One of the more notable Commissioners was John R. Commons. Dr. Commons was a Economics Professor at the University of Wisconsin. Commons influenced a  generation of people who became involved in social reform and progressive legislation.

A reformer rather than a revolutionary, Commons championed laws that protected workers while preserving the efficiency of large-scale industry. Effective labor legislation, he maintained, could make the capitalist economic system work in favor of workers as well as employers. Commons' thinking influenced Wisconsin's most important new labor laws, especially industrial safety and unemployment insurance. On occasion, Commons' University classes became staging grounds for new legislation. Many of his students, including Arthur Altmeyer, became state or federal labor law administrators.

The Wisconsin legislature enacted more laws to regulate hours, wages and employment conditions of women and children.

    Work week for children reduced
      to 48 hours.

    Work week for women set at 55
      hours.

Other industrial safety laws were passed.

Wisconsin established free employment services in its Milwaukee, Superior, LaCrosse and Oshkosh Employment Offices. These employment services were primarily local labor exchanges.

Nation's first modern apprenticeship law that included area vocational schools as a necessary component of apprenticeship programs.  625 apprentices were indentured in the first year in Wisconsin.

Nation's first state constitutional Workmen's Compensation Act (now Worker's Compensation) guaranteeing injury compensation as a legal right was enacted on May 3, 1911 and became effective September 1st to be administered by the Industrial Commission. The Constitutionality of the Act was upheld by the Wisconsin Supreme Court on November 1, 1911 (and by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1926).

The first Wisconsin wage law was enacted in 1913 and specified that a "living wage" must be paid to women and minors. In enacting this law, the Legislature specified that "every wage paid or agreed to be paid by any employer to any female or minor employee shall be not less than a living wage." Administrative authority was given to the Industrial Commission, which was to use an advisory board equally representing employers, employees and the public in its determination of a "living wage," thereby also necessitating consideration of the cost of living. There were several events which delayed the determination of a living wage and contributed to a 6-year lapse between the 1913 enactment of the law and issuance of the first wage orders in 1919.

. . . The Industrial Commission completed an extensive study in 1913- 1914 of the working conditions and cost of living of employed women in Wisconsin; and most pertinent - the constitutionality of the Oregon Minimum Wage Law (which was similar in principle to the Wisconsin law) was being challenged in the courts from 1914 to 1917, when a tie vote of the U.S. Supreme Court sustained the Oregon Law and thus helped clear the way for action in Wisconsin.
  

Photo Source: Wisconsin Historical Society

. . . World War I began . . .
  

Current Employment Statistics (CES) began, managed by the United States  Bureau of Labor Statistics and Industrial Commission (the program continues today!).

 
Commissioners are:
Edwin E. Witte, Secretary (1917-22);  Joseph D. Beck; Fred M. Wilcox; and George P. Hambrecht.
  Photo Source: Wisconsin Historical Society

The Wisconsin Free Employment Service had 31 public employment offices.

State Legislators centralized child labor permit-granting authority under the Wisconsin Industrial Commission.

Apprentices Learning

A 22-cent minimum wage was established for women and minors 17 years of age and older.
  

A petition presented May 1, 1919, to the Industrial Commission by the Wisconsin Federation of Labor, the Consumers League of Wisconsin, and the Central Council of Social Agencies of Milwaukee initiated a wage action by the Commission. As required by law, the action involved appointment of an Advisory Wage Board and consideration of their recommendations and findings, as well as those of the Commission in its 1913-1914 cost of living study. After the required public hearings were held, the commission issued Wage Orders on June 27, 1919, and named their effective date as August 1,1919.
  

Wisconsin created the Vocational Rehabilitation program with emphasis on people injured in industrial employment accidents.

Additional Commissioners:
  R. G. Knutson (1921-1933)
  L.A. Tarrell (1921-1927)
  Voyta Wrabetz (1927-1955)

1921 Employment Office
  

New legislation required employers to pay all laborers, workman and mechanics on state public works projects at the "prevailing" wage rate of the area.

Development of Safety Codes were continuing as technologies evolved.

Safety Guard on Machine

At the above link you can learn more about about the Social Security Act and its relationship to Unemployment Insurance, Aid to Families with Dependant Children and other social programs. 

On January 28, 1932, Governor Philip La Follette signs the nation's first unemployment compensation law.  Also pictured in back, left to right, are: Henry Oltl, President, Wisconsin Federation of Labor; Elizabeth Brandeis; Paul Raushenbush; John R. Commons; Henry Huber Lt. Governor; Assemblyman Harold Groves; and Assemblyman Robert Nixon.
  

The U.S. Randolph Sheppard Act created the blind vending program which was enacted to provide blind persons with remunerative employment, enlarge their economic opportunities, and encourage their self-support through the operation of vending facilities in Federal buildings. In addition to federal buildings, the program was extended to State buildings. The program continues today as the Blind Business Enterprise Program (BEP).

Wisconsin extended vocational rehabilitation services to disabled homebound. 
  

First Unemployment Check

Photo Source: Wisconsin Historical Society

  Photo Source: Wisconsin Historical Society

During World War II, women became a vital labor resource for war materials production.

Women in Ammunition Plant
  

Protections were subsequently added for: age 40 and over (1959); gender (1961); handicap/disability (1965); arrest or conviction record (1977); marital status (1982); sexual orientation (1982); membership in the national guard, state defense force or any other reserve component of the military forces (1987); and use or nonuse of lawful products, such as tobacco, off the employer's premises during nonworking hours, i.e., smoker's rights legislation (1991). The prohibition against discrimination based on sexual orientation was the first so-called "gay rights" law in the nation.
  

Additional Commissioners:
  R.G. Knutson (1952-63)
  Arthur Enright (1953-59)
  John H. Rouse (1955-61)
  

Legislation to prohibit discrimination for organizations having contracts with the state.

In 1959, the legislature granted bargaining rights to local government workers.
  

As agricultural surpluses reappeared in the 1950s, Congress considered legislation to reinstate a food stamp program.  A pilot food stamp program was started under President Kennedy in 1961 and made permanent with the passage of the Food Stamp Act of 1964 under President Johnson. The stated purpose was "to raise levels of nutrition among low-income households," and "to promote the distribution in a beneficial manner of our agricultural abundance."

In 1961, the anniversaries of 2 significant Wisconsin firsts were marked: the 25^th anniversary of the payment by the state of Wisconsin of the first unemployment compensation check and the 50^th anniversary of the enactment of the first modern state Workmen's Compensation act. On August 31, 1961 in ceremonies hosted by President John F. Kennedy on the south lawn of the White House, the Wisconsin Worker's Compensation law was commemorated with a 4-cent stamp to celebrate the 50^th anniversary of its enactment as the first worker's compensation law in the nation.

Text of President Kennedy's speech.

Larger picture of President Kennedy
  

President John F. Kennedy

WC Commemorative Stamps

Additional Commissioner:
  George W. Otto (1963-65)
  

Open housing law was passed, and guaranteed all persons equal opportunity for housing, regardless of race, religion, color, national origin, or ancestry.