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Frances PerkinsFrances Perkins
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that particular case. I heard the union people, but we just went ahead and followed the procedures that had been set down. However, this was the first time that I heard them say, “why bother with all this investigation? We can tell you what the wages are everywhere.”

I said, “Now, you couldn't. The government bids on lots of things you haven't got any union in.”

“Oh, well, we could estimate it, according to what the union wage is in that town for other things.”

The only people organized in some communities are building trades workers and printers. In almost any community you're likely to find a few union men in those trades, but not in any others, speaking as of the early thirties. They were going to set the wages in some very unskilled labor as the lowest wage that was paid in the building trades. All this wasn't fair and proper.

At any rate, we stuck to our guns and we did the job in accordance with the procedures we had laid down, and I lived to be glad. We had a case that came up on appeal before the Supreme Court at just about the same time that one of the first cases in the Agricultural Adjustment Administration came up, the Lukes Steel Company case. I don't remember whether our case or the AAA case came up first, but I think theirs came up first. The AAA was turned down in their case, but the Supreme Court





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