The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1920-06-09
NO SAVING MADE BY REPUBLICANS, CHARGES BYRNS Deficiency Budgets Will Offset Alleged Cuts in
 Expenditures. WAR INVESTIGATIONS ADDED TO EXPENSES Government Should Be Ap- preaching Pre-War
 Creditors.

Washington D. C., June 9---Expos- ing the fallacy of Republican claims that the present Congress has effected great "economies'' in appropriations, Representative Joseph w. Byrns, of Tennessee, ranking Democrat of the House Appropriations. committee, an- alyZed the work of the closing session of Congress from an intimate knowl- edge of appropriation figures.
 There has been no real retrench- ment, said MT. Byrns, as will be illus trated by deficiency budgets that have
 been passed and must yet be passed and that will offset so-called cuts in the departmental estimates. Further more, he averred, the Republican ma
 jority has added million dollars
 or more to the country's tax burdens
 by conducting partisan investiga-
 tions of the conduct of the war. These
 Investigations have been fruitless, have developed no fraud and have re-. suited in no legislation.
 From the very moment this Con- gress convened in extra seGion,' said MT. Byrns, Fit began to play politics in the interest of the presidential election of 1920. Instead of devoting itself to the enactment of wholesome laws, it began immediately to provide for a large number of investigating committees. It is estimated these in vestigations will cost the government more than $1, COG, coo for high salaried employees, experts, travel and other expenses, junkets and time consumed | in the departments supplying data de- manded.
 These committees have only found large sums of money were spent dur | ing the war, which everybody knew and approved at the time, that the l war was brought to a trlum phant con- ! clusion earlier than anybody antici- l pa ted, and with a minimum loss of life
 and expenditure under Democratic | administration
 l Mr. Ryrns cited figures showing that
 despite Republican claims that they l would economize when they got in control of Congress and the fiHouSter | against Dem ocratic appropriation bills as the Democrats were going out Of ! power, this Congress has imposed ob- legations and charges on the Treasury
 for the next fiscal year amounting to
 around s4. 500 900. .oo0." These appropri-
 ations, he said, were for a period two 1 years after the signing of the armls-
 ttce, when the government should be
 approaching pre-war conditions. 1 The hold-over expenses of wartime i he contended, in no sense Just1fed such large appropriation bills and l contract obligations. The total ap- 1 priations made for 1916, the year be- l fore the war. were s97s,722, 900. For l the same purposes in 1921 MT. Byrns l showed the Republican Congress
 has appropriated s2,1Ss.96o,oo 1 Even when it is considered there | are certain war hangovers, said MT, 1 Ryrns they cannot account for l more than two hundred per cent in 1 crease in ordinary expenses. An
 analysis of the appropriations. made | in other bills, which cannot be said 1 to have any connection with obliga- 1 tions growing out of the war. shows 1 there have been like increases made l in those bills for these strictly pre- 1 war activities"
 l Representative Byrns said Congress i has enacted number of appropria- , tions in varying amounts which were not asked by the administration | and do not appear in the estimates" | Granting that some of the allowances 1 may be desirable, Representative ! Byrns contended that a number of l them could and should have been postponed until the people had been l relieved of al least a portion of the 1 burdens under which they are now staggering"
 MT Byrns added that the claims