Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1929-03-04
MANY PROBLEMS STUDIED
IN WORKING TO SUCCESS
Nearly 1000 Prominent Citizens of City
Tackled Task With Col. Grant.
Few Details Remain.


i citizens of Washington who
gathered under the leadership
Of Lieut.. Col. U. S. Grant, Sd, to ar
range the greeting Of the Capital City
and the Nation to President Herbert
Hoover and Vice President Charles Cur
It's. Weeks of arduous and painstaking
labor ended with a job well done as the
colorful units of the military and patrl-
otto societies, welfare organizations and
State units marched down Pennsylvania
avenue behind the President. The work
of the inaugural committee is virtually
completed, but certain details remain
to be cleared up before the task of or
ganizing the civic welcome to Herbert
Hoover is ended.
From the date that Col. Grant was
aupointed chairman of the inaugural
committee. on December Z, and 1mme-
diately gathered about him these volun-
tary workers on his inaugural commit
tee this group of nearly a thousand
prominent citizens worked as one man
to make the Hoover-Curtis inaugural
the complete success 1t Is shown TO be
today.
Unusual Situation Met.
At the outset the committee was faced
with the unusual situation OF Presl-
dent-elect thousands of miles away.
even while plans for his inaugural were
maturing, for Mr.. Hoover a short time
after his election in November embarked
from California on his trip through
South America and consequently was
not available for consultation as 10 MS
wishes with respect to most Oh the oe-
tails incident to his inaugural. On ms
return to Washington early In January,
however, he gave complete mdorsemenI
to the plans of the committee as OUT,
lined to him by Chairman Grant. and
the machinery of the inaugural moved
forward with renewed speed, after
period of INDIGESTION as to just how pre-
tentious the affair could be.
Reports had come to washington
from South America quoting Mr.. Hoo
yer as favoring a simple inaugural, pos
siblv less extensive than that OF Mr..
Coolidge. which babe fair for time
materially to reduce the inaugural pa
rade and seriously to curtail other fea-
lures of the civic celebration. With the
return of Mr.. Hoover to washington
and his complete approval OF all the
plans that had been made by the COM
mittee the work moved rapidly forward,
and two weeks before today's celeoratlon
all the details were we'll in hand.
Practically all that remained to be
done a fortnight ago was to complete
construction of the inaugural STANDS In
which thousands of persons sit today.
With the appointment of Col. Grant
as chairman of the committee, some
observers professed to see trend to-
ward official recognition OF the CIVIC
section of future inauguralS, with the
possibility that control of the civic END
might be centered in Government
body or group of officials, and that
Congress might ultimately enact legis-
lation placing the parade and civic
celebration under definite regulations
to be supervised by the Federal Gov
eminent. This. it was pointed out,
would at the same time place upon Con-
gress the duty of appropriating the M
augural guarantee fund heretofore
raised by the citizens OF washington,
and Congress would delegate an Official
body. possibly the War Department. to
handle it.
But Senator Arthur Capper, chair
man of the District committee OF the
Senate. and Col Grant himself saw In
the appointment of the Army of1lcer TO
the Craftsmanship of the inaugural COM
mittee not a move toward transferring
the civic part of the inaugural to Con-
gress, but simply the appointment OF an
engineer officer familiar with handling
large affairs to supervise the big job
of a civic celebration in honor OF the
incoming President. Col. Grant is a
Republican, and although he is not &C
tive in the political sense, his appoint
ment was looked upon in some quar-
tiers as reward for his many years OF
labor in the Engineer Corps. The chair
hi
head of the inaugural committee as a
welcome opportunity to embrace a line
of duty which differed materially from
his post of executive officer of the
Division of Public Buildings and Public
Parks and the many duties which that
post entails He swung into the job
with customary assiduityi revealing the
efficiency of Army training in his
handling of details, and soon after his
appointment had transformed the cha
otic mass of detail work into an orderly
routine whose parts fitted together with
the precision of well oiled machinery.
Difficulties Pointed Out.
Senator Capper believes, with Co.
Grant, that any touch of official super
vision of the end of the inaugural cere-
mony heretofore handled by the citi-
zens of Washington might reduce the
spontaneity of the civic greeting and
might conceivably run into difficulties
in the matter of appropriations, which
would seriously embarraSS the inaugural
committee Necessarily in the view OF
Col Grant, the civic celebration
under such circumstances would be
conducted along much the same
time honored lines as that OF today
But if its extent were regulated by the
Federal Government, much OF the per-
sonal contact of the citizens Of Wash
ington and the genuineneSs OF theiI
greeting would be removed. Others
point out that asCongress hostile to the
new administration could hold up an
appropriation for the inaugural until
too late to arrange many OF the details
For the inaugural committee func-
tons in a financial way In addition tc
arranging most of the details of the
civic greeting to the new President
Grandstands must be contracted for
decorations purchased and supervised
together with the assumption of many
more financial responsibilities. There
is always the possibility of damage suit:
against the committee. For these pur'
poses a fund of more than 100000 wa!
raised by the commlCIee III charge VI
he celebration today, donated by public
spirited Washingtonians and friends o.
the incoming Chief Executive, as
guaranty measure that the committed
might not find itself paralyzed for lacl
of funds. Most of this amount ma!
be paid back from receipts of sales O.
tickets in the lengthy stretch of grand
stands, and the committee hopes re
ceipts may be large enough to pa.
back the guarantors 100 per cent, a.
was done on the occasion of the Cool
idge inaugural.
Early in the marshaling of the plan
for the parade the possibility Of a
inaugural ball was injected into tn
discussion. But Mr.. Hoover followe
precedent of recent years in not wish
ing to attend an inaugural ball, an
the project to make the ball an ON
cial affair graced by the presence c
G,--