The Brattleboro daily reformer. (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1913-1955, 1921-04-18
BY DAVID LAWRENCE.

Brainy Head for that job
49,. BY DAVID LAWRENCE.
Especial Despatch to The Reformer)
Copyright 1921.
WASHINGTON. April 1S.-The big
geSt job in the government service still
untitled is the commissionership of inter
nal revenue. And the various influences
fighting for and against various candi-
dates constitute the most spectacular con-
test for a government post that the ia
tional capital has witnessed in a long time.
Judging by the activities Of the vets
and "dryS, one would suppose that the
commissioner of internal revenue has the
power to make the country moist or
arid" according to his own thirst or the
desire of his friends. The Anti Saloon
league is on the job. working in its usual
effective way to prevent the appointment
of anyone who Is in the least degree UNI
friendly to the enforcement of the prOhi-
bition laws. Politicians who imagine that
a stand IN with the commissioner of in
ternal revenue will be a powerful lever
in local politics, especially since there
will be so many collectors of internal rev
enue to appoint are displaying more in
terest in the selection of Il commissioner
than they did over the secrctaryship of
the treasury itself
QuaIIilcatI0HS Are secondary.
But the thing which nobody seems to be
stresSing-indeed one hears very little
about it from any quarters that the
commissioner of internal revenue must be
an administrative officer of executive tai
entS and must really collect the taxes for
the nation-practically all of four billion
dollars a year must go through his Office
I in one form or another.
The public generally has been irritated
over the income tax law and has demanded
not merely that taxes shall be lowered.
but that an understandable income tax
, blank be drafted and the auditing of in
come tax returns be expedited. 1t hap
pens in many cases that the income tax
auditors opened up business accounts two
and three years after the return itself
has been made. The disturbing effect of
slow auditing has already been felt in
business. Under the strain of wartime,
the two mmisSiOncrS-Daniel G. Roper
and William Williams-have done a
splendid job. but their troubles in keep
ing experienced personnel were manifold.
Congress has a habit of cutting off appro-
prlatiOnS from government bureaus which
most need them and it was not always an
easy way for the internal revenue eStab-
liShment to get from congress the help
that was needed With the two branches
of the government of the some POLITICAL
party, that task will be easier. Yet the
big job of the commissioner of internal
u
but administration of the income tax
laws.
Business Indifferent to DryS.
The next congress will go before the
people for reelection a year from next
autumn and viii have to answer on qucS-
tons of taxation. What the business men
of the country are interested in is an eff
Gent administrator in the internal rev
enue office and most of them do not care
in the slightest whether the appointee Is
wet or dry.
As u matter of fact. the actual enforce
ment of prohibition has been in the hands
of a prohibition commissioner. who is a
subordinate of the commissioner of inter
nal revenue and there are so many regula-
tiOnS which restrict the activities of the
bureau that the opportunity for diScre-
tionary action is not as great as it has
been. In any event, the chance for
Is very much exaggerated. The job is SO
big and there are so many people work
ing in the bureau that no conspiracy to
evadc the prohibition laws could be car
ried on without a knowledge of it by the
general public, and then the influences of
public sentiment are always powerful
enough to bring the batter to the atten-
ton of the president himself, if necessary.
Politics Us. Ability.
The national capital is expecting an ap-
noIntment of n commissioner of internal
revenue in a few days. If Secretary of the
Treasury has his way, the country will
get an able administrator. If the politi-
clans are supreme. the job viii become
part of the spoils of the campaign and the
personnel of the internal revenue officers
throughout the nation will be political,
Just as was very largely the case under
the democratic administration.