Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1925-09-27

would be found to possess well established ideas
OF what was before HIM The functions OF
the Shipping Board and the Emergency Fleet
are not unfamiliar to him. AS busy as he Is
with other matters he has found time to make
a careful study of these warning agencies.
In addition, his knowledge was broadened when
he served a member of the special commit
tee. principally of cabinet officers, appointed
by the President in the Winter Of 1924, to
study and make report and recommends
tons on matters affecting the American mer.
chant marine. This committee also considered
matters respecting the future policy Of the
merchant marine and according to its subse
quent report, went into different phases Of the
question.
Among other things this committee agreed
with the recommendation of President Coolidge
In his message to Congress that the Emergency
Fleet Corporation should be completely sepa-
rated from the Shipping Board; that in affecting
this separation the board should be restored to
its original status of semi judicial regulatory
body for the merchant marine whole and
that the custody and operation of all shipping
and shipping properties should be transferred
to the Emergency Fleet Corporation. AS for the
promotion functions, economic investigations
and the like, the special committee recommend
ed that these be transferred to the Department
of Commerce.
The negotiation and sale of the shipping
should rest entirely in the Emergency Fleet
Corporation, subject to approval of the board Of
directors, the committee also recommended.
Although Mr.. Hoovers opinions regarding the
adjustment of the board and the placing of all
Its and the Emergency Fleet Corporations func-
tons in the Department of Commerce, are not
known now. it Is known that he believes much
could be accomplished if the next Congress saw
fit to carry out the recommendations made by
the special committee of which he
ber
Known Views of Hoover.
Mr.. Hoover makes no secret of the fact that
he believes the Shipping Board should function
only a semi-judtcial body and should not be
intrusted, is now the case, with purely adj
ministrative functions. The latter is exactly the
reverse of the basic principles of sound admins
tration, he contends. In this connection he
CUES further that boards and commissions are
soundly adapted to the deliberate processes
necessary to semi judicial and semi-legislative
and advisory functions, but that they abb
solutely hopeless where decisive administrative
action is necessary, is the case in operating
the merchant marine. He contends that there is
not single successful business organization in
the country that confuses such functions the
way do in the Federal Government.
The Shipping Board, in the opinion of Secre-
tary Hoover is a glaring example of this con-
fusion of basic principles. BY way of explaining
this. Mr.. Hoover contends that the board was
originally created body to regulate rates
md abolish discrimination in ocean going traffic.
These he describes semf-judical functions
that We're very properly intrusted to the board
but, political jealousies and sectional jealousies
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