Born in 1900 on a farm near Thornton, Arkansas, John Steelman, as a young man, spent time as a hobo riding the rails and working in western wheat fields, serving in the army during WWI, and working a variety of jobs. All the while, he saved money to attend college. He eventually earned a PhD, and began a career as an Alabama college professor in the early 1930s. When not teaching, Steelman researched racial violence and labor problems in the South. When his work came to Labor Secretary Perkins’ attention, she hired him as a USCS Conciliator, and when the longtime Director of USCS died, she appointed him Director in 1937.

As Director, he promoted the visibility of USCS by giving speeches, making friends in Congress and the White House, and personally mediating high profile disputes. He encouraged his Conciliators to promote the use of arbitration, and encouraged qualified Conciliators to arbitrate cases when appropriate. He created Technical Conciliators to handle cases involving time and motion engineering issues as they became more popular.

Steelman’s high level mediation as USCS Director placed him in frequent contact with the FDR White House, including contacts with the President. As a result after seven years as Director, President Truman offered Steelman a job in the White House, where he would remain until the Truman’s presidency ended in 1953. Steelman was the first person to hold the title of Assistant to the President, the position later called Chief of Staff. [1]

In the White House, Steelman, in addition to all his other duties, continued to handle high profile disputes, and in doing so, he upstages the Director of USCS and later the Director of FMCS, as well as the National Mediation Board on railway disputes. A dramatic example of Steelman’s work occurred during late 1945 and early 1946 a period when the U.S. experienced the most strikes in a year at any time before or since. As the last of those five million striking workers returned to work, a major railroad strike began. With the economy struggling to adjust to peace time, a national strike of all railways would have dramatically impacted the economy in just two days.

While Steelman mediated the dispute, President Truman call an emergency Saturday joint-session of Congress with the intention of announcing he would use unprecedented authority to draft the workers into the Army and nationalize the railroads. As the President was speaking, a House official rushed into the chamber and handed the President a message from Steelman reporting he had just mediated a settlement of the strike.

The mediation work Steelman performed while in the White House is minor compared to his role as Assistant to the President. One illustration of that role is captured in a Truman remark to Steelman during the President’s whistle stop reelection campaign . Truman told Steelman you take care of the White House business while Clark Clifford and I are out taking care of the Republicans.

At age 53, Steelman left the White House six months after Eisenhower’s election, having help with the transition, and rejecting the President’s offer to remain in the White House.

In 1999, Steelman died of natural cause at age 99 in his Florida home.

Steelman’s remarkable life and work is extensively documented in President Harry Truman Presidential Library.

[1] Photo: John Steelman (left), President Truman (right) aboard Presidential Yakut on Potomac River in early 1950s.

Pictured above are Charlie Tilton, Bob Donnahoo, Lou Towers and Yates Heafner, all served as technical conciliators[1]. The U.S. Department of Labor’s United States Conciliation Service (USCS) created a new category of conciliators (mediators), in response to a trend that introduced engineering principals into manufacturing processes, such as “time and motion studies.” When this trend began in 1920s, unions were too weak to resist employers. But with FDR’s New Deal legislation in the 30s, unions gained organizing and collective bargaining rights, which gave them some influence on these practices.[2]

A major part of FDR New Deal legislations was the National Recovery Act (NRA) of 1933, which created a number of governmental units designed to promote economic recovery. One such unit was a small Board, including eight members, tasked with helping employers and employees deal with new engineering trends, which directly impacted employees.

In 1934, when the Supreme Court declared the NRA unconstitutional, all NRA employees were fired, including these eight board members. Since USCS conciliators[3] had found these board members helpful with grievances and collective bargaining on engineering issues, USCS immediately hired the eight and placed them in a newly created Division of Technical Analysis Services (DTAS)[4] in their Washington D.C. national office. The staff was referred to as Technical Conciliators or TCs.

The beginning TC staff of eight soon grew to 15 based on increased demand because conciliators, having become comfortable with their new colleagues during their prior role, requested assistance whenever they faced an engineering issue. In 1937, seeing the successes of DTAS, the new USCS Director John Steelman continued to increase the DTAS staff.

When assigned a case, TCs inspected and studied work-place processes and wrote reports on their findings for the parties to use in negotiations. If asked, TCs would return to the parties to answer questions, and depending on the circumstance, they would mediate, alone or with the assigned conciliator.

As the TC’s became busier, they often persuaded labor and management to do much of the work themselves based on training provided by the TC. In some cases, the parties had worked together so well in completing the study that they were able to achieve a resolution without additional USCS[5] help.

[1] This writer interviewed each of them.

[2] Enhanced public awareness of this practice came 20 years later with the 1950 film based on the 1948 autobiography “Cheaper by the Dozen” by Frank Bunker Gilbreth, Jr. and Ernestine Gilbreth Carey, two married efficiency engineers with 12 children.

[3] USCS referred to its dispute resolvers as conciliators. Later, FMCS referred to theirs as mediators.

[4] Not to be confused with the FMCS Office of Technical Services (OTS) created in 1973.

[5] When USCS became FMCS on August 22, 1947, the FMCS Director eliminated the Division of Technical Analysis Services because he believed such work should be done by the private sector.