New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1921-06-24
Dawes to Ask SO
Business Men to
W ork ON Bud get
As Soon as He Detrains
at Washington General
Makes ''Let's Co!'' the
Slogan for Department
Will Use Army Methods
Sees Harding, and Perslling
Lets Him Have Military
Office for a Conference
Front The Tribune's Washington Bureau

y
| WASHINGTON, June 23.--Thas slo-
gan of the A. E. f., Lets got" was
put into practice to-day with the ar
rival of former Brigadier General
Charles G. Dawes to assume his du-
ties as Director Of the Budget. The
Chicago banker was prevailed upon by
the President to take the post as pa
triotic duty and to inject into the new
budget organization the same energy
and driving power which the general
| instilled into the S 0 S for the army
in France.
Things began to happen as soon as
General Dawes arrived. His collar wilt
ed first. He conferred with the Presi-
dent at $3.50 a. M, later selected the
four men the law allows him as assist
ants, took few shots at Congress and
the Civil Service and issued lengthy
statement.
He announced that he would call for
fifty volunteers among the big busi-
ness men of the country to aid him in
starting the new business machinery
of the government.
Upon leaving the White House he
hurried over to the War Department
and into the Office of his old friend,
General Pershing. There he conducted
a brief meeting with three of the men
who are to serve as assistants. They
include William T. Abbott, vice-presi-
dent of the Central Trust Company of
Chicago, who will serve as acting as
sistant director pending the appoint
ment of q permanent assistant; Colo
mel I. G. Hoop, of New York, and Fran
els j. Kilkenny, of the Central Trust
Company of Chicago.
viii Borrow Officers
General Dawes will ask the War De-
partment to lend him two officers who
were associated with him in the A. E..
F.-General George Van Horn Moseley
and Colonel Henry C. Smither, both of
whom were assistant chiefs Of staff
The Budget Commission later will be
assigned Offices in the Treasury De-
partment, but General Dawes had to
conduct meeting to-day, and there
fore received permission from General
Pershing to call it on the spot. So in
terested was General Dawes in the
business of getting started that he
went without breakfast. In the lengthy
statement given out he reviewed the
situation as it exists to-day, pointed
out the evils to be overcome and the
problems to be met His comments on
certain phases of government operation
of departments are Illuminating. Re-
ferring to $225,000 appropriated by
Congress for the budget work, he said:
From this appropriation, besides the
assistant director of the budget, he
(the director of the budget) can en-
ploy for this stupendous work only
four men of his own selection at not
more than $4,000 each. For the rest of
his force he is compelled to take his
chance on men to be certified to him by
the Civil Service Commission. One
might as we'll be handed toothpick
with which to tunnel Pixies Peak.
t'Pitiful Machinery"
"It is evident that if this, the great
est business crisis which our govern
ment has ever confronted, is TO be
properly met, chief reliance will have
to be placed upon something else than
the pitiful machinery provided by law
with which to exercise the wide powers
extended to the budget bureau"
General Dawes pointed out that the
President had asked him to head bu-
reau whose first and most important
duty is to suggest an alternative bud
get-a more economical budget-for
the fiscal year ending June 80, 1923.
(Contnued on next pags}