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Francis Perkins was the first woman to serve in a presidential cabinet position. She served as Secretary of Labor, from 1933 through 1945, the longest serving Labor Secretary.
Dear Miss Perkins: A Story of Frances Perkins’s Efforts to Aid Refugees from Nazi Germany, by Rebecca Brenner Graham is a biography of Perkins, telling of her tenure as Labor Secretary, and examining US immigration policy.
Graham opens by introducing Francis Perkins. Coming from upper-middle class New England stock, Perkins was college-educated. She supported progressive causes, while believing in the work ethic. She gains prominence despite a difficult marriage (her husband went insane and Perkins supported the family).
Appointed Labor Secretary by Roosevelt, Perkins helped develop Social Security and drafted the Fair Labor Standards Act. From 1933 through 1940, the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) was part of the Labor Department. The period’s dominant immigration issue was the plight of Jewish Europeans rendered stateless by Nazi policies.
The book shows Perkins’s attempts to help them, fighting efforts by the State Department and some within the Labor Department. Immigration was unpopular due to the Great Depression. Antisemitism, socially acceptable, was at a peak, especially in the State Department.
The book documents innovative methods Perkins used to circumvent immigration roadblocks, while acting within the law. She used temporary visas to get refugees out of harm’s way in Europe. She made it easier for refugees to post a monetary bond which guaranteed they would not become public charges. She started a program to bring Jewish child refugees to the US under care of foster homes. There was even an attempt to establish a Jewish colony in Alaska, then a territory.
The book suffers from the author’s unwillingness to differentiate between legal and illegal immigration. There is a difference between immigrating because of economic straits and desiring to immigrate because a native government seeks their elimination. Graham also adheres to modern academic fallacies about America. The US is not as uniquely xenophobic or nativist as she portrays. Despite occasional excesses, it comes up short only when measured against its own expectations, as opposed to the performance of other countries throughout the world.
The book is worth reading for the facts presented between opinions. It gives fresh insights into the 1930s. It provides a vivid portrait of a remarkable woman, revealing obscure aspects of mid-twentieth century US public policy. It shows the remarkable progress made in the last 70 years.
“Dear Miss Perkins: A Story of Frances Perkins’s Efforts to Aid Refugees from Nazi Germany,” by Rebecca Brenner Graham, Citadel, January, 2025, 336 pages, $29.00 (Hardcover), $24.65 (E-book), $17.49 (audiobook), $45.95 (Audio CD)
This review was written by Mark Lardas, who writes at Ricochet as Seawriter. Mark Lardas, an engineer, freelance writer, historian, and model-maker, lives in League City, TX. His website is marklardas.com.
Discussion (4)
CHARTER MEMBER
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Not to hijack the thread, but I have always been amazed two related facts about the period:
1: Everyone assumed that adding people reduced wealth. This was accepted as self-evident across the world. Today we know better: Economic wealth is driven by hard-working and creative people. Jews add economic value.
2: Because of #1, very few would accept many Jews as immigrants. Hitler did not actually feel the need to kill the Jews - he just wanted Europe rid of us.
Garbage assumptions lead to garbage policy.
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What a quaint idea that immigrants should not be public charges.
CONTRIBUTOR
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The problem was that Jewish immigrants were originally not allowed to post charge bonds until they got immigration visas, but the State Department would not issue immigration visas because they claimed they feared Jewish immigrants would become public charges. The immigrants could not post bonds because they did not have visas, but the visas would not be issued because they had not posted bonds. Perkins's changed things to allow bonds to be posted before they were issued visas to remove that as an obstacle. The State Department fought the change. They disliked Jews, not because they and tried to bar them even though they did not think they would become public charges.
I think the public charge rules are still on the books. The Biden Administration simply ignored them.
CONTRIBUTOR
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That doesn't really hijack the thread. The assumption that adding people reduced wealth was the basis of a lot of the nativist thinking of the period. It was compounded by the Great Depression making it hard to find worth.
One reason Perkins used temporary visas - even temporary work visas - was to get people out of harm's way. Those on tourist visas could not work and did not compete for American jobs. The work visas covered jobs American citizens literally could not do, mainly writers and artists.
One example was the Von Trapp family. They tried to immigrate permanently, but failed. Instead they came on a work visa to do a singing tour. No one except the Trapp Family Singers could perform as the Trapp Family Singers, so they were not viewed as displacing US workers. The visa kept getting extended until they were allowed permanent residency.