The Greenville journal. [volume] (Greenville, Ohio) 1850-1918, 1912-03-28
PRESIDENT TAFT'S
ECONOMY RECORD
Insists That Government Be Run
on Sound Business Basis.
STRONG PROGRESSIVE POLICY
His Personal Efforts to Reduce Cost
of Efficient Service Bring Results
Work Done by the Economy
and Efficiency Com
mission.

President Taft, more than any OF
his predecessors in the White House,
has given strict attention to placing
the government upon business basis
as regards its receipts and expendi-
lures. Economy and efficiency became
one of the cardinal policies of his ad-
ministration as soon as he entered
upon the presidency and it was well
for the country that this was so, for
his administration inherited deficit
in the treasury of $58,000,000, which
has now been transformed to a sur
plus of $30OOO,000. The average citi-
zen and taxpayer will be interested in
this fact because the problem which
confronted the president at the outset,
although upon a Gigantic scale, was
similar to that of the ordinary shop
keeper or business man, farmer or
wage-earner or even housewife, who
is called upon to make both ends
meet" either in business or in the
home.
By law the secretary of the treasury
is called upon every year to submit to
congress in December the estimates"
of governmental expenditures for the
next fiscal year beginning the follow
ing July 1. As congress has to pro
vide the money to run the government
the money has to be appropriated for
specific purposes before it can be eX
pended and if this were not done be-
fore the beginning of the fiscal year
the machinery of government would
stop unless emergency provision
could be made.
How Estimates Are Made.
The estimates" are prepared by
the executive departments Of which
each member of the cabinet is head
The cabinet officers get the "esti
mates" in their respective depart
ments from their chiefs of bureau!
and then combine them as the "esti
mates" for the department. The les
Inmates" from all departments art
then sent to the secretary of th'
treasury to be submitted to congress
and they then become the estimates
for the cost of running the entire gov
ernment during the next fiscal year
Upon these figures congress make
the greater part of it's annual appro
priations amounting to more than on
billion dollars annually.
Until 1908 a more or less lax meth
ods of making estimates for the an
nual appropriations obtained through
out the government. The figures sen
to congress each year, instead of show
ing indications of careful pruning
all along the line, showed there was
disposition among the departments t
vie with each other in getting a
large appropriations as possibl
without considering whether or no
the money demanded could be advar
tageously expended during the comm
year. There was no standardizatio
of supplies and the various depart
ments were paying varying prices TO
the same article. In other words
business methods did not obtain 1
the government activities and ther
was no conservation of the resource
, of the treasury department.
What President TAFT Did.
AS soon as President Taft took off1c
this system ceased. At the outse
President Taft impressed upon hi
cabinet officials the absolute necessit
| of economy and efficiency in their d.
partments. He admonished them tina
not a dollar beyond what was necei
sary to run the government eficientl
Hn the departments, including fai
margin for progress which is part {