James Arthur Salter, 1st Baron Salter, (15 March 1881 – 27 June 1975) was a British politician and academic, who played a minor, but important role in the foundations of pan-European government. Background and education Salter was the eldest son of James Edward Salter (1857–1937) of the Thames boating company Salters Steamers, and who became Mayor of Oxford in 1909. Educated at Oxford City High School and Brasenose College, Oxford, where he was a scholar, he graduated with first class honours in Literae Humaniores in 1903. Career Salter joined the Civil Service in 1904 and worked in the transport department of the Admiralty, on national insurance, and as private secretary, being promoted to Assistant Secretary grade in 1913. On the outbreak of war, he was recalled to the Admiralty, and became director of ship requisitioning. He was sent to Washington D.C. to press for a US programme of new construction. In 1917–18 he was a colleague of Jean Monnet in the Chartering Committee of the Allied Maritime Transport Council, and in 1919 appointed secretary of the Supreme Economic Council in Paris. Salter then worked as head of the economic and financial section of the League of Nations secretariat, and in the League secretariat at Geneva, where he worked for stabilization of currencies of Austria and Hungary and resettlement of refugees in Greece and Bulgaria. In the 1920s, having seen the League of Nations fail through the vested interests of individual countries, Monnet and Salter worked together to develop plans for the establishment of a 'United States of Europe', headed by an unelected technocrat government. He returned to London in 1930, and worked as journalist and author. In 1932, he presided over a Conference on Road and Rail Transport tasked with looking at the true costs and benefits of transport, and whose results were known as the Salter Report. It recommended changes to the way that public roads were funded to account for the growing demands of the motor car and road freight, and to ensure that road and rail were evenly regulated and competed fairly. In 1934, he was appointed Gladstone professor of political theory and institutions at Oxford University, and a fellow of All Souls College, Oxford. He was Independent Member of Parliament (MP) for Oxford University from 1937 to 1950. On outbreak of war in 1939, he resumed his role in shipping, being appointed Parliamentary Secretary to the