Uploaded October 2020 | Updated September 2026, 13 hours ago
George Guenther was appointed the first Assistant Secretary for OSHA in April 1971. He was an experienced public official who was then director of the Labor Standards Bureau. Guenther had come to the Labor Department from the post of deputy secretary of the Pennsylvania Department of Labor and Industry. Before that he headed a hosiery manufacturing firm in Pennsylvania. In 1971 the Department of Labor acquired one of its most important and demanding responsibilities ever with the enactment of the Occupational Safety and Health Act. This law requires the Secretary of Labor to set and enforce safety and health standards for almost all of the nation's workplaces. The Department set up the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) to implement the law. New Federalism found expression in the provision that the Department would oversee, assist and partially fund the development and operation of state-operated safety and health programs. Eventually about half the states developed OSHA-approved plans, which meant OSHA did not have to enforce federal law in those states. During OSHA's start up phase some of its actions and policies were reasonably successful, others were less so. The organizing and establishment of the agency within the Labor Department went smoothly. A decision to seek voluntary compliance and avoid a punitive approach to enforcement was well received by the business community. Because of limitations on resources to protect workers in five million workplaces nationwide, OSHA loosely targeted its enforcement in a worst-case-first approach which emphasized investigation of catastrophic accidents and employers' compliance in the most dangerous and unhealthy workplaces. Partly at the urging of organized labor, OSHA tried to emphasize the "H" (for Health) in its name. The first standard that it set was for asbestos fibers. On the other hand, a move that brought OSHA long lasting notoriety as a "nit picker" was the verbatim adoption and sometimes unreasonable enforcement of a body of voluntary consensus standards developed by industry associations. While adoption was specifically mandated by the Act, OSHA chose to promulgate the rules en masse and immediately, having them take effect in August 1971 instead of using the full two year phase in period which the law allowed. Another unsuccessful early move was the decision to develop state programs as the primary means of realizing the goals of the Act. Counting on the bulk of the states to participate, OSHA limited the development of its own staff of enforcement officers. It quickly became apparent that the states were not going to participate as extensively as OSHA had hoped. As a result, the agency soon found itself inadequately prepared to directly enforce the law on a nationwide basis. A damaging legacy from the start up period came to light during the 1974 Watergate investigations in the form of an internal memorandum which sought ideas on ways to tailor OSHA's program that would increase business' support of President Nixon's reelection campaign in 1972. There is no evidence that this "responsiveness" program affected OSHA significantly at the time, but its revelation in 1974 did considerable damage to the agency's reputation. OSHA has been one of the most controversial programs in the Department's history. Early on, inspectors attempting to enforce privately developed safety and health regulations which the agency adopted hurriedly in 1971 ran into criticism, not all of it unfair, for being "nitpickers". As new health standards were developed, the costs of compliance caused much opposition from manufacturers. Attempts to accommodate them caused consternation among the unions. This interview was conducted by the DOL History office and is available at the US National Archive Sound Collection in College Park, Maryland.
George Guenther was appointed the first Assistant Secretary for OSHA in April 1971. He was an experienced public official who was then director of the Labor Standards Bureau. Guenther had come to the Labor Department from the post of deputy secretary of the Pennsylvania Department of Labor and Industry. Before that he headed a hosiery manufacturing firm in Pennsylvania. In 1971 the Department of Labor acquired one of its most important and demanding responsibilities ever with the enactment of the Occupational Safety and Health Act. This law requires the Secretary of Labor to set and enforce safety and health standards for almost all of the nation's workplaces. The Department set up the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) to implement the law. New Federalism found expression in the provision that the Department would oversee, assist and partially fund the development and operation of state-operated safety and health programs. Eventually about half the states developed OSHA-approved plans, which meant OSHA did not have to enforce federal law in those states. During OSHA's start up phase some of its actions and policies were reasonably successful, others were less so. The organizing and establishment of the agency within the Labor Department went smoothly. A decision to seek voluntary compliance and avoid a punitive approach to enforcement was well received by the business community. Because of limitations on resources to protect workers in five million workplaces nationwide, OSHA loosely targeted its enforcement in a worst-case-first approach which emphasized investigation of catastrophic accidents and employers' compliance in the most dangerous and unhealthy workplaces. Partly at the urging of organized labor, OSHA tried to emphasize the "H" (for Health) in its name. The first standard that it set was for asbestos fibers. On the other hand, a move that brought OSHA long lasting notoriety as a "nit picker" was the verbatim adoption and sometimes unreasonable enforcement of a body of voluntary consensus standards developed by industry associations. While adoption was specifically mandated by the Act, OSHA chose to promulgate the rules en masse and immediately, having them take effect in August 1971 instead of using the full two year phase in period which the law allowed. Another unsuccessful early move was the decision to develop state programs as the primary means of realizing the goals of the Act. Counting on the bulk of the states to participate, OSHA limited the development of its own staff of enforcement officers. It quickly became apparent that the states were not going to participate as extensively as OSHA had hoped. As a result, the agency soon found itself inadequately prepared to directly enforce the law on a nationwide basis. A damaging legacy from the start up period came to light during the 1974 Watergate investigations in the form of an internal memorandum which sought ideas on ways to tailor OSHA's program that would increase business' support of President Nixon's reelection campaign in 1972. There is no evidence that this "responsiveness" program affected OSHA significantly at the time, but its revelation in 1974 did considerable damage to the agency's reputation. OSHA has been one of the most controversial programs in the Department's history. Early on, inspectors attempting to enforce privately developed safety and health regulations which the agency adopted hurriedly in 1971 ran into criticism, not all of it unfair, for being "nitpickers". As new health standards were developed, the costs of compliance caused much opposition from manufacturers. Attempts to accommodate them caused consternation among the unions. This interview was conducted by the DOL History office and is available at the US National Archive Sound Collection in College Park, Maryland.
