Evening star., 1945-10-05


partment and the weight of the
work which he, now in his late
Sos, has taken on. As they see
1t. the chances of foregathering as
Of old with this singularly charm
ing and companionable man are
slim, indeed. For the duties that
recently have been piled on him
certainly make him, next to the
President, the most heavily bur-
dened oficial In the Government.
Compared to him, other cabinet
members will be relatively unem-
ployed.
This Is not altogether because we
have emerged from the war the
richest and most powerful world
power upon whom rests the respon-
sibility of leadership in the effort
10 insure peace through inter-
national cooperation and to whom
many stricken nations look for help
In regaining their economic health.
Naturally, this situation imposes
problems Of foreign policy such as
no other Secretary Of State has had
to deal with. 1t means constant
conferences and consultations, long
journeys to all parts of the world,
wrestling with difficult men who
speak strange languages, engaging
In unavoidable controversies and
meeting crisis after crisis. All Of
this is clearly enough to absorb
fully the time and tax the endur-
ance Of any. man.
Burdened with Other Agencies.
But that is not all by any means.
For reasons neither clear nor con-
vincing various domestic agencies
with which the State Department
never had anything to do have now
been transferred to 1t. In addition
to absorbing the owl, the OSS, the
ONES Of Inter-American Affairs,
the Foreign Economic Administra-
ton, the department is expected to
hquidabe the Nations $43, 3,000, 600 900
lease-lend accounts and to dispose
of between $4,000, ,000, 900 and $9, ,000,-
100000 Of surplus war material,
which the Army and Navy have
left abroad. Altogether, a total Of
some $1,000 employees have been
added to the department payrolls
in the last month. And it has been
given functions which utterly trans
form 1t from the policy-making body
It used to be.
The interesting thing is that all
this had been done while Mr.. Byrnes
was away. Upon his return he finds
the department doubled in size. In
stead Of conflning itself to foreign
policy making, 1t will have entered
the fields of business, publicity and
intelligence in big way. No longer
will 1t be the smallest department.
Six years ago 1t had 4,e60~ employees;
now 1t has $4,000. -
Budget Raised 81 Million.
It's budget In 1899 was Is million.
This year 1t Is So million and next
year will be very much larger-un-
less Congress balks. The originator
of all this expansion is not entirely
clear. How much Mr.. Byrnes has
had TO do with it personally Is un-
certain. Some of 1t surely will come
as . surprise to him. Perhaps he
will like 1t and perhaps 1t will not.
At any rate he Is saddled with q
good deal more work than any pre-
vious Secretary of State has had.
Not anticipating this, naturally, he
is without the kind of organization
essential to handle it. If the de-
partment is to function efiiciently
In all these fields with a payroll Of
$4,000, clearly what it needs is o.
f1rst-class administrator.
Now, Mr.. Byrnes is a talented and
able man, but his best friends do not
claim that he Is an administrator.
Dean Acheson and Ben Cohen are
perhaps, brilliant young lawyers but
administration is not their dish.
6everal minor administrators for
The separate agencies are being
brought In, but the obvious need Is
for . real administrator of expert
ence at the top. He Just Is not there
Assistant Secretary Clayton is quail
sfied all right but he has his hands
very full, indeed, and, anyhow. has
no authority to administer, outside
his particular area.
Depressing State Of Affairs.
70 1t Is q rather depressing state of
affairs and it is not surprising that
Mr.. Byrnes' friends are concerned
Mr. pvrpae hos 3,,et ,~&,,..~s 80