SUNDRY CIVIL BILL.

EXTRACT FROM THE REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS REPORTING THE SUNDRY CIVIL APPROPRIATION BILL TO THE HOUSE, JUNE 3, 1912.

IMPROVING METHODS OF PUBLIC BUSINESS.

In the sundry civil act for the fiscal year 1911 an appropriation was made of $100,000 to enable the President to employ experts for the purpose of investigating and improving methods of transacting the public business in the several executive departments of the Government. For the present fiscal year $75,000 additional was appropriated for the same purpose, and provision was made for a report to Congress at its first regular session of this Congress and not later than December 31, 1911. The report was to have set forth the progress made and the results attained, and such recommendations as were deemed advisable were required to be submitted thereon.

It was believed that if conditions were disclosed in the several executive departments which were archaic, or inefficient, or obsolete, and the required changes could not be made by executive action alone, but necessitated legislation, that the Congress, by having the information at a sufficiently early date in this session, might be in a position to consider carefully and intelligently the various recommendations submitted. The reports anticipated were not submitted to Congress within the time fixed. A number of reports were prepared, but for various reasons it was deemed advisable by the President to submit many of them to the departments and other Government establishments affected thereby before making any recommendations based thereon. The result has been that the information and recommendations based thereon reached Congress too late to permit of that consideration which the revolutionary and farreaching character of many of the recommendations demanded.

The committee is convinced that many reforms in the methods of transacting the public business in the executive departments and other governmental establishments are imperatively required. If accomplished, greatly increased efficiency in the public service would result and the public business would be conducted for very much less money than at present. The committee in the several bills reported has recommended many reforms originating in investigations conducted by the committee, all of them designed to improve the public service and at the same time lessen the cost thereof. If all are adopted, as it is believed they will be if impartially examined and thoroughly understood, a new era of efficient administration will be marked in the history of our country.

It was not expected that in a single session every reform resulting in proper retrenchments could be adopted. The committee believes that its action thus far is an earnest of the spirit in which the work has been undertaken, and indicates that it will be conducted vigorously to completion.

WEDNESDAY, MAY 15, 1912.

STATEMENT OF MR. F. A. CLEVELAND, CHAIRMAN, ACCOMPANIED BY MESSRS. W. F. WILLOUGHBY, W. W. WARWICK, AND FRANK J. GOODNOW, MEMBERS OF THE COMMISSION, AND MR. M. O. CHANCE, SECRETARY.

ORGANIZATION.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Cleveland, we have an estimate of $75,000 for the next fiscal year for what is known as the President's Commission on Economy and Efficiency. Will you please state your present organization?

Mr. CLEVELAND. The present organization is a chairman, four commissioners, a secretary, and the staff-58.

The CHAIRMAN. Does that include the commission and secretary? Mr. CLEVELAND. Fifty-eight includes the commission and secretary. The commission, according to the letter of authorization of the President, is made up of the chairman, secretary, and four commissioners.

The CHAIRMAN. That is, the letter transmitted by the President to Congress?

Mr. CLEVELAND. No; the letter to his secretary organizing the commission under the act authorizing him to conduct the inquiry.

The CHAIRMAN. Is the compensation of these officers the same as contained in your letter to the President under date of January 29, 1912?

Mr. CLEVELAND. It is.

[Senate Document No. 294, Sixty-second Congress, second session.]

February 5, 1912.-Read, referred to the Committee on Appropriations, and ordered to be printed.

To the Senate:

In response to the resolution of the Senate dated January 25, 1912, I transmit herewith, for the information of the Senate, a letter from Mr. F. A. Cleveland, chairman of the President's Commission on Economy and Efficiency, giving the names of the members and officers of the commission, their ages, what official positions, if any, they have held, and the salaries they are receiving in their present positions.

THE WHITE HOUSE, February 5, 1912.

WM. H. TAFT.

The PRESIDENT:

WASHINGTON, January 29, 1912.

Complying with your request for a memorandum setting forth the names of the members and officers of the President's Commission on Economy and Efficiency, their ages, what official positions, if any, they have held, and the salaries they are receiving in their present positions, the following is submitted:

Frederick A. Cleveland, chairman.-Age, 46. Salary as chairman of the President's Commission on Economy and Efficiency, $10,000 per annum; appointed March 8, 1911. Official positions previously held: Instructor of finance, University of Pennsylvania, 1900 to 1902; professor of finance, School of Commerce, Accounts, and Finance, New York University, 1903 to 1905; member of commission on finance and taxation appointed by Mayor McClellan, of the city of New York, 1905 to 1906; member of committee appointed by Comptroller Metz for the revision of accounts and administrative methods of New York, 1907 to 1908; member of committee on office methods and practices, appointed by Controller Prendergast, city of New York; director bureau of municipal research, Philadelphia; director bureau of municipal research, New York City. William F. Willoughby.-Age 44. Salary as member of the President's Commission on Economy and Efficiency, $6,000 per annum; appointed March 8, 1911. Official positions previously held: Expert, Department of Labor, 1890 to 1901; treasurer of Porto Rico, 1901 to 1907; secretary of Porto Rico and president of the Executive Council of Porto Rico, 1907 to 1909; Assistant Director of the Census, 1909 to 1911.

Walter W. Warwick.-Age 43. Salary as member of the President's Commission on Economy and Efficiency, $6,000 per annum; appointed April 20, 1911. Official positions previously held: Clerk to United States circuit judge, 1892 to 1893; confidential clerk, law clerk, and chief law clerk, Treasury Department, 1893 to 1898, and 1905 to 1908; deputy auditor Isthmian Canal Commission

(Washington office), 1904 to 1905; examiner of accounts of the Isthmian Canal Commission and auditor of the government of the Canal Zone (on duty on the Isthmus), 1908 to 1911; appointed associate justice of the Supreme Court of the Canal Zone, 1911. (Did not enter on duties of office last named because of appointment as member of the commission.)

Frank J. Goodnow.-Age 53. Salary as member of the President's Commission on Economy and Efficiency, $6,000 per annum; appointed April 20, 1911. Official positions previously held: Professor of law, Columbia University, New York, since 1883; member of commission appointed by Gov. Roosevelt in 1900 to revise the charter of the city of New York; member of commission on finance and taxation appointed by Mayor McClellan, of the city of New York, 1905; member of commission appointed by Mayor Gaynor to inquire into the causes of congestion of population in New York, 1910; delegate of the United States Government to the first Congress of Administrative Science, at Brussels, 1910. Harvey S. Chase.-Age 50. Salary as member of the President's Commission on Economy and Efficiency, $40 per day while on duty at Washington, without cost to the Government for traveling and personal expenses, the total cost per annum not to exceed $6,000; appointed June 30, 1911. Official positions previously held: Consulting expert in the installation of uniform systems of accounting for the State of Ohio, 1902; expert for finance commission of the city of Boston, 1908 to 1910; expert for governor of State of Massachusetts, 1910 to 1911; president of Massachusetts Society of Public Accountants; trustee and member of executive committee of American Association of Public Accountants.

Merritt O. Chance, secretary.-Age 42. Salary as secretary of the President's Commission on Economy and Efficiency, $6,000 per annum; appointed March 8, 1911. Official positions previously held: Assistant messenger, Post Office Department, 1888; clerk, War Department, 1890; clerk, Post Office Department, 1891 to 1894; clerk and private secretary to Fourth Assistant Postmaster General, 1895 to 1899; chief clerk, Fourth Assistant Postmaster General, 1899 to 1901; private secretary to the Secretary of War, 1901 to 1904; superintendent of post-office supplies, Post Office Department, 1904; chief clerk, Post Office Department, 1905 to 1908; auditor for the Post Office Department, 1908 to 1911. Very respectfully,

F. A. CLEVELAND, Chairman.

The CHAIRMAN. Do the members of the commission devote all their time to this work?

Mr. CLEVELAND. All except Mr. Chase. It may be said, however, that the chairman has an arrangement, made at the time he came here, by which he was to be permitted to be absent at such times as would be necessary to attend to work in New York and Philadelphia for which he had assumed responsibility, the understanding being that he would relieve himself of that work as quickly and as far as possible. The chairman has been absent a few days during the last year, and Mr. Chase, one of the commissioners, by special arrangement, was expected to be here not more than half of the time.

The CHAIRMAN. He is paid $40 a day while on duty, but not to exceed $6,000 a year?

Mr. CLEVELAND. That was the arrangement, with the specific understanding that he would pay all his own personal expenses in coming to and going from Washington, as well as while in Washington. He is subject to the call of the commission.

The CHAIRMAN. Which members, if any, of the commission and staff were in the Government service when assigned to this work? Mr. CLEVELAND. Mr. Chance, the secretary; Mr. Willoughby; and Mr. Warwick.

The CHAIRMAN. Mr. Chance was the Auditor for the Post Office Department?

Mr. CLEVELAND. He was.

The CHAIRMAN. Where had Mr. Willoughby been employed before he came in?

Mr. CLEVELAND. He had been Assistant Director of the Census immediately before coming here. He had previous to that time been secretary of state of Porto Rico and had held various other offices. The CHAIRMAN. And Mr. Warwick?

Mr. CLEVELAND. He held the position of examiner of accounts of the Isthmian Canal Commission and auditor for the Panama Canal Zone. Immediately before being appointed to this position he had been appointed associate justice of the Supreme Court of the Canal Zone.

The CHAIRMAN. Did these gentlemen resign and were they then appointed to these positions?

Mr. CLEVELAND. They resigned to accept these appointments. The CHAIRMAN. The reason I ask is that the language of the provision authorizing the employment of experts and others for this work is "To enable the President to continue, by the employment of accountants and experts from official and private life, such officials to receive no compensation beyond their official salaries, to more effectively inquiry into the methods of transacting the public business of the Government," etc.

Mr. CLEVELAND. That, Mr. Chairman, was the language of the appropriation act of March 4, 1911. The first act (June 25, 1910) under which they were appointed provided as follows:

To enable the President, by the employment of accountants and experts from official and private life, to inquire more effectually into the methods of transacting the public business.

The CHAIRMAN. This language, "such officials to receive no compensation beyond their official salaries," was not in the act when they were appointed?

Mr. CLEVELAND. That was inserted in the act of March 4, 1911, to prevent claims for increased compensation in case persons in departments were assigned to this work.

The CHAIRMAN. These appointments were all made prior to the time that this provision became a law?

Mr. CLEVELAND. They were. The appointments were made in March and April, and this act of March 4, 1911, did not go into effect till July 1. In fact, the commission was not organized till the added appropriation was provided.

The CHAIRMAN. The compensation of the Auditor for the Post Office Department is $5,000, of an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the Canal Zone, $6,000, and of the Assistant Director of the Census, $5,000 during the decennial census period?

Mr. CLEVELAND. I understand that Judge Warwick received a salary of $6,600 as auditor in the Canal Zone, and also had allowances, such as being provided with a furnished house, which was probably equal to somewhere between $750 and $1,000 extra pay. He was receiving in pay and allowances approximately $7,500 when he came here.

EXPENDITURES AND APPROPRIATIONS.

[See also p. 152.]

The CHAIRMAN. Have you a statement which shows the character of staff and the compensation paid them?