Several years ago I had a very pleasant experience in service on the Appropriations Committee. The budget would come to us and then the executive heads would come and defend the budget, and the men on the Appropriations Committee would have very little information of the manner in which that money was being expended and the necessity for the amounts, except that which the executive gave him.

Mr. MERRIAM. Yes.

Representative VINSON. There were a number of particular instances where a committee member happened just to go out fishing and find out that everything was not just what it seemed. It has been in my mind a long time that you could have a saving of tremendous sums in money, and you would really have more efficient administration, if the Congress of the United States, or the Appropriations Committee of the Congress, had an agency that was responsible to the legislative branch, a staff of men who would in effect prepare trial briefs for the benefit of the men who were defending the taxpayers, you might say, to give them information in respect of certain policies and certain methods so that they might avoid excessive appropriations. Have you ever thought of anything of that kind?

Mr. MERRIAM. Well, that is broadly what we had in mind in setting up this committee on accountability, but, as I said before, we did not want to go into much detail on that for the reason that we would have been intruding on another field.

Representative VINSON. Of course, I think there is one thing that we are all interested in, and that is in efficiency and economies where they can be had. If you have a separate committee on accountability, or whatever you call it, then they are apart from the Appropriations Committee. That is where the money is appropriated, and I say, with all due deference, that it is one of the hardest working committees in the Congress. I know that you will agree with me that if you have got an appropriation of $100,000,000 or $1,000,000,000, and you spend a day or 2 days on that, you just barely scratch the surface. What would you think of an agency of that kind, that would give information to the legislative branch of the Government so that it might cross-examine, it might develop the appropriations, when the executives appear before the committee?

Mr. MERRIAM. Well, that is roughly what we had in mind

Representative VINSON. If you have got a separate committee, then you have got another committee out here that has nothing to do with how many dollars shall be appropriated. It just seems to me if you do not tie it into the Appropriations Committee where this money is appropriated you do not get very far.

Mr. MERRIAM. I might read to you, with your permission, the language of those sections in the bill. I think they are pertinent here. It says that the Auditor General shall render an annual report to Congress not later than March 1 of each year in which he shall report fully

Representative VINSON. I have read that and, with all due deference, I do not think it touches the point I have in mind at all.

Senator BYRNES. When we passed the Budget Act it was our intention that the representative of the Budget Bureau assigned to the

Agriculture Department, when he prepared that budget would thereafter during the year keep in touch with that Department and ascertain how the Department spent the money which had been appropriated for it by the Congress, and that by observing it, not for the 30 days in which he makes the investigation but during the 12 months, thereafter he would be available to the Appropriations Committee of the Congress, and when the next Budget was submitted the Appropriations Committee would ascertain from this employee of the Budget Bureau how this money would be spent. As a matter of fact it has never been done. I must say that on several occasions I have called on the Budget Bureau to send to the subcommittee of which I am a member the representative of the Budget Bureau having charge of that particular Department. So far as I know, during all the years that have passed, it has not been done, and the statement of the Directors of the Budget has been that they have never had a sufficient number of employees to enable them to devote all of their time to the various departments, the budgets of which they prepared.

Representative VINSON. They will not do that; but even if they did, Senator

Senator BYRNES. I see your point. If you have another committee, the committee would not accomplish anything unless the person who had this information reported to the Appropriations Committee having the power to reduce the appropriation asked for.

Representative VINSON. Even if the Budget Department had complied with your request, the representative would have been from the executive or the spending branch of the Government, whereas, it seems to me that the information should come from a representative of the legislative branch who would have no control over the expenditure of the moneys appropriated but he certainly would be able to pick up information and carry it to the legislative branch which would assist him in determining what the future appropriations should be.

Senator BYRNES. The thought was, when we originally enacted the law, that the representative of the Budget Bureau would consider the requests from the heads of the departments, pass on the reasonableness of the requests, and either agree to them and recommend them to the President or reject them, and thus, be in the position of hearing the pleas of the respective chiefs of divisions and passing upon them and could give to the Appropriations Committee information which would be of great value.

Representative TABER. Let me say this, that 2 years ago we gave the Budget additional help that would put them in position to do just exactly what you state was originally proposed, but they have not actually done it and gotten it in such shape that they could give the thing to us.

Representative VINSON. That man would be hired by the Bureau. of the Budget, and that would be by the executive branch.

Senator O'MAHONEY. Mr. Chairman, the remarks of Congressman Vinson and Senator Byrnes suggests to my mind the fact that as long as I can remember reading the Congressional Directories I have seen both in the schedule of committees of the House and the

schedule of the committees of the Senate a Committee on Executive Expenditures, expenditures in the executive departments. I wonder if any of the members of this joint committee who have served in Congress for a long time recall any instance in which either one of those committees have attempted to function?

Representative GIFFORD. I want to answer that question, Mr. Chairman, because he took the words out of my mouth. I have been waiting for 5 minutes to say something. I happen to be the ranking member of the House on the Committee on Expenditures.

Representative VINSON. And Mr. Cochran is chairman.

Representative GIFFORD. Yes; Mr. Cochran is chairman, and a very able chairman. I have suffered demotions now for several years. I could have gone on the Appropriations Committee in the House; it was my choice, but they assured me that the Committee on Expenditures was to be a very important committee to investigate and hand on to the Appropriations Committee the information we gathered. I want to say to Dr. Merriam that, except on slight matters, the Committee on Expenditures, even this new committee, has functioned very little. I personally have demanded that the Resettlement Administration and many other activities that have been spending extravagantly be brought before the committee, but no administration will investigate its own expenditures, no matter how you set it up. I have learned that, and the floor of the House has been my only forum, much to my regret, for criticizing the expenditures of government.

I trust the independent Auditor General representing the Congress would force the Treasury after auditing their accounts to report the true picture of the value of recoverables, for instance, on which I am having considerable correspondence.

Mr. MERRIAM. Did you say could he or should he?

Representative GIFFORD. Could he, or would he, though the country and the Congress would have a true picture of the actual recoverables of which we hear so much.

Mr. MERRIAM. I see no reason why he should not, myself, but you are dealing now with some very technical questions.

Representative GIFFORD. Dr. Brownlow, I have suggested

Mr. BROWNLOWw. May I say one thing? That is the reason that in this working out of this draft of bill we suggest that the Auditor General make any investigation at any time required by the Congress or any committee of the Congress.

Mr. MERRIAM. That is what I started to read a moment ago.
Mr. BROWNLOW. He is the agent of the Congress.

Representative GIFFORD. If you wait for the administration in power to investigate anything, you will wait a long time.

Mr. BROWNLOW. This committee is to be independent of the Executive and the agent of the Congress.

Representative GIFFORD. I have learned that the administration in power will not investigate its own expenditures. I have learned that, and I do not need any more proof.

Representative VINSON. There has got to be something more than audits. You have got to have somebody on the job throughout the year, and I think that his mere presence in some of these departments would realize a material saving.

Mr. BROWNLOW. That is precisely the reason that we thought the Auditor General should make a concurrent audit, with his men right there every time anything is spent.

Representative VINSON. You have to have something more than an

audit.

Representative COCHRAN. The outstanding complaint that causes this recommendation for a change in the set-up of the Comptroller General's Office, which includes the General Accounting Office, is based more upon the so-called control that he has exercised than anything else? Now, isn't that true? Is that true, Dr. Merriam?

Mr. MERRIAM. Do you mind stating that again?

Representative COCHRAN. The outstanding complaint that causes this recommendation in reference to the Comptroller General's Office, which includes the General Accounting Office, is that he assumes certain control over expenditures, isn't that true?

Mr. MERRIAM. He assumes control over administration and destroys the line of administrative responsibility.

Representative COCHRAN. He says, "You cannot spend this money other than for what Congress says it can be spent for. That is the outstanding complaint, is it not?

Mr. MERRIAM. He substitutes administrative judgment rather than auditing judgment.

Representative COCHRAN. There has always been a question in my mind as to whether the Congress has the power to control an expenditure after it has once been made. I happen to have over in my office a decision written, I think by Judge Stoner of New York, concurred in by Justice Cardozo, in which they held that the Legislature of New York did not have the power to control the expenditure after it had once been made.

Representative VINSON. And incidentally citing a number of Supreme Court cases.

Representative COCHRAN. Yes. Suppose the Congress of the United States should remove that control that is complained of from the existing law, take that power away from the Comptroller, and still leave the Comptroller General's office as it is, as an agent of the Congress, and then specifically provide that he must do these things that Mr. Vinson just now says should be done to help the committees of Congress, but not report on March 1, but report on December 1 before the hearings are held by the Appropriations Committee of the House where the real work on appropriations bills is done. Would that be satisfactory to the executive branch of the Government if we should do that?

Mr. MERRIAM. I could not speak for the executive branch of the Government, but it is in general something of that sort that, we have in mind. You said the 1st of March?

Representative COCHRAN. While we are on that, Mr. Brownlow spoke about claims and minimized them. I was confident in my own mind that he was not well informed on it, so I telephoned to the General Accounting Office when I left this room and followed my request with a letter, asking for a break-down of the claims. I have it here. Mr. Chairman, and I think it would be advisable to put it in the record for the information of the committee.

The CHAIRMAN. Very well.

of use if he is going to do his own job properly in attempting to exercise a budgetary control. I think that is pretty nearly apparent. Wouldn't you think so, Senator Byrnes?

Senator BYRNES. I can think that the effect of it would be to have your budget office study it, as we intended. Now, whether it is wise to take the Congressman's suggestion and have the representative of another bureau, in the Department of Agriculture, for instance, I do not know. That is the first time I have ever heard it suggested and I do not know whether it is wise or not, but it is certainly worth thinking about. We all have the same object in view, that once it is appropriated to have someone check it to see how the funds are expended, and, as a result of that checking to be better prepared to draft an estimate for the next year and then to come before the Appropriations Committee and tell us how it was done and where economies might be effected. I don't know whether it ought to be the same man or not. The suggestion the Congressman makes is worth while thinking about, and I suggest that we go on with this witness and then debate it in executive session.

Senator O'MAHONEY. Mr. Chairman, may I ask one or two questions of the witness?

The CHAIRMAN. Very well.

Senator O'MAHONEY. As I understand the report, Dr. Merriam, it is purely a limit on administrative matters and not at all upon the advisability of the expansion or contraction of Government activities; is that correct?

Mr. MERRIAM. Yes, with regard to the functions. We felt that the appropriations for activities was a matter for Congress.

Senator O'MAHONEY. As to whether or not the Government establishments should be increased or decreased, that was not a question into which you made any investigation?

Mr. MERRIAM. No. Do you want to have the C. C. C. or not, and on what scale? Do you want to continue the N. Y. A., and on what scale? Do you want to continue the P. W. A., and on what scale? We felt those things were not within our mandate.

Senator O'MAHONEY. Yes, but fundamentally the question of total expenditures depends upon the number of activities in which we engage, and the economy with which those expenditures shall be made will depend upon the effectiveness of the administrative machinery?

Mr. MERRIAM. Administrative management, precisely. As the Congressman here said, you can reduce the unit cost per mile of roads but you might want to build more roads.

Senator O'MAHONEY. Now, may I ask whether in the study you have carried on through your subordinates and among the three members of the President's committee, you have come to any conclusion as to whether or not it will be possible to curtail the expansion of Government activities or is the Government to continue to grow?

Mr. MERRIAM. Well, that is a different matter entirely, is it not, within the power of the policy-determining body?

Senator O'MAHONEY. Certainly; but I am asking now for your opinion. From what you have seen, do you think that inevitably this Government establishment is bound to grow?