Evening star., 1942-08-27
Letters to the Editor
Discusses Need for Transportation
Authority Seen From Suitland Angle.

Discusses Need for Transportation
Authority Seen From Suitland Angle.
To the Editor Of The STAR
AS regular reader of your paper. I
wish to give enthusiastic Endorsement
to your timely editorial of Saturday.
August %, entitled "A Transportation
Authority"
Why do not other newspapers dare to
deal with such important local problems?
1t Is indeed travesty on administra-
ton OF the Federal Government in
Washington for the OPA to rule that
the Census Bureau is not an essential
war industry, so that the workers at
Suitland are not entitled to &C" gasoline
ration cards to get to and from work.
But this is only one of the impositions
on those employees
No informed person, from Leon Hen
derson down through the latest recently
imported college professor, can sustain
the position that the Census Bureau is
not essential to war industry Director
Capt has publicly announced that about
IS per cent of the Bureaus activities
relate directly to war work. Any one
caring to know the truth of this state
ment could verify 1t without difficulty,
either by casual inquiry or by an in
spection of Suitland and other offices
of the bureau.
The travesty lies in having some up
start in OPA given the power to make
ruling which involves Weighing the
bureaus services. A qualified, perma-
nent, impartial agency, such as the
Budget Bureau, should have this au-
thority. Congress, after careful investi-
cation, has voted the bureau funds,
even in wartime, because it realizes
the value of the bureau. If any phase
Of the bureaus work is deemed nom
essential, the Budget Bureau can i'm
pound portion of the appropriation.
The bureau is a statistical agency
the largest in the world; and the place
OF statistics, in wartime as in peace
time, is recognized by all nations. Facts
always were and always will be neces-
sary for administrative control and guild
ance and determination of policy. For
this reason, all our war agencies have
established statistical departments on an
unprecedented scale.
One conjures up new war agencies
like the OPA calling in college pro-
fessors, who may get $1,000 at home, and
paying them $4,000 here to do some task.
They haven't the faintest notion of gov
ernmental operation on the scale of
the Federal Government. They become
bloated with their self-appraised i'm
portance in their new jobs. What do
they do? Under the guise of essential
war work, they devise lot of expert
ments to be tried out on John @. Tax
payer, and they learn about public ad-
ministration-at public expense.
All the while there are available quail
fed men in many of the departments in
Washington, trained in administration,
fully competent to do the responsible
work of these new agencies. Civil serv-
Ice can supply their names. Even the
Census Bureau has it's quota AS evil
dence, look at the successful records of
those who have been transferred from
the Census Bureau - not to mention
those in the bureau now engaged on
essential war work.
OF course, not all the professors are
In Washington. Some are continuing to
serve on the home front And, inter-
estingly enough, this applies to such
universities as Syracuse, Michigan,
Wayne, Texas. Minnesota, California
and others where the principles of pub
lie administration are being taught in
strong departments OF political science.
Hundreds of census workers are ready
and willing to transfer to more essential
war work. Why is this not done? It is
not the fault OF the workers, who are
just as loyal and competent as the
swivel-chair patriots OF the OPA. A
census OF census workers would prove
this assertion. That they have been