Bethlehem Steel Case - Correspondence, 1919-1922

The W. Jett Lauck collection consists of his professional, business and personal papers as an economist, statistician and government consultant on immigration, banking, railroads, coal, and unemployment problems as well as other facets of labor in the United States. Included are correspondence, scrapbooks of news clippings reflecting his activities, labor reports and studies, drafts of congressional bills, legal briefs, and other material concerning labor problems in the United States from its formative World War I years until 1949. They begin with his association with the progressive labor codes of the Taft-Walsh Labor Relations Commission and continue with the Railway Labor Act of 1926; the fight to gain recognition of labor's right to collective bargaining "through representatives of their own choosing" under the National Industrial Recovery Act in 1933; the incorporation of its principles in the National Labor Relations Act; and further activity in defense of this act.

Other manuscripts deal with studies of government competition with private business, the American Association for Economic Freedom, the New York Power Authority; branch, chain, and group banking, drafts of speeches, and work diary accounts of activities and meetings with prominent congressional and labor leaders on labor problems and legislation.

The largest portions of the W. Jett Lauck papers deal with cases and arbitrations, chiefly railroad and coal related, his work on various boards and commission and topical files.

His correspondence with individuals heading organizations interested in labor and industrial relations was wide-spread, just as it was with political figures, educators, and labor leaders. Among the public figures with whom he corresponded are Bernard Baruch, Homer S. Cummings, Clarence A. Dystra, John T. Flynn, Guy M. Gillette, Leon Henderson, Herbert Hoover, Hugh S. Johnson, Jesse Jones, William S. Knudsen, Robert M. Fa Follette, Jr., Franklin K. Lane, John L. Lewis, H.C. Lodge, Jr., William G. McAdoo, James M. Mead, Francis P. Miller, Henry Morgenthau, Karl E. Mundt, Donald Nelson, Judge Ferdinand Pecora, Frances Perkins, Gifford Pinchot, James H. Price, Franklin D. Roosevelt, E.R. Stettinius, Jr., Robert F. Wagner, David I. Walsh, Burton K. Wheeler, and Woodrow Wilson. The educators include Hardy Dillard, Edward C. Elliot, Frank Graham, J.W. Jenks, Richard R. Mead, Lewis Tyree, Harry F. Ward, H.B. Wells, and Ray Lyman Wilbur; and the labor leaders Jacob Baker, Solomon Barkin, Van A. Bittner, Sophia Carey, David Dubinsky, P.T. Fagan, John P. Frey, William Green, Sydney Hillman, Earl E. Houck, Thomas Kennedy, Donald MacMillan, and A.O. Wharton.