New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1916-11-27
Undoing Mr.. Hays Blunders

Representative James Hay has retired
from Congress, but the evil that he did
there lives after him. The Secretary OF
War has just been obliged TO neutrallze
by construction one Of the many vicious
provisions which Mr.. Hay wrote into the
army reorganization law of June last.
In Section 3 of that law Mr.. Hay made
a covert attack on the General Staff. He
sought 10 undermine its authority and I'M
pair its status. The General Staff of the
ARMY has always been Mr.. Hays pet
aversion. He encouraged Adjutant Gen
eral Ainsworth to defy General Leonard
Wood. when the latter was Chief of Staff.
When General Ainsworth was threatened
with discipline and went on the retired
list. Mr.. Hay took up the quarrel IN the
House Of Representatives and did his best
10 clip the General Stats wings. His
malice was frustrated. But he has had
il in for the General Staff ever since. Last
spring he slipped into the army reorgani-
cation bill. along with the Carson appoint
ment Joker, joker forbidding members Of
the General Staff corps 'to assume or en-
gage in work Of an administrative nature
that pertains 10 established bureaus or
Offices of the War Department, or that, be-
ing assumed or engaged in by members OF
the General Staff Corps. would involve
impairment of the responsibility Of such
bureaus or offices or would cause injurious
or unnecessary duplication or delay in the
work thereof"
Mr.. Hays purpose was to set the bu-
reau heads and the Chief Of Staff at odds,
lust as he had supported Adjutant Cen
eral Ainsworth's insurgency several years
ago. A Secretary of War in sympathy
with Mr.. Hays obstructive notions could
easily have construed the language Of Sec
ton 5 so as TO restore the bureaus to their
former status of uncoordinated and jar
ring independence.
Secretary Baker has been better advised
than that. He has realized the vicious
ness of what he calls this glancing blow
at the General Staff system and has boldly
interpreted Section Of the Hay law to
mean something which its author mani
festly did not intend it to mean.
The Secretary blandly assumes that it
was not the purpose of Congress (that is,
of Mr.. Hay) "to inaugurate race for
power among bureau chiefs or TO erect
,the bureaus of the War Department into
a system of coordinated impediments to
one another" Yet that was exactly what
Mr.. Hay had in view, judging from his
past record and his inveterate hostility TO
a Capitalization of power in the General
staff Corps. If he had felt strong enough
TO do it, he would doubtless have reduced
the General Staff to a mere ornamental
appendage to the Secretary's Office and
restored the bureau chiefs to their old con-
dition Of autonomy and responsibility.
The Secretary of War is gradually
waking up to the bunders and shortcom-
ings of the Hay army reorganization act.
That measure was a makeshift, a counter
felt. The army has not been properly re-
organized. 1t cannot be properly reorgan-
lied until the Hay law is repealed or radi-
cally amended The National Guard sec
ttouS nave pioNCu uHNOIhdOIe' ANU lHe
National Guard sections are the backbone
of the military system created by the Hay
law.
IL is at least something that the Admin
istration's eyes have at last been opened to
the maleyolence of the man whom it al
lowed to dictate the terms on which the
army was to be enlarged and modernized.