Home
Search transcripts:    Advanced Search
Notable New     Yorkers
Select     Notable New Yorker

Frances PerkinsFrances Perkins
Photo Gallery
Transcript

Part:         Session:         Page of 564

REORGANIZATION OF LABOR DEPARTMENT

After that first Cabinet meeting on the 7th, I undoubtedly went back to the office. The problem in those days was to get enough time to do the things that were piled up and waiting to be done. I was in a very handicapped condition. As I hear the cries of harassment of the incoming administration of this year (1953), I realize that we were in much the same state of crying and harrassment. We couldn't get anything done and nobody would help us. We couldn't trust the people around us. I was really in the position of not knowing who I could trust and who I couldn't. I was surrounded by people some of whom I knew I couldn't trust - the two secretaries sitting outside, for instance. The man who was the private stenographer secretary was very nice and I tried to keep him, but he said to me after four or five days, when I had fired these two supernumeraries out there, or told them I wouldn't need them, “I don't think I ought to stay. I really am a Republican. I'm a very good Republican. I worked for the National Republican Committee. I would like to work for you. It's all right with me, Miss Perkins.”





© 2006 Columbia University Libraries | Oral History Research Office | Rights and Permissions | Help