Evening star., 1937-01-12
Summary Of Committees Report

service within year. Unless designated as tempo.
rary" policy determining by executive order all
Federal positions will covered into the civil service
Those persons in these positions will not be given
civil service status however without taxing quaniy
ing examination given by the civil service admin
istrNtor and without being certified by their director
having rendered satisfactory service in their posts
The Civil Service Commission, which has been
the policeman civil service since 1883, abolished
The administrative duties transferred to the civil
Service Administrator, who though appointed by the
PRESIDENT is himself selected on the basis Of competi-
tive examination, while the protection of the system
from politics be enforced by unpaid citizen
board composed of seven members with sevep-year
overlapping and provided with funds for inves-
tigation The Civil Service Board says the committee
for which the President can secure the ablest men
and women of the country drawn from business, ad-
ministraton education, the professions, labor and
finance, will be "the watchdog Of the merit system
Under the program Of the committee 1t would be
impossible to appoint to this board any person who
Is party committeeman, who has held or run for
political ONCE within hve years.
The Committee on Administrative Management
also condemns all other boards and commissions when
used for management, and recommends that they be
abolished and their work transferred to the regular
departments in which there would be set-up wherever
needed, commission board to deal exclusively with
the judicial phases OF the work. The committee points
out that the independent commissions have been
created the last so and that they
threaten in time to become "a headless fourth branch
of the Government, not contemplated by the Con-
sttution and not responsible admnistratvely either
to the President to the Congress- or to the courts
Managerial Agencies
Need Strengthening.
The budgeting and planning are, together with
personnel three managerial agencies which should
be strengthened in the opinion of the committee 1t
is pointed that the Bureau OF the Budget was by
supposed to engage in efficiency research and TO
promote economy, but that the whole Budget Bureau
spends only sls7oo0 year, though 1t is responsible
for dealing with budgets of billions. The committee
recommends that the staff Of the bureau be expanded
{rop1a atelv o.
its efficiency research division which will advise the
President in reaSsgnng and reorganzng the Work OF
the executive branch under the recommended program
Planning has been carried thus far through
temporary National Resources Committee and through
many interdepartmental State and local planning
commissions and committees The committee insists
that this should be made permanent by the establish
ment Of National Resources Board. This board would
be advisory only would work directly under the
President assist him in thinking broadly about the
state of the Nation" dealing particularly with PROB
lens which cut departmental and Jurlsdctlonal
lines The board would continue to rely on interde-
partmental committees and would encourage State ana
local planning bodies The committee believes that the
main purpose of planning in America should be to bring
into the center of government more intelligence re-
search and long-range thinking about all our related
problems especially those dealing with water, land and
natural resources that the Congress and the Pres
dent may, in determining policy and carrying on the
Government make better Job Of it, and so that the
Federal Government and the States and localities may
work together effectively in dealing with common
problems.
Executive Accountability
Has Been Ineffective.
Accountability of the executive branch to the
Congress the committee maintains, has been confused
and ineffective in the past because OF the TACT tnat
the Controller General has endeavored to control
the spending policy of the departments. This the
committee regards AN unconstitutional usurpation
Of power and recommends the abolition of the ONCE
and the establishment of q new ONCE OF auditor
general to do what the controller was supposed but
failed to do for Is years. namely give Congress an
independent annual audit and a report on illegal
transactions. The committee does not blame any
person for this failure but that the system as set
up by law was impossible from business standpoint,
and certainly unconstitutional If what has happened
under the law actually contemplated The committee
points out that the dangers of the law were recognized
before adoption by Gov. Frank O. Lowden, Secretary
of the Treasury Carter Glass and other experts and
since its enactment by President Hoover and by the
committee Federal expenditures of the United States
Chamber Of Commerce.
In line with these criticisms the committee recon-
mends that there be post-audit, by an independent
auditor (taking part whatsoevei in making admin
istrative decisions, reporting illegal and wastefu
practices directly to the policy determining body that
is the Congress, would be done in any American
business concern. Current administrative audit is
transferred the Treasury, under guidance on legal
matters by the Attorney General and the business Of
keeping the accounting system up to date is intrusted
the Treasury where it be related to the budget
system.
American People Must
Appreciate Advantages.
In its conclusion, the Committee on Administrative
Management summarizes its fve-pont program for
undermining the executive branch and says:
These changes cannot be adopted and main
tanned unless the American people itself fully appreciates
the advantages of good management and insists upon
getting them. The need for reorganization rests not
alone the idea of savings, considerable they will
be, but upon better service to society. The times
demand better governmental organization stated with
competent public servants, free to do their
best and co-ordnated by executive accountable to
the Congress- and fully equipped with modern tools of
management"
The Presidents Committee on Administrative
Management which today submitted its report to the
President, appointed last May. 1t is made of:
Louis Brownow of Chicago director of the Public
Administration Clearing House chairman; Luther
Guck of New York director of the Institute of Public
Administration, and Charles E. Merriam of Chicago.
chairman of the Department of Political Science of
the University of Chicago. Its director Of research is
Joseph p Harris of the staff Of the Committee on
Public Administration Of the Social Science Research
Council