Vandiver Brown to A. Cromwell at Lompoc on Occupational Disease Legislation (1935)

A three-page "Personal & Confidential" memorandum of March 25, 1935, from Vandiver Brown of Johns-Manville's legal department to A. Cromwell at J-M's Lompoc, California, operation, copied to S. A. Williams and E. M. Voorhees. Brown welcomes a California Self-Insurers' Association effort to draft a law protecting industry and insurers "against the racketeering aspects involved in the pneumonoconiosis claims," and encloses two addresses from the January Mellon Institute dust symposium. He lists seven features of an ideal occupational disease law, among them a fixed list of covered diseases, medical rather than lay decision of claims, a minimum exposure requirement, a statute of limitations "to safeguard Industry against stale claims," and a maximum limit of liability.

What it shows

Brown writes that J-M's officials, and most other dusty industries he had met, saw "properly drawn" disease legislation as "the chief safeguard against future disaster." He explains that J-M had opposed New Jersey silicosis bills because their definition of silicosis would take in "combined silica," which would make asbestosis "a form of the much more serious disease," while he praises the Illinois Manufacturers' Association draft, which treats asbestosis separately and presents a risk insurers consider "insurable" (the Illinois draft law). He reports discussing definitions with Dr. A. J. Lanza of the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company. For the symposium itself see Brown's January memorandum.

In Johns-Manville's chronology

Johns-Manville's own chronology of what the company knew describes this document as follows:

Vandiver Brown sent a memo to Cromwell at the Lompoc plant, copying Voorhees and Williams. He discusses his attendance at the Dust Symposium, encloses copies of "The Problem" by Alfred Hirth, and "Silicosis from the Insurance Standpoint" by F. Robertson Jones of the Association of Casualty Insurance Executives. He talks about California law, and pending legislation being drawn in Illinois. He will send copies when he has them.

Related documents

• Vandiver Brown to E. M. Voorhees on the Illinois Dust Situation (1935)