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|  | MAY 5, 2004
Frances Perkins: Labor's Great Defender FDR's Labor Secretary was America's first woman Cabinet member, a fighter for workers, and helped create Social Security That was Labor Secretary Elaine Chao creating controversy on Capitol Hill in late April, when she unveiled the first significant revision of the Fair Labor Standards Act in 50 years -- one that will substantially change the equation for calculating who qualifies for overtime pay for working more than 40 hours a week. But it was the legacy of President Franklin D. Roosevelt's Labor Secretary, Frances Perkins, that shadowed the debate. Like so many domestic policy discussions in America today -- from privatizing Social Security or improving public schools in big cities -- the overtime imbroglio concerned an idea that had once been an initiative of Perkins, the first woman ever to hold a Cabinet position. A native of Boston, where she was born on Apr. 10, 1882, Perkins developed an interest in workplace issues after her history professor at Mount Holyoke College, Annah May Soule, led her students on tours of textile and paper mills to witness how the working poor made a living. Having developed a new empathy for the exploited classes, Perkins subsequently signed on as a teacher and social worker at the infamous tenement Chicago Commons, alongside such social reformers of the day as Jane Addams, Ellen Gates Starr, and Grace Abbott. PERSUASIVE ABILITIES. However, it wasn't until Perkins earned a master's degree in sociology from Columbia University that her real education began. While surveying the Hell's Kitchen neighborhood in New York City to report on residents' living conditions for Columbia's School of Philanthropy, Perkins went to see Timothy McManus, the notorious Tammany Hall boss for the west side of Midtown Manhattan. To her surprise, McManus was receptive to her pleas for help for the area's indigent families. Perkins began to understand both her own powers of persuasion and the desire of powerful politicians to make their mark -- a trait of Roosevelt's that she would exploit time and again. In 1910, Perkins became secretary of the New York Consumers' League, where she led the fight for job-safety laws after the Triangle Shirtwaist fire in New York City killed 146 factory workers, most of them young women. Perkins was on her way to becoming a powerful social activist. Yet, in that role she was outside the power structure and thus limited in her ability to bring about change. It would take two high-profile mentors to help Perkins make a leap into the male-dominated world of power politics. PIONEER POSITION. One was New York State Governor Al Smith who, impressed by Perkins' crusading on workplace health and safety, took her under his wing. Smith selected her for the State Industrial Commission in 1919, then in 1926 made her chairwoman of the Industrial Board of the State Labor Dept. Perkins transformed both of these previously sleepy state agencies, whose job was to enforce labor laws. She successfully pushed Smith to support legislation reducing the work week to 54 hours, for example. The other mentor was Roosevelt, who, after succeeding Smith as governor, selected Perkins as Industrial Commissioner. That made her the top labor official in New York State -- a position no woman had ever held. But when, as President, Roosevelt appointed Perkins U.S. Labor Secretary in 1933, even Smith expressed doubts: "Men will take advice from a woman, but it's hard for them to take orders from a woman," he intoned. Still, it was fitting that Perkins, who had fought so long for the unfortunate, came to national prominence at the depths of the Depression, when so many people were newly indigent, jobless, and penniless. STARTING FROM SCRATCH. Besides pushing for the Fair Labor Standards Act, Perkins was a primary architect of many New Deal social programs, including the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), a domestic forerunner of President Kennedy's Peace Corps; the Works Progress Administration (WPA), which provided jobs ranging from photographer to engineer to firefighter for 8 million people; and the Federal Emergency Relief Administration (FEMA), which is still going strong as the agency that provides the government's first response to natural and other disasters. Perkins' primary legacy, however, remains her pivotal role in the establishment of Social Security. In 1934, Roosevelt appointed the Committee on Economic Security to look into the possibility of creating a government-managed pension fund for the elderly. There was only one problem: Congress had neglected to pass legislation creating a budget for the committee, leaving it with no money, no offices, and no staff. Perkins cobbled together a budget of $125,000 borrowed from another department, then sent telegrams to associates all over the country, offering railroad fare to Washington and some expense money -- but no salary. "BASIC ROCK OF SECURITY." She rejected numerous proposals for Social Security that she deemed too "idealistic" until the committee settled on a model that included regular, substantial contributions taken out of a worker's pay. Perkins assessed that accomplishment on Aug. 15, 1960, at the 25th anniversary celebration of the passage of the Social Security Act: "We will go into the future a stronger nation because of the fact that we have this basic rock of security under all of our people." During her tenure at the Labor Dept., Perkins often acted as a counterweight to other Presidential advisers. It was she, for example, who persuaded Roosevelt not to mandate identification cards for everyone in the U.S. during World War II. Perkins showed unusual political courage and resilience under fire, speaking out against the creation of camps to segregate Japanese Americans and surviving an impeachment attempt in 1938 over her refusal to deport West Coast labor leader Harry Bridges, an avowed communist. ONE POINT OF AGREEMENT. Perkins stayed on the job until Roosevelt died in April, 1945. After being appointed to the Civil Service Commission by President Truman, where she stayed seven years, she taught at Cornell University's School of Industrial & Labor Relations until her death in 1965. At Chao's Apr. 28 appearance, Democrats criticized her for laying out rules that eliminated overtime for many white-collar professionals. On the other hand, the Bush Administration guaranteed overtime for workers earning $23,660 or less, nearly tripling the salary threshold for guaranteed overtime. It isn't hard to imagine that Perkins -- no matter how much she might have disliked other aspects of the Bush agenda -- would have approved of that.  As part of its 75th anniversary celebration, BusinessWeek is presenting a series of weekly profiles for the greatest innovators of the past 75 years, from science to government. BusinessWeek Online is joining in by adding more online-only profiles of The Great Innovators. In late September, 2004, BusinessWeek will publish a special commemorative issue on Innovation By Mike Brewster in New York
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