The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1907-1939, 1922-03-03
OPPOSE PLAN
TO REARRANCE
DEPARTMENTS
Bureau Heads, Politicians and
Clerks Against Consolida-
tion-Differ on Forest Ser
vice Transfer.
AFRAID JOBS WILL GO
by MARK SULLIVAN

WASHINGTON, March 3-The plan
for the reorganization of the govern
ment seems to have halted. and with !
each day of delay the aggregate OF in
Vulnerable oppositions to it grows
stronger.
When the Republicans came intol
power year ago, Mr.. Harding took
the enterprise up energetically. He
appointed Walter F. Brown of Toledo,
Ohio, to lay out the plan.
The theory was that he was to re-
arrange the various bureaus and de-
partments of the governments as a
private business corporation would
have them. with an eye to logical or
der and economical efficiency.
The government as a business in
stitution had been growing for 130
years without order or symmetry
Congress had been adding bureau
here and a bureau there until the
whole of it looked like an irregular
mass of barnacles had had the waste
fulness that would attend such a lack
OF system.
Admirable Plan.
Mr.. Brown spent about 10 months
in investigation. He sought the as
sistance of Secretary Hoover, post
master general Hayes General Dawes
and various others familiar with the
problem and capable of advising on it
wisely. In the end Mr.. Brown en-
Volved a report and plan which is
described by most OF the disinterested
who are familiar with it as admirable.
Mr.. Brown gave his report to Mr..
Harding, and it has been on the
Presidents desk for some time 1t is
understood the President expects to
submit it himself to Congress with
any notifications he may want to
make, in the near future. The re-or-
ganization plan has merely been wait
ing on the Presidents leisure until
after he should have made his ship
subsidy report to Congress.
Unhappily. in the meantime world
of opposition has developed. The
chief change proposed in the plan, it
is reported. is the combining of the
war and navy departments into one
department to bear as its name the de-
partment of national defense.
Although this is said TO be the only
instance in which the combining of
two cabinet departments is recon-
mended, IL is not the case that has
aroused the most violent opposition.
The most energetic protest has arisen
over the suggestion that the forestry
service should be transferred from the
department of agriculture, where it
now is, 10 the interior department
Differ on Forest Service
This would seem to be a logical
change in-as-much as the interior is
the department supposed to admins
ter the national domain, and already
has jurisdiction over the national
PARKS, the reclamation service. Alas
kan matters, the indian bureau. and
the general land office. But the for
e.try service seems to have devel-
oped a distinct Discrimination to be
weaned from the department of agri-
culture. which has been its parent
ever since it was started Also. the
department of agriculture has shown
some sense of outrage at being de-
priyed of its child.
The forestry service has always been
a stormy petrol since the time of Gift
ford Pinchot and the Ballinger case.
And lot of persons outside the gov
crnment have stirred themselves into
partisan opposition Just now the
farm bloc in Congress seems more
disposed TO enlarge the department OF
agriculture by giving it functions now
carried on by other departments than
to let their. department lose anything
Many of the other changes recon-
mended in the Brown report have eX
cited similar opposition. lnasmuch as
every clerk who is made fearful oi
he possibility OF dismissal for him
relt in the proposed consultations
ha3 his own congressman. The aggre
r"te of the opposition Will be formid
able.
Could Run Over Congress.
Mr. Harding can only recommend
The plan TO congress, and congress
has shown no such disposition TO fol
low the Presidents leadership a.
would justify confident hope of sue
cess for this move toward econom,
and efficiency. The time to have this
change was during the first months o
the administration, when the presiden
had the maximum of ascendacy ovel
congress, and before heads of depart
ments had had time to develop senti
mentS of jealous proprietorship. New
ertheless. this is so good an innovation
that il the president should care t
call on the country for support h.
could probably run over congress.
The immediate savings of casl
through the Brown plan would be con
siderable, and the ultimate saving
through increased efficiency would rur
into hundreds of millions.
copyrighted, 1922 by New York
Evening Post, Inc.