State License Bureau, who also acts as Chairman. The remaining two
members are appointed by the Governor for four-year terms. Both
appointive members must have been actively engaged in the real estate
business for ten years prior to appointment; one must be a resident of
Baltimore City and the other a resident of one of the counties. The
Commission licenses all real estate agencies, brokers and salesmen
doing business, or wishing to do business, in Maryland. It has the
power to revoke, refuse, or suspend licenses of any agency or person
for violating the State real estate laws or for unethical conduct (Code
1957, Art. 56, sees. 212-32).

Appropriations 1959 1960

General Funds $46,690 $46,743
Staff: 6.

Labor and Industrial Relations

DEPARTMENT OF LABOR AND INDUSTRY

Murray L. Schuster, Commissioner, 1963
Margaret W. Kimble, Deputy Commissioner
Matthew Gibson, Chief Boiler Inspector

301 W. Preston Street, Baltimore I Telephone: Vernon 7-9000

The Department of Labor and Industry has its origins in an Act of
the Legislature of 1884, which established the Bureau of Statistics and
Information (after 1892 also known as the Industrial Bureau). Until
the twentieth century this agency functioned solely as an information
service, collecting data on general economic activity, including labor
conditions and causes of strikes. Beginning in 1902 it gradually
acquired powers to operate a free State employment service, inspect
working conditions, and enforce child labor laws, and in 1904 its chief
became State labor mediator. A reorganization in 1916 renamed the
agency the State Board of Labor and Statistics, and concentrated in it
powers to enforce all the factory acts. The General Assembly made
further changes in 1939 and created the present Department in 1945.

The Department of Labor and Industry is under the direction of a
Commissioner appointed by the Governor for a four-year term. The
Commissioner collects and publishes statistics and other data concern-
ing labor in Maryland ana the causes of strikes and disagreements
between employers and employees (Code 1957, Art. 89, sees. 1, 2). He
follows the negotiations in all labor disputes occurring within the State
and must do all in his power to promote the voluntary arbitration,
mediation, and conciliation of such disputes. To this end he may
appoint, subject to the approval of the Governor, boards of arbitration
to conduct investigations and publish findings for the settlement of
these disputes. The Commissioner may also conduct such investigations
himself and publish his findings (Code 1957, Art. 89, sees. 4, II).

Upon petition, the Commissioner also approves and supervises the
holding of consent elections and makes a final determination of the
facts ascertained as the result of such elections (Code 1957, Art. 89,
sec. 12).

The Department licenses and supervises all fee-charging employ-
ment agencies operating within Maryland, and it enforces the laws
that determine the hours of labor for females. It also carries out the
provisions of the Child Labor Laws, which require minors between the
ages of fourteen and eighteen to receive employment certificates from