, Spring Quarter. Miss Claghorn.

Elementary theory of probability, fitting of data to the normal curve, fitting to trend lines, correlation, linear and non-linear, reliability of measures.

Soc. Res. 4. The Immigrant, 2 points, Fall Quarter. Miss Claghorn.

Soc. Res. 5. The Immigrant, 2 points, Winter Quarter. Miss Claghorn.

To deal with people successfully, it is necessary to know something of what they are and what they think and feel. A large proportion of the persons with whom social agencies come in contact are foreigners of many different varieties, each with peculiar habits and characteristics which largely determine their reactions to the new environment. As a help toward understanding our foreign peoples, this course undertakes the study of the racial heritages, economic background, and the social institutions of the more important immigrant groups from Europe and the Near East.

Soc. Res. 201. Vocational Course, Social Investigation, Fall Winter and Spring Quarters. Miss Claghorn.

Study and practice of methods of social investigation in some special field selected according to the needs of the student or group of students electing this course. In the past, studies have been made in this Department in immigrant life, housing, and juvenile delinquency.

Soc. Res. 301. Field Work, 4 points.

Two days a week for one Quarter in some agency carrying on social research may be arranged in accordance with the special needs of the student.

Source: Charity Organization Society of the City of New York, the New York School of Social Work, General Announcement 1923-1924 (April Bulletin), pp. 30-31.

___________________

Students that have received the Degree of Bachelor of Arts from Bryn Mawr College

Kate Holladay Claghorn. Group, Greek and Latin.

Leonia, N.J. Prepared by Mr. Caskie Harrison, Brooklyn, New York City: passed examination covering the Freshman year in Columbia College, 1888-89. A.B., 1892; Ph.D., Yale University, 1896. Graduate Student in Sociology, Bryn Mawr College, 1892-93; Graduate Student in Political Science, Yale University, 1893-95, and University Scholar, 1894-95; Secretary-Treasurer of the Association of Collegiate Alumnae, 1898-1900.

Source: Program Bryn Mawr College 1900-01, p. 89.

___________________

Partial List of publications (with links)

Kate Holladay Claghorn. College Training for Women. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell, 1897.

___________. “Occupation for the [woman] college graduate,” (Association of Collegiate Alumnae. Publications, series 3, no. 3 (February, 1900), pp. 62-66. 1900).

___________. “The problem of occupation for college women,” Educational Review, Vol. XV (March, 1898), pp. 217-230.
Appears to be same publication as (Association of Collegiate Alumnae, Publications Series 2, no. 66).

Final Report of the Industrial Commission, Vol. XIX (1902).

___________. “Slavs, Magyars and Some Others in the New Immigration”. Charities Vol. Xiii, No. 10 (Dec. 3, 1904), pp. 199-205.

___________. “The Limitations of Statistics,” Review of William H. Allen Efficient Democracy. In Quarterly Publications of the American Statistical Association, New Series, No. 81 (Vol. XI) March, 1908. Pages 97-104.

___________. “The Use and Misuse of Statistics in Social Work.” In Quarterly Publications of the American Statistical Association, New Series, No. 82 (Vol. XI) June, 1908. Pages 150-167.

___________. “Record Keeping as an Aid to Enforcement” in Housing and Town Planning, Carol Aronovici, ed. Philadelphia: American Academy of Political and Social Science (1914), pp.117-124.

___________. Juvenile Delinquency in Rural New York. U. S. Department of Labor. Children’s Bureau, no. 32, 1918.

___________. The Immigrant’s Day in Court. New York: Harper & Brothers Publishers, 1923.

___________.  Statistical Department of the Municipal Court of Philadelphia.  A Report by the Bureau of Municipal Research of Philadelphia. Philadelphia: Thomas Skelton Harrison Foundation, 1931.

Further publications can be found in the longer bibliography provided in the Bibliography of Female Economic Thought, Kirsten K. Madden, Janet A. Seiz and Michèle Pujol, editors. London: Routledge, 2004, pp. 107-108.

Image Source: Frank Parker Stockbridge. “A Woman Who Spends Over Forty Million Dollars Each Year and Some Others Who Hold Positions of Financial Power and Moral Responsibility in the Government of New York City.” The American City, vol. 6. No. 6 (June, 1912), pp 814-. [photo of Kate Holladay Claghorn on page 816].

 

 

 

Categories
Economists Funny Business

Oberlin and Syracuse. Baseball and John R. Commons, 1886 and 1898

 

While getting material for the previous post that provided a bibliography of sociology at Oberlin prepared by John R. Commons in 1891-92, I came across two instances when baseball was important enough to warrant mention in his autobiography.  There is an allegory in Commons’ belief that he had discovered the “curve ball” in 1886, only to discover that it, like fire and the wheel, it had been discovered earlier. (See, “The story of baseball’s first curveball“). It defies belief, but yes, in 1898 it was considered radical for someone to argue that workers had a right to play baseball on a Sunday, so radical as to result in the elimination of a professorship! 

______________________

Curve Ball and Bean Ball

“I had read in the printing office at Leesburg, Florida, in the year 1885-86, that Herbert Spencer had recently maintained that, according to the science of physics, it was impossible to pitch a curved ball. He knew not the seams on the ball and forgot the friction of the air. His was evidently a single-track mind. Ever after, I looked for the omitted factors, or the ones taken for granted and therefore omitted, by the great leaders in the science of economics. That was how I became an economic skeptic.

My brother and I experimented on Spencer’s omitted factors, with our log house as backstop. I learned all four curves. When I returned to Oberlin in April, 1886, the baseball season was on. The seniors, my former classmates, were sweeping everything. My brilliant friend, Job Fish, was their pitcher. He could get his lessons in a third of the time it took me, and then gave the rest of the time to preparing me for recitations. His was a huge muscular frame and he could throw a straight ball like a cannon. Nobody, it seems, had ever heard of a curved ball. The catcher on the junior side discovered my twisters. He made the signs to me. The slow up-curve did the business. Job Fish got the only “out” that I pitched. It came straight to me like a thunderbolt. Somehow, unconsciously, from boyhood habit, I reached out my left hand and held it. I could not use that hand for two weeks. My friend, the catcher, did not make the “out” sign to me again. He stuck to the “up” sign, though my “ups” were slow. Nobody got to first base in the first eight innings. The score stood 7 to 0 in our favor. Then Job got mad. He quit throwing over the base and threw at me. Certainly he rattled me when I came to the bat. He hit me on the side of the head, adjoining the temple. Evidently I was not an all-round ball player. My playing was academic, like Herbert Spencer’s theory. I had not learned to dodge straight lightning. I insisted on pitching the ninth inning. But the boys of my own team physically held me down. They took me to the doctor. He encouraged us all by saying that such a blow did not usually show its results until ten years later. They forced me to bed, where my indigestion returned for a week. My substitute pitcher, Harry Brown, afterwards chaplain to Roosevelt’s Rough Riders, could not, by his straight ball, keep the seniors from making ten runs in the ninth inning. But the Athletic

Association held a mass-meeting that afternoon. They voted Job unanimously out of baseball forever.

Ten years later I had a letter from Job, then a high official with the Otis Elevator Company. He wrote that he had been worrying about me these ten years, but seeing that I was not yet dead, or insane, he must tell me how ashamed and glad he was. We returned to our good friendship. Poor fellow, he died within a year or two, and here I am, forty years after the doctor’s allotted ten years, though with the same indigestion.

I never played baseball again.

In this old age of mine I began to brag about pitching the first curved ball in America. I was able to get away with it on a visit to Oberlin, where I was currying favor with the students to listen to my lecture on political economy. There were two witnesses on the faculty who got up and testified. They had seen the game. Then I tried to brag it out, in Madison, on my fifty-year-old Town and Gown Club. One member figured out that he had seen a curved ball in 1884. Therefore, I was the first at Oberlin but not the first in America. So it is ever thus. I may do something stunning or unexpected, but, if so, I soon drop out because somebody else does it better or has already done it. I have found my most brilliant thoughts anticipated long before, in my study of earlier economists in the original.”

Source: John R. Commons. Myself. New York: Macmillan, 1934. Pp. 28-30.

Play Ball…on Sunday (on your own account)

“One Sunday morning, at Syracuse, I arrived on the night train from a two-weeks’ residence at the University Settlement in New York. In the morning newspaper, on the train, I read an announcement that on that Sunday evening there would be a union meeting of all the churches at the municipal auditorium to protest against the mayor’s refusal to enforce the law against Sunday baseball. I was named as one of the speakers. I was startled because I had not received any invitation to speak. The Catholic mayor was my friend, and I was trying to omit modern religion from sociology and stick only to ethnology. I went around immediately to see my friend, the Methodist minister, whose name appeared in the paper as manager of the meeting. I asked him how it came that I was announced as one of the speakers without previous invitation. He said they had been trying to get a workingman to speak but could find only one who was willing. He turned out to believe that the biblical Sunday was Saturday, and that our Sunday came over from the heathen who worshiped the Sun-god. Evidently he was a scholar, but evidently also disqualified as an opponent of Sunday baseball. So they thought I was as near being a working man as they could find, and announced me because it was too late to ask me by wire.

Chancellor Day was to be the chairman and principal speaker of the mass meeting. There was also the city attorney representing the mayor. His speech was quite political and evasive. I was too timid to speak at the meeting, but finally the minister persuaded me. I looked up one of my labor acquaintances to take me around to all the ball grounds on that Sunday afternoon. We found there large crowds of sober workingmen with their families, with no admission fees, and with pick-up teams of players from the various industries. At the mass meeting of about 3,000 I spoke after the politician. I recited what I had seen during the day. I opposed professional baseball with admission fees on Sunday, but contended that the city should open up free parks, on the abandoned saltpans of the old town of Salina, for all kinds of athletic games for workingmen on that day. As long as employers kept workingmen from having a Saturday half-holiday, the only relief for exercise and sobriety was Sunday. I was hissed by the audience. The Chancellor made no criticism but rather excused me. The daily newspapers stood for me.

A few days afterwards the Chancellor called me to his office. He told me of letters received from ministers and others declaring they would withdraw their children if I were not removed. His reply to them was that I had perfect liberty to speak what I thought, though he would be sorry to lose their children.

A year or so later, in the month of March, 1899, he called me in again. He said that the trustees, at their preceding meeting in December, had voted to discontinue the chair in sociology. I was not dismissed but my chair was pulled out from under me. I did not know about it until three months later. He explained that when he went out on his trips to obtain money for the University from hoped-for contributors, they refused as long as I held a chair in the University. Also, at a recent national meeting of college presidents which he attended, all had agreed that no person with radical tendencies should be appointed to their faculties. Therefore I had no hope for another college position. He was convincing and I never tried to get another teaching job.

I began to draw some inferences …. It was not religion, it was capitalism, that governed Christian colleges. Afterwards I sought the fundamental reason, and included it in my historical development of Institutional Economics. The older economists based their definitions of wealth on holding something useful for one’s own use and exchange. I distinguished a double meaning. The other meaning was, withholding from others what they need but do not own. This was something real to me and the Chancellor. It made possible a distinction of Wealth from Assets which I began to think economists and laity had failed to distinguish.”

Source: John R. Commons. Myself. New York: Macmillan, 1934. Pp. 56-58.

Image Source: Ibid. p. 38.

Categories
Bibliography Economics Programs Economist Market Economists Indiana Sociology

Oberlin. Sociology bibliography by John R. Commons, 1891-1892

 

The core of this post is a twelve printed page bibliography of sociology prepared by the institutional economist, John R. Commons (1862-1945), during the one year he taught at his alma mater, Oberlin College in 1891-92. I have been able to provide links to close to 100% of the items he has listed. From the Oberlin College catalogue for that year I have transcribed the course offerings and their brief descriptions. A brief chronology of Commons’ education and professional career was put together from his very readable autobiography, Myself (1934) for this post.

_____________________

John Rogers Commons
Education and Professional Career

John R. Commons graduated from Oberlin College with an A.B. in 1888; A.M. (honorary) awarded in 1890.

1888-1890. Two trustees of Oberlin College lent Commons a total of $1,000 to finance his first two years of graduate work at Johns Hopkins University.

“Within a year and a half came my usual fate. I failed completely on a history examination. This ruined my hopes of a fellowship to carry me through the third year. So I had only two years of graduate work and never reached the degree of Ph.D., the sign manual of a scholar.” Myself, p. 42.

1890-91. Taught at Wesleyan ($1000 salary). Commons’ contract was not renewed, he was considered a poor teacher.

“Three months before the year was ended President Raymond notified me that I would not be needed the next year, because I was a failure as a teacher. My students were not interested.” Myself, p. 45.

1891-92. Associate Professor of Political Economy at Oberlin. The salary at Oberlin $1,200 “would not pay expenses, to say nothing of debts”.  Sociology bibliography from that time transcribed below.

1892-95. Indiana University. Increase in salary of $800 to $2,000 was his reason to leave Oberlin to move to Bloomington, Indiana. There he received a job offer for $2,500 at Syracuse in 1895 and went to the president of Indiana, hoping to negotiate a counter-offer. “Evidently he [the President] was loaded, for he immediately pulled the trigger: ‘Accept the offer at once.’”

1895-99. Syracuse University. Mr. Huyler of “Huyler Candy” fame established a chair in sociology at Syracuse.

“Afterwards, when sociology was separated from political economy in university teaching, charity was transferred to sociology. I never could reconcile myself to this separation. I taught “sociology” at Syracuse University and got out a book in 1895 on machine politics, which was to be cured, I thought, by proportional representation.” Myself, p. 43.

“I taught ethnology, anthropology, criminology, charity organization, taxation, political economy, municipal government, and other things, all under the name of sociology.” Myself, p. 53.

The chair for sociology was abolished after the university was confronted with serious resistance from donors who wanted Commons fired for having taken a public stand both against professional baseball with ticketed admission on Sundays and for the right of workers to play baseball on their day off, i.e. Sunday.

1899-1904. Odd jobbing.

Set up a Bureau of Economic Research in New York. Published the first weekly index of wholesale prices. Commons’ sponsor, George Shipley, did not like the fact that the index number stopped showing  a decline in prices and cancelled Commons’ contract with him in September 1900. The index number project was discontinued but within a few weeks a former student, E. Dana Durand, hired Commons to finish a report on immigration for the Industrial Commission.

“It was a comparison of ten to fifteen races of immigrants from Eastern and Southeastern Europe, where they knew only dictatorship, in two great American industries to which they had come for what they thought was liberty. In one of these industries, clothing, they knew, at that time, only the cycle of revolution and dissolution. In the other, coal mining, they were learning fidelity to contracts—their trade agreements—in forming which they themselves had participated through representative government. It was their first lesson in Americanization, the union of Liberty and Order. Afterwards I wrote a series of articles for the Chautauqua Magazine and revised them at Madison for a book on Races and Immigrants in America, which was the title of one of my first courses of lectures at the University.” Myself, pp. 73-74.

Commons participated  as immigration and labor expert in the writing of the Final Report of the Industrial Commission, Vol. XIX (1902).

Move back to New York, hired as an assistant to the secretary of the National Civic Federation, Ralph M. Easley. Worked on taxation and labor conciliation.

“It was here that I first learned to distrust the ‘intellectuals’ as leaders in labor movements. I have known scores of them since then and have found other scores in my long study of the history of labor movements. Gompers, the clearest and most outspoken of all trade unionists, denounced them as the ‘fool friends’ of labor. I always look for them and try to clear them out from all negotiations between capital and labor, and from the councils of labor. My friends, the economists, often deplored this antagonism of American labor organizations toward the intellectuals. But they simply did not know the kind of intellectuals that come to leadership in labor movements. The kind is not the studious economist and statistician who cannot make an oratorical public speech, and who takes a broad social point of view which neither capitalists nor laborers understand. Such an intellectual is discarded and overwhelmed by the passions and cheers for a speaker who can hold a great audience. I have tried it and know. Such intellectuals are ‘class conscious’ instead of ‘wage conscious,’ to use the distinction proposed by my friend Selig Perlman. But the studious economist is nearly always ‘social conscious.’” Myself, p. 87.

1904-33. University of Wisconsin.

This period is worth its own post, sometime.

Source: John R. Commons, Myself, New York: Macmillan, 1934.

____________________

Course Offerings at Oberlin 1891-1892

Political Science and Sociology.

  1. Political Economy.—Ely’s Introduction to Political Economy, and monographs on special topics. Professor Commons.
    Spring Term. Mo., Tu., Th., Fr., Sa. 55 hours.
    Elective for Sophomores.

This course is mainly historical and descriptive, showing the development of modern industrial conditions and the significance of modern problems. It serves as a necessary introduction to the courses in sociology and economics.

  1. Sociology.—Lectures and Recitations on assigned readings. Professor Commons.
    Through the year. We., Fr. 71 hours.
    Elective for Juniors and Seniors who have taken Political Science 1.

This course is introductory to Courses 4 and 5 of the Senior year. In the Fall term primitive society is studied with reference to beliefs, the institutions of the family, clan and tribe, and the origins of property and social classes. In the Winter and Spring terms social classes and institutions are traced through English history from the Saxon invasion to the present time. In the latter part of the Spring term the same line of study is followed in the American field. The aim is to show the evolution of modern social classes, and the development of poor laws and class legislation. Students will be examined upon the outlines of English history. It is expected that those who elect the course will continue it through the year.

  1. American Institutional History.—Fiske’s Civil Government in the United States. Professor Commons.
    Spring Term. We., Fr. 22 hours.
    Elective for Juniors who have taken Political Science 2.

The work is a continuation of the political side of Sociology into American History. Students are examined upon the outlines of American History.

  1. General Sociology.—Lectures, Readings, and Recitations. Professor Commons.
    Fall Term. Tu., Th., Sa. 38 hours.
    Elective for Seniors who have taken Political Science 1 and 2.

The attempt is here made to formulate the general principles of social organization and evolution. Attention is given to the history of social and political theories, and the works of the principal sociologists are studied and compared.

  1. Social Problems.—Lectures and Recitations. Professor Commons.
    Winter Term. Tu., Th., Sa. 35 hours.
    Elective for Seniors who have taken Political Science 1, 2, and 4.

The study of Charities, Pauperism, Intemperance, Penology, Education, Immigration, Race Problems, the Family, and Plans for social reform. Reports are made by students on assigned readings and investigations.

  1. Finance.—Ely’s Taxation in American States and Cities. Adams’ Public Debts, with lectures. Professor Commons.
    Fall and Winter Terms. Tu., Th., Sa. 73 hours.
    Elective for Juniors and Seniors who have taken Political Science 1.

Attention is given to the history and practice of taxation, to Public Debts and Public Industries. Students are required to consult public documents and to make reports on assigned topics. Those who elect the course are required to continue it through both terms.

  1. Corporations and Railways.—Lectures, Readings, and Reports. Professor Commons.
    Fall Term. Tu., Th., Sa. 38 hours.
    Omitted in 1892-93.
    Elective for Juniors and Seniors.

The history of corporation laws is studied, and the laws of the United States are compared with those of other countries. Railways are then studied in the same manner.

  1. Financial History of the United States.—Lectures, Readings, and Reports. Professor Commons.
    Winter Term. Tu., Th., Sa.
    Omitted in 1892-93.
    Elective for Juniors and Seniors.

Historical investigations are made of the different sources of income of the National Government, of the public debt and paper money.

  1. Economic Investigations.—Two hours per week through the year, counting as a three hours’ course. Professor Commons.
    Elective for Seniors who have shown proficiency in economic studies and are able to read German.

The investigations of students are guided by the instructor. Reports on the progress of work are made, and informal discussions and lectures are conducted by both instructor and students. The College libraries are well supplied with material for original study. In 1892-93, the investigations are concerned with economic theories and the distribution of wealth.
Students electing this course are required to continue it through the year.

  1. Advanced Political Economy.—Lectures with discussions. Professor Monroe.
    Original papers by the class.
    Spring Term. Tu., We., Th., Fr., Sa. 54 hours.
  2. English Constitution and Government.—The English and American governmental institutions compared. Lectures. Professor Monroe.
    Winter Term. Tu., We., Th., Fr., Sa. 58 hours.

Source: Catalogue of Oberlin College for the year 1891-1892, pp. 79-81.

____________________

A POPULAR BIBLIOGRAPHY OF SOCIOLOGY
JOHN R. COMMONS,
ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR OF POLITICAL ECONOMY,
OBERLIN COLLEGE.

OBERLIN, OHIO: THE OBERLIN NEWS PRESSES, 1892.

 

A POPULAR BIBLIOGRAPHY OF SOCIOLOGY.

The aim in compiling this Bibliography has been to furnish the general reader, especially the Christian minister and worker, a list of the best available books on important Sociological problems. Specialists, or those who desire to carry their studies further, can find extensive references in many of the books here mentioned to works in English and other languages. A more complete bibliography is the “Readers’ Guide in Economic, Social, and Political Science,” published by the Society for Political Education, New York.

Useful suggestions have been received from Gen. R. Brinkerhoff, of Mansfield, Ohio; Rev. Samuel W. Dike, LL. D., secretary of the National Divorce Reform League; Prof. Richard T. Ely, of Johns Hopkins University; Mr. W. B. Shaw, of the State Library, Albany, N. Y.; A. G. Warner, Ph. D., Superintendent of Charities of the District of Columbia.

The prices given are the publishers’ retail prices. Re ductions can usually be secured from any bookseller.

This is the first of a series of bulletins which the library of Oberlin College hopes to publish from time to time. It can be obtained free of charge on application to A. S. Root, Librarian of Oberlin College, Oberlin, Ohio.

GENERAL SOCIOLOGY.

Ely, Professor Richard T. Social Aspects of Christianity. N. Y., T. Y. Crowell & Co. 132 pages, price 90 cents.

This is the first book recommended for study by the Christian Social Union. It is a reprint of essays given at different times and places. It gives a forcible statement of the present attitude of the church toward social problems, and suggests principles and plans for social reform. It is well suited to arouse interest in, and show the importance of, Christian Sociology.

Ely, Professor Richard T. An Introduction to Political Economy. N. Y., Chautauqua Press, Hunt & Eaton, 1889. 358 pages, price $1.

A solid basis for studies in Sociology can be obtained only by beginning with that branch of Sociology which has reached most scientific development — Political Economy. This book is historical and descriptive, and furnishes an admirable introduction to Sociology. It contains selected bibliographies.

Ward, Lester F. Dynamic Sociology. N. Y., D. Appleton & Co., 1883. 2 vols., price $5. [Volume I; Volume II]

The ablest systematic treatise in English on Sociology. Superior to Comte or Spencer. The author, however, is biassed by grossly materialistic views of Christianity. He should be read with constant reference to works like those of Fremantle and Westcott, mentioned below.

Fremantle, Canon W. H. The World as the Subject of Redemption. N. Y., 1885. 443 pages, price $3.50. A cheaper edition is announced to appear soon by Longmans, Green & Co., N. Y.

“A magnificent description of the purpose of Christianity.” — Professor Ely. It should be in the hands of every minister of the gospel. The author discusses admirably the fundamental principles involved in the practical application of Christianity to Sociology.

Westcott, Canon B. F. Social Aspects of Christianity. London and N. Y., Macmillan & Co., 1887. 202 pages, price $1.50.

Sermons delivered at Westminster in 1886. Many good points.

Crooker, J. H. Problems in American Society. Boston, G. H. Ellis & Co. 293 pages, price $1.25.

Contains chapters on education, scientific charity, temperance, politics, religion. Good.

Social Science Library of the best authors. Edited by Rev. W. D. P. Bliss. N. Y., Humboldt Publishing Co. There have been issued seven numbers, as follows: (1) Rogers, Six Centuries of Work and Wages; (2) the Socialism of John Stuart Mill; (3) and (4) The Socialism and Unsocialism of Thomas Carlyle [Volume I; Volume II]; (5) William Morris, Poet, Artist, Socialist; (6) The Fabian Essays; (7) The Economics of Herbert Spencer. Price, paper cover, 25 cents each, or $2.50 a year for twelve numbers. Cloth extra, 75 cents each, or $7.50 a year for twelve numbers.

Public Opinion. Washington, D. C., Public Opinion Co. Weekly, price $3 per year.

Contains well-selected extracts from representative periodicals, giving all sides of current social and economic discussions. Sample copies may be obtained free on application.

Economic Review. Published quarterly for the Oxford University Branch of the Christian Social Union. First number, January, 1891. American agents, James Pott & Co., N Y. Subscription $2.50, single copies 75 cents.

The Christian Social Union is an organization inside the Established Church for the study of social questions. The Economic Review has been also adopted as the organ of the American Branch of the Union.

 

THE STATE.

Bluntschli, J. K. Theory of the Modern State. Translated from the sixth German edition. London and N. Y., Macmillan, 1885. 518 pages, price $ 3. 25.

This book is for the Modern State what Aristotle’s Politics is for the Ancient. It cannot be too highly praised, both for its historical and its philosophical insight. It presents the State as the outcome of social and economic forces, and in this regard its discussion of social classes is especially able and important.

Wilson, Woodrow. The State. Boston, D. C. Heath & Co., 1890. 686 pages, price $ 2.

A condensed description of the origin and growth of political institutions, and comparisons of Ancient and Modern States. Able chapters on law and the functions of government.

Adams, Henry C. The Relation of the State to Industrial Action. Baltimore, American Economic Association, 1888. 85 pages, price $1. (Vol. I, No. 6 of its “Publications.”).

An able presentation of fundamental principles regarding the industrial activities of the State.

Bryce, James. The American Commonwealth. [Volume I; Volume II, 3rd ed., 1897)] N. Y., Macmillan & Co., 1891. 2d edition, price $ 2.

 

THE FAMILY.

Westermarck, E. The History of Human Marriage. London, Macmillan, 1891. 664 pages, price 145.

“The best single book on the history of the Institution.” — Dr. Dike.

Starcke, C. N. The Primitive Family. Translated. N. Y., D. Appleton & Co., 1889. 315 pages, price $ 1. 75.

A valuable collection of facts and review of theories.

The English Bible for the family in Hebrew life.

Coulanges, Fustel de. The Ancient City. Translated from the French by Willard Small. Boston, Lee & Shepard, 1874. 529 pages.

Best for the family in Greco-Roman life.

Report of the United States Commissioner of Labor on Marriage and Divorce. Washington, 1889. 1074 pages.

The most complete source of information regarding the law and statistics of Marriage and Divorce in the United States and Europe. A second edition is already nearly exhausted.

Reports of the National Divorce Reform League contain useful discussions and references to literature. Published annually, 1886 to date. Rev. Samuel W. Dike, LL. D., corresponding secretary, Auburndale. Mass.

Reference should be made to chapters in other works. To writers on Social Ethics: Lotze, Practical Philosophy, translated and edited by Prof. G. T. Ladd, Ginn & Co. Hegel, edited by Prof. S. P. Morris. Wuttke, Christian Ethics, [Volume 1 History of Ethics; Volume II Pure Ethics] American edition. Writers on Political Science: Mulford, The Nation; Bluntschli, The Theory of the State; Woolsey, Political Science [Volume I; Volume II]. Writers on Law and Social Institutions: Sir Henry Maine’ s works, Gomme, Village Communities, Seebohm, The English Village Community. Law Books: Gray, Husband and Wife; Franklin, Marriage and Divorce.

 

LABOR.

Besides the following, there are also books mentioned under the heading “Remedies,” which describe the history and present conditions of the working classes.

Ely, Richard T. The Labor Movement in America. N. Y., T. Y. Crowell & Co., 1886. 383 pages, price $1.50.

A historical account of Labor organizations and communistic and socialistic movements in the United States. An Appendix gives platforms of Labor organizations and illustrative extracts from labor literature. The best.

Rogers, J. E. Thorold. Work and Wages. N. Y., Putnam. 591 pages, price $3. London, Swan Sonnenschein & Co. Abridged edition, 206 pages, price 25. 6d. Also abridged edition edited by Rev. W. D. P. Bliss, Humboldt Publishing Co., New York. Price, cloth 75 cents, paper 25 cents.

A history of English labor during the past six centuries, condensed by the author from his original investigations. A standard work.

Toynbee, Arnold. Industrial Revolution in England. London, Rivington, 1884. N. Y., Humboldt Publishing Co., 1890. Paper 60 cents, cloth $1.

Contributes admirably to a clear understanding of the rise and causes of present industrial problems.

Booth, C., ed. Labour and Life of the People. London, Williams & Norgate, 1889-’91. 2 vols. Vol. 1, East London, 10s. 6d; vol. 2, London, 215.

By far the most comprehensive and scientific investigation yet made into the actual conditions of a city’ s working population. No student of social science can dispense with it.

Riis, Jacob A. How the Other Half Lives. N. Y., Scribner, 1889. 304 pages, price $ 2.50.

The best description of New York tenements.

Campbell, Helen. Prisoners of Poverty. Boston, Roberts Bros., 1887. 257 pages, price $1.

A startling revelation of the life of women wage -workers in New York city, “based upon the minutest personal research.”

Campbell, Helen. Prisoners of Poverty Abroad. Boston, Roberts Bros., 1890. 248 pages, price $1.

A useful book.

Willoughby, W. F., and Graffenried, Miss Clare de. Child Labor. American Economic Association, 1890. 149 pages, price 75 cents. (Publications of the Am. Econ. Ass’n, vol. 5, No. 2.)

Two prize essays. The first is historical, and deals with general principles. The second gives the results of personal observations. The best.

Smith, R. M. Emigration and Immigration. N. Y., Scribner, 1890. 316 pages, price $1.40.

The best work on an important subject. Contains extensive bibliography.

Howell, George. The Conflicts of Capital and Labour. London and N. Y., Macmillan. 2d edition, revised, 1890, 536 pages, price $2.50.

The best description of trade-unions. Written by a trade-unionist and labor representative in Parliament. The author is not in sympathy with the “new trades unions” and the socialistic movements.

McNeill, Geo. E., ed. The Labor Movement, the Problem of To-day. Boston, A. M. Bridgman & Co., 1886. 650 pages, price $3.75

A co-operative work. Professor E. J. James contributes three chapters on the history of labor and labor legislation in Europe. The editor gives the history of labor in the United States. Leading representatives of labor organizations describe the growth of their own organizations. There are also chapters on arbitration, co -operation, industrial education, the land question and “army of the unemployed.” An important work.

Lloyd, H. D. Strike of Millionaires against Miners, the story of Spring Valley. N. Y., Belford, Clarke & Co., 1890. 264 pages, price $ 1; paper, 50 cents.

A good instance of evasion of responsibility on the part of stockholders for corporate management.

Burnett, John and others. The Claims of Labour. Edinburgh, Co-operative Printing Co., 1886. 275 pages, price 1s.

Contains an able chapter on “Irregularity of Employment and Fluctuations of Prices,” by H. S. Foxwell, professor of economics, University College, London.

Clark, J. B. The Philosophy of Wealth. Boston, Ginn & Co., 1889. 239 pages, price $1.10.

A thoughtful work. Treats of the functions of the church.

Gunton, G. Wealth and Progress. N. Y., Appleton, 1887. 382 pages, price $1; paper, 50 cents.

A discussion of the law of wages and an argument for eight -hour legislation.

Journal of the Knights of Labor. 841 North Broad street, Philadelphia. Price $1 per year.

The best of the labor press. Indispensable for the student of current labor problems.

Reports of Labor Bureaus, especially Massachusetts and the United States Department of Labor. Valuable reprints from Massachusetts reports can be obtained on payment of postage. Reports of the United States Department of Labor are free. Write to the Commissioner of Labor, Washington, D. C., and to the Chiefs of the Bureaus of Labor Statistics of the States, at the State Capitals.

Reports of Factory Inspectors of Ohio, New York, New Jersey and Massachusetts. Can be obtained on payment of postage by writing to the Factory Inspectors at the Capitals of the States.

 

PAUPERISM. CHARITIES.

Dugdale, R. L. The Jukes; a story in Crime, Pauperism and Heredity. N. Y., G. P. Putnam, 1888, 4th edition. 121 pages price $1.

A wonderful book. Well worth careful study. Shows by personal investigations of a single pauper tribe, traced back a hundred and fifty years, the relations of heredity and crime.

McCulloch, Rev. Oscar C. The Tribe of Ishmael; a story of Social Degradation. With diagram. Indianapolis, Ind., Charity Organization Society. 8 pages, price 50 cents.

A striking summary of investigations into two hundred and fifty related pauper families, extending through five generations. Based on personal investigations and the records of the Charity Organization Society, of Indianapolis.

Loch, C. S. Charity Organization. London, Swan Sonnenschein & Co., 1890. 106 pages, price 2s. 6d.

The best description of the principles and methods of organized charity.

Lowell, Josephine Shaw. Public Relief and Private Charity. N. Y., G. P. Putnam, 1884. 111 pages; price, paper, 40 cents.

An excellent little manual.

Fields, Mrs. James T. How to Help the Poor. Boston, Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1883. Price 60 cents; paper, 20 cents net.

Describes the work of the Boston Associated Charities. Practical and Helpful.

Peek, F. Social Wreckage; Laws of England as they Affect the Poor. London, Isbister, 1889. Price 3s. 6d.

A short work, but valuable.

Hill, Florence Davenport. Children of the State. Edited by Fanny Fowke. N. Y., Macmillan & Co., 1889. 2d edition. Price $1.75.

Treats of the important subject of the care of dependent and delinquent children. Gives experience in different countries. Opposes “institutions.”

Reports of the National Conference of Charities and Corrections, Mrs. I. C. Barrows, ed., 141 Franklin street, Boston, Mass. Published annually, 1876 to date. The earlier numbers are out of print. Price $1.50; paper, $1.25 each.

“Its sixteen volumes constitute a library upon these subjects of more practical value than all others combined.’—Gen. Brinkerhoff.

Reports of the Boards of State Charities, especially of Ohio, Illinois and New York, which should be secured from the beginning, and Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Massachusetts, and Pennsylvania. These reports can be obtained by asking for them of the secretaries of the boards, at the State Capitals.

Charities Review, A Journal of Practical Sociology. Published for the Charity Organization Society, of the City of New York. The Critic Co. First number, November, 1891. Price $1 per year.

Contains contributions from the ablest specialists in sociological work and study.

 

CRIME AND PRISONS.

Baker, T. B. L. War with Crime. London and New York, Longman’s, 1890. 300 pages, price $4.

This book is a posthumous edition made up of papers and pamphlets published during the lifetime of the writer, and does not present a digested system, but it is a mine of gold. No other man in England in this generation is the peer of Baker. — Gen. Brinkerhoff.

Winter, Alexander. The New York State Reformatory at Elmira. London, Swan Sonnenschein & Co., 1891. 172 pages, price $1.

This reformatory has done more than any other institution in the world for the solution of the problem of the proper treatment of criminals. Eighty-three per cent. of its commitments are cured. This book well describes the institution and its methods.

Ellis, Havelock. The Criminal. New York, Scribner & Welford, 1890. 337 pages, price $1.

An able summary of recent investigations in criminal anthropology. The best in English.

Morrison, W. D. Crime and Its Causes. London, Swan Sonnenschein & Co., 1890. Price 2s. 6d.

A work of special value. The author antagonizes some of the current opinions. He has had an experience of fourteen years in connection with H. M. Prison at Wandsworth, England.

Wines, E. C. The State of Prisons and Child-Saving Institutions. Cambridge, Mass., J. Wilson & Son., 1880. 919 pages, price $5.

The most comprehensive and exhaustive work extant. Indispensable for a wide knowledge of the subject.

Du Cane, Sir Edmund F. The Punishment and Prevention of Crime. English Citizen Series. London and New York, Macmillan, 1885. 255 pages, price $1.

The writer for years past has had the charge of the entire prison system of England.

Tallack, W. Penological and Preventive Principles. London, Howard Association, Wertheimer, Lea & Co., 1889. 414 pages, price 8s.

A standard work on prison management, yet lagging behind in some lines of progress and to be accepted with allowance.

Rylands, L. G. Crime, Its Causes and Remedy. London, T. Fisher Unwin, 1889. 264 pages, price 6s.

An interesting work. There is a chapter on the prevention of drunkenness. The writer lays special emphasis on the care of children.

Brace, Charles Loring. The Dangerous Classes of New York and Twenty Years Work Among Them. Third edition. New York, Wynkoop & Hallenbeck, 1880. 468 pages, price $1.25.

Mr. Brace was founder of the New York Childrens’ Aid Society. This book, though written in 1872, is still valuable in many points. It deals especially with juvenile delinquents.

Round, W. M. F. Our Criminals and Christianity. New York, Funk & Wagnalls, 1888. 16 pages; price, paper, 15 cents.

Encyclopedia Britannica. Ninth edition. Also American Supplement.

The articles on “Prison Discipline” and “Reformatories” give the best birds-eye view of the whole subject.

Reports of the National Prison Association. W. M. F. Round, secretary, 35 E. 15th street, New York. Published annually, 1885 to date. Price $1.25 each. [Index to the Reports of the national Prison Association, 1870, 1873, 1874, 1883-1904. Washington, D. C.: Government Printing Office, 1906.]

Lalor’s Cyclopedia of Political Science.

Contains a valuable article on “Prisons and Prison Discipline,” by F. H. Wines.

 

INTEMPERANCE.

This subject has received indifferent scientific treatment. The best attempts are here given.

Mitchell, Kate, M. D. The Drink Question. London, Swan Sonnenschein & Co., 1891. Price 25. 6d.

A useful discussion.

Richardson, B, W., M. D. Ten Lectures on Alcohol. N. Y., National Temperance Society, 1883. 190 pages, price $1; paper, 50 cents.

Describes the physiological effects of alcohol.

Kerr, Norman, M. D. Inebriety; Its Etiology, Pathology, Treatment and Jurisprudence. London, H. K. Lewis, 1888. 415 pages, price 12s. 6d.

Clum, Franklin D., M. D. Inebriety; Its causes, Its Results, Its Remedy. Philadelphia, Lippincott Company, 1888. 248 pages, price $1.25.

A careful discussion of the causes of intemperance, and interesting suggestions for its cure.

 

REMEDIES.

Price, L. L. F. R. Industrial Peace; its advantages, methods and difficulties. N. Y., Macmillan, 1887. 127 pages, price $1.50.

Describes the practical workings of arbitration.

Weeks, Joseph D. Labor Differences and their Settlement. N. Y., Society for Political Education. Price 25 cents.

Favors arbitration.

Gilman, N. P. Profit Sharing Between Employer and Employee. Boston, Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1889. 460 pages, price $1.75.

The standard work on this subject.

History of Co-operation in the United States. Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University Studies in Historical and Political Science, vol. 6, 1888. 540 pages, price $3.

A comprehensive work. The best covering the entire field in the United States.

Dexter, Seymour. Co-operative and Loan Associations. N. Y., D. Appleton & Co., 1889. 299 pages price $1.25.

The best treatise on Building and Loan Associations. Explains their advantages and workings, tells how to organize them, and gives the laws of several states.

Schaeffle, A. Quintessence of Socialism. Translated from the German, London, Sonnenschein & Co. 1891. 127 pages, price 25. 6d. N. Y., The Humboldt Publishing Co., paper, 15 cents.

“The clearest account of Socialism that can be obtained in anything like the same compass.” — The translator.

Kirkup, T. Inquiry into Socialism. London and New York, Longmans, 1887. 188 pages, price $1.50.

The best presentation of a reasonable and moderate kind of Socialism.

Bellamy, Edward. Looking Backward, 2000. 1887. Boston, Houghton, Mifflin & Co. Price $1; paper, 50 cents.

Has had greater influence in propagating socialistic views among English-speaking people than any other book.

Hyndman, H. M. Historical Basis of Socialism in England. London, Kegan Paul, 1883. 492 pages, price 8s. 6d.

A summary of the works of Karl Marx and Rodbertus. The best introduction to the theories of Socialism.

Gronlund, Laurence. The Co-operative Commonwealth; an Exposition of Modern Socialism. Boston, Lee & Shepard, 1884. Price $1. Also N. Y., G. W. Lovell & Co., paper, 30 cents; London, Swan Sonnenschein & Co., 2s. 6d.

An explanation of Socialism as applied to the United States.

Laveleye, Emil de. The Socialism of To-day. Translated by G. H. Orpen. London, Field & Tuer, 1885. 331 pages, price 6s.

A valuable history of European Socialism, and a lucid statement of Socialistic doctrines.

Marx, Karl. Capital. Translated from the third German edition by Samuel Moore and Edward Aveling. N. Y., Appleton & Co., 1889. Price $3.

The “Bible of Socialism.” Very difficult reading, except in the historical parts. Marx’s arguments are summarized by other writers, especially Hyndman.

Barnett, Rev. and Mrs. Samuel A. Practicable Socialism; essays on social reform. London and New York, Longmans, Green & Co., 1888. 212 pages, price $1.

Reprints of magazine articles which appeared during the years 1879 to 1887. The authors are devoted workers in Whitechapel, London. The book gives a vivid picture of their life and work among the poor.

George, H. Progress and Poverty, an inquiry into the causes of industrial depressions, and of the increase of want with the increase of wealth. N. Y., Henry George & Co., 1888. 250 [sic] pages, price $1; paper, 35 cents.

A remarkable extension of the older economic theory, and a proposition to impose a “single tax” on land -values in order to appropriate for the public the “unearned increment.”

Ely, Professor R. T. Taxation in American States and Cities. N. Y., T. Y. Crowell & Co., 1888. 544 pages, price $1.75

Contains descriptions of the present systems and suggestions for better equalization of taxes.

Ely, R. T. Problems of To-day. N. Y., T. Y. Crowell & Co., 2d edition, 1890. Price $1.50.

Reprint of newspaper and magazine articles on protection and natural monopolies. Contains suggestions for reform.

U. S. Department of State. Consular Report No. 117, June, 1890, contains a valuable description, with illustration, of the municipal artisan’s dwellings of Liverpool. The report of October, 1888, No. 98, contains “Homes of the German Working People.” Washington, D. C., Department of State. Free on application.

Woodward, C. M. The Manual Training School. Boston, D. C. Heath & Co., 1887. Price $2.

The best. Contains exposition of the methods and scope of manual training, and discusses its educational, social and economic bearings.

Abel, Mary Hinman. Practical Sanitary and Economic Cooking, adapted to persons of moderate and small means. Rochester, N. Y., American Public Health Association. 182 pages, price 40 cents; paper, 35 cents.

Contains analyses of foods showing nutritive value, and suggestions for varying the diet at small expense.

Booth, General W. In Darkest England and the Way Out. N. Y., Funk & Wagnalls, 1890. 300 pages, price $1; paper 50 cents.

A notable scheme for rescuing the “submerged tenth” of England by means of city refuges, farm colonies, colonies over the sea, and other agencies, to be administered by the Salvation Army.

Loomis, S. L. Modern Cities and their Religious Problems. Introduction by J. Strong. New York, Baker & Taylor, 1887. 219 pages, price $1.

The results of personal study and experience. A useful book.

Gladden, Rev. W. Applied Christianity; moral aspects of social questions. Boston, Houghton, Mifflin & Co, 1886. 320 pages, price $1.25.

Sensible chapters on the relations of Christianity to the problems of the distribution of wealth.

Gladden, Rev. W., ed. Parish Problems. N. Y., The Century Co., 1887. 479 pages, price $2.

An useful hand-book for Christian workers. Valuable chapters by eminent writers on the relations of pastor and people to the community.

Reports of the Convention of Christian Workers of the United States and Canada. Rev. John C. Collins, secretary, New Haven, Conn., price $1. Published annually since 1886.

Valuable reports and discussions on methods of Christian work.

Reports of the Evangelical Alliance, especially the report of the meeting at Washington in 1887, published under the title “National Perils and Opportunities.” Price $ 1.50, paper $1. Parts of this report have been printed in two separate volumes by The Baker & Taylor Co., N. Y., the first entitled “Problems of American Civilization,” the second, “Co-operation in Christian Work.” Price 60 cents each, paper 30 cents. The Report for the meeting at Boston in 1890, entitled “National Needs and Remedies.” Same publishers and prices.

Leaflets of the Christian Social Union in the United States. Professor Richard T. Ely, secretary, Baltimore, Md. Free on application.

 

Source: Oberlin College Library Bulletin. January, 1892. Volume I, No. 1. Oberlin, Ohio: The Oberlin News Presses, 1892.

Image Source: John R. Commons in the Oberlin College yearbook Hi-oh-hi, 1892 (page 43).

Categories
Cornell Economist Market Economists Michigan

Michigan. Henry Carter Adams’ Plea on Own Behalf, 1887

 

The dirtiest my hands have ever become from archival work was during my exploration of Columbia University’s collection of John Maurice Clark’s papers. Now having the luxury of digital images to scroll through, I can work without forsaking the pleasures of biting my finger nails, rubbing my eyes and scratching my nose. The younger Clark was quite a paper hoarder so it pays to return to my folders with the images of  his documents.

This post builds on notes Clark took after a talk given by his colleague Joseph Dorfman on the economist Henry Carter Adams. Clark was struck by a phrase used by Adams, “all power carries responsibility,” that was a recurring theme in Clark’s own “preaching”. Attached to his brief note was a typed copy of a transcribed letter that Henry Carter Adams had written to the President of the University of Michigan to plead the case that he wished to be judged for a professorial appointment for the right reasons, i.e. not for any particular policy positions he might be thought not to hold but for exhibiting high scholarly virtues in his research and teaching.

Adams had earlier managed to attract the ire of a Cornell trustee, businessman Henry Williams Sage, much in the way Paul Samuelson was to attract the ire of the former member of the M.I.T. corporation, Lamott Dupont II, some 60 years later. Clearly not wanting his Cornell history to repeat itself, Henry Carter Adams successfully went pro-active with the University of Michigan in lobbying on his own behalf. He did get the appointment.

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Socialist Tease?

Henry C. Adams along with Richard T. Ely was attacked for “Coquetting with Anarchy” in The Nation (September 9, 1886), pp. 209-210. In that article Adams was incorrectly identified as President [C. K.] Adams of Cornell. The correction was immediately forthcoming in the following issue, September 16, 1886 issue, p. 234. The essay by Henry Carter Adams being attacked was “Principles that Should Control the Interference of the States in Industries” that was read before the “Constitution Club”of New York City.

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Several biographical accounts of Adams

Joseph Dorfman. The Economic Mind in American Civilization, vol. 3. Pp. 164-174.

S. Lawrence Bigelow, I. Leo Sharfman, and R. M. Wenley, “Henry Carter Adams,” The Journal of Political Economy, April 1922, pp. 201-11 (includes a selected bibliography);

“Memorial to Former President Henry C. Adams,” The American Economic Review, September 1922, pp. 401-16.

Mark Perlman’s review of the 1954 publication of Henry Carter Adams’ Relation of the State to Industrial Action (1887) and his American Economic Association Presidential Address (1896) edited by Joseph Dorfman with introductory essay. [Note: this re-publication of two of Adams’ essays includes the letter transcribed from Dorfman’s copy in J. M. Clark’s papers.]

A. W. Coats. Henry Carter Adams: A Case Study in the Emergence of the Social Sciences in the United States, 1850-1900. Journal of American Studies, Vol. 2, No. 2 (October 1968), pp. 177-197.

Nancy Cohen. The Reconstruction of American Liberalism, 1865-1914. University of North Carolina Press, 2002. (Especially Chapter 5 “The American Scholar Revisited”, pp. 154-158, 162-164, 169-174)

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Henry C. Adams, some early publications

The Position of Socialism in the Historical Development of Political Economy. Penn Monthly, April 1870, pp. 285-94.

Outline of Lectures upon Political Economy (Baltimore: privately printed, 1881); (second edition, Ann Arbor: privately printed, 1886).

“The Labor Problem,” Sibley College Lectures.—XI. Scientific American Supplement, August 21, 1886.

Adams’ statement in The Labor Problem, edited by William E. Barns (New York: Harper, 1886), pp. 62-63.

“Principles that Should Control the Interference of the States in Industries” read before the “Constitution Club” of the City of New York. [Fun Fact: Frank Taussig’s copy]

Relation of the State to Industrial Action. Publications of the American Economic Association, 1887. Pp. 471-549.

Public Debts: An Essay in the Science of Finance (New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1887).

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Note by John Maurice Clark attached to transcribed copy of Henry Carter Adams’ letter

Letter of Henry Carter Adams (1851-1921)
to President James B. Angell, March 15, 1887.

J.M.C. Nov. 27, 1951, Comment, from memory of Dorfman’s remarks yesterday.

President Angell appointed Adams professor after receipt of this letter, and Thomas Cooley (father of Charles Horton Cooley?) who was on the original Interstate Commerce Commission, got Adams the job of chief statistician of the Commission, where he created the system of control of accounts of railroads aiming at enough uniformity to make financial and operating reports comparable, so totals for the country and comparisons of companies would mean something.

Adams had already commented on Jevon’s “The State in Relation to Labor[”] and Adams’ original paper on this theme was later (later than Mar 15, 1887) worked over and enlarged, and came to be regarded as a classic by economists between Adams’ generation and mine.

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[Clark’s note] This is the letter of a man 36 years old who had earned his academic freedom by a sober and responsible attitude. From my standpoint, it is especially interesting because Adams gives such central importance to the principle that all power carries responsibility (presumably inner responsibility plus subjection to checks and controls where appropriate). This is the principle I’ve been preaching (or announcing factually) as the only alternative to regimentation or chaos.

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

COPY

Ithaca, N.Y. March 15, 1887.

Dear Dr. Angell:

I don’t think there is any danger of my misunderstanding your letter or the spirit in which it was written. Last year, your questions came to me with the shock of a complete surprise, but I am coming to be pretty well accustomed to such expressions now.

You ask if I can help you any more so you can see your way clear on my nomination. I don’t see as I can, except it be to suggest that, in my opinion, your point of view in this matter is not the right one. If you make a man’s opinions the basis of his election to a professorship, you do, whether you intend it or not, place bonds upon the free movement of his intellect. It seems to me that a board has two things to hold in view. First, is a man a scholar? Can he teach in a scholarly manner? Is he fair to all parties in the controverted questions which come before him? Second, is he intellectually honest? If these two questions are answered in the affirmative, his influence upon young men cannot be detrimental.

Upon these points, certainly, nothing new can be said. I have served for five years as an apprentice and you have had opportunity to know. Or, with regard to the fairness in which topics are presented in the classroom, you have the outline of (the) lectures. My conscious purpose in teaching is two-fold. To portray social problems to men as they will find them to be when they leave the University and to lead men to recognize that morality is an every day affair.

But all this, you will say, is by the point. You say you do not know what my views are on capital and labor. I am not surprised at that for I have intentionally withheld them. No one knows them and I had madeup my mind to keep them to myself until I had worked through my study of the industrial society. My reason for such a decision was, that, in my study of social questions I had found myself on all sides of the question, I started as an individualist of the most pronounced type. But my advocacy of it led me to perceive its errors, and my criticisms were formulated before I read any literature of socialism. But when, upon coming into contact with socialistic writers I found their criticisms were the same as my own I was for a while carried away by their scheme. But upon further study, I found their plans to be, not only as I though impracticable, but contrary to the fundamental principles of English political philosophy, in which I still believed. You can imagine that was not a pleasant condition for one appreciative of logical symmetry. You said a year ago that my views were not logical, that is, that some of my expressions were contradictory to each other. I don’t doubt that they appeared so, it seems bad logic to admit the purpose of individualism and the criticism of socialists at the same time. You say now in your letter that I have not worked out my ideas into clear and definite shape. That is true, but I am doing it as fast as I can and in my own way. My book upon Pub. Debts is one stage in this direction.

But to go back to the development of this subject in my own mind. The illogical position into which my mind had drifted as the result of the first five years of study, was the occasion of keen intellectual pain: but the sense of the necessity of harmony led me finally to discover a principle, which I thought, and still think, adequate to bridge over the chasm between the purpose of individualism and the criticisms of socialism. This principle is the principle of personal responsibility in the administration of all social power, no matter in what shape that power may exist. This principle has given form to our political society: I wish it to be brought over into industrial relations. Its realization will cure the ills of which socialists complain, without curbing or crushing that which is the highest in the individual. I thought, at first, this principle to be so simple that its statement must gain for it quick recognition. But when I tried to make that statement, and work the theory out, I was at once surprised and chagrined to see what a task lay before me. It is useless to deny that the interests of the privileged classes in our civilization is against responsible administration of industrial power. I worked at it for a year, and then came to the conclusion that I did not yet know enough, nor was I sure enough of my position, to make public the thought which had assumed direction of my studies. It was then that I took up the study of finance and went to work upon Pub. Debts. This is the most simple of any of the topics which must be treated as the subject of constructive economics opened before me: it was also furthest removed from the points likely to cause controversy. I thought I might, perhaps, gain the reputation of a sound thinker so that expressions of views more unusual might attract a candid reading from scholarly men. It has taken a year and a half longer than I had anticipated, and now that it is done seems to have dwarfed in importance.

I do not think this narration will relieve you from embarrassment. I do not see that anything can do that, except a promise on my part to give expression only to orthodox views of social relations. But it has relieved me somewhat and I trust you will consider that an adequate apology. I have of course full confidence in your personal friendship: I only wish you might have equal confidence in my scholarly purposes.

Very truly yours,
H.C. ADAMS.

P.S.

May I add a postscript, for I am sure it is an unjustifiable pride which kept me from inserting it in the body of the letter. I presume the expression(s) of my views which have given you the greatest solicitude are to be found in the Sibley address of last year, and in the syndicate article which I wrote on the Knights of Labor. I do not wish to recall anything said, but I am willing to say that these expressions were as unwise as they were unpremeditated. In justice to myself I should say: that the Sibley address was on Friday afternoon and my invitation was on the Wednesday previous. Professor [R. H.] Thurston said he had been disappointed in his lecturer for the afternoon, that he did not like to postpone the meeting, and that he would like me to open a discussion on the labor problem. He told me, who besides myself would speak, and they were all decidedly opposed to any expression of sympathy with the struggle of the Knights then going on. After my opening address, the man against whom I talked, who, it was said, would reply to me, took his hat and left. Others spoke, among them President [Charles Kendal] Adams, Mr. Smith [sic, perhaps Mr. Frank B. Sanborn?] and Henry [W.] Sage. The President was not dogmatical but did not understand what I tried to say. The others were. My part in the discussion has cost me a professorship, for I do not see how, with the views of Mr. Sage to the functions of a teacher, he can vote for me. It was after the address was made that the talk began, and I thought it then cowardly not to let it be printed, and dishonest to change it. So it went in, as nearly as I could remember as it was given. I think it unfair to judge of my classroom work on this address.

With regard to the syndicate article [“What Do These Strikes Mean?”, a copy attached to Adams’ letter to James B. Angell dated March 25, 1887], I confess myself to have been deceived by the attitude of the Knights of Labor during their strike on the Gould system or I should not have written it. In their articles of complaint, they said certain things which I believed to be true, and I thought the men who drew them up had thought the labor problem through to its end, and had made a stand on a principle in harmony with English Liberties. If so, it was time for men of standing to declare themselves. But it turns out that the Knights hit the mark by a chance shot. They did not know what they were about and got whipped as they deserved. The result of this unfortunate venture is, that I believe more strongly than ever in the necessity of scholarship as one element in the solution of this terrible question that is upon us.

Have you seen “The Ind. Revolution” by Arnold Toynbee? His death is a loss. The scraps of his lectures and letters show him to have had much the same purpose as myself in his studies.

Respectfully
H.C.A.

Source: Columbia University Archives. John M. Clark Collection, Economic Theory and Methodology, Box 28. Folder “Group Power carries moral responsibility”.

Image Source: Johns Hopkins University Sheridan Libraries, graphic and pictorial collection. Henry Carter Adams (Ph.D., Johns Hopkins, 1878). Photograph by Sam B. Revenaugh (1847-1893), Ann Arbor, Mich.

Categories
Economists Wisconsin

Wisconsin. Debate on role of federal government in the economy. Keyserling vs. Friedman, 1963

Rummaging through the digitized archival offerings of the University of Wisconsin library, I came across the poster above announcing a debate betwen Leon Keyserling and Milton Friedman. The poster gives a date and time for the debate but no year was included for the obvious reason that advertising years in advance on posters seldom makes sense. The webpage where the image of the poster is displayed is hardly helpful in dating the debate:

Economic debate poster

  • ca. 1961-ca. 1973
  • A poster announcing a debate on government action on the economy to be held at the Union Theater. The poster once hung in Van Hise Hall and was found during construction.

From the following two articles in the Wisconsin State Journal we find that the debate took place in 1963. It is also somewhat interesting to note that the debate took place just eight days before the assassination of John F. Kennedy in Dallas, Texas. 

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U.S. Government Role in Economy Will Be Debated

Economists Leon Keyserling and Milton Friedman will debate the proposition that the federal government should play an active roll in the economy, at 8:15 tonight in the Wisconsin Union theater.

Keyserling, chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers to the President from 1950 until the end of the Truman Administration, will present the affirmative aide of the argument.

He is presently the head of the Conference on Economic Progress and a consulting economist and attorney in Washington. He has served as deputy administrator of the U.S. Housing Authority, and as consultant to various committees and members of the Senate and the House.

Keyserling has been connected with the studies and drafting of such economic legislation as the National Industrial Recovery act, the National Housing act, the National Labor Relations act, the Employment act, and the General Housing act.

Debating the negative side of the proposition will be Friedman, professor of economics at the University of Chicago and a member of the research staff of the National Board [sic] of Economic Research.

A visiting professor at the University of Wisconsin in 1940-41, Friedman has also served as an associate economist with the National Resources committee and as the principal economist for the division of tax resources of the U.S. Treasury Department.

The debate is sponsored by the Wisconsin Union Forum committee and the Pan-Hellenic and Interfraternity Associations. No tickets are needed.

Source: Wisconsin State Journal. Madison. Thursday, November 14, 1963, p. 4.

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1,000 Hear Top Economists Debate Role of Government
By William Hauda (State Journal Staff Writer)

Economists Leon Keyserling and Milton Friedman Thursday night didn’t reach any agreement on what role the federal government should play in the national economy.

Keyserling, a liberal and a leading consulting economist and attorney in Washington, D. C, contended that the federal government should play an active role in the economy.

Debate Before 1,000

Friedman, a conservative and professor of economics at the University of Chicago, argued the negative in a debate before more than 1,000 persons in the Wisconsin Union theater.

Keyserling maintained that today’s world problems of competing economic systems and large armaments “can only be solved through the system we call government”

“These things will continue to require sensitive, progressive, alert, and — yes — expanding public responsibility,” he said.

Friedman said, “Of course we all know the federal government has for a long time played a role in the economy. I am sure that; Mr. Keyserling, like all of us, would like to see a world where less is spent on armaments.”

He went on to argue that, in most every case, federal control has not accomplished its objectives.

He said it was “not a simple issue of responsible government” and that he wanted to see a system in which a producer can’t get government protection and can only prosper by serving the consumer.

Cites Travels

Friedman said neither the Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) nor the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has accomplished their objectives and described anti-trust legislation as a “mixed bag” of good and bad.

Of his recent travels around the world, he said, “What struck me was wherever there was extensive central planning, there was poverty.” As examples, he cited Russia, India and Indonesia.

“I am not saying free enterprise will produce prosperity,” he added. “By itself, it is not a sufficient condition.”

In his rebuttal, Keyserling said Friedman’s arguments were like saying if there is corruption in the New York police department, we should just get rid of the police.

“Next, my friend trys to tell you that the farm program has accomplished nothing. Goodness knows, there are thorns in the farm program. But what person can stand up in the state of Wisconsin and tell you the farmer is not better off than 40 years ago.”

“My friend wants to do away with the public operation of secondary schools,” said Keyserling. I don’t. I think we need more schools.”

“I’m the first one to the government has not perfected the degree of control of business cycles that I would like to see it obtain,” said Keyserling. But he added, “all this progress has been made within our life time and I’d like to see it continue.”

Friedman said, “The best thing the government can do is provide a stable (economic) background.” He said the government should not disrupt the economy and should allow free enterprise to run the economy.

Source: Wisconsin State Journal. Madison. Saturday, November 16, 1963, p. 7.

Image Source: University of Wisconsin digital library.