Annual Report of the Comptroller General of the United States For the Fiscal Year Ended June 30, 1941 A Foreword In submitting to the Seventy-seventh Congress this report of the work of the General Accounting Office for the fiscal year 1941, as required by section 312 (a) of the Budget and Accounting Act, approved June 10, 1921, 42 Stat. 25, it should be stated that my responsibility for the work of the General Accounting Office began November 1, 1940, and that the work during 4 months of the fiscal year had already been performed under the direction of the Assistant Comptroller General of the United States, as the Acting Comptroller General. Chapter I contains a report, with explanatory comment, of the volume of the various classes of work accomplished during the fiscal year. As an indication of the rate of increase of the volume of work during the fiscal year, the number of contracts received, 1,470,813, may be compared with the number received during the fiscal year 1940, 1,077,885, and the number of general vouchers (not including transportation vouchers) received for audit, 19,394,009, may be compared with the number of such vouchers received during the fiscal year 1940, 16,836,408. Chapter II contains a report of special audits, inspections, and miscellaneous assignments with accompanying comment. In chapter III, there is submitted a statement showing some of the special problems confronting the General Accounting Office as a result of the national defense program and the manner in which it is striving to meet these problems and to aid the national defense program. The General Accounting Office was created for the performance of an important mission-important to the Congress, to all establishments of the Government, and to the citizens of the country. The demands of increased Government programs and increased Government expenditures have necessitated its expansion during recent years into a large establishment. Its task is great. Its possibilities as a helpful force in the Government have not yet been fully reached. I would not regard its mission as entirely performed if it should serve merely as a fiscal policing force for the detection of improper use or disposition of public funds and as an office for the certification and collection of balances found to have been improperly used. It can be helpful to the departments and establishments of the Government in many additional ways which will contribute to the prevention of wrongful or irregular use of, and incomplete accounting for, public funds and this without any encroachment upon administration. During my brief tenure of office it has been my purpose to see that assistance is extended to administrative officials of the departments and establishments whenever possible and practicable. I shall continue to follow this policy. I entertain no doubt that the attitude of resistance to the efforts of the General Accounting Office, occasionally still manifested by a few administrative officials of the Government, will disappear. Conscientious and sound administrative officials of the Government are equally interested in seeing the General Accounting Office fully perform its mission. It is appropriate to report that I am studying the entire organization of the General Accounting Office and its procedures for the purpose of determining whether changes therein will promote efficiency and economy. Some changes have been made and others. will be made if experience and mature consideration indicate that they will be desirable. To aid in this study I established in March 1941 a Committee on Organization and Planning composed principally of officials of long experience in the Office. In August 1941 I established a Planning and Budget Section to assist the Committee on Organization and Planning in its work and to coordinate current planning and budgetary work. Efficient and effective performance of the work of the General Accounting Office will continue to be seriously hampered until its personnel and records, now scattered in 17 widely separated buildings, can be consolidated and adequately housed. The new building, already authorized by the Congress, and now being planned by the Public Buildings Administration, is urgently needed and will help greatly. No recommendations for legislation are made in this report. Any such recommendations which may be deemed advisable prior to the next Annual Report will be made in special reports. LINDSAY C. WARREN, Comptroller General of the United States. Administrative accounts, General Accounting Office......... Receipts and expenditures - - Special deposit and trust funds.... Labor-saving devices, repairs, maintenance. Administrative accounting systems and forms.. Systems and installations in process. Accounting forms.... Special accounting forms Standard forms... General regulations and circular letters. 1 13 13 13 15 15 15 16 17 18 18 20 20 23 24 General Regulations No. 94, organization... 24 General Regulations No. 91, revised, check data, procedure, etc.--- 24 24 Circular Letter Mar. 20, 1941, consolidated index-digest, etc. 24 24 25 Inspections and surveys.. Work projects equipment rental irregularities. Volume and detail of accounting and ledger accounts maintained Fiscal officers' accounts, received, audited, and settled.. Transportation claims. Volume of claims received and settled.. Volume of review cases settled___. Effects of American citizens dying abroad.. Suits involving the United States.. Indian tribal claims.. Checks outstanding liabilities... Collections of miscellaneous amounts due the United States.. Miscellaneous debt transactions.. Gasoline tax collections.. Voucher audit work.... Vouchers, etc., preaudited in Washington... Field preaudit for Department of Agriculture.. Volume of post-audit vouchers, etc. - Volume of Federal contracts, etc., examined.. |