Position Classification and Pay Plans

a fundamental prerequisite of personnel administration. " H. F. Hub-bard explained why-"The successful administration of an equitable pay plan, of a sound recruiting and selection program, and of virtually all other personnel functions depends in a large measure upon the existence of a sound classification plan." Although it was not until 1908 that a governmental unit, Chicago, started a program of classifying positions on the basis of duties and responsibilities, petitions from federal clerks more than seventy years earlier centered attention on the need for a duties classification plan and the gearing of salaries thereto. Their petition of 1838 resulted in a resolution passed by the U.S. Senate and addressed to heads of departments which called for reports showing "the classification of the clerks... in reference to the character of the labor to be per-formed, the care and responsibility imposed, the qualifications re-quired, and the relative value, to the public, of the services of each class, as compared with the others.... " At various periods thereafter Congress considered and attempted to find a solution to the problem of uniform compensation for employees in all departments and offices who were doing the same kind of work. With the passage of the Classification Act of 1923 the Personnel Classification Board was set up to deal with the classification of, and pay for, positions in the U.S. departments in Washington. Federal field positions were not covered until several years later. As library employees were included in the classification and pay plans of governmental jurisdictions, librarians became concerned in the relative placement of library positions in the classification plans and in whether the salaries paid were equitable in relation to dutie