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Frances PerkinsFrances Perkins
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concept was of the American idea of a proper peace treaty. They didn't expect to stick with it, you see. I mean, this was the beginning of the bargaining, and so forth.

I was in here merely to represent labor, to bring the labor concepts of the economy of every country to view.

Interviewer:

Did you always think in terms of “a peace treaty” or, as it eventually worked out, of several treaties?

Perkins:

At this committee, we were thinking of a peace treaty, originally. It was exploratory. It was not a static pattern or form. It was exploratory. We were getting together the items that would be needed, whether you made a peace treaty or twenty peace treaties--that was the idea.

Interviewer:

It seemed to me this fragmentation of the peace treaty as it finally developed was different from the original aim.

Perkins:

That undoubtedly was true, but at the very beginning, there may have been some thought of it, but it wasn't my duty to make a peace treaty. It was the State Department's duty to do that. Hull and the State Department were thinking in these various terms, and I was in there to not and contribute information about what labor circumstances and labor conditions were in various countries.

At any rate, Hull was building up these ideas





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