THE END OF SHORTER HOURS
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by
Benjamin Kline Hunnicutt
Shorter work hours was a vital issue during the formation of
the labor movement in the 19th century and continued to be important until the end of the Great Depression. Some of the most
dramatic and significant events in the history of labor (such as
the strikes of 1886, the Haymarket disaster, the steel strike of
1919) and some of labor's most notable achievements (such as
the ten hour day and the eight hour day) were parts of labor's
century-long struggle for shorter hours. Recent writers have
also noted that workers valued shorter hours because it was
necessary for the expression of the nonpecuniary values, motives, and activities which the "new labor historians" have
shown to be of such significance.1
But the history of shorter hours transcends the labor movement. Shorter hours was a political issue almost as long as it was
a labor cause. It was part of reform politics from before the
Civil War through Franklin Delano Roosevelt's second term. It
was an issue for the idealistic, antebellum reformers. It had a
prominent place in the Populists' Omaha platform and the Bull
Moose platform, and appeared in both the Democratic and Re1
John R. Commons, et al., History of Labour in the United States (New York, 1918-1935,
4 vols.) 1, 170-172, 384-386, 479, 546; see also vol. III, 97-113; Harry A. Millis and Royal
E. Montgomery, The Economics of Labor (New York, 1938-1945, 3 vols.), Vol. I:
Labor's Progress and Some Basic Labor Problems, 481-483; see also Vol. III: Organized
Labor, 423; Irving Bernstein, The Lean Years: A History of the American Worker, 19201933 (Boston, 1960), 476-484; see also Foster Rhea Dulles, Labor in America (New York,
1966), 106, 107; Marion C. Cahill, Shorter Hours: A Study of the Movement Since the
Civil War (New York, 1922), 14-19, 43-46, 156-159, 211; E.P. Thompson, "Time, WorkDiscipline and Industrial Capitalism," Past and Present, 38 (Dec. 1967), 56-97; Herbert
Gulman, Work, Culture and Society in Industrializing America (New York, 1976), 3-78;
David Montgomery, Beyond Equality: Labor and the Radical Republicans, 1862-1872
(New York, 1967), 234-238.
O023-656x/84/2503/373
© 1984 Tamiment Institute
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LABOR HISTORY
publican platforms as late as 1932. Shorter hours also raised important judicial issues in the early 20th century, leading to the
writing of some of the most progressive legal opinions of that
day. Federal and state legislation and executive action began
before the Civil War and continued until the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938. State hours legislation for the period fills a
good sized book. Federal action, beginning with Van Buren's
ten hour executive order, proceeded step-by-step to reduce
working hours for government employees until World War II.
A large number of influential writers and social critics welcomed and promoted shorter hours, believing it was as natural
and as good a result of technological advances as higher wages.
While higher wages would lead to material welfare and security,
shorter hours would make progress possible in other areas of
life—reducing the burden of work at first, and eventually allowing the common man to exercise his higher faculties in a democratic culture.2
The average hours worked per week reflected these attitudes.
Hours of labor reduced slowly but steadily from before the Civil
War to the turn of the century. Between 1900 and 1920 a rapid
reduction took place—especially between the years 1913 and
1919 when weekly hours fell about eight percent. During the
1920s they stabilized at about 49 hours a week and during the
Depression fell below forty.3
But for some reason, the shorter hour movement stopped
after the Depression. During World War II weekly hours of
2
See for example John D. Owen, The Price of Leisure (Montreal, 1970), 62-67; Millis and
Montgomery, The Economics of Labor, I, iii-v, 468-473; Cahill, Shorter Hours, 11-58,
250-256; Richard Hofstadter, The Age of Reform (New York, 1955), 242; Arthur Link,
Woodrow Wilson and the Progressive Era (New York, 1954), 226-239; Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., The Crisis of the Old Order (Boston, 1957), 111-116; Bernstein, The Lean
Years, 70-82; Leo Wolman, "Hours of Work in American Industry", Bulletin No. 71 of
National Bureau of Economic Research (New York, 1938), 20; Robert McCloskey, The
American Supreme Court (Chicago, 1960), 153-156; Norman Pollack, The Populist
Response to Industrial America (Cambridge, Mass., 1962), 28-31 New York Times,
Aug. 8, 1912 and July 5, 1892.
3
Owen, 62-67; Joseph S. Zeisel, "The Work Week in American Industry," Monthly Labor
Review, 81 (Jan. 1958), 23-29; U.S. Bureau of Census, Historical Statistics of the United
States (Washington, DC, 1975), Section on "hours of Work"; Juanita Kreps, Lifetime
Allocation of Work and Income (Durham, NC, 1971), 17-24; see also Ethel B. Jones,
"New Estimates of Hours of Work Per Week and Hourly Earnings, 1900-1957," Review
of Economics and Statistics, 45 (Nov. 1963), 374-385; and Hours of Work, Hearings
before the Select Subcommittee on Labor of the Committee on Education and Labor,
House of Representatives, 88th Congress, 1963, Parts I and II, 73-104.
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work increased, but afterwards stabilized at forty. Unlike other
broadly based reform measures which have prospered in this
century, the shorter hour movement reached some sort of historical plateau nearly 40 years ago. Some economists have recently
made the stronger claim that there has been no increase in leisure
since World War 11/ During this period, labor has turned its
attention to higher wages, collective bargaining rights, and fringe
benefits. These have virtually eclipsed all new calls for shorter
hours. For 40 years, labor has done nothing comparable to its
19th and early 20th century initiatives and successes. Similarly,
since the Depression no major party has made shorter hours a
political issue. In addition, state and federal legislators have
simply modified and corrected the 1938 law, elaborating upon
but not altering the Fair Labor Standard Act's forty hour week
provision. During this tirne neither Washington nor the states
have passed new laws substantially lowering working-hours.5
Indeed, shorter hours have ceased to be an important part of
public discourse. The dreams of the Utopian writers of the four
hour day and the hopes of those who believed that progress
involved leisure as much as it involved economic growth have
4
5
See John D. Owen, "Workweeks and Leisure: An Analysis of Trends, 1948-75," Monthly
Labor Review, 48 (1976), 3-8 for the stronger claim. For other economists who have commented on the end of shorter hours see Y. Barzel and R. McDonald, "Assets, Subsistance, and the Supply Curve of Labor," American Economic Review, 63 (1973), 621-633;
Donald H. Dalton, "The Age of the Constant Workweek: Hours of Work in the United
States since World War II," (unpublished Ph.D. diss., Univ. of Calif., Berkeley, 1975);
T. Aldrich Finegan, "Hours of Work in the United States: A Cross Sectional Analysis,"
Journal of Political Economy, 70 (1962), 452-470; compare Finegan with Paul H. Douglas,
Theory of Wages (New York, 1934), Chapt. xii; Staffan Linder, The Harried Leisure Class
(New York, 1970), 135; Herbert Northrup, "The Reduction in Hours," in C. Dankert,
et al., Hours of Work (New York, 1965), passim; G.C. Winston, "An International Comparison of Income and Hours of Work," Review of Economics and Statistics, 48 (1966),
28-39; Jiri Zuzanek, "Society and Leisure," Journal of Leisure Research, 6 (1974),
294-304.
In 1979, Representative John Conyers of Michigan introduced a bill (HR1784) to amend the
Fair Labor Standards Acts by reducing the standard work week from 40 to 35 hours over
a four year period. Very little interest in this bill was generated, even though Conyers used
labor's traditional arguments. Nevertheless, this was the nearest legislators have come to
passing such legislation. John Conyers, unpublished letter, dated Feb. 15, 1979, photocopy. Another curious fact about shorter hours is that the work week and day declined
during a period of relative stability in the total work force (as a percentage of the total
population) and stabilized during the period when the work force has increased rapidly
because of growing population and the entrance of more women into the labor force.
More people are at work today as a percentage of the total population than ever before,
the percentage increase occurring largely during the period of hours stability. See U.S.
Bureau of Census, Historical Statistics of the United States from Colonial Times to the
Present (Washington, DC, 1975), 127.
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LABOR HISTORY
evaporated, and labor's old demand for "the progressive shortening of the hours of labor" has been forgotten.
Historians have not yet come to grips with these facts and
begun to formulate appropriate questions, much less construct
hypotheses. By contrast, economists have recently asked "why
have working hours stabilized in America since World War II?"
They have also offered valuable explanations, most of which of
course are economic ones.6 But since the shorter hour movement was more than an economic event and since its ending involved political, social and cultural dimensions, it is necessary
for historians to pose their own types of questions—a few of
which are suggested below as possibilities.
Why did organized labor abandon its century-long struggle
for shorter hours? Why have shorter hours ceased to be important as a political issue? Why did such a broad scale social
movement and the ideas and public debate generated by that
movement stop so suddenly? Why did this one part of the 19th
and early 20th century liberal/progressive tradition end; and
ending, disrupt reform's continuum? Why did the work week
do all of its shrinking during the century when the United States
was relatively poor and then stop during the time when this
country became the richest one in history? Why did the American concept of progress change from dreams both of the growth
of wages which would improve material welfare and of the
steady increase of ieisure which would free individuals from material concerns for other, finer things?
With these sorts of questions for guides, it is possible to begin
a search for answers to the larger puzzle—the end of the shorter
hour movement. Since this is a large task, and since it is not
clear just what the right questions to tackle are, the best course
of action is simply tp chronicle the last 20 years of the shorter
hour movement—to describe labor's last initiatives (the 40 hour
week that succeeded and the 30 hour week that failed), to dis6
Ethel B. Jones, An Investigation of the Stability of Hours of Work Per Week in Manufacturing 1947-1970, Univ. of Georgia, College of Business Administration, Research Monograph Number 7 (Athens, 1970), passim; see also footnote no. 4. Among these economists'
explanations are: the reduction of fatigue, availability of consumer credit, commuting
time, stability of employment, easier work, pent-up consumer demand, increased cost of
education and raising larger families, and stable cost of recreation.
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377
cuss the public debate and the political events that bore on the
shorter hour process.
After World War I, labor leaders attempted to consolidate
the gains in the eight hour day that they had made and opened
up a new initiative—the five day week. Whereas the eight hour
day had received considerable public support and advanced rapidly during Wilson's administration—one observer noted that
"it seemed quite literally to sweep the country"—still, pockets
of "long hour resistance" remained in major unorganized industries such as steel. Labor set the goal of standardizing the
eight hour day as one of its first priorities. By the end of the
decade, this goal had largely been realized. Fairly confident that
the eight hour day was becoming universal, labor leaders began
to turn their attention to the five day week in the 1920s. In this
initiative they achieved only limited success.7
Before the end of the war, fewer than 20 manufacturing establishments had adopted the five day week. Most of these were
Jewish establishments, managed and staffed by Jews who considered it a religious obligation to observe the Sabbath day. But
during the 1920s, over 240 manufacturers adopted the plan. By
1929, approximately 400,000 to 500,000 employees were working a five day week.8
In addition to these few advances, the AFL, at its October
1926 Convention in New Orleans, recommitted itself to the
shorter hour movement in general, using some interesting language:
7
8
Opinion that the eight-hour day, 48 hour week was becoming standard was expressed in articles such as: "Doom of the Twelve-Hour Day," Outlook, 13! (1922), 24S-6; "Triumph for
the Eight-Hour Day," Outlook, 134(1923), 572-4; "Death Struggles of the Twelve-Hour
Day," Literary Digest, 70 (June 9, 1923). The idea that the five-day week was a new direction taken by labor and was a trend that, like the eight-hour day, was becoming a national
force may be found in: "Labor Now Out for a Five-Day Week," Literary Digest, 91
(Oct. 16, 1926). 9-11; New York Times, October 17, 1926; "Prevalence of the 5-Day
Week in American Industry," Monthly Labor Review, 23 (1926), 1153-69; "How the
Five-Day Work Week Works," Literary Digest, 86 (Aug. 15, 1925), 10-11; "Coming: A
Five-Day Working Week," Literary Digest, 36 (March. 31, 1928), 12-13; "New Era, Five
Days a Week," Business Week, (Sept. 7, 1929), 5-6; "Five Days Shalt Thou Labor,"
Literary Digest, 101 (May 18, 1929), 8.
National Industrial Conference Board, The Five Day Week in Manufacturing Industries
(New York, 1929), 15-24. See also New York Times, June 2, 1929, feature article on "History of Movement for Shorter Hours in Industry and the Five-Day Week"; "The Prevalence of the 5-Day Week in American Industry," Monthly Labor Review, 23 (Dec. 1926),
1153-1169; John P. Frey, "Labor's Movement for a Five-Day Week," Current History
Magazine, 25 (1926), 369-372.
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LABOR HISTORY
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Whereas in the present methods of modern machine industry the workers are continually subjected to the strain of mechanized processes
which sap their vitality; and
Whereas if compelled to work for long hours under modern processes
of production, the vitality, the health, and the very life of workers is
[sic] put in serious jeopardy;
Resolved, that this convention place itself on record as favoring a progressive shortening of the hours of labor and days per week, and that
the Executive Council be requested to inaugurate a campaign of education and organization to that end . . . .'
Labor's initiatives were met by exceptionally strong business
opposition.10 But they were also supported by an unusually large
and varied group of people; ranging from James Truslow Adams
to Stuart Chase, from Orthodox Jewish groups to "progressive" educators. This was true because more than at any time
before, labor's shorter hour cause involved basic questions
about the purpose of work and economic growth, the future of
capitalism, and the very course of progress. This widespread
public interest took the form of a debate, with one side supporting labor and the other rejecting the open ended increase in leisure time.
This debate, its scope and intensity, was occasioned by what
was then seen to be the larger social and economic problem of
"overproduction." Many Americans, businessmen and labor
leaders alike, believed that chronic unemployment and massive
disruptive surpluses constituted national threats and were the
bitter fruits of improved productivity and economic abundance.
A "mature economy" was seen to be a real and present danger.
9
Chester M. Wright, "Epoch-Making Decision in the Great American Federation Labor Convention at Detroit," American Labor World (1926), 22-24. American Federation of
Labor, Report of the Proceedings of the 46th Annual Convention of the American Federation of Labor (Washington, DC, 1926), see especially the Report of the Committee on
the Shorter Workday, 195-207. See also Hillman's statement in "Attitude of Organized
Labor Toward the Shorter Work Week," Monthly Labor Review, 23 (1926), 1167-1168.
10
The Readers Guide to Periodical Literature, 35 vols. (New York, 1900-1983), III, IV, V, VI,
VII, under the heading "leisure." This standard reference provides some indication of the
increase in public interest in leisure during the 1920s. In Vol. V, an index of 1919-1921,
only four entries are listed for articles dealing with leisure. In Vol. VII, covering the years
1925-1928 and giving an index of the same 180 reports and periodicals as did Vol. V, over
45 entries are listed. See also L.A. Thompson, "Worker's Leisure: A Selected List of
References," Monthly Labor Review, 24 (1928), 508. The best available bibliographies
demonstrate this increased interest. See for example Majorie Casebier, An Overview of
Leisure (San Anselmo, 1963); Eric Larrabee and Rolf Meyerson, Mass Leisure (Glencoe,
1L, 1958), 389 ff; Larrabee and Meyerson found 51 articles and books having to do with
leisure from 1910-1919 and over 410 for 1920-1929.
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379
Businessmen and economists tried to deal with these threats by
embracing the "new economic gospel of consumption" which
proclaimed that new consumption could keep the economy eternally dynamic. Spokesmen for this new gospel opposed labor's
efforts and offered alternatives to increased leisure such as an
improved standard of living, consumerism, and steady work.
Those who supported the shorter hour cure for unemployment
had a different view. They supported labor's call for "progressive shortening of the hours of labor," believing with labor that
this would help to control unemployment and shape the direction of industry; limiting surpluses, encouraging the production
of basic needs, and discouraging "luxuries."
At the beginning of the 1920s, businessmen tended to have as
gloomy a view of the economy as any other group. In 1922 Garet
Garrett pointed out that "American business [was] despairing
at overproduction," believing that "we are equipped to produce
more of the goods that satisfy human wants than we can use."
A number of other observers commented on "the prevalent
business view" that America was experiencing "universal consumptive indigestion" resulting from "the outright satiation of
human wants.""
Examples of bullish investors and pessimistic businessmen
who expressed these sorts of fears may be found throughout the
decade. The New York Times in its annual assessment of "the
financial outlook" reported periodically that "business experts" believed that "great prosperity" invited "industrial reactions," and that the "saturation point" in traditional markets
such as textiles had been reached and was near in the newer industries such as automobiles.12 But the majority of such rhetoric
11
12
Garet Garrett, "Business" in Harold Stearns, ed.. Civilization in the United States (New
York, 1922), 414; John A. Hobson, Economics of Unemployment (New York, 1923), 23;
Hobson, Incentives in the New Industrial Order (New York, 1923), 50; Hobson, "The
Limited Market," The Nation 120(1925), 350-2; Francis J. Boland, Wage-Rates and
Industrial Depressions: A Study of the Business Cycle (New York, 1924), 4-7, 75; also
Warren M. Persons, "Crisis of 1920 in the United States," The American Economic
Review, 12 (March, 1922—Supplement No. 1), 5; Maurice Leven, Harold Moulton, and
Clark Warburton, America's Capacity to Consume (Washington, DC, 1934), 115-117.
Victor M. Cutter, "Our Greatest Economic Problem," Current History, 27 (Oct. 1927),
74-76; Wright, "Need We Be Afraid of a Job Famine?" Nation's Business, 15 (Jan.
1927), 22-24; "Volume, Production, and 'Stabilized Prosperity'," Nation's Business, 15
(Aug. 1927), 88, 89, for a representative quote from Iron Age; P.M. Mazur, "Mass Production, Has It Committed Suicide?" Review of Reviews, 78 (1928), 476-479; New York
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LABOR HISTORY
occurred during and just after the 1921-22 depression. During
this time, the press was full of expressions such as "buyers'
strike," "psychological reactions," the "dominance of the buyers' iSarket," "overproduction," and "limited markets." In
spite of professional economists who tried to assure those who
would listen that motives to buy were not limited to some set of
specific human needs and would expand quite readily when
wages increased, businessmen as well as labor feared that Americans were working themselves out of their jobs by producing
more than they would consume. Chronic unemployment and
depression seemed to be a likely result of this "need saturation."13
But like labor, some pessimistic businessmen saw another
possibility—shorter work hours. Unlike labor though, those
businessmen who recognized the possibility, despised it. They
did not see the open-ended increase of leisure as a positive development but as a clear threat to future economic growth. If
basic needs were being met by industry and workers chose to
devote less and less of their time to their work and do other
things, then extended periods of general unemployment would
not be necessary to halt progress. Free time in the form of leisure could create the same conditions as free time in the form of
unemployment; reduced production and consumption, idle productive capacity, limited investment opportunities and even a
mature stable economy.14
Businessmen's fears about the threat of increased leisure to
economic growth were expressed throughout the decade. The
most elaborate and thorough-going expression may be found in
Times, Jan. 1, 1923; Jan. 1, 1925; Jan. 1, 1926; Oct. 26, 1926; Jan. 1, 1927; Oct. 10, 17,
1927; New York Herald Tribune, Jan. 2, 1926; Herman E. Krooss, Executive Opinion
(New York, 1961), 92-94.
13
Kuanty Yung, "Some Aspects of the Business Depression of 1921," (unpublished Master's
Essay, Univ. of Iowa, 1926), 79, 80. See also for example, New York Times, Dec. 5, 1920,
20; Dec. 28, 1920, 18; Sept. 21, 1921, 16; Jan. 8, 1921, 18; Jan. 10, 1921, 28; Feb. 16,
1921, 4; Sept. 29, 1921, 1.
14
"Attitude of Certain Employees to the 5-Day Week," Monthly Labor Review, 23 (1926),
1168-70; William Boyd Craig, "Business Views in Review," Nation's Business, 14 (Dec.
1926), 72-75, for Judge Elbert Gary's views; "Mass Production of Time," Nation's Business, 14 (May 1926), 33. See also "Business Attitudes Toward the Five Day Workweek,"
Nation's Business, 15 (April 1927), 32; for pro and con business views see "Manufacturers Discuss Ford's Five-Day Week," Iron Age, 118 (1926), 592; A.H. Young, "Some
Considerations in Reducing Working Time," Iron Age, 119(1927), 1599; John Edgerton,
"Annual Address of the President," Proceedings of the National Association of Manufacturers (1929), 23; Edgerton, "Annual Address of the President," Proceedings of the
National Association of Manufacturers (1930), 17.
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the National Association of Manufacturer's Pocket Bulletin of
October 1926. The NAM questioned 32 prominent business leaders about the five day work week that unions were demanding
and Henry Ford had already instituted in some of his automobile plants. All but two of these businessmen were opposed.
Some equated increased leisure—"the extra holidays on Saturday"—with crime, vice, the waste of man's natural capacity,
corruption, radicalism, debt, decay, degeneration, and decline.
John E. Edgerton, president of the NAM, for example, declared that
it is time for America to awake from its dream that an eternal holiday is
a natural fruit of material prosperity, and to reaffirm its devotion to
those principles and laws of life to the conformity with which we owe all
of our national greatness. I am for everything that will make work happier but against everything that will further subordinate its importance
in the program of life.
George L. Markland warned that "the men of our country are
becoming a race of softies and mollycoddles . . .". He saw the
five day week as an indication of "a gradual sinking into decay,"
a trend toward the dissipation and frivolity that had caused
Rome's downfall."
These businessmen saw free time as the result of market
saturation. Nevertheless they vehemently opposed reduction of
work hours and searched about for alternatives such as "new
foreign markets," "enforced attention to business" and work,
appeals to patriotism, and an increased standard of living which
might deal with overproduction and stem the tide of free time.
But they all agreed that shorter hours meant less production and
limited growth. They also characterized labor's position on this
issue as "unAmerican" since they felt that labor's bid for the
40 hour week was basically an attempt to limit production.16
Other pessimistic observers of the economy linked increasing
productivity to saturated demand, and saturated demand to unemployment or the process of shorter work hours. For them
free time was the chief threat to industrial advance. In any
15
16
See Pocket Bulletin, 27 (Oct. 3, 1926), for the entire issue devoted to criticism of the 40 hour
week.
See W.H. Grimes, "The Curse of Leisure," Atlantic Montly, 142 (1928), 355-360 for one of
the best summaries of business pessimism concerning overproduction and leisure.
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LABOR HISTORY
form, free time would mean slower growth or outright cessation
of growth. Work was critically scarce and becoming more so as
productivity improved.
But by mid-decade, these sorts of fears were evaporating.
They were gradually replaced by a new and vigorous optimism,
founded upon what Edward Cowdrick called the "new economic
gospel of consumption."17 Responding to the threats of chronic
overproduction and the decline of the need to work, businessmen began to concentrate on consumption and conclude that
demand could be stimulated. If traditional markets were being
"saturated," then the reasonable response would be to find new
markets and increase consumption, not to reduce working hours.
Businessmen became increasingly convinced that Americans
could be persuaded to need things produced by industry which
they had never needed before and consume goods and services,
not in response to some out-of-date set of economic motives,
but according to a standard of living that constantly improved.
With this concern with consumption, the business community
broke its long concentration on production, introduced the age
of mass consumption, founded a new view of progress in an
abundant society, and gave life to the advertising industry.18
Some businessmen and economists, such as Henry Ford,
went so far as to suggest that workers be paid enough to buy
17
18
Edward Cowdrick, "The New Economic Gospel of Consumption," Industrial Management,
74 (1927), 208; Report of the 15th Annual Meeting of the Chamber of Commerce, "Prosperity and Production," Nation's Business, 15 (May 20, 1927), 40, 41; William Foster
and Waddill Catchings, "What Is Business Without a Buyer?" Nation's Business, 14
(June 1926), 27; William Craig, "Digest of the Business Press," Nation's Business, 14
(June 1926), 14; Glen Buck, "This American Ascendancy," Nation's Business, 15 (Mar.
1927), 15; "Business Views in Review," Nation's Business, 15 (July 1927), 117 and (Aug.
1927), 95; "Other Times, Other Occupations," Nation's Business, 13 (July 1925), 35;
Lewis Pierson, "Looking Ahead for Business," Nation's Business, 16 (June 1928), 13;
John Hammond, "Look Back—and Ahead," Nation's Business, 16 (Dec. 1928), 35;
A.W. Shaw, " I s This Why the Overproduction Bogy-Man is a Bogy-Man?" Magazine of
Business, 54 (1928), 263-5; P.U. Kellogg, "When Mass Production Stalls," Survey, 59
(1928), 683-6; H.S. Dennison, "Would the Five-Day Week Decrease Unemployment?"
Magazine of Business, 54 (1928), 508; Henry Ford and S. Crowther, "The Fear of Overproduction," Saturday Evening Post, 203 (July 12, 1930), 3.
Irvin S. Paull, "When is Industry's Job Complete?" Nation's Business, 15 (Dec. 1927),
28, 29; James L. Wright, "Is the Machine Replacing M a n ? " Nation's Business, 15 (Sept.
1927), 78-80; Merle Thorpe, "The Amazing Decade," Nation's Business, 16(Sept. 1928), 9;
J.H. Collins, "Producer Goes Exploring for the Consumer," Saturday Evening Post, 195
(April 7, 1923), 8; T.C. Sheehan, "Must We Limit Production?" Magazine of Business,
53 (1928), 150-152; E.S. Martin, "Advertising as a World Power," Harpers, 148 (1924),
553-554; E.J. Kulas, "Whip of Prosperity," Saturday Evening Post, 201 (June 29,1929), 5;
"We Have Because We Spend," Collier's, 196 (Sept. 2, 1927), 146; I.F. Marcossen,
"Production and Prosperity," Saturday Evening Post, 189 (Aug. 14, 1926), 12.
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what they produced." But most businessmen relied heavily on
capital spending and on the gradual increase of the consumer
markets to insure steady demand. And this demand could be assured only if the enlightened business community provided stable or expanding capital markets and then gradually convinced
the American consumer to desire goods and services enough to
underpin economic growth in the consumer sector. Growth in
the "New Era" of abundance was a problem of human nature,
not simple economics. Higher wages did not automatically assure more consumption. If raises were given to workers too rapidly then it was quite possible that production would cease to
grow as the workers lost their desire for hard work and tastes
for new goods and services, and used high wages as an excuse
for taking time off from their jobs. Consumption was not guaranteed, but it could be promoted. It would be the hard work of
investors, marketing experts, advertisers, and business leaders,
as well as the spending examples set by the rich which would
promote consumption and prevent workers from taking time
off from their jobs.20
Businessmen's new interest in consumption has been well
documented as has their optimism that demand could be stimulated.21 Herbert Hoover's Committee on Recent Changes published one of the first and finest examples of this documentation
in 1929. The Committee criticized pessimistic predictions about
"saturation points," calling these predictions "abstract" and
the likelihood of market saturation "remote." They pointed
19
Joseph Dorfman, The Economic Mind In American Civilization (New York, 1949), 5 vols.
IV, 57, 58, 84, 343; Henry Ford, " W h y I Favor Five Days' Work with Six Days' P a y Interview by Samuel Crowther," World's Work, 52 (1926), 613.
20
Thomas Nixon Carver, The Present Economic Revolution in the United States (Boston,
1925), 59-65; John E. Edgerton, "Industry Has Advanced Further Than Religion,"
Pocket Bulletin, 27 (April 1927), 4; Edgerton, "The President's Annual Address," Proceedings of the National Association of Manufacturers (New York: National Association
of Manufacturers, 1925), 12; Robert S. Lynd, "The People as Consumers," in Report of
the President's Research Committee on Social Trends, Recent Social Trends, 857.
21 W.W. Rostow, The Stages of Economic Growth (London, 1960), 9-11; Dorfman, IV, 60;
Thomas C. Cochran, 200 Years of American Business (New York, 1977), 192; Thomas
C. Cochran and William Miller, The Age of Enterprise: A Social History of Industrial
America (New York, 1961), 310-324; Herman E. Krooss, Executive Opinion (New York,
1970), 90, 91; Charles H. Hession and Hyman Sardy, Ascent to Affluence: A History of
Economic Development (Boston, 1969), 666; Frederick Lewis Allen, Only Yesterday: An
Informal History of the Nineteen-Twenties (New York, 1964), 140; David M. Potter,
People of Plenty (Chicago, 1954), 173-175; David Riesman, The Lonely Crowd (New
Haven, 1950), 74, 75, 96-98, 116-123, 150, 189-191. 227, 290; William Leuchtenburg,
Perils of Prosperity, 1919-32 (Chicago, 1958), 278.
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LABOR HISTORY
both to economic theory and actual accomplishments to attack
the notion that the economy had matured. On the one hand,
"economists have long declared that consumption, the satisfaction of wants, would expand with little evidence of satiation if
we could so adjust our economic processes as to make dormant
demands effective." On the other hand, Americans had proven
that this theory actually worked in the 1920s. The "almost insatiable appetite for goods and services, this abounding production of all things which almost any man can want, which is so
striking a characteristic of the period covered by the survey . . ."
was the hard reality shattering false fears about overproduction.
The Committee found
from study of the fact finding survey on which this report is based, that
as a people we have become steadily less concerned about the primary
needs—food, clothing and shelter . . . the slogan of 'full dinner pail,' is
obsolete
and we now demand a broad list of goods and services which come under the category of 'optional purchases'. . . . 'Optional consumption'—optional in the sense that this portion of the
income may be saved or spent, and if spent the manner of this spending
may be determined by the tastes of the consumer or the nature of the
appeals made to him by the industries competing for his patronage—
presents one of the marked characteristics of the recent economic situation. . . . the survey has proved conclusively what has long been held
theoretically to be true, that wants are almost insatiable; that one want
satisfied makes way for another. The conclusions is that economically
we have a boundless field before us; that there are new wants which will
make way endlessly for newer wants, as fast as they are satisfied . . . .
By advertising and other promotional devices, by scientific fact finding,
by carefully predeveloped consumption, a measurable pull on production has been created which releases capital otherwise tied up in immobile goods and furthers the organic balance of economic forces . . . .
As long as the appetites for goods and services are practically insatiable,
as it appears to be . . . it would seem that we can go on with increasing
activity. . . . our situation is fortunate, our momentun is remarkable.22
Business optimism about the possibility of increasing "optional consumption" spilled over into and answered the concerns expressed by organizations such as the NAM about the
declining need to work and the threat of leisure. Optimistic
businessmen such as Henry Ford and Henry Dennison saw the
22
Report of the Committee on Recent Economic Changes, Recent Economic Changes (New
York, 1929), XV, XVIII, 52, 59, 80, 81, 574-578.
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40 hour week as an ally to growing consumption rather than as
a threat to production. Like the new "consumption economists," such as Teresa McMahon and Hazel Kyrk, they believed
that increased leisure would increase consumption. Spokesmen
at the National Distribution Conference agreed and pointed out
that increased leisure stimulated the growth of some of the most
vital industries, such as amusement, radio, phonographs, motion pictures, publishing, and hotels. Henry Ford argued that
"leisure [was] a cold business fact." He maintained that "where
people work[ed] less they buy more," since "business is the exchange of goods. Goods are bought only as they meet needs.
Needs are filled only as they are felt. They make themselves felt
largely in the leisure hours." E.S. Cowdrick agreed that the
40 hour week was good because "it promises more leisure to use
up golf balls and holiday clothes."" Examples of this reasoning
were numerous in the decade, but the President's Committee on
Recent Economic Trends again presented one of the best summaries:
It was during the period covered by the survey (the 1920s) that the conception of leisure as "consumable" began to be realized upon in business in a practical way and on a broad scale. It began to be recognized,
not only that leisure is "consumable" but that people cannot "consume" leisure without consuming goods and services, and that leisure
that results from increasing man-hour productivity helps to create new
needs and new broader markets. . . . the acceleration of technological
shifts in production and consumption would have resulted in much
more serious unemployment if workers had not been absorbed in the
newly expanded service industries which both create and serve leisure.24
While recognizing leisure as an ally to consumption, businessmen such as Ford and Cowdrick nevertheless reaffirmed
their faith that work was, and should remain, a primary American value. Ford, for example, while praising the economic significance of leisure, cautioned "of course, there is a humanitarian side of the shorter day and the shorter week, but dwelling
on that subject is likely to get one in trouble, for then leisure
23
24
" N a t i o n a l Distribution Conference Meeting, 1 9 2 5 , " Outlook, 141 (1925), 656-7; C o w d r i c k ,
" T h e New Economic Gospel of C o n s u m p t i o n , " 209; Dennison, " W o u l d the Five D a y
Week Decrease U n e m p l o y m e n t ? " 5 0 8 .
Recent Economic Changes, X V I .
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LABOR HISTORY
may be put before work rather than after work—where it belongs." Leisure was deemed to be valuable by businessmen, not
as an alternative to work, but as a new reason to work—vital
because the traditional reasons for work to meet basic needs
were not sufficient to support the economy. Leisure, subordinate to work, supported economic growth and thereby helped
to save work.25
But because leisure entailed increased consumption it was
limited. The century-long shorter hour process would taper off
since workers would need higher incomes in order to finance the
leisure they had already. Together with the traditional pessimists such as Judge Gary and John Edgerton—who were calling
"the thought of reducing the week's working time" a "blasphemy," optimistic businessmen supposed that increased leisure
had to have a limit. Even though the 40 hour week was reasonable because it stimulated consumption, shorter hours as a continuous, open-ended process was opposed by most businesmen.26
. But according to optimistic businessmen, the shorter hour
process would either stop naturally or be controlled by the efforts of advertisers and marketing experts. Since "more spare
time would mean desire to spend more money" and "it is impossible to reduce income and the supply of goods and services
(through reduced hours) and then have more money to spend"
progressively shorter hours would eventually come into direct
competition with new spending. But what the economist Constance Southworth called "the infinite capacity of the common
man to want things," would check workers' desire for increased
leisure. The good coin of increased material wealth would eventually drive out of circulation the bad coin of increased leisure.
As Henry Dennison put it, prosperity offered society the chance
"to take more leisure or to get more wealth, as it chooses."
Even though "luxuries or leisure" was a theoretical "free consumer choice," optimistic businessmen were confident that they
25
26
"The 5-Day Week in the Ford Plants," Monthly Labor Review, 23 (1926), 1163.
T.M. Kappen, "Can We Work Less and Earn More?" Magazine of Wall Street, 39 (1927),
788-91; William Boyd Craig, "Business View in Review," Nation's Business, 14 (Dec.
1926), 72-75; D.A. Laird, "This Bunkum About Hard Work," Printer's Ink, 147 (April 18,
1929), 33-4; T.H. Price, "Employing the Labor Saved by Machinery," Commerce and
Finance, 17 (June 20, 1928), 134-7; James Wright, "Need We Be Afraid of a Job Famine?" Nation's Business, 15 (January 1927), 22-24.
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could successfully compete with leisure by linking it to consumption and promoting their new products.27
During the time businessmen were reaffirming their belief in
work and industrial growth and looking to "optional consumption" to undergird that growth, others such as labor spokesmen, religious leaders, reformers, intellectuals, educators, and
social critics were disturbed by this new economic gospel of consumption. Some of these people became convinced that it was
beginning to exploit workers. By producing new goods and new
demands for these goods, industry was keeping the common
man at work longer than necessary. He was working more to
serve the interests of the capitalist profit system and less to take
care of his real material necessities or meet his own individually
felt needs. They questioned perpetual industrial growth, believing that it would continue to exploit workers by convincing
them to produce unnecessary "luxuries." The worker had lost
control of production. Now he was losing control of consumption and the ability to shape his future and culture. He was facing a new definition of progress—economic growth for the sake
of economic growth. Growth toward obtainable goals, such as
the meeting of basic needs, still made human sense. But long
hours of work in his new "squirrel cage" which capitalism had
set up did not. These people continued to feel that higher wages
and shorter hours together constituted "genuine progress." The
disciples of the new economic gospel of consumption had broken
tradition and set up a false idol to resemble real progress.
However, these groups shared the pessimism of those who
predicted saturated demand and limited markets. Like businessmen, they too feared and wished to avert the unemployment,
chronic or acute, that was threatened by industrial productivity.
But in contrast to businessmen and economists, they promoted
27
Dennison, "Would the Five-Day Week Decrease Unemployment?" 508-510; T.T. Read,
"The American Secret," Industrial Management, 73 (June 1927), 321-3; C. Stelzle,
"Religious Ideal Dignifies the Work of Man," Forbes, 21 (Jan. 15, 1928), 26-28;
F.M. Trumbull, "Work," Industrial Arts Magazine, 16 (Aug. 1927), 281-2; J. Klein,
"Can Industry Provide New Jobs as Machines Take Away Old Ones?" Magazine of Wall
Street, 44 (Oct. 19, 1929), 1078-1081; James Prothro, Dollar Decade: Business Ideas in
the 1929's (Baton Rouge, 1954), 5-15; Ford and Crowther, "The Fear of Overproduction," 3.
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LABOR HISTORY
labor's alternative solution to general overproduction and unemployment: limited production through shorter work hours.
Between 1920 and 1934, the shorter hour cure for overproduction and unemployment was almost as important as the
other solution, the gospel of consumption. The critical debate
about unemployment that developed in the 1920s was not, as it
has been since the Depression, over how to stimulate demand.
Rather the debate revolved around the question of whether
work time would continue to decrease, limiting unnecessary
production and distributing necessary employment, or new markets would be established. Both points of view shared the idea
that the economy had reached a critical juncture.28
The arguments of the supporters of increased leisure and the
shorter hour cure for unemployment may be abstracted as follows: Modern work was an increasing burden. Economic abundance threatened overproduction and unemployment. Shorter
hours could decrease work, raise wages, spread employment, reduce unnecessary production and surpluses, and insure a minimum standard of life for everyone. Therefore, leisure was as
practical in "New Economic Era" as new markets and was
preferable. It was preferable in the first place because leisure
could be used to revive the benefits and values that work had
lost to the machine. Things such as craftsmanship, creativity,
worker control, and initiative could take place during sports,
hobbies, volunteers projects and other constructive recreation.
Leisure was preferable also because it would help keep other
institutions and traditions alive which were threatened by mass
society, standardization, and mass consumption. Individualism,
the community of workers, the family and the church would be
strengthened and would grow as people had more time to devote to these things. In addition, increased leisure would keep
open the possibility of what Edwin Sapir called "genuine prog28
For example see "Shorter-Hours Cure for Overproduction," Literary Digest, 90 (Sept. 18,
1926); "Would the Five-Day Week Decrease Unemployment?" Magazine of Business, 54
(Nov. 1928), 508-9. One way of understanding the position of the advocates of limited
production is by reviewing their opponents' attacks. For the businessmen's and economists' views of the limited production idea see L. Ardzrooni, "Philosophy of the Restriction of Output," Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 91
(Sept. 1920), 70-5; E.J. Kulas, "Whip of Prosperity: Curtailment of Production—a Mistake," Saturday Evening Post, 201 (June 29, 1929), 5.
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ress." The dreams of Utopian writers, socialists, and reformers
which had been around for over a century—dreams of a democratic culture, worker education, the universal pursuit of happiness, and "humane and moral freedom"—were reasonable possibilities given increased leisure. Lastly, shorter hours would
counter the new "economic gospel of consumption" which had
begun to define progress solely in terms of economic growth
and abandon the other, more humane kinds of progress."
AFL President William Green, for example, explained that
less work and more free time were natural results of technological advance and the more efficient satisfaction of human needs.
This free time could either be forced upon some workers as unemployment or it could be rationally divided among all workers
as leisure.30 A. O. Wharton, president of the International Association of Machinists, argued that "increased production accentuates the problems of overproduction and underconsumption.
Increased wages and reduced hours go hand in hand with increased production . . .". Economic balance could be maintained only if "wages advance and leisure hours increase. If
some sort of balance is not maintained, we are headed straight
for disaster." AFL vice president Matthew Woll observed that
since "production is overlapping our ability to consume," shorter hours would serve as a "restraining influence" and limit production to "rational levels."31
29
30
31
Robert Green McCloskey, American
Conservatism
in the Age of Enterprise:
1865-1910
(New York, 1964), 12, 15, 17, 20, 2 1 , 46, 169, 170.
William G r e e n , " L e s s W o r k i n g H o u r s is L o g i c a l , " American Labor World (Nov. 1926), 20;
" T h e P r o p o s e d Five-Day W e e k , " Industry, 108 (Oct. 23, 1926), 1; " T h e Five Day W e e k ,
Facts for W o r k e r s , " Labor Bureau Economic News Letter ( N o v . 1926), 12; " L a b o r N o w
Out for a Five-Day W e e k , " Literary Digest, 91 (Oct. 16, 1926), 9-11.
James Wright, " I s the M a c h i n e Replacing M e n ? " , Nation's Business, 15 (Sept. 1927), 79;
William G r e e n , " T h e Five Day W e e k , " American Federationist,
33 ( N o v . 1926), 1299,
1300; for Green a n d W o l l ' s attitudes see also American Federation of L a b o r , Report of
the Proceedings
of the 46th Annual Convention
( W a s h i n g t o n , D C , 1926), 195-207;
H . S . Dennison, " W o u l d the Five-Day Week Decrease U n e m p l o y m e n t ? " Magazine
of
Business, 54 (1928), 508-9; William Green, " L e i s u r e for L a b o r , " Magazine of Business,
56 (Aug. 1929), 136-7; J a m e s M . Lynch, " S h o r t e r W o r k i n g Day Urged as Alleviation for
Depression C y c l e s , " American Labor World (Nov. 1926), 28, 29; William Green, " T h e
Five-Day W e e k , " North American Review (1926), 567-575; New York Times, Dec. 9,
1926; J a m e s Lynch, " T h e Shorter W o r k d a y : The C o m p l e t e A r g u m e n t , " American
Federationist, 33 ( M a r . 1926), 2 9 1 ; " T h e Shorter H o u r C u r e for O v e r p r o d u c t i o n , " Literary
Digest, 90 (Sept. 18, 1926), 16; New York Times, July 18, 1926, Sect. 7, p . 6, col. 1;
William G r e e n , " T h e Five-Day Week to Balance P r o d u c t i o n and C o n s u m p t i o n , " American Federationist,
33 (Oct. 1926), 1299; William Green, " T w o Kinds of U n e m p l o y m e n t , "
American Federationist,
35 (April, 1928), 402; J o h n P . Frey, " L a b o r ' s Movement for a
Five Day W e e k , " Current History, 25 (Dec. 1926), 369-372.
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LABOR HISTORY
In addition to limiting production to "rational levels," shorter hours would improve wages according to labor spokesmen.
By reducing the supply of labor, shorter hours would create a
sellers' market for labor, strengthening the unions' bargaining
position. Thus workers would be able to command a large proportion—their "fair share"—of the nation's wealth. Instead of
the rich buying more luxuries, workers could buy necessities.
The direction of the economy would be changed from the production of useless and expensive goods for the more wealthy, to
the tasks of assuring that everyone had their basic needs met.
Before 1927, organized labor considered shorter hours as an efficient and fair way to help redistribute wealth and assure that
necessities were produced before luxuries—without direct governmental action."
An example of those reformers who actively supported labor
was George Alger. Active in New York reform efforts such as
child labor laws and penal reforms, he came to believe that reform and "racial minds" in the 1920s were concerned "as much
with the growing social surplus of time" as the "distribution of
the social surplus of things." He argued that the new business
view of economic advance led to "artificial demands for useless
products." It led to "a consumer wonderland" and to a "new
slavery." Individual self-expression and creativity had been sacrificed because "the people who can set before us a long list of
new things to want and a way to make us want them irresistibly
are the main contributors to our current squirrel cage concept
of progress." He criticized work as specialized, mechanical,
passive, lacking in self-expression, dull, monotonous, and the
cause of increased drug addiction, insanity and crime. He was
also suspicious of industrial psychologists and advertisers who,
between them, led the masses to a "pendulum-like existence"
—a "life of producing and purchasing" useless things for artificial reasons. He reasoned that "the stimulus of what we want
to buy rather than what we want to be is, in current theory, that
which keeps us at work."
32
Matthew Woll, "Leisure and Labor," Playground, 19 (1925), 322-23; Matthew Woll,
"Labor and the New Leisure," Recreation, 27 (1933), 418; William Green, "What is a
Five Day Week?" American Federalionisl, 39 (Sept. 1932), 985.
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Concluding that in the face of the "new economy of consumption, . . . any theory of the use of leisure which should
make it something else than principally an expression of buyingpower, may be considered an alarming heresy because of its
possible effect on sales," Alger nevertheless suggested such a
theory. "The quality of work and the lack of self expression
through work" eroded virtues and "paralyzed our powers."
But "enlarged leisure" could revive "artisan and craftsman"
values such as creativity, self-expression, and individual control. Leisure could also renew cultural and spiritual values.
Through leisure Americans could "enlarge their field of self
expression, become active and in control of their lives and freedom and come to grips with the greatest practical problem before us to which depends the future of Western civilization . . .
the reapplication of love to life.""
Like Alger, Stephen Leacock thought that industry's needs
to grow, to promote more consumption, and to create new markets for luxuries were socially destructive. He also believed that
the concept of progress was changing. Progress has been redefined by businessmen and economists as the chasing after the
"phantom of insatiable desires." This progress had little to do
with old progressive ideals about material or human welfare.
According to Leacock, the satisfaction of human needs through
industrial production had reached the point of diminishing returns. The creation of "luxuries and superfluities" was a perversion of progress. Businessmen were producing values as well
as new goods and services. "Real human needs" were being ignored in this situation. Leacock maintained that "the shortening of the hours of work with the corresponding changes in the
direction of production [was] really the central problem of social reform."34
These sorts of arguments were widespread in the 1920s. Jewish groups and individuals used them in their Sabbath campaign.35 They were repeated by people with widely differing po33
George
34
Alger, "Effects o f Industrialism," Atlantic, 135 (1925), 486-92.
Stephen Leacock, The Unsolved Riddle of SocialJustice (New York, 1920), 2 3 , 24, 3 1 , 34,
66-70, 82, 149, 125-35.
35
Benjamin Kline Hunnicutt, " T h e Jewish Sabbath Movement in the Early Twentieth Cent u r y , " American Jewish History, 69 (1979), 196-225.
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LABOR HISTORY
litical persuasion—from Elilu Root to Samuel Strauss.36 Walter
L. Weyl, Stuart Chase and Edward Ross followed their teacher
Simon Patten, the "discoverer of abundance," in condemning
the way America was adjusting to economic prosperity." The
displaced aristocrat James Truslow Adams and the humanist
scholar Irvine Babbit joined the fray to support shorter hours.38
Labor leaders, radicals, sociologists, educators, psychologists,
prominent religious leaders and intellectuals continued as many
Americans had for a century, to believe that leisure, like higher
wages, was still a basic element of social reform.39
With the onset of the Great Depression, shorter hours be36
37
38
39
Joseph K. Hart, "The Place of Leisure in Life," Annals, 93 (Mar. 1925), iii; Samuel Strauss,
"Things are in the Saddle," Atlantic Monthly, 294 (1924); "Elihu Root at the Classical
League," New York Times, Feb. 25, 1923; New York Times, Nov. 23, 1924.
Daniel Fox, The Discovery of Abundance (New York, 1967), 145-69; Edward Alsworth
Ross, "Adult Recreation as a Social Problem," American Journal of Sociology, 23
(1918), 516-28; Walter Weyl, Tired Radicals (New York, 1921), 73; Stuart Chase, "Leisure in a Machine Age," Library Journal, 41 (1931), 629-32; Stuart Chase, "Consumers
in Wonderland," New Republic, 50 (May 2, 1927), 38; Stuart Chase, Men and Machines
(New York, 1929), 35-43; Stuart Chase, " P l a y " , Charles and Mary Beard eds. Whither
Mankind (New York, 1928), Chap. 8, passim.
J a m e s T . A d a m s , Our Business Civilization (New York, 1929), 15-25, 191-96; Kate Sargent,
" P u s h o r b e P u s h e d " , Forum, 78 ( O c t . 1927), 17-24, 6 2 2 ; Irving B a b b i t t , On Being Creative ( B o s t o n , 1932), 2 2 9 .
Weaver P a n g b u r n , " T h e W o r k e r ' s Leisure a n d His I n d i v i d u a l i t y , " American Journal of
Sociology,
28 (1922), 433-41; Robert S. a n d Helen M . Lynd, Middletown
(New York,
1929), 11, 5 3 , 80, 8 1 , 2 2 5 , 226, 301-10, 495-97; George L u n d b u r g , etal, Leisure: A Suburban Study ( N e w York, 1934), 21-25; J o h n A . Ryan, " T h e Experts Look at Unemploym e n t : A S h o r t e r W o r k P e r i o d , " Commonweal,
10 (1929) 636-48; Henry Suzzallo, " T h e
Use of L e i s u r e , " Journal of the National Education Association,
14 (1930), 123; J o y E.
M o r g a n , " T h e Leisure o f T o m o r r o w , " Journal of the National Education
Association,
19 (1930), 2; George C u t t e n , " L e i s u r e a n d E d u c a t i o n , " Playground,
20 (1927), 601-5;
J o h n J . Loftus, " A P r o g r a m for the Desired Use of Leisure T i m e as a Cardinal Objective
of t h e Public Elementary S c h o o l , " National Education Association:
Addresses and Proceedings (1928), 390; Frank D . Boynton, " H o w W e Should E d u c a t e for L e i s u r e , " School
Executives
Magazine,
49 (1930), 4 0 6 ; Eugene Liles, The New Leisure Challenges
the
Schools ( N e w York, 1933), 14, 15; W . D . Ross, " T h e Right Use o f Leisure as a n Objective
of E d u c a t i o n , " Educational
Review, 94 (Sept. 1923), 71-74; New York Times, J u n e 5 ,
1924; Althea P a y n e , " E d u c a t i o n for Leisure as Well as for V o c a t i o n , " English
Journal,
10 (1921), 2 0 2 ; M . C . Winston, " T h e New L e i s u r e , " Progressive Education,
4 (1927),
315-17; J . W . H a m m o n d , " T h e Challenge of G r o w i n g L e i s u r e , " American Education, 27
(1925), 166-67; L . P . J a c k s , "Vitalized L e i s u r e , " Journal of National Education
Association, 19 (1930), 145; A . B . Brown, " E d u c a t i o n for L e i s u r e , " Hibbert Journal, 31
(1933), 440-450; G. Stanley Hall, " N o t e s on the Psychology of R e c r e a t i o n , " Pedagogical
Seminary,
29 (1922), 72-99; Hall, Life and Confessions
of a Psychologist
( N e w York,
1923), 531-36; Hall, Recreations of a Psychologist ( N e w York, 1920), vii; J o h n M a y n a r d
Keynes, The Economic
Consequence
of the Peace ( N e w York, 1920), 2 1 ; A . H . Silver,
" L e i s u r e a n d the C h u r c h , " Playground, 20 (1927), 539-43; J . David, " O u r Leisure Class
at P l a y , " Christian Century, 44 (1927), 897-99, G . S . C o y l e , " M a r g i n s of L e i s u r e , " Jewish Center, 5 (1927), 20-24; Albert B. Wegener, Church and Community
Recreation (New
York, 1924), passim; Weaver W . P a n g b u r n , " C h a l l e n g e of L e i s u r e , " Religious
Education, 23 (1928), 748-52; L . L . W a r d , " P l e a for Light H a r n e s s , " Catholic World, 127
(1928), 562-68; " L e i s u r e T i m e of W o r k e r s , " Playground,
18 (1924), 342-7; Ralph Aiken,
" A L a b o r e r ' s L e i s u r e , " North American Review, 1931, 268.
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came more than a topic for public debate. It took center stage
as a political issue for nearly five years. The different opinions
expressed in the 1920s about the economic and social potential
of increased leisure on the one hand and the benefits of the new
economic gospel of consumption on the other became political
positions and surrounded concrete proposals such as the Black/
Perkins Bill and key components of Roosevelt's New Deal.
In the first years of the Depression, some businessmen temporarily abandoned their opposition to shorter hours and accepted the concept as a solution to unemployment. In 1930 and
1931, several major industrial firms cut weekly working hours
to 40 and later to 30. Kellogg of Battle Creek, Sears Roebuck,
General Motors at Tarrytown, several cotton manufacturers,
Standard Oil of New Jersey and the Hudson Motor Company
each thought it was better to institute a shorter work week than
to lay off workers. Even though this usually meant a decrease in
wages, managers of these firms thought that this measure would
increase job security.40 Herbert Hoover gradually began to look
with favor upon such voluntary and spontaneous efforts to
"share-the-work." Beginning in 1931 with his public support of
the chemical industry's program to spread its work, Hoover began to incorporate shorter hours as a basic part of his administration's Depression policies—a position consistently pressed on
him from the time of the stock market collapse by Secretary of
Labor Doak and later by his Emergency Committee on Employment and his Organization on Unemployment Relief.41
In June 1932, pressed by the AFL to call a national congress
on shorter hour legislation, Hoover chose instead to meet with a
group of New England politicians and businessmen organized
by Governor Winant of New Hampshire to discuss worksharing.
This choice reflected Hoover's faith in business voluntarism, his
40
41
New York Times, July 30 and Oct. 2, 1931.
Letter to President Hoover from Walter S. Gifford, Director of the President's Organization on Unemployment Relief, Box 319, IA; " R e p o r t of the President's Organization on
U n e m p l o y m e n t Relief," Box 339, Herbert H o o v e r ' s Presidential P a p e r s , Hoover Library,
West Branch; " S p r e a d - W o r k Plans Gain G r o u n d o n the E m p l o y m e n t F r o n t , " Business
Week ( A u g . 3 , 1932), 11; " S p r e a d i n g - W o r k P r o g r a m of President's Conference of
August 26, 1 9 3 2 , " Monthly Labor Review, 35 (1932), 790-92; " P r e s i d e n t H o o v e r ' s Economy P r o p o s a l : Five Day Week Staggered Furlough P l a n , " Congressional Digest, 9 (May,
1932), 130.
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LABOR HISTORY
recognition that shorter hours was an important political issue
in the presidential campaign, and his disapproval of labor's
movement toward shorter hour legislation.42 In August Hoover
gave his blessings to the National Conference of Business and
Industrial Committees' appointment of the Teagle Commission
on employment spreading. Teagle opened the "share-the-work
drive" in September. This grew into a national force with strong
industrial and business support principally because the Chamber of Commerce and the NAM saw this voluntary effort as a
hedge against labor's push for national legislation. Teagle repeated labor's arguments that work-sharing would increase employment, provide relief, promote job security, and lead to economic recovery. Unlike labor though, Teagle and his business
supporters thought that shorter hours were a temporary expedient which depended on wage reductions and which would no
longer be needed when the Depression ended.43
During 1930 and 1931 the AFL intensified its efforts to gain
the 40 hour week. But as the Depression deepened it began to
press for federal legislation for a 30 hour week. This was a clear
break from its historic policy of voluntarism. The Federation
had always relied upon collective bargaining and had opposed
legislation except for women and children. But union spokesmen now argued that a new tack was necessary because the Depression was an abnormal situation. In normal times, hours got
shorter and wages increased together. Collective bargaining was
designed basically to insure this. But labor had not been very
successful since the war. Average hours had stabilized around
49 per week—this following a period of very rapid reduction.
Fewer than 20% of American workers had benefitted from the
40 hour initiative and worked less than 48 hours a week. Furthermore, all other industrial nations in the world had made significantly more progress than the United States in this area.
Since hours had not been reduced in a reasonable manner, free
42
43
New York Times, July 21, 22, 24, 25, Aug. 2, 1932; J.G. Winant, "New Hampshire Plan,"
Review of Reviews, 86 (Nov. 1932), 24.
New York Times, Aug. 27, 28, Sept. 2. 1932; "Job Sharing: 5 Million Helped by WorkSpreading, Teagle Committee Estimates," Business Week (Feb. 1, 1933), 14; "Nationwide Drive for the Five-Day Week," Literary Digest, 145 (Aug. 13, 1932), 3-4; New York
Times, Sept. 9, 1932; New York Times, Aug. 14, Oct. 3, 1932; Jan. 15, 1937.
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THE END OF SHORTER HOURS
395
time had come all of a sudden—in the economic jolt of massive
unemployment.44
Abandoning their briefly held optimism about the benefits of
increased productivity/5 labor leaders again saw general overproduction and acute technological unemployment linked together. The Depression seemed to have demonstrated that William Green had been right—that free time was a natural result of
technological advance and workers had a choice only as to the
form that that free time would take: leisure or unemployment.46
The Depression had shown that the new economic gospel of
consumption was bankrupt. It was felt that labor was under an
extreme disadvantage because of the excess, not so much of
workers, but of total time worked. A buyers' market for labor
ruled. The possibility of negotiating any contract for higher
wages and shorter hours was remote. In the Depression condition shorter hours meant a reduction in pay. This was borne out
by the efforts of businessmen, Hoover's administration, and the
Teagle Commission to deal with unemployment by "sharing the
work" voluntarily.47
Hence, after some half-hearted overtures to the Teagle Commission in August 1932, the AFL leadership directed the Federation's Executive Council to draft 30 hours legislation. Hugo
Black introduced the Federation's Bill to the 72d Congress in
December. The Bill specified that anything produced by establishments where the work week was more than five days and the
work day more than six hours was prohibited in interstate or
foreign commerce.48
44
45
46
47
48
William Green, " S h o r t e r H o u r s , " American Federationist,
38 (1931), 22; " L a b o r ' s Ultimatum to Industry: T h i r t y - H o u r W e e k , " Literary Digest, 114 (Dec. 10, 1932), 3-4; " A . F . of
L. Opens W a r for Its 3 0 - H o u r W e e k " , Newsweek, I (July 22, 1933), 6; New York Times,
Oct. 12, 1932, Sept. 28, 1933, Oct. 10 a n d 2 3 , Dec. 13, 1934; July 17, 1932.
J. Charles L a n e , " T h e Five-Day Week is Now a Vivid Industrial I s s u e , " New York Times,
Oct. 17, 1926, section 9, p . 1, cols. 1-8; Elsie Gluck, " W a g e T h e o r i e s , " American
Federationist, 3 2 ( 1 9 2 5 ) , 1163.
H . L . S l o b o d i n , " U n e m p l o y m e n t or L e i s u r e — W h i c h ? " American Federationist,
37 (1930),
l205-8;New
York Times, Oct. 30, N o v . 18, 1 9 3 1 ; U . S . Congress H o u s e of Representatives,
C o m m i t t e e on L a b o r , Hearings on H R 14105, 72nd Congress, 2nd Session, 1933, 1-23.
New York Times, April 25 and 27, 1933; U . S . Congress, S e n a t e , C o m m i t t e e o n T h e J u d i ciary, Subcommittee Hearings on S. 5267, 72d Congress, 2d Session, 1933, 1-23 283 ff;
New York Times, J a n . 9, 1932; F e b . 13, 1933.
T h e evolution of L a b o r ' s shorter h o u r legislative cure for unemployment may be followed
in t h e American Federationisl.
See in sequence, American Federationist,
38 (1931), 22,
(1931), 145, (1931), 401, (1931), 677, (1931), 1056, (1931), 1455; 39 (1932), 382, (1932),
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LABOR HISTORY
Several affiliate unions had argued that provisions for a minimum wage should be included in this Bill. The AFL, however,
concluded that such a piece of legislation would have less political support and would almost certainly be ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. Moreover, some labor spokesmen
opposed the minimum wage provision because they felt that a
minimum wage might easily become a maximum wage. The best
course was to enforce a nationwide reduction in the supply of
labor. This would provide immediate "work relief" —make the
"work sharing" idea really work. Then, as more people were
put back to work at thirty hours, buyer confidence would return,
purchasing power could expand, and the economy would rebound. As the economy improved, labor could then bargain effectively for higher wages in a condition of continued labor
scarcity. Shorter hours legislation was a necessary first step to
higher wages.49
Labor closed ranks behind the Black Bill (and the Connery
version in the House of Representatives) from 1932 to 1938. In
fact, unions exhibited an exceptional degree of agreement and
militancy. Green and the AFL, for example, threatened several
times to call a "national strike" in support of the Black and
Connery Bills and firmly believed that they had worker backing
nationally for such drastic measures.50
Green was moved to some of his most extreme rhetoric by
this bill. During the hearings conducted by the Senate Judiciary
Committee in 1933, the following exchange took place between
Green and Hugo Black:
Senator Black. That being true, you say organized labor is going to
fight for it [thirty hour week] and it can be accomplished in one of three
ways, the first by voluntary action. Has experience demonstrated that
you will get it by voluntary action?
Mr. Green. I am satisfied we will never get it universally by voluntary
action.
49
50
504, (1932), 985, for continuous support of Black/Connery Bills see 40 (1933), 13, (1933),
347, (1933), 458, (1933), 1174; 42 (1935), 12,(1935), 132; 43 (1936), 1244; 44(1937), 1052;
45 (1938), 1176.
New York Times, Jan. 8, 1932, Feb. 13, 1922; "Shorter Work Periods in Industry," Monthly
Labor Review, 36 (1933), 87-91; F.T. Carlton, "Employment and Leisure," American
Federationist, 39 (1932), 1256-60.
New York Times, Jan. 6 and 28, Dec. 12, 22, 1933.
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THE END OF SHORTER HOURS
397
Senator Black. One of your suggestions is the application of economic
force.
Mr. Green. Yes; for we can organize the workers, and whenever we
organize them and can arrange to demand—
Senator Black. By universal strike?
Mr. Green. By universal strike.
Senator Black. Which would be class war, practically.
Mr. Green. Whatever it would be, it would be that.
Senator Black. That is the second alternative.
Mr. Green. Yes.
Senator Black. And the third is legislation in line with this bill?
Mr. Green. Yes. This is force.
Senator Black. Legislative force.
Mr. Green. Legislative force, and that is the only language that a lot of
employers ever understand—the language of force.
Senator Black. So that your conclusion is you will not reach this objective except by the application of economic force?
Mr. Green. Yes.
Senator Black. Or by legislative force?
Mr. Green. Yes; one of those ways.51
In the same year, the AFL at its annual convention declared
the five day week-six hour day its "primary objective" and accompanied the resolution with some more threats. Green called
for the use of "force" to establish the thirty hour week and
commented on the "militant spirit" that characterized the convention and labor, nationally. He saw a willingness to use "every
weapon; economic, political, and industrial at our disposal."52
By 1937, union agreements for the 35 or 36 hour week were
the rule in five major American industries; glass, coal mining, fur
manufacture, men and women's clothing. Approximately 66%
of organized workers in newspaper publishing had negotiated
agreements for less than forty hours—about half of them worked
371/2 hours. The 36 hour week was a part of agreements covering two-thirds of motion picture operators and half the workers
in the manufacturing of hats. Two of the largest companies in
the rubber industry and two large radio companies had the 35 or
36 hour week. About 5% of organized building construction
workers had 30 hour agreements—another 5°7o worked 35 hours.
51
52
U.S. Congress, Senate, Committee on the Judiciary, Subcommittee Hearings on S. 5267,
72d Congress, 2d Session, 1933, 21-22.
Richard M. Boeckel, "Thirty-Hour Week," Editorial Research Reports, 1 (Jan., 1936),
35-50; W. Green, "Thirty Hour Week," American Federationist, 40 (1933), 1174.
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LABOR HISTORY
Longshoremen on the Pacific Coast also had won the 30 hour
week by 1937. These few examples indicate that individual unions
were struggling on their own toward the 30 hour objective. Even
though the AFL considered national legislation a prerequisite for
shorter hours during the Depression, workers such as the San
Francisco Longshoremen were willing to strike for the 30 hour
week and other workers such as those in the rubber industry
were willing to give up other benefits for shorter hours in their
bargaining sessions.53
During 1932 and 1933 the shorter hour cure for unemployment built up momentum. Both the Republican and Democratic
platforms pledged their parties to shorter hours (but did not endorse the 30 hour bill). Hoover and Roosevelt went out of their
ways to approve the shorter hour concept. In fact, this was just
one of the few concrete unemployment proposals made by the
candidates during the election.54 Some of this interest was translated into support for the Black and Connery Bills. Supporters
were found along the range of the political spectrum, including
such people as Monsignor John Ryan, C.H. Palmer, Governor
Pinchot, Representative LaGuardia, Secretary of Labor Doak,
Frances Perkins, Henry Ford, Senators Wagner and Walsh,
E.A. Filene and Viscount Astor.55
During the hearings held in Congress on the Black and Connery Bills and in the public debate, educators, sociologists, politicians, intellectuals, old fashioned reformers, farm groups, religious leaders, and others accepted labor's argument that shorter
hours would reduce unemployment, improve wages, provide relief and lead to economic recovery. In addition, the Senate and
House hearings provided a forum for reciting the humanitarian
benefits of shorter hours which had been explored thoroughly
during the 1920s. Like labor leaders, supporters of the 30 hour
bill felt obliged to defend the leisure time that would have re53
"Hours of Work Provided in Collective Agreements in 1937," Monthly Labor Review,
46(1938), 341-347.
New York Times, May 16 and 21, June 21 and 30, Sept. 22, Oct. 5, 1932; William Graf,
comp., Platforms of the Two Great Political Parties: 1932 to 1944 (Washington, DC,
1944), 336, 354; Robert F. Himmelberg, The Great Depression and American Capitalism
(Boston, 1968), 41.
55
Henry Ford, "Unemployment or Leisure?" Saturday Evening Post, 203 (Aug. 2, 1930), 19;
New York Times, May 30, June 8, Sept. 26, Oct. 15, Nov. 4, 1930.
54
THE END OF SHORTER HOURS
399
suited from the legislation, and in so doing expressed an idealism as old as the liberal reform movement itself.56
The Senate passage of the Black Bill on April 6, 1933,
prompted Roosevelt and his advisers, who had been engrossed
in the banking crisis, to take their first legislative steps toward
economic recovery. Secretary of Labor Perkins was instructed
to come up with an administrative alternative, which when
drafted and presented to the House Labor Committee, included
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56
New York Times, Jan. 6, 8, 12, 19, 20, 1933; U.S. Congress, House of Representatives,
Committee on Labor, Hearings on 158 and H.R. 4557; 73rd Congress, 1st Session, 1933;
passim; U.S. Congress, House of Representatives, Committee on Labor, Hearings on
H.R. 7202, H.R. 416, and H.R. 8492, 73rd Congress, 2nd Session, 1934, passim;
Dorothy Canfield Fisher, "The Bright Perilous Face of Leisure," Journal of Adult Education, 5 (1933), 237-43; Louis C. Walker, Distributed Leisure: An Approach to the
Problems of Over-Production and Under Employment (New York, 1931), 21-52; A.
Pound, "Out of Unemployment into Leisure," Atlantic Review, 146 (1930), 784-92;
"Unemployment and Tomorrow's Leisure," Recreation, 25 (1931), 478-82; Bertrand
Russell, "Reeducation of Working Hours and the Advantages of Leisure," Review of
Reviews, 82 (1932), 48-54; George B. Cutten, Challenge of Leisure (Columbus, 1933),
passim; Henry P. Fairchild, "Exit the Gospel of Work," Harper's, 162 (1931), 566-73;
Arthur O. Dahlberg, Jobs, Machines, and Capitalism (New York, 1932), passim; Steward
Grant Cole, Leisure in Our Time (Philadelphia, 1934), passim; Cecil Delisle Burns, Leisure in the Modern World (New York, 1932), passim; Spencer Miller, Jr., "Labor and the
Challenge of the New Leisure," Harvard Business Review, 11 (1933), 462-67; W.H.
Hamilton, "Challenge of Leisure," New Republic, 74 (1933), 191-92; Thomas D. Eliot,
"Reevaluating Leisure in Our Civilization," Christian Register, 113 (1934), 758-59; Felix
S. Cohen, "The Blessing of Unemployment," American Scholar, 2 (1933), 203-14; F.H.
Allport, "This Coming Era of Leisure," Harper's, 163 (1931), 641-52; "New Leisure,"
Nation, 137 (1933), 610-11; "In the Driftway: American Vice of Busyness," Nation, 132
(1931), 98-99; E.E. Calkins, "Lost Art of Play," Atlantic Monthly, 106 (1933), 438-46;
A.B. Brown, "Education for Leisure," Hibben Journal, 31 (1933), 440-50; Ralph Aiken,
"A Laborer's Leisure," North American Review, 232 (1931), 268-73; "Coming: The Age
of Leisure," Literary Digest, 112 (Jan. 16, 1932), 26; "Not Less, But More: Thirty-HourWeek," Saturday Evening Post, 207 (Feb. 9, 1935), 26; Weaver Pangburn, "Leisure Time
and Education Opportunities and Needs," Recreation, 27 (1934); 499-500; Arthur
N. Pack, The Challenge of Leisure (New York, 1934), passim; Roger Payne, Why Work?
Or the Coming Age of Leisure and Plenty (Boston, 1939); passim; A. Daniels, "Responsibility of the College in Education for Leisure," Schools and Society, 41 (1935), 706-7;
H.S. Dimock, "Can We Educate for Leisure?" Religious Education, 29 (1934), 120-24;
Elizabeth E. Hoyt, "The Challenge of the New Leisure," Journal of Home Economics
Oct. 1933, 688;Eugene T. Lies, "Education for Leisure," National Education Association Journal, 21 (1932), 253-54; Lawrence P. Jacks, "The Coming Leisure," New Era, 13
(1932), 349-51; Lawrence P. Jacks, "Education and Training for Leisure," Vocational
Guidance Magazine, 11 (1931), 28-31; B.A. McClenahan, "Preparation for Leisure," Sociology and Social Research, 18 (1933), 140-49; J.T. Palmer, "New Leisure—Blessing or
Curse?", School Executives Magazine, 54 (1935), 198-99; Martin H. Neumeyer, "The
New Leisure and Social Objectives," Sociology and Social Research, 20 (1936), 347-51;
William Aylott Orton, American in Search of Culture (Boston, 1933), passim; Harry A.
Overstreet, A Guide to Civilized Loafing (New York, 1934), passim; Herbert Mongredien,
"Leisure," New Church Magazine, April-June, 1934, 113-17; W.S. Coffin, "Art and
Leisure," Art Digest, 7 (1933), 10; T.F. Coade, "Education for Leisure," in Education
of Today (New York, 1935), 141-52; W.B. Bizzell, "Learning and Leisure," School and
Society, 39 (1934), 65-72; Marjorie L. Greenbie, "The Meaning of Leisure," Forum, Dec.
1936, 290-92; Lawrence P. Jacks, "Leisure: A New and Perplexing Problem," World
Wide, July, 1931, 1091; Nicholas Murray Butler, "Leisure and Its Uses," Recreation, 28
(1934), 219-222.
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LABOR HISTORY
the Black Bill's 30 hour provision with the additions of a minimum wage and federal control of production.
The business community was outraged. Because of the 30 hour
legislation's political momentum, business interest in voluntarily "sharing-the-work" had decreased and by 1933 the Chamber
of Commerce had shelved the Teagle program. By the time the
Black Bill had passed the Senate and Roosevelt had responded
with administration support, business had closed ranks against
shorter hours as a desirable Depression measure. In fact, the
strongest opposition came from businessmen, economists, and
industrial managers. Hugh S. Johnson characterized this opposition by declaring, "they would turn back-hand somersaults
against the thirty hour week."57
Through Raymond Moley the Chamber of Commerce offered Roosevelt their own alternative plan which they had been
working on since 1931. Moley, Hugh S. Johnson, and Rexford
Tugwell met with the Chamber of Commerce on May 3, 1933
and worked out a compromise which the Chamber accepted.
With this compromise secured, Roosevelt sent this National Industrial Recovery Act to Congress on May 15. The NIRA was
designed specifically to accomplish the same goals that labor
was seeking with the Black Connery Bills—providing work relief, limiting production to "basic needs" to stabilize prices,
and establishing minimum wages and maximum hours.
But as the NIRA folded and the Depression continued and
the so-called second New Deal began, Roosevelt abandoned the
project of controlling production and lost patience with business
voluntarism. He was convinced by new advisors such as Harry
Hopkins to act directly to stimulate economic activity. Leaving
his suspicions about market maturity and limited growth behind,
Roosevelt began to use such things as public works, liberal mane57
New York Times, Nov. 1, Dec. 10, 1932; "What Price Leisure," Business Week (Aug. 3,
1932), 36; "Work-Spreaders Will Make Jobs Now, Face the Issues Later," Business
Week, Oct. 12, 1932, 13-14; "Work-Spreaders Will Have to Spread It Thin," Business
Week Oct. 26, 1932, 6; "6-Hour Day: Cornell Crystallizes Some Conclusions on Industry's Attitude," Business Week, May 10, 1933, 4; U.S. Congress Senate, Committee on
the Judiciary, Subcommittee Hearings on S 5267, 72d Congress, 2d Session, 1-28, 283-90;
New York Times, Mar. 17, 1932; New York Times, Feb. 5, April 29, May 5, 1933; U.S.
Congress, House of Representatives, Committee on House, Hearings on H.R. 7202, H.R.
416, H.R. 8492, 73d Congress, 2d Session, 1934, 285; New York Times, Oct. 28, 1934.
THE END OF SHORTER HOURS
401
tary policy, larger government payrolls, and deficit budgets to
promote production and consumption. As Robert Heilbroner
described these events:
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to the economists in the Roosevelt administration . . . the government
not only could but should use its spending powers as an economic instrument for securing full employment... They envisioned a new form
of guided capitalism—a market society in which the all-important levels
of employment and output would . . . be promoted, protected against
decline and stimulated toward growth by public action.
Such programs as the WPA demonstrated that Roosevelt had
begun to think of the Federal government as having an obligation to provide work for its citizens if the private sector could
not. But government would be the employer of last resort. The
first line of attack would be to stimulate business activity. Whatever slack was left in the economy would be taken up not by
shortening the hours of work but by constructive government
spending policies. Hence, Roosevelt, at the prodding of his advisors, consistently opposed the 30 hours legislation throughout
the Depression, offering his own programs as a series of alternatives.58
The New Deal and the new gospel of consumption shared
economic goals but differed about the means to obtain them.
Those who supported the gospel of consumption relied on advertising, salesmanship, capital growth, the consumption example
of the more wealthy, and the slow growth of wages to compete
efficiently with workers' desire for leisure and thus to provide
effective demand. Roosevelt, however, looked to government
spending to stimulate that demand, since these other methods
had not worked. Drew Pearson saw this similarity of goals when
he wrote: "Uncle Sam is a drummer with a commercial line to
sell. He sold Liberty Bonds before but never refrigerators."59
Certainly Roosevelt supported private attempts to increase
business activity. He encouraged and supported the National
Retail Dry Goods Association and department store owners' efforts to expand retail credit and even defended certain question58
Arthur S. Link, American Epoch (New York, 1963), 390-395; New York Times, May 12,
1933, Oct. 14, 1934; Robert Heilbroner, The Economic Problem (Englewood Cliffs, NJ,
1970), 152-153.
59
Pearson quoted in Carl Degler, "The Third American Revolution," in Out of Our Past
(New York, 1959). 379-385.
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LABOR HISTORY
able marketing techniques. In return, retail business people
tended to be among the strongest and most loyal of his supporters. As Harry W. Schacter, president of the Kaufman Straus
Company in Louisville, pointed out, manufacturers opposed
Roosevelt because "they are so far removed from the public."
Retailers, on the other hand, knew through direct contact with
the consumer about the importance of his efforts to expand
"purchasing power." One of the best examples of Roosevelt's
efforts to help retailers was his 1939 proclamation, moving up
the national celebration of Thanksgiving by one week in order
to expand the Christmas shopping season. While Roosevelt tried
to assist private efforts to boost retail sales, he was more concerned with increasing purchasing power through Federal spending. This was illustrated by such things as his opposition to the
earmarking of work relief money to some of the PWA's heavy
construction projects, which he thought would tie up too much
money in material and capital costs. He favored instead those
projects that paid more wages and thus more directly increased
retail spending.60
The Roosevelt administration began to characterize the shorter hour movement as regressive, the 30 hour bills as a clever ruse
to disguise the tragedy of unemployment. Such legislation would
not cure unemployment; it would simply "redistribute the misery." According to Roosevelt and his advisors, unemployment
was unemployment. It had to be cured by full recovery and reliable economic growth. "Normalcy" was to be found in an economy that grew, that provided 40 hours of work a week, and that
allowed the standard of living to increase steadily—not one that
"forced" people to work fewer hours a week." With the failure
60
61
New York Times, Jan. 2, 19, Feb. 20, April 18, Oct. 4, 13, 20, 1936; Mar. 19, Oct. 13, 1937;
Aug. 5. Nov. 1, 1939.
"Satin Still Finds Work; Summary of Report of the NRA Committee of the Use of Leisure
Time," Nation, 138 (1934), 663-4; Committee on the Use of Leisure Time of the NRA
was composed of Chairman, Raymond B. Fosdick, and members Nicholas Murray
Butler, Alfred Smith, Mattew Woll. Conferences were held in the Fall of 1933; Raymond
B. Fosdick, "The Public Hearings on the Use of Leisure," Recreation, 27 (Dec. 1933),
418; " I n the Driftway; Spurious Leisure," Nation 138 (1934), 73; "Wages, Hours, and
Recovery," Business Week, (Mar. 3, 1934), 24; "What Price Leisure," Ibid., Aug. 3,
1932, 36; "Hours and Wages," Ibid., Oct. 20, 1934), 5; "Labor's Day: NRA Policy
Hearings," Ibid., Feb. 9, 1935, 6; "Washington Notes," New Republic, 81 (1934), 191;
Hearing on HR 14105, 1-23; New York Times, April 29, May 3, 1933, Oct. 28, Nov. 22,
1926, Dec. 3, 1934.
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THE END OF SHORTER HOURS
403
of the Black Bill and the advent of governmentally managed
capitalism, the shorter hour movement lost its short-lived political momentum. But more importantly, Roosevelt's administration committed the Federal government to assuring American
workers a 40 hour week and in so doing institutionalized a bias
against free time in any form—leisure or unemployment. Since
the Depression, few Americans have thought of free time as a
natural, continuous, and positive result of economic growth
and increased productivity. Rather, leisure has been seen as a
drain on the economy, a liability on wages, and the abandonment of economic progress.
Certainly, the end of the shorter hour movement has many
dimensions and causes which must be explored. But the short
narrative of events presented in this essay suggest two important
dimensions and causes—one social, the other political. Among
the reasons for the ending of the shorter hour movement was
the fact that American attitutes toward free time changed. For
over a century, American workers and their supporters valued
shorter hours. They did so for a variety of reasons—some economic and some non-pecuniary. Only higher wages competed
with this issue for workers' attention. During the 1920s and early 1930s labor and other groups and individuals saw in "the
progressive shortening of the hours of labor" a practical foundation for liberal idealism as well as a necessary remedy for economic ills. But during the Depression, free time took the form
of massive unemployment. Instead of accepting labor's 30 hour
week remedy, Roosevelt and the majority of Americans saw this
free time as a tragedy that had to be eliminated by increasing
economic activity—an activity stimulated by government spending if necessary. The concept of free time as leisure—a natural
part of economic advance and a foil to materialistic values—
was abandoned. The reform continuum in this one area was
broken by Roosevelt's New Deal and by the modern adherence
to economic growth as the great liberal goal.
The change in attitudes found concrete forms in Federal law
and policy established during the Depression, which continue
today. Hence the end of the shorter hour movement is to be explained partially in political terms. Since the Depression, public
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LABOR HISTORY
policy has been designed to maintain "adequate demand" and
"full employment." Government deficit spending, liberal treasury policy, increased government payrolls, and expanded public works projects have usually been employed whenever the private sector has shown indication of stagnation.
Beginning with Roosevelt's inauguration and continuing
through such efforts as the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938,
the Employment Act of 1946, the Commission on Money and
Credit in 1961, and the Humphrey-Hawkins Bill of the 1970s,
liberal programs to deal with unemployment have been constant. They have been premised on, in the words of the Unemployment Act of 1946, "the continuing policy of the federal
government... to promote maximum employment, production, and purchasing power . . .". In practical terms, liberal
programs have been and continue to be designed to remedy unemployment by the federal government acting as a "permanent
stabilizing force in the economy," spending whatever is necessary to stimulate the economy to "full employment" and "full
production."62
The shorter hour cure for unemployment has been forgotten
for over 40 years partly because of the public policy described
above. Share the work and increased leisure have simply not
had a political constituency since the Depression. Leisure has
neither been an important social nor a political issue. The decisions made during the Depression about the unimportance of
increased free time and the importance of economic growth and
"full employment" have become articles of modern liberal faith
and political dogma. This faith and dogma are demonstrated by
modern public policy and economic assumptions. And they are
manifest in the fact that the shorter hour movement has been
dormant for nearly half a century.
62
Arthur M. Okum, ed., The Battle Against Unemployment: An Introduction to a Current
Issue of Public Policy (New York: W.W. Norton and Company, 1965), pp. vii-viii; Albert
Rees, "Dimensions of the Employment Problem," in A Symposium on Employment
(Washington, DC: The American Bankers Association, 1964, passim; Heilbroner, The
Economic Problem, 140-170.