David K. Niles, administrative assistant to President Truman and also to President Roosevelt, was today awarded the Order of Merit by President Truman in a ceremony at the White House.
The citation, read by the President, lauded Niles for “exceptionally meritorious conduct in the performance of outstanding service to the United States” as adviser on Labor problems to the War Production Board. Declaring that Niles “worked assiduously and rendered invaluable services to his country,” the citation said that his “immediate perception and keen insight” into the complex labor-management problems which were created by a wartime economy, aided immeasurably in uniting both labor and management in the collaborative production of the weapons of war.
“In this task,” continued the President, “he won the full confidence and high regard of all those with whom he dealt by the display of an essential fairness and desire to understand and reconcile the problems of worker and employer and by communicating to them his own zeal in the American principles of democratic action, He gave unstintingly of his time and efforts and handled all of his assignments with finesse and dexterity.”
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.