Eric Johnston - Chamber of Commerce

Chamber of Commerce

As a rising regional businessman, Johnston became active in the national Chamber of Commerce. He was appointed to its tax committee in 1933, elected a director in 1934, and elected vice president in 1941. Johnston became head of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce after a revolt by younger, moderate business executives pushed several older, conservative candidates aside. He refused to antagonize the American Federation of Labor or the Congress of Industrial Organizations, and advocated labor-management cooperation. Johnston persuaded the labor federations to make a no-strike pledge during World War II.

In 1940, Johnston ran in the Republican primary for Senator from Washington state, but placed a distant second place with only 18 percent of the vote.

Johnston served on several wartime commissions for President Franklin D. Roosevelt, including the Committee for Economic Development, the War Manpower Commission, and the War Mobilization and Reconversion Committee. In 1943, President Roosevelt named him chairman of the United States Commission on InterAmerican Development. He traveled widely in Latin America, reassuring heads of state that the United States intended to protect them in the event of war.

Soviet leader Joseph Stalin invited Johnston to tour Russia in 1944. Johnston agreed, and Roosevelt appointed Johnston an emissary of the United States. Johnston spent nearly a month in the Soviet Union, and was the first American diplomat to tour the Central Asian Republics of the Soviet Union. He met with Stalin for three hours at a time when Ambassador W. Averell Harriman had yet to present his credentials to the premier.

Johnston retired as Chamber of Commerce president in 1945. He was awarded the Presidential Medal for Merit in 1947.