The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1909-06-09


curtailment.
The most advanced work in the big |
curtailment scheme has already been |
done by Secretary of the Navy Meyer. |
He is business man, accustomed to |
handling large projects and has dis
tanced all his colleagues in the cabinet |
in this effort at more economical
administration. Although new in the
Office of the Secretary of the Navy, |
he had hardly become, acquainted with
his official force before he set them
to work to find out where economy
could be practised. Commandments of
navy yards, who have the expenditures
of enormous sums annually, have been
coming to Washington of late for con-
sultation and conference. The govern
ment keeps on shore at the navy yards
almost as numerous an army of men
as it keeps on board ships and main
tains at the navy yards plants that
cost for building and maintenance al
most as much as the warships cost in
construction and maintenance. The
commandments of yards have been in
formed of the situation and their adj
vice followed but the cut has been so
deep in this branch of navy expenditure
tailment in the maneuvers of the war
fleets and the army Of jackies who are.
kept at sea. With navy curtailment
of $10,000,000 the government can still
build two dreadnoughts annually of the
largest size, which is as many as have
ever been authorized yet by Congress
in any one year.
1t may be difficult to get much money
= ~,
endorses the new economy estimates.
Ambitious plans have been laid for i'm
proving the larger yards and for the
construction of the most modern naval
station in the world at Pearl Harbor.
Certain of these plans will be checked,
although it is doubtful whether, because
of the peculiar conditions la the Pa
cific Ocean, the Pearl Harbor station
will suffer.
Now that Secretary Meyer has ac
complished his part of the economy
task and Secretary Dickinson has been
directed how deep he must cut, other
cabinet officers have to find how they
can save the government at least $780,
600, 000 There are seven other de-
partments over which the pruning hook
is uspended-State, Treasury, Justice,
Postoffice, Interior, Agriculture, and
Commerce and Labor. 1t is a very
serious question to determine where
$50, 100000 can be saved in the admin
istration of these seven, which, in real
ity, must be in four or five depart
ments. The State Department, for ex
ample, has the disbursement of com
paratively a small sum of government
money-chief1y the salaries of the dip
lomatic and consular bodies, which are
fixed by law The clerical and official
forces of the State Department are
very small. No large curtailments are
practical in the Treasury. 1t has
great number of employees, but there
have been fewer extravagances in the
Treasury than in most other depart
ments. The Treasury has to collect
customs dues and internal revenues,
keep supervision over finances, and
exercises jurisdiction over a score of
matters of magnitude. 1t attends to
the very large public building under
takings, which are now costing the
government many millions of dollars
annually The erection of public build
ings will undoubtedly be reduced TO
minimum, although the money already
voted for those purposes will be ex-
pended. Sufficient work has been au-
thorized by Congress to keep the Treas
ury officials as busy as they can be
planning and constructing public edifces
/ for at least two years.
Postmaster General Hitchcock has
been called upon to cut deep the postal
estimates. There has been great ex
| travagance in that department. The
mail facilities have been enormously
improved but Congress has voted very
great sums annually for increasing the
| salaries of employees and for extra fast
mails and the like The civilian army
| in the postal service numbers into hun
dreds of thousands and there are count
| less ways of spending money on the
service when times are flush and the
| Treasury is bullying with a surplus. The
| postal service, however, is nearest to
the people of any of the government s
| operations and great care must be OBJ
served in cutting off the supply of
funds therefor. Congress is very jealous
of the postal service. with its many
| tens of thousands of Offices.
Attorney General Wickersham has
| had to take the pruning knife in hand.
| the while he runs the big Department
of Justice. He is looping off salaries
| in his estimates, preparing to employ
fewer special agents. of whom the de
partment has had very many in the
last ten years. Fewer expensive ex-
| perts will be employed and those who
work for the department in prosecut-
ing offenders must do so for less money.
| Secretary of the Interior Ballinger also
has big task with the pruning knife,
for his department, with jurisdiction
over the General Land Office, the In
| dian Bureau. the Pension Office, the
| Geological Survey, and the Patent Of
| fee and several other like bureaus is
one of the largest. The forces of en-
ployes will be thinned and the inspec-
tion and operation in the field-which
| is where much of the money goes-will
| be restricted.
] ssUnc1e Tama JIM Wilson, Secre-