Visions of a New Industrial Order

This is an historical examination of the debate in the USA over labour relations and the resulting expansion of the government agencies that provided the basis for the system. In the final months of the US Commission on Industrial Relations in 1915, economist John R. Commons sent a memorandum recommending the creation of a permanent council for administering labour relations. Commons felt that, after years of labour unrest, the USA teetered on the brink of a "civil war" regarding labour relations, and that the gravity of the situation warranted its priority over banking, trusts and railroads. He urged that the USA expand its administrative government along European lines and apply administrative law to American labour relations. The author argues that the public organizations involved in the formation of labour relations policy functioned to stabilize industrial relations within the emerging corporate capitalist system - although often at the expense of important business interests. This study also examines the activities of two other social scientists, E. Dana Durand and Jeremiah W. Jenks, in addition to Commons. Each made significant contributions in the national discussion of labour relations during the Progressive Era, a critical time in American industrial growth.