Evening star., 1937-02-19
BATTLE TO SHIFT
c. A. A.0.P0WERS TO
EXECUTIVE BEGINS
Administration Forces Begin
Determined Drive in Joint
Committee.
STIFF FIGHT is SEEN
ON POST-AUDIT PLAN
Elimination of Controller Gen.
erals Office Seen as Blow to
Congress Financial Control.

SOIS lCS0 L 4ud1kC1dk SUutlU1s
The fight already has started in the
Joint Committee on Government Or
ganization over the Presidents pro-
posal to take the Office of controller
general and the general accounting
office away from Congress and turn
these functions over to the executive
branch. There has been only one wit
ness before the joint committee
Chairman Brownlow Of the Presi-
dents. Committee on Administrative
Management. The sessions have been
executive.
Already it has developed that the
most urgent drive-if not the only OBJ
jective Of the administrations forces
in the present session of Congress-is
to abolish the Office of controller gen.
eral. AS the Presidents message to
Congress on January II put it: And
restore to the Executive complete re-
sposibility for accounts and current
transactions" and providing post
audit of all fiscal transactions by an
auditor general"
The office of controller general Is
responsible directly and solely to Con-
gress for pre-audit on expenditures.
The recommendation of President
Roosevelt to give Congress a post-audit
agent in the auditor general is viewed
as a "sop" to the legislative branch
and, in effect, locking the barn after
the horse is stolen" As one minority
member emphasized in the conference,
such an audit is in the nature of a
post-mortem.
Both Sides Determined.
This phase Of the Presidents reor-
ganization program is the one point
on which Congress is determined to
buck. It seems to be the issue on
which the administration, with its
packed joint committee, seems deter
mined to force first action.
1t Is the biggest issue in the entire
reorganization program as outlined by
the President. If the President wins
out on this the rest should be easy sail
Ing for him. But, Senator Byrd of
Virginia, a member of the Joint COM
m1ttee who sponsored the original
motion for reorganization study, can
not support the administration pro-
poSal and maintain strict consistency
because it is directly contrary to the
reform he set up as Governor Of Vir-
ginia in reorganization of the State
government. There he made the audit
ing authority directly responsible to
the legislature Nor can the admin.
astration, consistently, have the sup
port Of the Brookings Institution,
which was hired jointly by the Presi-
dents committee and the Senate and
House committees on reorganization
to make study of the executive agen-
cies, and which has made its first
sectional report to the Byrd Commit
tee on Government Financial Agen-
cies. Brookings Institution claims an
achievement in its assistance in draft
ing the bill providing for establishment
OF the Federal budget system"
Two Parts to Act.
The budget and accounting act of
1921 contained two distinct parts
the one providing for the establish
ment Of a budget system for the ma
tional Government, and the other for
an Independent general accounting
office, presided over by a controller
general, which in addition to taking
over the duties then performed by the
Controller Of the Treasury and the six
auditors for the departments, had i'm
posed on it other exceedingly impor-
tant functions. These two parts of
the act had the common purpose of
strengthening and making more effec-
tive general, or overhead control of
the administration of Federal fiscal
affairs.
Part II of the act, having to do with
the establishment of the General Ac-
counting Office. sought to strengthen
the hands Of Congress in performing
Its duties as q board of directors by
giving in an agency which should be
Independent Of the executive depart
ments and directly responsible to
Congress, through which it could as
sure itself that its orders as contained
In general statutes and appropriation
acts were being complied with rigidly.
A Brookings Institution publication
emphasizes the correlation and dis
tinct purposes of the two sections of
the budget and accounting act, say
Ing:
1.-THE two agencies-the Bureau Of
the Budget and the General Account
ing Of1ce-thus constitute two great
organs for financial control, the one
serving as an agency for executive
control and the other as an agency
for legislative cnYtrol -