Tag: Moore

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Columbia Economists

Columbia. Excerpt from Dean’s Report dealing with faculty of political science. 1930-1931

The previous post was a backward look from October 1930 at the first fifty-years of Columbia’s Faculty of Political Science (home of its graduate economics department). The following excerpts from the annual report of the Dean of the Faculties of Political Science, Philosophy, and Pure Science give us a snapshot of the Faculty of Political Science for the year 1930-31.

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FACULTIES OF POLITICAL SCIENCE, PHILOSOPHY, AND PURE SCIENCE

REPORT OF THE DEAN
FOR THE ACADEMIC YEAR ENDING JUNE 30, 1931

To the President of the University

Sir:

As Dean of the Faculties of Political Science, Philosophy, and Pure Science, I submit the following report for the academic year ending June 30, 1931.

The year was marked by a number of events of interest and importance to the Graduate Faculties. Scarcely was it under way when the University celebrated with appropriate dignity and simplicity the Fiftieth Anniversary of the Founding of the Faculty of Political Science. The details of this celebration, having been elsewhere recorded in print, need not be repeated here. The presence on that occasion of the venerable founder of the Faculty, Emeritus Professor John William Burgess, still in vigor of mind and of personality, gave it peculiarly interesting and dramatic focus. It was a fortunate circumstance that this expression of the University’s homage and debt to him was given at that time. Only a few months thereafter, deservedly honored and mourned, he passed from the earthly scene.

As a permanently useful memento of this celebration there was published a Bibliography of the Faculty of Political Science containing the list of the several thousand books and important articles written by its members as well as the titles of the nearly seven hundred doctoral dissertations that have been prepared and published under its guidance. Important to our University life as the integrity and unity of this Faculty is both historically and presently, it is regrettable that because of this fact this Bibliography falls far short of including the total of our contributions to the field of the social sciences. A complete bibliography of our publications in this wide field would have included numerous books and articles by members of other faculties, notably the Faculties of Business and of Law.

But while the Faculty of Political Science momentarily paused on the threshold of the year to celebrate its semicentenary, to look back upon its achievements and modestly to rejoice in its traditions, its spirit was in 1930, as in 1880, the spirit of youth. Professor Burgess himself was only thirty-five when he fathered the Faculty. And of the early famous small group whom he called to aid him in his high adventure in scholarship Professors Mayo-Smith and Munroe Smith were only twenty-six, and Professors Goodnow and Seligman twenty-four. Even among later arrivals Professor John Bassett Moore was only thirty-one, Professor Dunning thirty-two, Professor Osgood thirty-five, and Professor Giddings thirty-seven, when they joined the Faculty. It was a youthful company courageously and energetically facing the future.

And so this Faculty continues. It was the Department of Economics that was especially called upon this year to take thought of tomorrow. It had suffered severe losses. Professor Henry L. Moore retired in the spring of 1930. Professor Seager died in August of the same year. Professor Seligman retired at the end of the year. Inevitably the School of Business and the Department of Economics have been developing along many related lines of teaching and research. It would have been calamitous had they developed at cross purposes or in ungenerous rivalry. Happily no such misfortune befell. From the inception of the School of Business these two units have been held to common purpose by ties of common sense and of that fine spirit of loyalty and of friendship that is so much a part of the Columbia spirit. But the breach in the ranks of the Department of Economics seemed an appropriate occasion for welding these separate units, at least in so far as graduate work is concerned, into closer organic integration. Everybody recognizes that under our more or less arbitrary, but certainly unavoidable, scheme of departmentalization there are subjects and interests appropriate to a professional school of business that might not properly be included under a graduate department of economics. Conversely, there are manifestly subjects and interests that not only may be, but also should be, included under both. We severed the knot of this difficult problem of University organization by asking five members of the Faculty of the School of Business to become members of the Department of Economics and accept seats in the Faculty of Political Science. These were Professors Bonbright, Haig, McCrea, Mills, and Willis. This is no mere paper arrangement; it means a vital amalgamation of intellectual forces working toward common ends.

In recognition of the growing rapprochement between law and the social sciences it seemed fitting also that two members of the Faculty of Law, whose fields of interest are considerably economic, should be invited into this enlarged departmental membership. Professors Llewellyn and Berle were in consequence drawn into the unit. This was in line with the historic dual relationship that has so long prevailed with profitable results to teaching and scholarship between the Department of Public Law and the School of Law.

In addition to these internal realignments several new members were added to the Department of Economics. These are: Leo Wolman, eminent economist and practitioner in the field of labor problems; Carter Goodrich, whose special field for development will be American economic history; and Harold Hotelling, a distinguished mathematician turned economist. Arthur R. Burns, Lecturer in Economics in Barnard College, will henceforth devote himself to graduate instruction and research upon problems of industrial and business organization. Michael Florinsky, working upon recent economic developments in Europe, and Joseph Dorfman upon the development of American economic thought, have been made Associates in the Department. The remolding of this important Department at a moment of unprecedentedly swift change in the economic world augurs for the years ahead rich results in scholarship and in service.

In the closely related Department of Social Science the appointment of Robert S. Lynd, distinguished sociological investigator and for some years past Secretary of the Social Science Research Council, is likewise an omen of certain promise. It can scarcely fail to quicken, expand, and deepen the activities of our sociologists in this great laboratory of society in which we live, the city of New York.

[…]

I express the deep grief of the University over the death in August, 1930, of Henry Rogers Seager, Professor of Political Economy, and in June, 1931, of Franklin Henry Giddings, Professor Emeritus in Residence of Sociology and the History of Civilization. For a quarter of a century or more here at Columbia, Professor Seager studied with and expounded to his students the problems of labor in a changing industrial society and the economic problems of corporations and trusts. Scholar, teacher, writer, humanitarian, active participant in welfare movements and organizations, he died at the age of sixty, depriving us of many years of companionship and service upon which we had never thought not to count. Beloved of both students and colleagues, his deep personal interest in and influence upon the former will not be easily supplied by another. His loss to the latter is irreparable.

Professor Giddings’ death brought to its close a long, rich life of labor, of profound reflection, and of purposeful achievement. Trail blazer in an almost unexplored and unstaked field of social inquiry he more than any other American gave meaning to the term sociology and direction to its course. His numerous writings attest the catholicity of his interests, the depth of his penetrating scholarship, and the clarity of his thinking on social problems and developments. Scholars the world over acclaimed him, while the large company of his students and the small company of his immediate colleagues held him in the affectionate regard which his rich humanity and his fineness of spirit inspired and compelled.

The end of the academic year brought with it the retirement from active service to the University of Edwin R. A. Seligman, McVickar Professor of Political Economy, and of Edward Delavan Perry, Jay Professor of Greek. Professor Seligman’s enormous and varied contributions to modern economic thought, especially in the field of public finance, as well as his numerous public and quasi-public services are so widely and so favorably known that it seems quite as useless as it is impossible summarily to estimate them here. His name is known and his views are valued wherever informed men in almost any land discuss problems of finance, and many are the important laws embodying fiscal policies of city, state, and nation that bear in their contours the impress of his studious acumen and practical genius. A scholar in affairs he was and continues to be. Happily he tarries with us in residence as active and as interested as ever. For him relief from classroom instruction can but mean an increase of productive scholarship and of public activity, if such a thing be conceivable.

[…]

Respectfully submitted,
Howard Lee McBain,
Dean

June 30, 1931

Source: Columbia University. Annual Report of the President and Treasurer to the Trustees…for the year ending June 30, 1931. Pp. 202-204; 208-209; 214.

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

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Columbia Economics Programs Economists Germany

Columbia. Munroe Smith’s history of the faculty of political science as told by A.S. Johnson, 1952.

 

The following paragraphs come from Alvin S. Johnson’s 1952 autobiography that is filled with many such nuggets of fact and context that are relevant for the work of Economics in the Rear-View Mirror. The institutional histories from which departments of economics have emerged provide some of the initial conditions for the evolution of organized economics education. Like Johns Hopkins and unlike Harvard and Chicago, Columbia University economics was to a large part made in Germany.

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[p. 164] …Munroe Smith gave me detail after detail of the history of the faculty. Dean Burgess, as a cavalry officer in the Civil War, had had much time for reflection on the stupendous folly of a war in which citizens laid waste other citizens’ country and slaughtered each other without ill will. All the issues, Burgess believed, could have been compromised if the lawyers who controlled Congress and the state legislatures had been trained in history, political science, and public law. As soon as he was discharged from the army, after Appomattox, he set out for Germany to study the political sciences. He spent several years at different universities, forming friendships with the most famous professors and imbuing himself thoroughly with the spirit of German scholarship. On his return he accepted an appointment in history at Columbia College, then a pleasant young gentlemen’s finishing school. He was permitted to offer courses in public law. Although these could not be counted for credit toward the A.B., many of the ablest students were drawn to his lectures.

From among his students he picked out four and enlisted them in a project for transforming Columbia College into a university. The four were Nicholas Murray Butler, E. R. A. Seligman, Frank Goodnow, and Munroe Smith. They were to proceed to Germany to get their doctorates. Butler was to study philosophy and education; Seligman, economics; Goodnow, administration; Munroe Smith, Roman law. The young men executed Burgess’s command like good soldiers and in due time returned to offer non-credit courses at Columbia College.

Burgess’s next move was to turn his group into a graduate faculty. Such a faculty had been set up at Johns Hopkins, the first in America, and commanded nationwide interest among educators. Burgess argued with President Frederick Barnard on the need of a graduate school in the greatest city of the country. After some years the Board of Trustees authorized in 1886 the setting up of a graduate School of Political Science, manned by Burgess and his disciples, now advanced to professorial rank.

Butler early stepped aside to develop courses he later organized into Teachers College. Burgess and his three younger colleagues watched for opportunities to enlist additional abilities: William A. Dunning in political theory, Herbert L. Osgood in American history, John Bassett Moore in international law, John Bates Clark in [p. 165] economics Franklin Giddings in sociology. This process of expansion was going on energetically while I was on the faculty; Henry R. Seager and Henry L. Moore were enlisted for the economics department, Edward T. Devine and Samuel McCune Lindsay for sociology, James Harvey Robinson and later Charles A. Beard for history. In the meantime other graduate courses were springing up throughout the institution. The towering structure of Columbia University had risen up out of Burgess’s small bottle.

Still in my time the controlling nucleus of our faculty consisted of Burgess, Seligman, Goodnow, and Munroe Smith. They all knew American colonial history well and had followed the step-by-step evolution of Massachusetts Bay from a settlement governed by a chartered company in England to a free self-governing community, germ of American liberty. Step by step Burgess and his lieutenants built up the liberties of the School of Political Science. They got the Board of Trustees to accept the principle of the absolute freedom of the scholar to pursue the truth as he sees it, whatever the consequences; the principle of absolute equality of the faculty members; the principle that no scholar might be added to the faculty without the unanimous consent of the faculty. The principle was established that the president and trustees could intervene in the affairs of the faculty only through the power of the purse.

President Seth Low, regarding himself justly as a recognized authority on administration, sought admission to the meetings of the faculty. He was turned down. A university president could not conduct himself as an equal among equals. When Nicholas Murray Butler became president he thought it would be a good idea for him to sit in with the faculty. After all, he had been one of Burgess’s first panel. We voted the proposition down, unanimously.

Since my time the faculty has grown in numbers and its relations with other departments of the university have become closer. But the spirit of liberty and equality, established by Burgess and his lieutenants, still lives on at Columbia and has overflowed into the universities of America. From time to time a board of trustees steps outside its moral sphere and undertakes to purge and discipline the faculty. But established liberties stricken down are bound to rise again.

Source: Alvin Saunders Johnson. A Pioneer’s Progress. New York: Viking Press, 1952.

Image Source: The Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs: Picture Collection, The New York Public Library. “Columbia College, Madison Ave., New York, N.Y” [Architect: C. C. Haight] The New York Public Library Digital Collections. 1886-09-04. Image of the Mid-town Campus from The American Architect and Building News, September 4, 1886. (cf. https://www.wikicu.com/Midtown_campus)

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Columbia Economists

Columbia. Alvin S. Johnson’s impressions of Edwin R.A. Seligman, 1898-1902

"He had a catholic mind and found some good in every author, no matter how crackbrained."

Alvin Saunders Johnson’s 1952 autobiography, A Pioneer’s Progress, provides us a treasure chest of granular detail regarding his academic and life experiences. This co-founder of the New School for Social Research in New York City went on to live another 19 years after publishing his autobiography to reach the age of 96.

Economics in the Rear-View Mirror will clip personal and departmental remembrances of Johnson’s own economics training and teaching days. This post shares a transcription of his impressions of Edwin R. A. Seligman.

Previously posted Johnson observations: John W. Burgess, Franklin H. Giddings.

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Other posts with
E.R.A. Seligman content

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Alvin Johnson reminisces
about Seligman

[p. 123] Edwin R. A. Seligman was head of the Department of Economics.

He was a strikingly handsome figure, with his thick dark beard, wavy in structure, with mahogany overtones. We called it an ambrosial beard; I doubt great Zeus had a handsomer.

No economist living had read so widely in the literature of the social sciences as Seligman. He had a catholic mind and found some good in every author, no matter how crackbrained. A man of large income, he was the foremost academic advocate of progressive income and inheritance taxes at a time when all regular economists abominated the idea of the income tax as a Populist attack on the wealthy and cultured classes. He was a staunch supporter of trade unionism and government regulation of railway rates. It was hard for me to distinguish between Seligman’s populism and mine.

As a lecturer he was systematic and eloquent. He never appeared before a class without thorough preparation, and in the seminar meetings at his house he was always primed with all the facts and ideas that might supplement the students’ papers. He was a great teacher, and most of the graduate students turned to him for direction…

*  *  *  *  *  *

[p. 137]…As the doctoral examinations approached in the spring of 1901, three of our group of students — Jesse Eliphalet Pope, Allan Willett, and I — spent much time together cramming. We were to be examined on the entire literature of our major economics — and on the courses in the minors for which we had registered, in my case sociology under Giddings. It goes without saying that we hadn’t a chance to load ourselves up for the particular questions we might be asked in a three-hour oral examination. Still we boned manfully.

Our Columbia professors were as a rule very humane. If a student seemed to be floored by a question the examiner made haste to substitute another and easier question. I felt I was getting on very satisfactorily under the questioning of Seligman and Clark. But then Giddings pounced on me with blood in his eye. He was having a feud with Seligman at the time and meant to take it out of my hide. He did, and I resented it, for he was my friend.

After the examination I waited in the corridor to hear the results of the examiners’ deliberations. Soon Seligman came out and announced that I had passed with flying colors….

We were all three candidates for teaching positions, and Seligman had a powerful reach out into the colleges of the country. Three openings came to his jurisdiction: an associate professorship at New York University, which he awarded to Pope, the faculty favorite; an instructorship at Brown University, which went to Willett; and a position as Reader at Bryn Maw College, which he reserved for me. I was [p. 138] so very young, he said — all through my undergraduate life I had felt reprehensibly old. At Bryn Maw I would give only one three-hour course and have nearly all my time for finishing my doctor’s thesis.

*  *  *  *  *  *

[p. 151] … [At] Columbia and Barnard, in the fall of 1902, instruction presented problems quite new to me. Sometimes the problems were perplexing, often annoying, but usually capable of some sort of solution. By the end of my four years at Columbia I had been whipped into the shape of a fairly good teacher, although I was quite incapable of rising to the quizmaster heights many heads of departments at that time regarded as ideal.

My principal function was to drill classes of juniors, at Columbia and Barnard, in Bullock’s Introduction to Economics. At Columbia, Professor Seligman would lecture one hour to the assembled classes.

At Barnard, Professor Henry L. Moore would likewise assemble all the students for a general lecture. Then I would take over the students in smaller, though still large, groups and try to polish them off by quizzing them. It was on the whole a bad method.

*  *  *  *  *  *

 

Source: Alvin Saunders Johnson. A Pioneer’s Progress. New York: Viking Press, 1952.

Image Source: E.R.A. Seligman in Universities and their Sons, Vol. 2 (1899), pp. 484-6. Colorized by Economics in the Rear-View Mirror.

 

 

Categories
Columbia Economists Socialism

Columbia. Economics Ph.D. alumnus. Social insurance pioneer Isaac M. Rubinow, 1914

 

In the process of identifying participants in Edwin R.A. Seligman’s advanced seminar in Political Economy and Finance at Columbia University in 1902-03, I came across the name of Isaac Max Rubinow. His life and career were definitely interesting enough to warrant a separate blog post. Rubinow was a Russian-Jewish immigrant who became interested in social insurance after writing a paper on “Labor Insurance” for Seligman’s seminar. I’ll let the materials put together below speak for themselves, but I am puzzled by the three year delay between the submission of a printed draft of his dissertation submission (1911) and the awarding of a Ph.D. (1914). 

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Rubinow’s major works on social insurance

Studies in Workmen’s Insurance: Italy, Russia, Spain“ Copy of dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of doctor of philosophy” in the library of the University of California. New York, 1911. These are the three chapters he wrote for Volume II of the Twenty-Fourth Annual Report of the Commissioner of Labor 1909. Workmen’s Insurance and Compensation Systems in Europe.  Two volumes. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1911. [First volume: Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany]

Social Insurance, With Special Reference to American Conditions. New York, NY: Henry Holt and Co; 1913.

From a series of fifteen lectures given at the New York School of Philanthropy in the spring of 1912.

The Quest for Social Security. New York: H. Holt, 1934.

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Negative review of Columbia Professor, Vladimir Simkhovitch,
on Karl Marx and socialism

Was Marx Wrong? The Economic Theories of Karl Marx Tested in the Light of Modern Industrial Development. New York: The Marx Institute of America, 1914.

Revised review of Vladimir Simkhovitch’s book Marxism versus Socialism originally published in the Sunday magazine section of the New York Call (Nov. 2 and 9, 1913).

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Rubinow’s life up to age 36
(The addenda to his submitted dissertation)

VITA

I.M. Rubinow was born on April 19, 1875, in the Province of Grodno, Russia. In 1883 he moved with his parents to Moscow, where he remained until 1892, receiving his secondary education in the Classical Department (Gymnasialabteilung) of a German school, Petri-Pauli-Schule.

He arrived in America in February, 1893, and entered the junior class of Columbia University in the fall of the same year, graduating in 1895 as A.B. He was appointed University Scholar in Biology for 1895-1906, and studied Biology, Physiology and kindred subjects under Professors Henry F. Osborn, Edmund Wilson, Frederick S. Lee and others. In 1898 he graduated from the New York University of Medicine with the degree of M.D., and remained in medical practice until 1903. Meanwhile in 1900 he entered the School of Political Science of Columbia University, and studied there until 1903, taking courses in Economics, Statistics, Sociology and Political Philosophy, under Professors Edwin R A. Seligman, Franklin H. Giddings, Henry B. Seager, Henry L. Moore and William A. Dunning.

In July, 1903, he gave up the practice of medicine to accept a position of examiner in the United States Civil Service Commission in Washington, D. C. In July, 1904, he was transferred to the Bureau of Statistics of the United States Department of Agriculture, as Economic Expert; in May, 1907, to the Bureau of Statistics of the United States Department of Commerce and Labor, as Chief of the Division of Foreign Statistics, and in March, 1908, to the Bureau of Labor of the United States Department of Commerce and Labor, as Statistical Expert.

He severed his connection with the United States civil service on May 1, 1911, to accept a position as Chief Statistician of the Ocean Accident & Guarantee Corporation in New York.

In the fall of 1911 he was appointed lecturer on Social Insurance in the New York School of Philanthropy.

He began his literary activity in 1897 as American correspondent of several Russian daily papers in St. Petersburg and Moscow, and since 1898 was the staff correspondent of all the publications of the Russian Ministry of Finance which include a daily and weekly, and at one time a monthly economic review.

In addition to fifteen years of newspaper work he has published many Government reports and magazine articles on economic, statistical, financial and social topics in English and Russian, a list of which is given on the following pages.

LIST OF PUBLICATIONS

ENGLISH

  1. How Much Have the Trusts Accomplished? Soc. Rev., Oct., 1902.
  2. Bernstein and Industrial Concentration. Soc. Rev., Feb., 1903.
  3. The Industrial Development of the South. Soc. Rev., March, 1903.
  4. Concentration or Removal, Which? Hebrew, July 17th and 24th, 1903. (Reprinted in Menorah, Aug., 1903.)
  5. The Kisheneff Pogrom. Arena, Aug., 1903 (signed “A Russian”).
  6. Removal: A New Patent Medicine. Hebrew, Sept. 25th, 1903.
  7. Labor Insurance. Pol. Econ., June, 1904.
  8. Compulsory State Insurance of Workingmen. Amer. Acad., Sept., 1904.
  9. Compulsory Insurance. The Chautauquan, March, 1905.
  10. Economic and Industrial Conditions of the Russian Jew in New York. (A chapter in the “Russian Jews in the United States,” by Ch. S. Bernheimer, Philadelphia, 1905, John C. Winston Co.)
  11. The New Russian Workingmen’s Compensation Act. Bulletin, U. S. Bur. Labor, May, 1905.
  12. Premiums in Retail Trade. Polit. Econ., Sept., 1905.
  13. Poverty and Death Rate. Publ. Am. Stat. Assoc., Dec., 1905.
  14. The Jews in Russia. Yale Review, Aug., 1906.
  15. Is Municipal Ownership Worth While? Soc. Review, Aug., 1906.
  16. Meat Animals and Packing House Products. S. Dept. Agric., Bur. Statistics, Bull. No. 10, 1906 (published anonymously).
  17. Norway, Sweden and Russia as markets for packing house products, Ibid., No. 41, 1906, (published anonymously).
  18. Russia’s Wheat Surplus. Ibid., No. 42, 1906.
  19. The Problem of Domestic Service. Polit. Econ., Oct., 1906.
  20. Women in Manufactures: A Criticism. Journ. Polit. Econ., Jan., 1907.
  21. Economic Condition of the Jews in Russia. No. 72, U.S. Bur. Labor., Sept., 1907.
  22. Western Civilization and the Birth Rate (discussion). Journ. Sociol., March, 1907.
  23. Russia’s Wheat Trade. S. Dept. Agric., Bur. Statistics, Bull. No. 65, 1908.
  24. Russian Wheat and Wheat Flour in European Markets. Ibid., Bull. 66, 1908. 99 pages.
  25. Commercial America in 1907. (Compiled and edited anonymously). of Commerce and Labor, Bureau of Statistics, 1908.
  26. The Economic Aspects of the Negro Problem. Soc. Rev., Vol. VIII: Feb., March, April, May, June, 1908. Vol. IX: July, Sept., Oct., 1908; Jan., March., June, 1909. Vol. X: July, Sept., Dec., 1909; May, June, 1910. (Signed I. M. Robbins.)
  27. Problem of Domestic Service (discussion). Journ. Sociol., March, 1909.
  28. Depth and Breadth of the Servant Problem. McClure’s, March, 1910. (In conjunction with Daniel Durant.)
  29. Domestic Service as a Labor Problem. Home Econ. April, 1911.
  30. Compulsory Old Age Insurance in France. Sc. Quart., Sept., 1911.
  31. Workmen’s Insurance in Italy. Twenty-fourth An. Rept., S. Comm. and Labor, Chapter VII. 1911.
  32. Workmen’s Insurance in Russia. Ibid., Chapter IX. 1911.
  33. Workmen’s Insurance in Spain. Ibid., Chapter X. 1911.
  34. Workmen’s Insurance in France. Ibid, Chapter IV. (In conjunction with G. A. Weber) 1911.

RUSSIAN

  1. The School Season in New York. Viestnik Vospitania (The Messenger of Education.), Oct., 1897.
  2. American University Education. Ibid., Jan., Feb., 1898.
  3. A University for the People. Ibid., Oct., 1898.
  4. The Social Movement in the United States. Sieverny Viestnik (The Northern Messenger), March, 1898.
  5. The Policy of Expansion. Znamya (The Banner), May, 1899.
  6. New Journalism in America. Knizhki Nedieli (The Week’s Library), March, June, July, 1900.
  7. Coeducation in America. Viestnik Vospitania (Messenger of Education), Oct., 1900.
  8. Secondary Education in America. Russkaya Shkola. (The Russian School), Nov., Dec., 1901.
  9. The Process of Concentration in American Industry, Narodnoye Khoziaistvo (National Economics), March, Apr., 1902.
  10. Letters from America. Voskhod (The Dawn), Apr., 1902.
  11. John B. Clark’s Trusts. A Review. Russkoye Economicheskoye Obosrenie (Russian Economic Review), July, 1902.
  12. Peters’ Capital and Labor—A Review. Ibid, Aug., 1902.
  13. Roberts’ The Anthracite Coal Industry—A Review. Ibid, Sept., 1902.
  14. Burton’s Commercial Crises—A Review. Ibid, Oct., 1902.
  15. The American Immortals. Obrazovanie (Education). Oct., 1902.
  16. Industrial Feudalism in the United States. Nauchnoe Obosrenie (The Scientific Review), Jan., Feb., 1902.
  17. Hamilton’s Savings and Saving Institutions—A Review. Russkoye Economicheskoye Obosrenie (Russian Economic Review), Jan., 1903.
  18. Seligman’s Economic Interpretation of History—A Review. Ibid, Jan., 1903.
  19. Labor Legislation in the U.S. Congress. Ibid., Aug., 1903.
  20. Laughlin & Willes’ Reciprocity—A Review. Ibid., Sept., 1903.
  21. Laughlin’s Money—A Review. Ibid., Nov., 1903.
  22. The Jewish Problem in New York. Voskhod (The Dawn), May, June, July, Aug., 1903.
  23. Chautauqua—an Educational Center. Russkaya Shkola (Russian School), Nov., Dec., 1903.
  24. Child Labor in America. Russkaya Mysl (Russian Thought), Oct., Nov., 1903.
  25. Mead’s Trust Finance—A Review. Ibid. Russkoye Economicheskoye Obozrenie (Russian Economic Review), Feb., 1904.
  26. Mitchell’s Organized Labor—A Review. Ibid., Feb., 1904.
  27. Roberts’ Anthracite Coal Communities—A Review. Ibid., May, 1904.
  28. Gillman’s Methods of Industrial Peace—A Review. Ibid., August, 1904.
  29. To My Correspondents. Voskhod (The Dawn), Sept., Oct., 1904.
  30. American Imperialism. Viestnik Samoobrazovania (The Messenger of Self-Education), Nos. 34, 37, 39, 1904.
  31. Children’s Courts in America. Pedogogicheski Listok (The Pedagogical Monthly), Jan., 1905.
  32. Economic Condition of the Russian Jews in New York. Voskhod (The Dawn), Jan., 1905.
  33. Letters from America. Ibid., April, 1905.
  34. New York Impressions. Ibid., Aug., Sept., Nov., 1905; Jan., 1906.
  35. Ghent’s Benevolent Feudalism—A Review. Russkoye Economicheskoye Obosrenie (Russian Economic Review), Feb., 1905.
  36. Leroy Beaulieu’s Les États-Unis au XX Siècle—A Review. Ibid., Aug., 1905.
  37. Evolution of Domestic Life. Russkaya Mysl (Russian Thought). June, 1905.
  38. American Bureaucracy. Mir Bozhi (God’s World), Sept., 1905.
  39. The Cotton and Cotton Manufactures in the United States. Viestnik Finansov (Messenger of Finance), 41-44, 1905.
  40. Municipal Corruption in the United States. Izvestia Moskovskoi Gorodskoi Dumy (Annals of the Moscow Municipal Council), Oct., 1905.
  41. The Struggle Against Municipal Corruption in Philadelphia. Ibid., Nov., 1905.
  42. Municipal Elections. Ibid., Feb., 1906.
  43. Franchise Capital in American Municipalities. Ibid., March, Apr., 1906.
  44. Municipalization of Street Railways in Chicago. Ibid., June, 1906.
  45. Care of Dependent Children in the United States. Ibid., Sept., 1906.
  46. The Public School System of New York City. Ibid., Oct., 1906; Jan., Feb., 1907.
  47. Domestic Service in America. Russkaya Mysl (Russian Thought), Feb., 1906.
  48. Women in American Industry. Ibid., Apr., 1906.
  49. Professional Work of American Women. Ibid., Sept., 1906.
  50. Capital and Nation’s Food. Sovremenny Mir (The Modern World), Sept., 1906.
  51. Russian Jews in America: I. Economic Condition. Ibid., March, 1907.
  52. Russian Jews in America: II. Social Life. Ibid., June, 1907.
  53. Current Municipal Problems in America. Izviestia Moskovskoy Gorodskoy Dumy (Annals of the Moscow Municipal Council), Aug., 1907.
  54. Finances of New York City. Ibid., March, April, May, 1908.
  55. Women in American Universities. Russkaya Mysl (Russian Thought), Sept., 1908.
  56. The Labor Problem and the American Law. Russkaya Bogatstvo (Russian Wealth), Sept., 1908.
  57. The Presidential Election in the U. S. Ibid., Jan., Feb., 1909.
  58. American Milling Industry. Russky Melnik (The Russian Miller), Jan., Feb., 1909.
  59. A New Study of Municipal Ownership. Ivziestia Moskovskoy Gorodskoy Dumy (Annals of the Moscow Municipal Council), March, 1909.
  60. The Pure Milk Problem. Ibid., May, June, 1909.
  61. Medical Inspection of Schools. Ibid., Sept., 1909.
  62. Playgrounds in American Cities. Ibid, March, 1910.
  63. One Week at a Negro University. Pusskoye Bogatstvo (Russian Wealth), Jan., Feb., 1910.
  64. The High Cost of Living. Viestnik Finansov (Messenger of Finance), No. 20, 1910.
  65. The Problem of Accident Compensation in American Legislation. Ibid., No. 38, 1910.
  66. The Sinking Funds of New York City. Izviestia Moskovskoy Gorodskoy Dumy (Annals of the Moscow Municipal Council), June, 1910.
  67. The Housing Problem in America. Ibid., Dec., 1910.
  68. Industrial Education in the United States. Ibid., March, 1911.

 

Source:  Studies in Workmen’s Insurance: Italy, Russia, Spain. “A Dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of doctor of philosophy”. New York, 1911.

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Two Roosevelts

Rubinow’s views influenced Theodore Roosevelt in the drafting of the Progressive Party platform in 1912, which was the first major political party platform to call for social insurance. His 1934 book, The Quest for Security, further established Rubinow as probably the most eminent theorist of social insurance in the first three decades of the 20th century.

Former Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare, Wilbur Cohen, would say of Rubinow: “I.M. Rubinow was one of the giants in the field of social insurance in the pioneering days of social reform in the United States. . . In my 35 years of work in social security, I.M. Rubinow has been an inspiration and an example.” According to former U.S. Senator Paul Douglas (D-IL), President Roosevelt was much influenced by Rubinow’s book and Roosevelt considered Rubinow to be the “greatest single authority upon social security in the United States.”

President Roosevelt owned a copy of Rubinow’s 1934 book “The Quest for Security” and had been reading in the months surrounding the formation of the Committee on Economic Security (CES) which drafted the Administration’s Social Security proposals. When he learned Rubinow was terminally ill, he autographed his copy of Rubinow’s book and sent it to him with this inscription on the flyleaf: “For the Author—Dr. I. M. Rubinow. This reversal of the usual process is because of the interest I have had in reading your book.” (Signed) Franklin D. Roosevelt.

Source: United States Social Security Administration. Social Security History Web page: Social Security Pioneers: Isaac M. Rubinow.

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Rubinow’s relations to the American Medical Association and to Jewish philanthropy

Also active in various political and reform movements during America’s Progressive Era, Rubinow was a member of the American Association of Labor Legislation (AALL) from its formation in 1906. In the early 1910s, he was one of the most effective advocates for workmen’s compensation legislation. Inspired by the success of that movement, in 1913 he turned with other AALL leaders to what Dr Rupert Blue, president of the American Medical Association (AMA), called “health insurance—the next great step in social legislation.” The AMA joined the campaign and appointed Rubinow executive secretary of its newly created Committee on Social Insurance. Rubinow worked tirelessly in this position until, in early 1917, the AMA, in a sharp reversal, cut off funds to the committee.

After several short-term positions and a 4-year stint as head of the American Zionist Medical Unit in Palestine, Rubinow returned to the United States in 1923 and made a new career in the world of Jewish philanthropy and social service. Between 1925 and 1929, he also edited the Jewish Social Service Quarterly and in 1927 became vice president of the American Association for Old-Age Security. In this position and others, he led efforts in the late 1920s and early 1930s to create unemployment and old age insurance. In 1931, Rubinow chaired an important conference in Chicago whose purpose was to draw up a unified program of legislation for old age. Early in the New Deal, President Franklin D. Roosevelt wrote to Rubinow to express “great interest” in his suggestions. When the president appointed the Committee on Economic Security in the summer of 1934 to advise on drafting the Social Security Act, Rubinow served as a consultant.

Source: Theodore M. Brown and Elizabeth Fee. Isaac Max Rubinow: Advocate for Social Insurance. American Journal of Public Health, Vol. 92, No. 8 (August 2002), pp. 1224-1225.

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Biographical Timeline of Isaac Max Rubinow

1875 Born in Grodno, Russia

1893 Immigrated to the United States

1895 Columbia University, A.B. Degree

1898 New York University Medical College, M.D.

1899 Practiced medicine

1900-03 Columbia University, Studied political science

1903 Gave up practice of medicine

1903-07 Examiner, U.S. Civil Service Commission

1907 Economic Expert, Bureau of Statistics, U.S. Department of Agriculture

1907-08 Member, Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Department of Commerce & Labor

1908-11 Member, Bureau of Labor

1911-16 Chief Statistician, Ocean Accident and Guarantee Corporation

1913 First book published, Social Insurance.

1914 Columbia University, PhD.

1914-16 President, Casualty Actuarial Society

1916-17 Executive Secretary, American Medical Association, Social Insurance Commission

1917 Expert, California Social Insurance Commission

1917 Director, New York City Department of Public Charities, Bureau of Labor Statistics

1917-18 Investigator, Federal Trade Commission

1919-23 In Charge of American Zionist Medical Unit (renamed Hadassah Medical Organization)

1923-28 Director, Jewish Welfare Society of Philadelphia

1926-36 Executive Secretary, B’nai B’rith

1929 Executive Director, United Palestine Appeal

1932-33 President, National Conference of Jewish Social Service

1934 The Quest for Security published.

1936 September, Died at the age of 61.

Source: Kheel Center for Labor-Management Documentation and Archives, Cornell University Library. Guide to the Isaac Max Rubinow Papers.

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Secondary Literature

Obituary, Isaac M. Rubinow, 1875-1936 in Casualty Actuarial Society Proceedings Vol. XXIII, Nos. 47 (1936), pp. 118-120.

New York Times Obituary for Isaac M. Rubinow. September 3, 1936.

J. Lee Kreader. America’s Prophet for Social Security: A Biography of Isaac Max Rub inow [dissertation]. Chicago, Ill University of Chicago. 1988.

J. Lee Kreader. Isaac Max Rubinow: Pioneering Specialist in Social Insurance. Social Service Review Vol. 50, No. 3(September 1976), pp. 402-425.

Achenbaum WA. Isaac Max Rubinow. In: Garraty JA, Carnes M, eds. American National Biography. Vol 19. New York, NY: Oxford University Press; 1999:25–26.

Deardorff NR. Isaac Max Rubinow. In: Schuyler RL, James ET, eds. Dictionary of American Biography. Suppl 2. New York, NY: Charles Scribner’s Sons; 1958:585–587

 

Image Source: Isaac M. Rubinow Papers, Labor-Management Documentation Center, M. P. Catherwood Library, Cornell University.

 

 

 

 

 

Categories
AEA Bibliography

American Economic Association. Monographs: 1886-1896

 

Besides transcribing and curating archival content for Economics in the Rear-view Mirror, I occasionally put together collections of links to books and other items of interest on pages or posts that constitute my “personal” virtual economics reference library. In this post you will find links to early monographs/papers published by the American Economic Association. 

Links to the contents of the four volumes of AEA Economic Studies, 1896-1899 have also been posted.

A few other useful collections:

The virtual rare-book reading room (classic works of economics up to 1900)

The Twentieth Century Economics Library

Laughlin’s recommended teacher’s library of economics (1887)

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PUBLICATIONS OF THE AMERICAN ECONOMIC ASSOCIATION. MONOGRAPHS.
1886-1896

_____________________

General Contents and Index to Volumes I-XI.
Source: Publications of the American Economic Association, Vol XI (1896). Price 25 cents.

VOLUME I

No. 1 (Mar. 1886). Report of the Organization of the American Economic Association. By Richard T. Ely, Ph.D., Secretary. Price 50 cents.

Nos. 2 and 3 (May-Jul. 1886). The Relation of the Modern Municipality to the Gas Supply. By Edmund J. James, Ph.D. Price 75 cents.

No. 4 (Sep. 1886). Co-öperation in a Western City. By Albert Shaw, Ph.D. Price 75 cents.

No. 5 (Nov. 1886). Co-öperation in New England. By Edward W. Bemis, Ph.D. Price 75 cents.

No. 6 (Jan. 1887). Relation of the State to Industrial Action. By Henry C. Adams, Ph.D. Price 75 cents.

 

VOLUME II

No. 1 (Mar. 1887). Three Phases of Co-öperation in the West. By Amos G. Warner, Ph.D. Price 75 cents.

No. 2 (May 1887). Historical Sketch of the Finances of Pennsylvania. By T. K. Worthington, Ph.D. Price 75 cents.

No. 3 (Jul. 1887). The Railway Question. By Edmund J. James, Ph.D. Price 75 cents.

No. 4 (Sep. 1887). The Early History of the English Woolen Industry. By William J. Ashley, M.A. Price 75 cents.

No. 5 (Nov. 1887). Two Chapters on the Mediaeval Guilds of England. By Edwin R. A. Seligman, Ph.D. Price 75 cents.

No. 6 (Jan. 1888). The Relation of Modern Municipalities to Quasi-Public Works. By H. C. Adams, George W. Knight, Davis R. Dewey, Charles Moore, Frank J. Goodnow and Arthur Yager. Price 75 cents.

 

VOLUME III

No. 1 (Mar. 1888). Three Papers Read at Meeting in Boston: “The Study of Statistics in Colleges,” by Carroll D. Wright; “The Sociological Character of Political Economy,” by Franklyn H. Giddings; “Some Considerations on the Legal-Tender Decisions,” by Edmund J. James. Price 75 cents.

No. 2 (May 1888). Capital and its Earnings. By John B. Clark, A.M. Price 75 cents.

No. 3 (Jul. 1888) consists of three parts: “Efforts of the Manual Laboring Class to Better Their Condition,” by Francis A. Walker; “Mine Labor in the Hocking Valley,” by Edward W. Bemis, Ph.D.; “Report of the Second Annual Meeting,” by Richard T. Ely, Secretary. Price 75 cents.

Nos. 4 and 5 (Sep.-Nov. 1888). Statistics and Economics. By Richmond Mayo-Smith, A.M. Price $1.00.

No. 6 (Jan. 1889). The Stability of Prices. By Simon N. Patten, Ph.D. Price 75 cents.

 

VOLUME IV

No. 1 (Mar. 1889). Contributions to the Wages Question: “The Theory of Wages,” by Stuart Wood, Ph.D.; “The Possibility of a Scientific Law of Wages,” by John B. Clark, A.M. Price 75 cents.

No. 2 (Apr. 1889). Socialism in England. By Sidney Webb, LL.B. Price 75 cents.

No. 3 (May. 1889). Road Legislation for the American State. By Jeremiah W. Jenks, Ph.D. Price 75 cents.

No. 4 (Jul. 1889). Report of the Proceedings of Third Annual Meeting of the American Economic Association, by Richard T. Ely, Secretary; with addresses by Dr. William Pepper and Francis A. Walker. Price 75 cents.

No. 5 (Sep. 1889). Three Papers Read at Third Annual Meeting: “Malthus and Ricardo,” by Simon N. Patten; “The Study of Statistics,” by Davis R. Dewey, and “Analysis in Political Economy,” by William W. Folwell. Price 75 cents.

No. 6 (Nov. 1889). An Honest Dollar. By E. Benjamin Andrews. Price 75 cents.

 

VOLUME V

No. 1 (Jan. 1890). The Industrial Transition in Japan. By Yeijiro Ono, Ph.D. Price $1.00.

No. 2 (Mar. 1890). Two Prize Essays on Child-Labor: I. “Child Labor,” by William F. Willoughby, Ph.D.; II. “Child Labor,” by Miss Clare de Graffenried. Price 75 cents.

Nos. 3 and 4 (May-Jul. 1890). Two Papers on the Canal Question. I. By Edmund J. James, Ph.D.; II. By Lewis M. Haupt, A.M., C.E. Price $1.00.

No. 5 (Sep. 1890). History of the New York Property Tax. By John Christopher Schwab, A.M. Ph.D. Price $1.00.

No. 6 (Nov. 1890). The Educational Value of Political Economy. By Simon N. Patten, Ph.D. Price 75 cents.

 

VOLUME VI

No. 1 and 2 (Jan.-Mar. 1891). Report of the Proceedings of the Fourth Annual Meeting of the American Economic Association. Price $1.00.

No. 3 (May 1891). I. “Government Forestry Abroad,” by Gifford Pinchot; II. “The Present Condition of the Forests on the Public Lands,” by Edward A. Bowers; III. “Practicability of an American Forest Administration,” by B. E. Fernow. Price 75 cents.

Nos. 4 and 5 (Jul.-Sep. 1891). Municipal Ownership of Gas in the United States. By Edward W. Bemis, Ph.D. with appendix by W. S. Outerbridge, Jr. Price $1.00.

No. 6 (Nov. 1891). State Railroad Commissions and How They May be Made Effective. By Frederick C. Clark, Ph.D. Price 75 cents.

 

VOLUME VII

No. 1 (Jan. 1892). The Silver Situation in the United States. Ph.D. By Frank W. Taussig, LL.B., Ph.D. Price 75 cents.

Nos. 2 and 3 (Mar.-May 1892). On the Shifting and Incidence of Taxation. By Edwin R.A. Seligman, Ph.D. Price $1.00.

Nos. 4 and 5 (Jul.-Sep. 1892). Sinking Funds. By Edward A. Ross, Ph.D. Price $1.00.

No. 6 (Nov. 1892). The Reciprocity Treaty with Canada of 1854. By Frederick E. Haynes, Ph.D. Price 75 cents.

 

VOLUME VIII

No. 1 (Jan. 1893). Report of the Proceedings of the Fifth Annual Meeting of the American Economic Association. Price 75 cents.

Nos. 2 and 3 (Mar.-May 1893). The Housing of the Poor in American Cities. By Marcus T. Reynolds, Ph.B., M.A. Price $1.00.

Nos. 4 and 5 (Jul.-Sep. 1893). Public Assistance of the Poor in France. By Emily Greene Balch, A.B. Price $1.00.

No. 6 (Nov. 1893). The First Stages of the Tariff Policy of the United States. By William Hill, A.M. Price $1.00.

 

VOLUME IX

No. 1 (Supplement, Jan. 1894). Hand-Book and Report of the Sixth Annual Meeting. Price 50 cents.

Nos. 1 and 2 (Jan.-Mar. 1894). Progressive Taxation in Theory and Practice. By Edwin R.A. Seligman, Ph.D. Price $1.00, cloth $1.50.

No. 3 (May. 1894). The Theory of Transportation. By Charles H. Cooley Price 75 cents.

No. 4 (Aug. 1894). Sir William Petty. A Study in English Economic Literature. By Wilson Lloyd Bevan, M.A., Ph.D. Price 75 cents.

Nos. 5 and 6 (Oct.-Dec. 1894). Papers Read at the Seventh Annual Meeting: “The Modern Appeal to Legal Forces in Economic Life,” (President’s annual address) by John B. Clark, Ph.D.; “The Chicago Strike”, by Carroll D. Wright, LL.D.; “Irregularity of Employment,” by Davis R. Dewey, Ph.D.; “The Papal Encyclical Upon the Labor Question,” by John Graham Brooks; “Population and Capital,” by Arthur T. Hadley, M.A. Price $1.00.

 

VOLUME X

No. 3, Supplement, (Jan. 1895). Hand-Book and Report of the Seventh Annual Meeting. Price 50 cents.

Nos. 1,2 and 3 (Jan.-Mar.-May 1895). The Canadian Banking System, 1817-1890. By Roeliff Morton Breckenridge, Ph.D. Price $1.50; cloth $2.50.

No. 4 (Jul. 1895). Poor Laws of Massachusetts and New York. By John Cummings, Ph.D. Price 75 cents.

Nos. 5 and 6 (Sep.-Nov. 1895). Letters of Ricardo to McCulloch, 1816-1823. Edited, with introduction and annotations by Jacob H. Hollander, Ph.D. Price $1.25; cloth $2.00.

 

VOLUME XI

Nos. 1, 2 and 3 (Jan.-Mar.-May 1896). Race Traits and Tendencies of the American Negro. By Frederick L. Hoffman, F.S.S., Price $1.25; cloth $2.00.

No. 4 (Jul. 1896). Appreciation and Interest. By Irving Fisher, Ph.D., Price 75 cents.

 

Image Source: As of 1909 the former Presidents of the American Economic Association (S. N. Patten in the center, then clockwise from upper left are R. T. Ely, J. B. Clark, J. W. Jenks, F. W. Taussig.) in Reuben G. Thwaites “A Notable Gathering of Scholars,” The Independent, Vol. 68, January 6, 1910, pp. 7-14.

Categories
Bryn Mawr Columbia Economists Germany Pennsylvania

Columbia. Appointments of H. L. Moore, H. R. Seager, and A. S. Johnson, 1902

 

 

Memorial minutes of the Columbia University Faculty of Political Science for both Henry L. Moore and Henry R. Seager have been transcribed earlier here at Economics in the Rear-view Mirror. This post takes us back to the start of their Columbia University careers, namely the 1902-03 academic year. Professor Richmond Mayo-Smith’s suicide in November 1901 left a significant gap in Columbia’s economics faculty which was then closed with the appointment of Henry L. Moore.

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Columbia Announcement of the appointments of Henry L. Moore (Prof.) and Henry R. Seager (Adjunct Prof.), 1902

It seems fitting to introduce to the acquaintance of the readers of the QUARTERLY those who come from other universities to occupy professors’ chairs in our own. Professors Moore and Seager enter the service of the University in the School of Political Science…

Professor Henry L. Moore, who comes to us from Smith College, is thirty-two years of age; a native of Maryland and a graduate of Randolph-Macon College in Virginia. His special training in economics was received at the Johns Hopkins University, from which he received, in 1896, the degree of Ph.D., and in Vienna, where he was a pupil of Professor Karl [sic, “Carl”] Menger. He was appointed to an instructorship in economics in the Johns Hopkins University in 1896, and to a professorship in Smith College in 1897, though he continued after this, for a time, to give, in the Johns Hopkins University, lectures which treated of the application of mathematical principles to economic problems.

His chief published work is an essay on Von Thünen’s “Theory of Natural Wages,” which, beside throwing new light on a scientific problem, offers to the English reading student the best introduction to the study of the works of Von Thünen and of the extensive literature which has grown up about them.

Henry R. Seager, the new adjunct-professor of political economy, was graduated from the University of Michigan in 1890. During the next four years he studied at Johns Hopkins, Halle, Berlin, Vienna and the University of Pennsylvania, receiving the degree of Ph.D. from the last-named institution in 1894. From that date he was on the teaching force of the University of Pennsylvania, holding successively the titles of instructor and assistant professor of economics, till he accepted the call to Columbia. Professor Seager was for three years Secretary of the American Academy of Political and Social Sciences, and in 1900 he became editor-in-chief of the Annals, the magazine published by the Academy. His publications in periodicals have been numerous, and his more important works include “The Finances of Pennsylvania,” “The Teaching of Economics at Berlin and Vienna,” [JPE, March 1893] “The Fallacy of Saving,” and “The Teaching of Economics and Economic History.”

Source: Columbia University Quarterly, v. 4, June 1902, pp. 293-94.

_______________________

Announcement of the Columbia appointments of Henry R. Seager (Adjunct Prof.) and Alvin Saunders Johnson (Reader), 1902

Columbia University.- Doctor Henry R. Seager has resigned his position of Assistant Professor of Political Economy at the University of Pennsylvania, and has accepted the position of Adjunct Professor of Political Economy in Columbia University. His duties in Columbia University will begin with the opening of the coming academic year.

Mr. Seager has published the following papers:

“German Universities and German Student Life.” The Inlander, June, 1892.

“Economics at Berlin and Vienna.” Journal of Political Economy, March, 1893.

“Philippovich’s Grundriss der Politischen-Oekonomie.” ANNALS, July, 1893.

“Pennsylvania Tax Conference.” Ibid., March, 1894.

“Seventh Annual Meeting of the American Economic Association.” Ibid., March, 1895.

“Malloch’s Labour and the Popular Welfare, and Dyer’s The Evolution of Industry.” The Citizen, June, 1895.

“Cunningham’s Outlines of English Industrial History.” ANNALS, January, 1896.

“Bruce’s Economic History of Virginia in the Seventeenth Century.” Ibid., 1896.

“The Fallacy of Saving.” Supplement to Economic Studies, American Economic Association, April, 1896.

“Smart’s Studies in Economics.” The Citizen, August, 1896.

“Stray Impressions of Oxford.” The Pennsylvanian, February, 1897.

“Higgs’ The Physiocrats.” ANNALS, July, 1897.

“Gibbins’ Industry in England.” Ibid., September, 1897.

“Bullock’s Introduction to the Study of Economics.” Ibid., November, 1897.

“The Consumers’ League.” Bulletin of American Academy, April, 1898.

“George’s Political Economy.” Political Science Quarterly, December, 1898.

“Devine’s Economics.” ANNALS, March, 1899.

“Hull’s The Economic Writings of Sir William Petty.” Ibid., May, 1900.

“Smart’s The Distribution of Income.” Ibid., July, 1900.

“Clark’s The Distribution of Wealth: A Theory of Wages, Interest and Profits.” Ibid., September, 1900.

Editorial. Ibid., January, 1901.

“Meeting of American Economic Association.” Ibid., March1901.

“Professor Patten’s Theory of Prosperity.” Ibid., March, 1902.

Editorial. Ibid.

“Meeting of American Economic Association.” Ibid.

“Crowell’s The Distribution and Marketing of Farm Products.” Report of United States Industrial Commission, Vol. VI, 1901. Political Science Quarterly, March, 1902.

Mr. Alvin Saunders Johnson, at present Reader in Economics at Bryn Mawr College, Pa., has been appointed Tutor in Economics at Columbia University, New York City. His work in Columbia will begin at the opening of the coming academic year.

Source: Personal Notes, Annals of the American Academy, Vol. 19 (May, 1902), pp. 103-104.

Image Sources: Henry Moore (left) Smith College, Classbook of 1902, p. 11. and Henry Seager (right) Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, D.C.

Categories
Columbia Economists NBER

Columbia Alumnus Arthur F. Burns applies to NBER for Research Associateship, 1930

 

 

Arthur F. Burns was twenty-five years old when he submitted the following application for a Research Associate position that provided 11 months funding at the National Bureau of Economic Research. Results from this project would be ultimately incorporated into Burns’ doctoral dissertation published as the NBER monograph Production Trends in the United States Since 1870 (1934).

_____________________

Arthur F. Burns’ late NBER application forwarded to Edwin Gay

National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.

February 25, 1930

Dr. Edwin F. Gay
117 Widener Library
Harvard University
Cambridge, Mass.

Dear Dr. Gay:

The attached application of Mr. Arthur Frank Burns has just been received. Athough the time limit has passed, you might wish to consider it, and I am therefore forwarding it to you.

Yours very truly,
[signed] G. R. Stahl
Executive Secretary

GRS:RD

[handwritten note]
[Frederick C.] Mills knows something about this man and regards him favorably.

_____________________

NBER Research Associate Application of Arthur F. Burns
(February, 1930)

National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.

51 Madison Avenue
New York

RESEARCH ASSOCIATES’ APPLICATION FORM

Applications and accompanying documents should be sent by registered mail and must reach Directors of Research not later than February 1, 1930. Six typewritten copies (legible carbons) should accompany each formal application.

Candidates should have familiarized themselves with the main objects and work of the National Bureau of Economic Research.

Candidates are expected to be in good health, free from physical or nervous troubles, and able to complete their work in New York without predictable interruption.

Research Associates will not accept other remunerative employment while connected with the National Bureau of Economic Research.

Candidates’ names should be written plainly on each manuscript.

Title of Project

A Study of Long-Time Indexes of Production

Name of Candidate

Arthur Frank Burns

Date of Application

February 21, 1930

 

THE CANDIDATE

PERSONAL HISTORY:

Name in full: Arthur Frank Burns
Home address: 34 Bethune St., New York City
Present occupation: University teaching
Place of birth: Stanislawow, Poland
Date of birth: April 27, 1904
If not a native-born citizen, date and place of naturalization: About 1920; Bayonne, New Jersey
Single, married: Married
Name and address of wife or husband: Helen, 34 Bethune Street
Name and address of nearest kin if unmarried: [blank]
Number, relationship, and ages of dependents: [blank]

Name the colleges and universities you have attended; length of residence in each; also major and minor studies pursued.

Columbia College, Sept. 1921-Feb. 1925. Majors—Economics, German. Minors—English, History
Columbia University, Feb. 1925-June 1927. Major—Economics. Minor—Statistics.

List the degrees you have received with the years in which they were conferred.

B.A.—Feb. 1925
M.A.—Oct. 1925

Give a list of scholarships or fellowships previously held or now held, stating in each case place and period of tenure, studies pursued and amount of stipend:

Columbia College Scholarship, 1921-1924. $250 per annum
Gilder Fellowship, Academic Year 1926-1927, Columbia University. Stipend $1200. Chief study pursued—Monetary Theory

What foreign languages are you able to use?

French and German

 

ACCOMPLISHMENTS:

Give a list of positions you have held—professional, teaching, scientific, administrative, business:

Name of Institution

Title of Position

Years of Tenure
Columbia University

Instructor in Extension

Feb. 1926-June 1927

Soc. Science Res. Co.

 Report on Periodicals Summer of 1927
Rutgers University Instructor

1927 to date

Of what learned or scientific societies are you a member?

Phi Beta Kappa
American Statistical Society

Describe briefly the advanced work and research you have already done in this country or abroad, giving dates, subjects, and names of your principal teachers in these subjects:

Master’s essay on Employment Statistics, under Professors F.A. Ross and W.C. Mitchell, in 1925
Studies in the field of Business Cycles, under Professor W.C. Mitchell, 1926 to date
Studies in the field of Monetary Theory, under Professors Mitchell and Willis, 1926-1927
Work on Negro Migration, under Professor F.A. Ross, Summer of 1925
Work on Instalment Selling, under Professor E.R.A. Seligman, Summer of 1926
Report on Social Science Periodicals for the Social Science Research  Council, under Professor F. Stuart Chapin, Summer of 1927.

Submit a list of your publications with exact titles, names of publishers and dates and places of publication:

See separate sheet on publications

THE PROJECT

PLANS FOR STUDY:

Submit a statement (six copies) giving detailed plans for the study you would pursue during your tenure of an Associateship. This statement should include:

(1) A description of the project including its character and scope, and the significance of its presumable contribution to knowledge. Describe how the inquiry is to be conducted, major expected sources of information, etc.
(2) The present state of the project, time of commencement, progress to date, and expectation as to completion.
(3) A proposed budget showing the amount of any assistance, whether of a statistical or clerical nature, or traveling expense that you would require to complete your project.

REFERENCES:

Submit a list of references

(1) from whom information may be obtained concerning your qualifications, and
(2) from whom expert opinion may be obtained as to the value and practicability of your proposed studies.

_____________________

Arthur F. Burns

THE PROJECT
A Study of Long-Time Indexes of Production

            Several years ago I embarked upon an inquiry into the broad problem “The Relationship between ‘Price’ and ‘Trade’ Fluctuations.” The study had two main purposes: (1) to provide a systematic description and analysis of one structural element of the “business cycle,” (2) to determine and appraise the empirical basis for the widely held view that “business stability” may be attained through the “stabilization of the price level.” But soon enough I found it difficult to adhere to the project that I had formulated. The task in the course of execution in the statistical laboratory loomed more formidable than in the “arm-chair” in which it found its inception. But another circumstance proved even more compelling in bring about a restriction of the area of the investigation: no sooner was a small segment of the plan that served as my procedural guide completed, but a host of new queries, not at all envisaged in the original plan, arose and pressed for an answer. Thus, impelled by considerations of a practical sort—working as I did single-handed, and by a growing curiosity, I subjected the project to successive reductions of scope. The present project, “A Study of Long-Time Indexes of Production,” is the untouched, and perhaps an unrecognizable, remainder of the original inquiry. On this limited project I have been at work intermittently for about a year and a half.

            The object of the present project is to study the “secular changes” in “general production” in the United States, and thereby throw light on one important constituent aspect of the trend of “economic welfare.” The establishment of a theory of secular change in general production calls, in the main, for the performance of two tasks. In the first place, the rate of growth of the physical volume of production and its variation have to be determined. In the second place, the empirical generalizations so arrived at have to be interpreted. The general plan of the investigation is built around these two problems; but to perform these tasks adequately, a host of subsidiary problems have to be met.

            Some details of the organization of the project, as well as the point to which work on the project has been carried thus far, may best be indicated by setting forth the extent to which the tentative individual chapters have been completed. The first chapter treats of the contents of the concept “economic welfare,” and traces, analytically and historically, problems in the measurement thereof; this chapter is practically finished. The materials for the second chapter, which is devoted to the history of production indexes, have, for the greater part, already been collected; and a preliminary draft of the chapter has been completed. Much of the third chapter, which is concerned with an analysis of a conceptually ideal measure of the physical volume of production, and the special bearing of this analysis on long-time indexes of production, is written; this chapter is to be but an extension of the paper on “The Measurement of the Physical Volume of Production,” which was published in the Quarterly Journal of Economics, February, 1930. In the fourth chapter, an analysis of the available long-time indexes of production is made; this chapter covers a much more extensive area than the brief reference to it may lead one to suppose; and though several months of continuous work have already been devoted to it, considerable literary research and statistical routine remain. The fifth and six chapters will present the results of the computations on the rate of secular change in physical production; though much ground has been covered (over one hundred trends have already been determined), even more remains to be done. Of the next and final two chapters, in which an interpretation of the computed results is to be offered, very little has been put into written form; but a substantial body of literature has been abstracted; and a preliminary outline of some portions of the theory to be presented, now that many of the calculations are completed, has been worked out.

            It will be apparent from this statement of the work already done on the project that it has reached a point where completion by the middle of 1931 may well be expected. In fact, the freedom to pursue the investigation unencumbered by academic duties may make possible a more intensive cultivation of the demarcated field than is presently contemplated; or, if it be deemed advisable, an extension of the investigation, now confined to the United States, to several other countries for which what appear to be reasonably satisfactory materials have of late become available.

            Needless to say, the above statement of the project constitutes no more than a report on its present status. There probably will be modifications of some importance. One change, in fact, is now being seriously considered: the replacement of Chapters II and III by a brief section, to be worked into the introductory chapter, to the end that a nicer balance between the divisions on, what may be described as, “data and method” and “results” be achieved.

            In continuing with this study there will be no travelling expenses to speak of. At the most, there will be a trip or two to Washington. It goes without saying that the study will proceed more rapidly if clerical assistance is had. Only a single statistical clerk would be needed, and a halftime clerk might suffice.

_____________________

Arthur F. Burns

References

Group I

Professor Robert E. Chaddock, Columbia University
Professor Wesley C. Mitchell, Columbia University
Professor H. Parker Willis, Columbia University
Professor Eugene E. Agger, Rutgers University
Professor Frank W. Taussig, Harvard University

Group II

Professor Wesley C. Mitchell, Columbia University
Professor Wilford I. King, New York University
Mr. Carl Snyder, New York Federal Reserve Bank
Dr. Edmund E. Day, Social Science Research Council
Dr. Simon Kuznets, National Bureau of Economic Research

_____________________

Arthur F. Burns

Publications

A Note on Comparative Costs, Quarterly Journal of Economics, May, 1928

The Duration of Business Cycles, Quarterly Journal of Economics, August 1929

The Geometric Mean of Percentages, Journal of the American Statistical Association, September, 1929

The Ideology of Businessmen and Presidential Elections, Southwestern Political and Social Science Quarterly, September, 1929.

Thus Spake the Professor of Statistics, Social Science, November, 1929

The Quantity Theory and Price Stabilization, American Economic Review, December, 1929

The Relative Importance of Check and Cash Payments in the United States: 1919-1928, Journal of the American Statistical Association, December, 1929

The Measurement of the Physical Volume of Production, Quarterly Journal of Economics, February, 1930

_____________________

Reference Letter:  H. P. Willis

Columbia University
in the City of New York
School of Business

February 27, 1930.

Mr. G. R. Stahl,
Executive Secretary,
National Bureau of Economic Research,
51 Madison Avenue,
New York City.

My dear Mr. Stahl:

            I have received your letter of February 26. Mr. Arthur F. Burns, whom you mention, was a student here some years ago, passed his doctorate examination with money and banking as one of his topics. I had general supervision of his work in money and banking and also came into contact with him individually now and then. I thought him a specially acute and capable student of the subject and it seemed to me that he had rather unusual research ability. He has been teaching, I believe, at Rutgers University for a couple of years past and during that time he has occasionally written articles in the scientific magazines and has sent me copies. I have read them with substantial interest and have thought that they showed steady growth in the grasp of the subject and in ability to present it.

            I do not know exactly what kind of work you would be disposed to assign him in your bureau were you to appoint him, and hence it is difficult for me to give specific opinion of his “strong and weak points”, for strength and weakness are relative to the work to be done. I should suppose that in a statistical research relating to monetary and banking questions, and particularly to the price problem, Mr. Burns would be decidedly capable. I do not think of any elements of corresponding weakness that need to be emphasized, but perhaps you might find him less devoted to the necessary routine work that has to done in every statistical office, than you would to the planning of investigation and the initiation of inquiries in it. Put in another was this might be equivalent to saying that Mr. Burns is perhaps stronger in conception and planning than he is in execution and yet I do not know that he is in any way to be criticized for his power of execution. I simply mean that he does not seem to be as outstanding in that direction as he is in the other.

            I, however, commend him unreservedly to you as a capable man in connection with price, banking and credit research.

Yours very truly,
[signed] H. P. Willis

HPW:S

_____________________

Reference Letter:  Willford I. King

AMERICAN STATISTICAL ASSOCIATION

Secretary-Treasurer
Willford I. King
530 Commerce Building, New York Univ.
236 Wooster Street, New York City

February 27, 1930.

Mr. G. R. Stahl,
National Bureau of Economic Research,
51 Madison Avenue,
New York City.

Dear Mr. Stahl:

            I have met Mr. Arthur F. Burns two or three times but do not know very much about his record. One thing, however, stands out strongly in his favor. He recently published in the AMERICAN ECONOMIC REVIEW a very fine piece of work on the equation of exchange. This indicates to me that he is competent to do research work of high quality.

Cordially yours,
Willford I. King.

WIK:RW

_____________________

Reference Letter: F. W. Taussig

HARVARD UNIVERSITY
DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMICS

Cambridge, Massachusetts
February 28, 1930

Dear Mr. Stahl:

            I have a high opinion of A. F. Burns. I have watched his published work, and some I have examined with care. As will be noted, he has an article in the current issue of the Quarterly Journal of Economics which I consider first-rate. He is a keen critic, and handles figures well. He writes more than acceptably, and in my judgment gives promise of very good work in the future. You will have to go far to find a man clearly better.

Very truly yours,
[signed] F. W. Taussig

Mr. G. R. Stahl
National Bureau of Economic Research
51 Madison Avenue
New York City

_____________________

Reference Letter:  E. E. Agger

Rutgers University
New Brunswick, New Jersey
Department of Economics

March 5, 1930

Mr. G. R. Stahl,
National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
51 Madison Avenue,
New York City

Dear Mr. Stahl:

            Replying to your letter of February 26th I may say that I have known Mr. Arthur F. Burns ever since his undergraduate days. He was one of my honor students when I was at Columbia and when he finished his graduate work I brought him to Rutgers as an Instructor. I think that he will be promoted to an Assistant Professorship next year.

            He has been a specialist in the field of Statistics and Economic Theory and would therefore, in my judgment, be ideally equipped for the post of Research Associate. He is meticulously careful and most painstaking. You are doubtless familiar with some of his writings during the past year or so. They have seemed to me excellent pieces of work. We shall sorely miss him should he ask for leave to accept possible appointment under you, but on the other hand, I believe that in the end it will add to his value to us, at the same time that you are getting the use of his services. In short, I recommend him without qualification.

Sincerely yours,
[Signed] E.E. Agger

EEA:H

_____________________

Reference Letter:  Carl Snyder

COPY
Thirty Three Liberty Street
New York

March 5, 1930

Dear Mr. Stahl:

            I have followed the work of Arthur F. Burns, of whom you wrote, with a great deal of interest. It seems to me careful, conscientious, well-planned work. He has the inquisitive mind, and that is the great thing. His ideas seem to me sound and his statistical methods well grounded.

            The problem in which he is interested is one in which we have done a great deal of work here, and I know of nothing of greater importance. I wish very cordially to endorse the recommendation for his appointment as a Research Associate.

Please believe me, with very best regards,

Sincerely yours,
Carl Snyder

Gustav R. Stahl, Esq.,
National Bureau of Economic Research
51 Madison Avenue, New York City

_____________________

Reference Letter:  Simon Kuznets

NATIONAL BUREAU OF ECONOMIC RESEARCH
51 Madison Avenue, New York

March 3, 1930

Committee on Selection,
National Bureau of Economic Research
51 Madison Avenue,
New York City

Gentlemen:

            Arthur F. Burns who is applying for appointment as a Research Associate is my former classmate from Columbia University, and has always impressed me by his keen powers of observation and analysis. His work speaks for itself, for he has had opportunity to publish some of the by-products of his doctor’s thesis in the form of articles.

            He has a thorough statistical training, both in theory and in technique, for he has studied statistics, taught it, and applied its principles. He is also thoroughly versed in economic theory, having studied it under Professors W. C. Mitchell and H. L. Moore.

            On the whole, Mr. Burns is a candidate of high promise. He is still quite young in years, but is quite experienced in research work. He ought to prove equal to the opportunities which an appointment as a research associate will provide for him.

Yours respectfully
[signed] Simon Kuznets
[Research Staff member, NBER]

_____________________

Reference Letter:  Robert E. Chaddock

Columbia University
in the City of New York
Faculty of Political Science

March 3, 1930.

Mr. G. R. Stahl, Executive Secretary
National Bureau of Economic Research
51 Madison Avenue, New York City

Dear Mr. Stahl,

            I have expressed my opinion as to the qualifications of Cowden, Gayzer and Leong as candidates for Research Associate. Mr. Arthur F. Burns is superior to any of these in qualifications for research, in my opinion. All his inclinations and his critical attitude toward his own and the results of others point to research as his field. He has unusual technical preparation in Statistics and does not lose sight of the logical tests of his knowledge. He has been publishing articles constantly since entering upon his teaching at Rutgers University where he is successful as a teacher so far as I know. I would not rate him ahead of the candidates I have described before in matters of personality and personal contact, but I do regard him as a very superior candidate in respect to qualifications for research and scholarly productivity.

Sincerely yours,
[signed] Robert E. Chaddock

REC:CT

_____________________

Letter:  Edwin F. Gay to Arthur F. Burns

NATIONAL BUREAU OF ECONOMIC RESEARCH
51 Madison Avenue, New York

June 25, 1930

Mr. A. F. Burns
34 Bethune Street
New York City

My dear Mr. Burns:

            At a recent meeting of the Executive Committee of the National Bureau it was decided that since all the members of the regular staff are not available until the end of September, the Research Associates should be asked to report here on October 1, 1930, instead of September 15. You may, of course, come earlier but full provision for your work cannot conveniently be made before the date indicated. The stipends of the Research Associates are to run from October 1, and also the salaries of such statistical assistants as are designated for the service of the Research Associates.

            Upon your arrival you are to report to Dr. Frederick C. Mills, who will have direct responsibility as your adviser. You will be free, of course, to consult with any of the members of the staff.

            In regard to arrangements for statistical and other assistance, you will consult with Mr. Pierce Williams, the Executive Director.

            It gives me great pleasure, in behalf of the directors and staff of the National Bureau, to welcome you as a research associate. We trust that you will find the eleven months with us not only scientifically profitable but personally enjoyable.

Sincerely yours,
[signed] Edwin F. Gay]
Director of Research

RD

[handwritten note] P.S In looking over your application, I [word illegible] certain [items?] which I think should be filled out. These are: the date of arrival in this country, precise date of naturalization; pre-college education.

Source: Duke University. David M. Rubenstein Rare Book and Manuscript Library. Economists’ Papers Archive. Arthur F. Burns Papers, Box 2, Folder “Correspondence/NBER, 1930”.  IMG_8329.JPG

Image Source: Duke University. David M. Rubenstein Rare Book and Manuscript Library. Economists’ Papers Archive. Arthur F. Burns Papers, Box 6. Folder “Photographs, B&W I”. Note: “1930s” written on back of photograph.

 

Categories
Barnard Columbia Economics Programs Gender Undergraduate

Columbia. Splitting the costs. Department of Economics v. Barnard College, 1906-9

 

The growing pains of the modern university can be seen in attempts to mould ad hoc understandings made earlier into long-term, binding, and explicit rules and regulations. We see this in E. R. A. Seligman’s untiring reminders to the Columbia University central administration and to Barnard College deans as to how to manage the legacy of having first hired John Bates Clark to fill a Barnard position while swapping Clark Barnard hours with the Department of Economics in the Faculty of Political Science hours, either by having department professors offer courses in Barnard College or by allowing Barnard women to take Columbia College or graduate courses. It was complicated, leaving plenty of room for misunderstandings. Seligman can be seen in the following memo and letters to have been one smooth intra-university operator. Still we come away (at least hearing his side of the story) that he would neither give nor take an inch. His motto apparently: Pacta sunt servanda.

____________________

MEMORANDUM AS TO PROPOSED CHANGES IN THE FINANCIAL ARRANGEMENT BETWEEN BARNARD COLEGE AND COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY IN RESPECT TO THE DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMICS. [Carbon copy, 1906]

I. HISTORICAL STATEMENT.

In 1895 a friend of Barnard College established for three years the Professorship of History and the Professorship of Economics, on the understanding that each of these departments should offer a corresponding amount of separate instruction to Barnard seniors and graduates, and that the Barnard Corporation would endeavor to maintain these Professorships after the expiration of such term. It was arranged that these professors should lecture at Columbia as well as at Barnard, and that for every course given by them at Columbia, a course should be given at Barnard by them or their departmental associates. The normal number of lectures by a professor was fixed at six; so that the Professor of Economics gave 2 hours at Barnard, the other four being supplied by his colleagues.

In 1898 Barnard College agreed to continue those professorships; and as a recognition of the action of the Barnard Trustees, the Faculty of Political Science decided to open to women holding a first degree, the graduate courses in History and Economics.

When Barnard College was incorporated into the educational system of the University, this arrangement was perpetuated. The 5th and 6th Sections of the Agreement of June 15, 1900, read in part, as follows:

“On and after January 1st, 1904, all of the instruction for women leading to the degree of B.A. shall be given separately in Barnard College……Barnard College will assume as rapidly as possible all of the instruction for women in the Senior year ****** and undertakes to maintain every professorship established thereof or an equivalent therefor shall be rendered in Barnard College; and when means allow, establish additional professorships in the University which shall be open to men and women, to the end that opportunities for higher education may be enlarged for both men and women.

The University will accept women who have taken their first degree on the same terms as men, as students of the University and as candidates for the degree of M.A. and Ph.D. under the Faculty of Philosophy, Political Science and Pure Science, in such courses as have been or may be designated by those Faculties, with the consent of those delivering the courses.

From the foregoing it is clear that so far as the Faculty of Political Science is concerned the opening of the University courses to women was in return for the establishment and maintenance of the professorships, and Barnard College thus declared itself ready to pay one-third of the salary of the professors of Economics, at that time three in number. In addition, Barnard College paid for the Junior work under the Department of Economics.

On this basis the whole system has reposed and has been continued. Changes in the personnel have been made in the mean time, and the instruction given to Juniors by the Department of Economics has been strengthened. Two professors, (or as during this year a professor and an instructor) have taken the place of what was originally an assistant. These changes, which called for an additional outlay on the part of Barnard College, were made with the consent of Barnard.

The Department of Economics and Social Science as it existed up to last spring, has kept strictly to the letter of the agreement. At an earlier period Professor Giddings had agreed to give at Barnard College a course in sociology in return for a suitable compensation. In 1900, however, he ceased to be paid an additional sum and his two hours were counted with the consent of Barnard College toward the six due from the Department, the other four being provided by Professors Seligman and Clark. In 1902 two additional hours were given at Barnard College by the new instructor, Professor Moore. Since then the Department has provided six hours of instruction at Barnard College, (two hours by Professor Clark, two by Professor Seager, and two by Professor Giddings.) It has given an additional two hours by Professor Moore to the Seniors, and it has put the Junior work in the hands of Professors Moore and Johnson (this year [word torn off from corner] Moore and Dr. Whitaker.) Every course given to the Columbia College undergraduates is duplicated at Barnard College, with the exception that it seemed unwise to the Barnard authorities to give the course on Taxation and Finance as being somewhat too remote from the interests of the Barnard undergraduates. The substance of this course is however included in that given by Professor Seager. This explains the fact that 12 hours are given at Barnard College whereas 14 hours are given at Columbia College. This arrangement was made with the consent of the Barnard authorities. In 1906 again with the consent of Barnard College, Barnard Seniors were admitted to the course of Prof. Giddings at Columbia, the Barnard course being discontinued. This arrangement has, however, not yet received the permanent sanction of the Faculty of Political Science.

Although Barnard College is not only getting all that was bargained for at the time, and although it has in addition the services of a full professor for both Senior and Junior work (Prof. Moore.), and although the proportion of the original expense of the Department of Economics paid by Barnard College was at the outset considerably over e4%,–being one-third of the salaries of the professors plus a payment for the Junior work, the proportion of the total expense of the Department of Economics and Social Science borne by Barnard College has now been reduced to 29.19%, Barnard paying at present $8350 out of a total budget of $28,600.

 

Barnard pays:

Columbia pays:
Seligman $5000
Giddings $5000
Seager $3500
Moore $1750
Clark $5000 Devine $3500 University Courses
Moore $1750 Simkhovitch $500
Whitaker $1600 Tenney $1000
$8350 $20250 Total $28600

 

In other words Barnard College receives more than it originally did and pays proportionately less.

 

II. WHAT SHOULD BE THE SHARE OF BARNARD COLLEGE.

Up to the year 199[blank] Barnard College made a money contribution to Columbia for each of the women graduate students enrolled, under the Faculties of Political Science, Philosophy, and Pure Science. In that year the money contribution was abandoned, and since then women graduate students have paid their fees directly to Columbia. It might be claimed by Barnard College that this new arrangement absolved it in future from all financial responsibility for or interest in the purely university (graduate) work. This claim is however, negatived by the provisions of the agreement of June 15, 1900 still in force, whereby Barnard College obligated itself to “maintain every professorship established at its instance” and to “establish additional professorships in the University upon foundations providing for courses which shall be open to men and women.” These contractual obligations are in no wise impaired or weakened by the modification subsequently introduced in the method of payment of fees by women students.

It might again be claimed that the financial obligations of Barnard are reduced whenever a Senior course, hitherto repeated at Barnard, is given only at Columbia, but open to Barnard Seniors. This claim, however, is likewise inadmissible if the change be made by and with the consent of Barnard College. For as long as the Barnard undergraduates receive the instruction, and as long as the Barnard authorities consent for any reason, that this instruction be given at Columbia, the financial obligation cannot be deemed to be impaired. As a matter of fact, this situation has not permanently arisen in the department of Economics and Social Science. In only one case, that of the Senior course by Professor Giddings, has a purely provisional arrangement been made for the year 1906-’07, with the understanding and the express statement on the part of the Barnard authorities that this would make no difference whatever in the financial arrangement for the year. It was on this understanding that the scheme was provisionally ratified by the Faculty of Political Science.

No opinion is here expressed by the Department of Economics as to the desirability of opening Senior courses at Columbia to Barnard students. It may be that for pedagogical reasons it is desirable in some cases to repeat courses at Barnard, or in other cases to admit Barnard Seniors to the Columbia courses. It may also be desirable to utilize the services of a professor, hitherto repeating a Senior course at Barnard for instruction in one of the lower classes at Barnard. But whatever decision may be reached by the Barnard authorities in conjunction with the Department of Economics, it is clear that this will not change the financial obligations of Barnard, as long as the Barnard undergraduates receive the same amount of instruction as before.

If it be maintained that the existing contract should be abrogated, the question arises: What share should Barnard College in equity contribute to the expenses of the Department? This question may be discussed on the basis of the number of hours given by the members of the department at Barnard College, at Columbia College, and in the University courses which are open to men and women graduates.

In any such computation it must be recognized that some part of the cost of the graduate instruction should be borne by Barnard College. For, irrespective of the existing contract, it cannot be claimed that women ever possessed a right to share in the advantages offered by an institution, originally established and endowed for the instruction of men without making some proportionate contribution to the support of that institution. The force of this argument is strengthened when it is remembered that every student costs the University more than he or she pays and that every increase in the student body entails the necessity of increasing the teaching course and of providing additional lecture rooms, educational appliances and library facilities.

It is for this reason that in any estimate of the share of the University expenses which is to be borne by Barnard College, a proportionate share of the expense of graduate instruction should be allotted to that institution.

On this assumption, the figures would be as follows:

 

Hours given

Barnard College

 Columbia College

University
Clark

2

 2 (109-110)

3 (205-6 & 291)
Seligman

—

 3 (1 & 101-102)

3 (203-4 & 292)
Seager

2

 2 (105-106)

2 (233 & 289)
Moore

3

 1 (104)

2 (210 & 255)
Whitaker

3

 4 (1-2)

—
Giddings

2

 2 (151-152)

3 (251-2 & 279)

12

 14

13

 

For undergraduate instruction

For Professors giving undergraduate instruction

Barnard pays:

Columbia pays:
Seligman

$5000
Clark

$5000

 Moore

$1750
Moore

$1750

 Seager

$3500
Whitaker

$1600

 Giddings

$5000

$8350

$15250

 =Total $23600
In addition Columbia pays for Purely University work

$5000
Grand Total

$28600

Total hours given as above by Professors giving undergraduate instruction = 41.

There is thus chargeable to:

The University 15/41 of $23600 = $8635 + $5000 = $13,635
Columbia College 14/41 of $23600 = $8,058
Barnard College should pay 12/41 of $23,600= $6907
                                                + 1/3 of $13,635= $4543[sic]
$11450

 

Barnard gets 12 hours to Columbia’s 14 and both share equally in the University work, although Barnard is here charged with only 1/3, not ½ of the purely university expenses. Yet Barnard pays $8350 instead of $11,450.

In the above computation Barnard College is charged with 1/3 of the purely university instruction because this was the proportion as arranged when the original professorship was established. On the basis, however, of the actual enrolment of women students the obligation of Barnard College would be slightly less. In the year 1906-07 there re-enrolled (not counting duplicates) in the purely university courses 60 women out of 251 students or 23.90%, i.e. roughly ¼. The contribution of Barnard College on this basis ought then to be: 12/41 of $23,600 = $6,907 + ¼ of $13,635 = $3,490 [sic, should be $3409] or a total of $10,316 in lieu of $8350, the present payment.

 

III. THE REDUCTION CONTEMPLATED BY BARNARD COLLEGE.

Although the authorities of Barnard College have not yet formulated any definite scheme it is understood that they have in contemplation a plan which calls on the one hand for a considerable reduction of the contribution, and on the other hand, the opening to Barnard Seniors of several Senior courses at Columbia College to make good the reduced facilities at Barnard College. In other words, Barnard College does not propose more opportunities with the same contribution as hitherto, nor does it demand the same opportunities with a smaller contribution; but it suggests more opportunities with a smaller contribution.

In considering the contemplated proposition of Barnard College it must finally be remembered that the Department of Economics has been built up on the assumption that the original scheme would be adhered to. All the instructors giving courses in Barnard College have been called with the advice and consent of Barnard College. Some of them have been put in part on the Barnard salary list. The contractual obligation “to maintain the professorships established at its instance” clearly attaches to the new professorships, which were established in 1902 in the department of Economics at the joint instance and expense of Barnard and Columbia. Any financial comparison between the Department of Economics and other departments on the basis of relative hours of instruction given at Barnard College is not pertinent in view of the contractual obligations hereinbefore recited. Barnard College entered at the outset into a definite contractual relation which has been perpetuated by the agreement of 1900 and which has not been impaired by the minor changes of 190[blank] hereinbefore referred to. Above all, the admission of women to university courses was arranged as a quid pro quo, and is specifically restricted in the agreement of 1900 to such courses “as have been or may be designated by these Faculties, with the consent of those delivering the courses”.

It is sincerely hoped that no action will be taken that might imperil this arrangement and that Barnard College may see its way, if not to make what it here suggested as an equitable contribution, at all events to maintain the status quo so that on the one hand Columbia may not be made to assume a still heavier burden, or that on the other hand the department of Economics may not be seriously crippled in its endeavor to provide adequate instruction at Columbia and Barnard alike.

Source:  Columbia University Libraries, Manuscript Collections. Papers of Edwin Robert Anderson Seligman. Box 36, Folder “Barnard 36-37”.

____________________

Letter of Seligman to Gill [carbon copy]

New York, December 30, 1906.

Miss Laura D. Gill, Dean,
Barnard College, Columbia University
New York City.

My dear Miss Gill:

Your letter of December 13th was received shortly before the Holidays. In reply, I would say that several weeks ago, at the request of the University authorities I submitted to the Committee on Education of Columbia University a detailed memorandum giving facts and suggestions as to the financial arrangements between Barnard College and Columbia University so far as the Department of Economics is concerned. That matter has now passed out of my hands entirely.

Let me however call your attention to the fact that these suggestions contained in your letter will require action not alone by the Department of Economics, but also by the Faculty of Political Science, as well as by the Faculty of Columbia College. If the recommendation contained in my memorandum to the Trustees were carried out, I think that I could urge the Department of Economics to prevail upon the Faculties concerned to take action in accordance with your wishes; but I am quite decidedly of the opinion that until some definitive financial arrangement is entered into between Barnard College and Columbia University, so far as the Department of Economics is concerned, it will be hopeless for the Department of Economics to expect any action whatever on the part of the Faculties concerned; and without such action nothing could of course be done.

Again assuring you of my readiness to co-operate with you and to take up the matter with the Department and with the respective Faculties as soon as we can learn from the Committee on Education what the financial arrangements are for next year,

I remain
Very respectfully yours

[E.R.A. Seligman]

 

Source:  Columbia University Libraries, Manuscript Collections. Central Files 1890-. Box 338, Folder 13 “Seligman, Edwin Robert Anderson 7/1904-12/1910”.

____________________

President Butler to Seligman [carbon copy]

December 28, 1908

Professor E. R. A. Seligman,
324 West 86 Street,
New York

My dear Professor Seligman:

I beg to hand you for your information an important letter which I have received today from the Acting Dean of Barnard College. Mr. Brewster points out that Barnard, under the present arrangement, is not securing its just due in the matter of economics teaching. Will you give this matter your attention and offer such suggestions as seem to you appropriate as to how the situation can be bettered?

Very truly yours,
President

 

Source:  Columbia University Libraries, Manuscript Collections. Central Files 1890-. Box 338, Folder 13 “Seligman, Edwin Robert Anderson 7/1904-12/1910”.

____________________

Seligman to President Butler

Columbia University
in the City of New York
School of Political Science

January 4, 1909

President Nicholas Murray Butler,
Columbia University, City.

My dear President Butler:

In reply to your letter of December 24th, 1908, I take pleasure in stating that I had a very satisfactory talk with Acting Dean Brewster a few days ago. I am enclosing to you herewith copy of the letter which I have sent to him as to the historical development, and which explains itself.

As to the new scheme, permit me to state that in my Budget letter I assumed that there would be hereafter in the second term in the Junior course at Barnard, four sections, as is now the case in the first term. It was on that assumption that I made the recommendations as to assistants.

I quite agree with Acting Dean Brewster that if the situation is to remain as at present, namely, nine hours in the first term and five hours in the second term, the new Adjunct Professor will be entirely competent to take charge of this. That would mean an average of seven hours per week, and as he is to do three hours’ work at Columbia that would mean a total of ten hours per week, which is not excessive. This would, however, reduce the Budget at Barnard from $2,700 to $2,500.

On the other hand, if, as there now seems to be some possibility, the Committee on Instruction of Barnard College decides to make the second term work nine hours (with four sections) the Acting Dean of Barnard agrees with me that the work will be a little too much for one man, and that he ought to have the aid of at all events the part time of an assistant.

Upon the decision to be reached, however, depends therefore the final recommendation of the Department for the assistants in the University as a whole. If no assistance is required at Barnard College the Department of Economics will be able to get on, although with some difficulty, with one high-class tutor, for his work will be to take charge not only of three of the four sections at Columbia, but also of the three new sections in the School of Mines, and this would mean the assumption by Columbia of his salary of $1,000. On the other hand, if the additional work is taken up at Barnard, it will be imperative to have a second man as assistant, at a salary of $500., as the amount of work to be done will be entirely too much for one tutor. We should then arrive at the final conclusion reached in my original Budget letter, which is the employment of two men, at a joint salary of $1,500., in addition to the new Adjunct Professor. What part of this salary of $1,500 is to be paid by Barnard, is, of course a matter on which I am not asked to express an opinion.

Permit me to say in conclusion that I am deeply sensible of the cordial way in which the Acting Dean of Barnard has accepted the propositions of the Department for the improvement of the work. Under the scheme as outlined not only will the work be, I think, entirely satisfactory to the authorities of Barnard College, but it will also be a considerable improvement at Columbia. The Department of Economics will be very glad indeed to adjust itself to whichever of the two alternative schemes may be adopted by Barnard: the one being the maintenance of the present situation calling for an appropriation for assistants of $1,000., to be paid entirely by Columbia, the other—involving additional work at Barnard—calling for an appropriation of $1,500 for assistants, to be defrayed in part by Barnard College.

Respectfully submitted,
[signed]
Edwin R. A. Seligman

Source:  Columbia University Libraries, Manuscript Collections. Central Files 1890-. Box 338, Folder 13 “Seligman, Edwin Robert Anderson 7/1904-12/1910”.

____________________

Seligman to Brewster [carbon copy]

January 4, 1909

Professor William T. Brewster,
Acting Dean, Barnard College, City.

My dear Sir:

I have the honor to acknowledge receipt of a letter of December 24, 1908, from President Butler, enclosing your letter of December 23, 1908, in which you refer to the courses offered by the Department of Economics at Barnard College.

As the existing situation is the result of steps taken by the administrative authorities of Barnard College and Columbia University, and as these agreements and instructions were never embodied in formal written documents, I venture to send you a written statement of the history of the case, in the hope that this letter may be put on file with the original agreement, in order that the question as to the interpretation of the original agreement may be settled, if it should again arise in the future.

The original agreement made with Professor Clark and the Faculty of Political Science, when he was called to the University in 1895, was to the effect that for every hour given by him at Columbia a member of the existing Columbia staff should give an hour at Barnard College. Under this agreement it was arranged that Professor Clark should give two hours at Barnard and four hours at Columbia. Of the four exchange hours due to Barnard, two were given by Professor Giddings and two by Professor Seligman. Several years later, when Professor Seager was called to Columbia, he took the courses previously given by Professor Seligman.

In the year 1905 when the Chair of the History of Civilization was founded at Columbia University, an arrangement was effected between the Dean of Barnard and the President of Columbia University, whereby the two hour course of Professor Giddings, given at Barnard, was transferred to Columbia, the Columbia course being now, however, open to Barnard students. This was recognized as a substantial equivalence, and since that time the Barnard students have been coming to Professor Giddings’ course at Columbia.

When Professor Henry L. Moore was called to the University in 1902 an arrangement was made whereby a portion of his work was to be done at Barnard in return for the payment of aa portion of his salary b Barnard College. Under this arrangement Professor Moore offered a two hour course to the Seniors at Barnard College, and took general supervision of the Junior work in Economics, which was, however, actually carried on by assistants. Several years later, as the Junior work at Barnard was not entirely satisfactory, the Dean of Barnard College suggested that Professor Moore give up his Senior course and in exchange take an active part in the lecturing and teaching of the Juniors at Barnard. This suggestion was adopted, and as the number of sections gradually increased at Barnard the work was finally divided between Professor Moore and two assistants, the class being divided into four sections in the first term and into two sections in the second term. As a compensation for the Senior course which was now dropped by Professor Moore, the Dean of Barnard College suggested that courses 107-108, given by Professor Seligman at Columbia University be open to Barnard students. This suggestion was adopted by the Department, and ratified by the Columbia Faculty, and has continued ever since.

What I desire especially to emphasize is the fact that in no case did the initiative for any of these changes come from the Department of Economics, but that in every case the initiative came either from the Dean of Barnard College or from the President of Columbia University in conjunction with the Dean of Barnard College. The Department of Economics has been at all times willing and anxious to live up to the terms of the original and supplemental agreements, and has in every case been glad to adopt the suggestions of the authorities of Barnard College. It so happens that during the present year Professor Seager is on his Sabbatical leave of absence, and that Courses 107-108 were not given at Columbia; but this is an exceptional situation, including the $5,000 salary of Professor Clark, with the corresponding work given in exchange at Barnard, the number of hours of instruction given at Barnard are economics A, 9 hours, Economics 4, 5 hours, or an annual average of seven hours per week. The salary list has been $2,700.,–$1,700 for Professor Moore and $1,000 for two assistants. This is an average of less than $400 per hour, and if we include Courses 107-108 at Columbia, which were open to the Barnard students when the supplemental agreement was made, it would reduce the cost per year to considerably less than $400, which I understand is the average in other Departments.

The new scheme of courses which has been elaborated by the Dean of Barnard College to take effect next year, meets with the entire approval of the Department of Economics, and is outlined in another letter a copy of which I have the honor of submitting herewith. I venture to hope, however, that this statement of the historical development of the situation may be put on file, in order to show that the Department of Economics has at all times endeavored to abide loyally by the spirit of the agreement between Barnard College and Columbia University.

Respectfully submitted,
[stamped signature: Edwin R. A. Seligman]

 

Source:  Columbia University Libraries, Manuscript Collections. Central Files 1890-. Box 338, Folder 13 “Seligman, Edwin Robert Anderson 7/1904-12/1910”.

Image Source:  Barnard College, Columbia University. Boston Public Library, The Tichnor Brothers Collection.

 

 

 

Categories
Columbia Rochester

Columbia. Economics PhD Alumnus, Meyer Jacobstein, 1907

 

Today in our continuing historical series “Get to know an economics Ph.D.”, we meet Meyer Jacobstein (1880-1963), a Columbia University Ph.D. (1907) who, before serving as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives (1923-1929), taught economics at the University of North Dakota and the University of Rochester.

Jacobstein’s disssertation was published by the Columbia Faculty of Political Science in its house journal:

Meyer Jacobstein. The Tobacco Industry in the United States. Studies in History, Economics and Public Law (Vol. XXVI, No. 3), 1907.

In his introduction Jacobstein thanks E.R.A. Seligman, H. R. Seager and H.L. Moore for criticism and suggestions.

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From: Columbia University Catalogue of Officers and Graduates

Meyer Jacobstein, A.B., 05; A. M., 05; Ph. D, 07; Asst. Prof. Univ. N. Dak. (University, N. Dak.)

Source:  Catalogue of Officers and Graduates of Columbia University from the Foundation of King’s college in 1754.(XVI edition, 1916), p. 200.

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From: Biographical Director of the U.S. Congress

JACOBSTEIN, Meyer, a Representative from New York; born in New York City, January 25, 1880; moved with his parents to Rochester, N.Y., in 1882; attended the public schools and the University of Rochester, Rochester, N.Y.; was graduated from Columbia University, New York City, in 1904; pursued postgraduate courses at the same university in economics and political science; special agent in the Bureau of Corporations, Department of Commerce, Washington, D.C., in 1907; assistant professor of economics, University of North Dakota at Grand Forks 1909-1913; professor of economics in the University of Rochester 1913-1918; was a director in emergency employment management at the University of Rochester under the auspices of the War Industry Board 1916-1918; elected as a Democrat to the Sixty-eighth, Sixty-ninth, and Seventieth Congresses (March 4, 1923-March 3, 1929); was not a candidate for renomination in 1928; delegate to the Democratic National Conventions in 1924 and 1932; declined the nomination of mayor of Rochester, N.Y., in 1925; engaged in banking in Rochester, N.Y., 1929-1936; in 1936 became chairman of the board of the Rochester Business Institute; member of the Brookings Institution staff 1939-1946; economic counsel in the legislative reference service of the Library of Congress from 1947 until his retirement May 31, 1952; resided in Rochester, N.Y., until his death there on April 18, 1963; interment in Mount Hope Cemetery.

Source: Biographical Directory of the United States Congress.

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Obituary

Dr. Meyer Jacobstein, Noted Economist and Educator, Dies in Rochester
(Apr. 21, 1963)

Funeral services were held here for Dr. Meyer Jacobstein, former member of the U.S. Congress, college professor and publisher of the Rochester Journal-American, who died last Thursday at the age of 83.

Born in New York, Dr. Jacobstein spent most of his life in Rochester. He was elected in 1922 to Congress on the Democratic ticket, and was the second Democratic representative from the 38th Congressional District since the Civil War. He was reelected twice but chose not to run in 1928. He was assistant professor of economics in the University of North Dakota from 1909 until 1913. In 1913 he joined the faculty of the University of Rochester as professor of economics.

Dr. Jacobstein was publisher of The Journal American here, from 1924 until the newspaper suspended in 1937. He then became a research consultant for the Brookings Institute in Washington. In 1944, he was director of a Senate special committee on postwar economic policy and planning. He retired from public life in 1957, after completing a one-year study of Rochester employment at the request of Governor Averell Harriman. He is survived by his widow, Lena (Lipsky), two daughters and eight grandchildren.

Source: Jewish Telegraphic Agency, April 22, 1963.

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Image Source: Campaign button from U.S. Congress, History of the House website; Meyer Jacobstein in Wikipedia.

Categories
Barnard Exam Questions

Barnard. Exam for one-semester outlines of economics course. Moore and Johnson, 1903

 

 

 

The following introductory economics exam from Barnard College in 1903 comes from a student’s college scrapbook that had been donated to the archives of her alma mater. The scrapbook belonged to Gertrude Helen Clark, who, according to  the Register of the Associate Alumnae of Barnard College (1925), married Frederick M. Hitchcock in 1917. Because such random singletons are quickly forgotten, I prefer to post them immediately. Similar to Radcliffe, Barnard could count on faculty from the patriarchal side of campus to provide instructors. Professor Henry L. Moore and the up and coming Alvin S. Johnson were definitely prime offerings for Barnard.

Incidentally, there is a nice website set up to celebrate the 125th anniversary of the founding of Barnard where one finds a list of the names of all Barnard College economics faculty starting with John Bates Clark up to most recent times.

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Course Announcement

Economics and Social Science

Economics A—Outlines of Economics. Study of the characteristics of modern industrial society and of the fundamental economic principles. Professor [Henry L.] Moore and Mr. [Alvin Saunders] Johnson [Tutor in Political Economy and Sociology]. One and one-half points, first half-year.

Section I, Tu., Th., S., 9.30; Section II, Tu., Th., 11.30, S. 9.30; Section III (if needed), Tu., Th., 1.30, S., 9.30.

Prescribed for Juniors. Open to qualified Sophomores who take Course I.
This course is given in two or, if necessary, in three sections. Students are assigned to the sections in alphabetical order, but for reasons of weight, with the consent of the Dean, a student may be transferred to a section other than that to which she properly belongs.

 

Source: Columbia University, Barnard College Catalogue, 1901-02. Announcement 1902-1903, p. 59. 

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BARNARD COLLEGE
Economics A
Mid-year Examination, [Jan. 27,] 1903

 

  1. Define wealth, capital, land; rent, demand, utility, marginal utility, value, price.
  2. What determines market value? normal value?
  3. State the law of diminishing returns.
  4. What are the economic reasons for the concentration of industry?
    Is there an economic limit to concentration?
  5. State the law of monopoly value.
  6. What determines the value of money?
  7. Assuming that the United States has a monetary circulation of 500,000,000 in gold, what will be the effect of an issue of 100,000,000 in legal tender paper money
    1. On prices within the United States
    2. On the foreign trade of the United States
    3. On the value of gold throughout the world.
  8. If a day’s labor in America will produce more yards of cotton cloth than a day’s labor in England, will the cotton industry need protection? Should it receive protection?
  9. How does a high standard of living affect wages?
  10. Discuss the “scope” of Economics.

 

Source:  Barnard College Archives. Gertrude C. Clark Hitchcock Scrapbook, 1898-1906, p. 48.

Image Source: Art and Picture Collection, The New York Public Library. “Barnard College, western boulevard” New York Public Library Digital Collections. Accessed February 24, 2018.