We begin with an example of the honored academic tradition of a faculty minute entered into the record following the death of a present or former colleague. In the year that the Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel was awarded to Angus Deaton, in part, for his work in applied consumption analysis, I post the Columbia University Faculty of Political Science memorial minute for Henry L. Moore.
I follow the Memorial Minute with a letter written by Moore to his chairman Edwin R. A. Seligman appealing for a pay raise on the grounds that his research performance had been undervalued relative to administrative work and teaching of a colleague.
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[Memorial Minute]
FACULTY OF POLITICAL SCIENCE
April 17, 1959
Henry L. Moore
Henry Ludwell Moore was born in southern Maryland in 1869, the seventh in direct male line of descent from a Henry Moore who settled in Virginia in 1635 and who later moved to Maryland. After obtaining a B.A. at Randolph Macon in 1892, he pursued his studies at the University of Vienna and later received his Ph.D. from Johns Hopkins in 1896. After one year as instructor of economics at Johns Hopkins and five years at Smith College, he came to Columbia in 1902 as adjunct professor, continuing as Professor of Political Economy from 1906 to his premature retirement from professional activity for reasons of health in April, 1929. He died at the age of 88 on April 28, 1958.
Professor Moore was a pioneer in the application of statistical theory, founded on the calculus of probabilities, to the evaluation of economic relationships in a context of a mathematically developed economic theory. Under the influence of his colleague John Bates Clark, 22 years his senior, and of Karl Pearson, Moore developed a statistical verification and extension of Clark’s theory of distribution in his “Laws of Wages,” published in 1911. In his “Forecasting the Yield and the Price of Cotton,” published in 1917, the inherent brilliance of his use of multiple correlation techniques by which he was able to outpredict, in retrospect at least, the elaborate crop forecasting machinery set up by the Department of Agriculture is in no way diminished, though somewhat disguised by the fact that the advent of the boll weevil completely upset the older relationships and made his formulas useless for subsequent forecasting, though the techniques remained valid.
In addition to his interest in economics, Moore had a deep attachment to classical philosophy and an interest ranging over many other fields; one of his courses was entitled “Interrelations of Political Economy and Sociology.” His interest in astronomy is perhaps responsible for his ill-fated attempt to relate the eight year business cycle, which he considered to be well established, to a corresponding weather cycle, and thereby to the corresponding periodicity of the transits and near-transits of Venus. In this he demonstrated a willingness to look for hypotheses to test wherever the data seemed to lead him, regardless of how remote the connection may initially seem, a procedure which, however dangerous it may be for the individual, is salutary for the progress of a science that finds it easier to weed out error than to develop new truth.
Moore’s pioneering steps have been to a considerable extent eclipsed in the minds of the current generation of economists by the tracks of those who have used the methods he pioneered. Henry Schultz’ all too brief but important career was given its initial impetus under Moore’s tutelage. Among the many others whose work was strongly influenced by Moore are Holbrook Working, Hugh Killough, Bradford Smith, Edmund Daggit, Fred Waugh, Louis Bean, and Mordecai Ezekiel. Moore’s final work, “Synthetic Economics” provided a significant bridge between the now classic work of Walras and Pareto in the field of mathematical economics and the more recent formulations of Hotelling and Samuelson.
In the nearly 30 years that have elapsed since his retirement, most of those who knew him intimately have left the science; yet it is appropriate to recall once more the significant role he had in the advancement of quantitative economics before the onrush of his successors hides his work completely from view.
Source: Department of Economics Collection, Columbia University Rare Book & Manuscript Library. Box 8, Faculty of Political Science Minutes 1913-1959; Folder, “Faculty of Political Science Minutes”.
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The following letter of Henry L. Moore reflects a severe salary structure problem within the Columbia economics department going into 1924-25. Professors Wesley C. Mitchell, Henry L. Moore and Vladimir G. Simkhovitch were all receiving $6,000 annual salaries whereas the second-highest paid professor, Henry R. Seager, was getting paid $7,500. Highest paid was the chairman, Edwin R. A. Seligman at $10,000. In his departmental budget request to Columbia President Nicholas Murray Butler (November 23, 1923), Seligman reminded Butler of an “understanding that the salaries of a number of professors now receiving $6,000 will be advanced next year to $7,500, the minimum, as everyone must agree, compatible with the maintenance of the standing of living desirable for Columbia professors” and made the case for pay raises for Mitchell, Moore and Simkhovitch. The pay raises were ultimately granted, not for 1924-25, but for the following year.
Henry L. Moore’s lament should probably be read as expressing as his disappointed hope and/or that he might have been unaware of Seligman’s efforts in 1923 to get him the parity with Henry R. Seager that he was petitioning for.
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Columbia University
in the City of New York
Faculty of Political Science
September 20, 1924
My dear Professor Seligman:
We are about to begin the work of another year and I am anxious to do all in my power to contribute toward the solution, within the Department, of the personal problem before us. I ask leave, therefore, to present to you and, if you think it advisable, to other members of the Department, a statement of the relative amounts received in salary by Professor Seager and myself from the University:
| Year | Prof. Seager | Prof. Moore | |
| 1902-3 | 3000 | 3000 | I have had to rely on my memory for the changes in Prof. Seager’s salary. The figures relating to my own income are taken from my records. |
| 1903-4 | 3500 | 3500 | |
| 1904-5 | 3500 | 3500 | |
| 1905-6 | 3500 | 3500 | |
| 1906-7 | 3500 | 3500 | |
| 1907-8 | 3500 | 3500 | |
| 1908-9 | 4000 | 4000 | |
| 1909-10 | 4500 | 2800 | Here Professor Seager’s salary went up $500 and mine down $1200 |
| 1910-11 | 4500 | 2800 | |
| 1911-12 | 6000 | 2800 | |
| 1912-13 | 6000 | 2800 | |
| 1913-14 | 6000 | 2800 | |
| 1914-15 | 6000 | 2800 | |
| 1915-16 | 6000 | 2800 | |
| 1916-17 | 6000 | 2800 | |
| 1917-18 | 6000 | 2800 | |
| 1918-19 | 6000 | 4500 | |
| 1919-20 | 6000 | 4000 | |
| 1920-21 | 7500 | 6000 | |
| 1921-22 | 7500 | 6000 | |
| 1923-24 | 7500 | 6000 | |
| $117500 | $82200 |
Several facts in this table need comment:
(1) Our salaries and rank were the same until the year 1909-10 when, at my request, in order that I might devote more time to research, I was relieved of much teaching and administrative work. I gladly paid for the increased leisure by suffering a reduction of my salary from $4000 to $2800. The same year Professor Seager’s salary was increased from $4000 to $4500. This annual difference of $1700 continued until 1911-12.
(2) In 1911-12 Professor Seager’s salary was increased to $6000; mine remained at $2800. The annual difference of $3200 continued until 1918-19 when, during the War, I was transferred to Barnard College at a salary of $4500. Professor Seager’s salary was $6000.
(3) The next year, 1919-20, I was transferred to Columbia, with a salary of $4000. Professor Seager’s remained at $6000.
(4) In 1920-21 Professor Seager’s salary was increased to $7500 and mine to $6000. The annual difference of $1500 has continued to the present time.
It would appear from these figures that if no account be taken of the reduction in our pay when we have been on leave of absence, Professor Seager’s aggregate salary has exceeded mine by more than thirty five thousand dollars.
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A few years ago there was a Convocation of the Faculties of the University to consider methods of promoting research. You made a memorable speech in which you went directly to the heart of the matter in saying: “The only way to promote research is to find a man who can do it and then let him alone”. You were absolutely right. But how does it work in the particular case of our own Department? For twenty odd years Professor Seager and myself, who entered Columbia together with the same rank and same salary, have pursued different ends. he has preferred administration and teaching and has justly prospered in honors and income. I have accepted the necessary isolation and incurred the risks of the investigator who attacks new problems and devises new methods, but after nearly a quarter of a century of unremitting labor I have received from the University some thirty thousand dollars less than my honored colleague.
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I am grateful to the University for giving me the opportunity for creative thought, and you will bear witness that I have never evinced any other sentiment than pleasure in the progress of a colleague. But isn’t there a principle at stake? Is it just to permit the financial discrimination between us to continue?
Yours sincerely,
[signed]
Henry L. Moore
Source: Columbia University. Rare Book & Manuscript Library. Seligman Collection Box 37 (aggregation of original Seligman boxes 100-102). Folder: “Box 100, Seligman, Columbia 1924-30”.
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For more about Henry Moore, see George J. Stigler, Henry L. Moore and Statistical Economics. Econometrica, Vol. 30, No. 1 (Jan., 1962), pp. 1-21.
Image Source: Precedes the Stigler article.