The Wilbur Cohen Papers provide documentation of his work as Dean of the School of Education at the University of Michigan and with the state of Michigan Task Force on the Prevention and Investigation of Abuse in State Institutions1977-1979, as well as files on school desegregation in Detroit and Kalamazoo. The papers are organized into five series: Cohen's Task Force on the Prevention and Investigation of Abuse in State Institutions, Public School Desegregation Files, two series of Dean of the School of Education files and Photographs.
Wilbur Cohen was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin in 1913. Following his graduation in 1934 from the University of Wisconsin with a degree in economics, he went to Washington to work for Edwin E Witte, who was then directing President Franklin D. Roosevelt's Committee on Economic Security, which was responsible for drafting the first Social Security Act. Cohen joined the newly-formed Social Security Board in 1935 and stayed in the government for two decades, ending in 1956 when he retired as director of the Board's Division of Research and Statistics. That year, he joined the University of Michigan as a professor of public welfare administration, a position he held until 1961.
After the election of President John F. Kennedy, Cohen returned to Washington, taking the position of assistant secretary for legislation in the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare. In 1965, he was elevated to the position of undersecretary in the department, and in 1968 was appointed to be secretary of HEW by President Lyndon Johnson.
In 1969, he returned to the University of Michigan, taking the post of dean in the School of Education. During his deanship at the University of Michigan, Cohen was appointed to chair the Task Force on the Prevention and Investigation of Abuse in State Institutions by Governor William G. Milliken. Cohen accepted the charge in early March 1978, and proceeded to direct the members of the Task Force through the investigations of abuse to institutionalized citizens in the mental health facilities of Southeastern Michigan. It may be presumed that it was Cohen's direction which split the focus of the Task Force from the purely investigative to include research into the means of preventing future abuse. The Task Force reports are clear in their statements indicating that it is not enough for the State of Michigan to act as watchdog, there is also a need to ensure, through appropriate social programs, training, and compensation, the well-being of all Michigan residents.
Cohen retired as dean in 1978, and in 1980 he moved to Austin, Texas to take the position of Sid W. Richardson Professor of Public Affairs at the Lyndon Johnson School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas. During his career, Cohen wrote a number of books on the Social Security system and welfare policy. He served in a number of non-profit organizations, including forming and leading Save our Security, a coalition of groups opposed to the cuts in Social Security benefits proposed by President Jimmy Carter's administration. He maintained his interest in social policy and related issues up to his death on May 18, 1987 at the age of seventy three.
