Evening star., 1920-01-07
SMOOT DECLARES
N|NE-TENTHS NOW
OVERPA|D BY j. s.

Uv[MHlU DI u. ,.
Believes RecIassifiers Will
Will Not Give Increases
Employees Are Expecting.
! Declaring that nine-tenths of the
government employees are overpaid.
not underpaid. Senator Smoot of Utah
! IN the Senate yesterday afternoon Wig
/ orouSly attacked the work of the re-
/ ciassitcation commission. He said
! that he did not believe that when the
! COMMISSIONS final report is submitted
! 70 congress it will carry recommended
| tioh for any such increases as the
employees have been led to ebelieve
/ from reports, apparently emanating
! rom the commission
: his statement to the Senate was
! made during consideration of joint
! resolution to extend the life of the
! commission until March II, in order to
permit 1t to complete its report. The
| resolution was adopted when Sena tor
| Smoot concluded his remarks. 1t had
| already passed the House and now
goes to the President for his ap-
prOVal.
FOresaw Trouble.
senator Smoot said that he knew at
the time of the creation of the re-
| claSslhcatIon commission it would
| bring trouble to the government and
dissatisfaction among employees.
This whole question: said Senator
Sm"ot. has been handled by one
/ heating: former member of Con-
SreSs from Colorado, and Luther
Steward. the head of the National
Federation of Government Employees.
| sun am going TO hope that the mem
hers of the Senate who are on that
commission viii pay little attention
I 70 the reports that have been made
through the two gentlemen I have
mentioned, and so widely published
| through the press of the country. |
nave upon my desk the clippings of
statements made through them, pub
| ilShed in Washington papers and some
OUTSIDE papers, and I want to say
! that II there ever was scheme or
propaganda started here with the
aVoWed purpose of bringing every
empioye of the government into a la
| por ofganlZatlon and making them
| IdlSsatlshed with the salaries they are
/ receiving from the government it has
oeen under the joint resolution of
| March l, 1919.
Overhears Phone Talk.
On saturday afternoon | wanted to
! get my home over the telephone /
| ,rled to get the telephone operator
! mere at the Capitol, and as I picked
| up the telephone receiver no one an
! SWered. but there were two parties
| talking on the phone. I put the re-
! celVer TO my ear. / heard at one end
! the voice of a woman, and at the other
| ehd the voice of an employe of the
Joint commission on reclasSification of
salaries, and / heard the young lady
say: Well. are you going to take
care or me? | want at least $1,000
/ The answer was: My dear. you need
not worry about $1,000. We are going
| to see that every employe of the
government gets $500
! There was colored women up at
| my house calling on our colored cook
not so very long ago, and after she
left we were informed that every
charwoman in the United States was
| going to receive 81 $50 per year from
| now on. and they were going to join
! the union, and the union was going
/ to see that the lowest salary paid by
| the government of the United States,
| no matter If it was a charwoman. and
worked only four hours a day should
! be $3.50. She asked the cook, Why
! do you work for $50 a month? Why
| don't you get in with the union, and
| get employment with the government
at salary of s1,320, with two months
! leave of absence?
in every newspaper in Washington. at
! least-and [ noticed the same thing
| in the New York papers-an article
headed. United States clerks pay
! raised - cents from 1923 to 1916
Says Statement Is Untrue.
! az do not doubt, Mr.. President. but
what the people of the United States,
seeing that bold statement. believe
that it is true. We'll, it is not true,
| and | want to make the statement
now of the facts which examinations
will show.
| The joint commission on reclassi-
! fcation of salaries in the District of
| Columbia has released for publication
/ the statement that the average sal
aries of the government clerical force
| Increased from $1.137.2S in 1928 to
! s113S in 1916. an increase of ~
cents This statement is thoroughly
misleading and, in fact involves ac
| tual distortion of the truth.
The number of employees in the
! federal service in Washington in
| 1928. and for several decades aft
| erward, was very small. Twenty
| eight years later. in 1851, according
| to writer in the Saturday Evening
| Post, issue of December 13, 1919, there
were in the whole Treasury Depart
ment only 437 employees. In the De-
partment of the Interior there were
Alb workers. In the quartermaster's
!
| Department, there were 13 employees;
in the engineering department. 6 en-
| ployes, and in the ordnance depart
ment 9. In the Navy Department
! there was total of 54 employees. In
| the Department of State there were
t27. The Postmaster General had
force of so persons, including him
self. The force of the Department
| of Justice consisted of 4.
100000 on Rolls Now.
Taken altogether the entire depart
| mental service in Washington amount
ed to about 1,100 people This was in
1851. Eleven hundred employees is
only 20 per cent of the number now
of the bureaus of the Treasury De-
partment. The total number of fed
eral employees now working in Wash
ington is bout 100, 900
| ut should be noticed however, that the
| reclaSSifcatlon commission has com
pared the salaries of the whole gov
ernment service at different dates. not
merely those of employees working in
tthe District of Columbia. The figure
! for 1916, $1,13S. of all employees with
in the retirement group in all depart
ments,' is an average salary for a
quarter of a million of government
workers, including postal carriers and
clerks and all other federal employees
scattered throughout the country.
"In 1851, and at earlier periods. the
! nature of the work performed by the
handful of employees then engaged in
| the governments business was very
| different from the work done at pres
| ent At that time. with only from
six to dozen employees in most bu-
reaus or departments, every man had
/ to he hiphIy trained and had to per-