priation. Then when the budget comes along, we know exactly how much the Government is costing, whereas in order to get the cost now, you would have to take the appropriation and then go into each agency and find out how much money they collected in fees and for other purposes, because all of that is expended there in that department.

Senator MILLIKIN. This is thinking off the cuff, Senator. There is just one possible exception, and that will be a very minor and inconsequential one. Recently before a committee, of which I am a member, we considered a bill which would set up a small emergency fund for an agency which at times has to deal with emergencies arising out of weather-transmission lines might blow down or a flood breaks a dike or something-where there isn't time to come before Congress to get a specific appropriation for the particular job. It may be that a few limited, carefully defined exceptions would have to be carved out of that, but I am in hearty agreement with the general principle which the Senator has been discussing.

If I may mention an example, Mr. Chairman-and I will do my best to keep any politics out of it. Last year we had a great fuss about reclamation. Coming from a Western State, I am very much interested in reclamation. It is a fact that the bookkeeping of the Bureau of Reclamation was so confused that it took three different estimates by that Bureau before they could tell us accurately what the carryover was from one fiscal year to another. It was not until the matter had passed the House and came over into the Senate that we finally received a set of figures-through the combined efforts of the Budget and the Bureau of Reclamation and some other agency-on which we could really base sound judgment. That sort of thing is a disgrace. The CHAIRMAN. Do you think it would be possible to get an appropriation bill enacted at an earlier date, so that, if we eliminated the carry-over each year for the different agencies, they would be able to have advance notice of what they would have to operate on before the end of the fiscal year?

Senator MILLIKIN. I think Senator, that if you come to a single appropriation bill, you will have a confusing lag period, where you may have to deal with a large number of supplementals, until the thing gets to clicking on a true annual basis, but that, as I view it, is nothing insuperable and assumes minor importance compared with the great objective of a single appropriation bill.

Senator O'CONOR. Senator Millikin, having great respect for your judgment and opinions on this matter, I would like very much to go one step further on the very interesting point that Senator Thye brought out.

Do you think it would be an insurmountable task or would it entail a very large outlay to have such an inquiry made as to the present staffing of the departments and bureaus? Personally, I had hoped it would not and think it would not, but I wonder, from your greater experience and knowledge of the general subject, whether you think it could be undertaken without having such a long inquiry that it might defeat its own purpose. In other words, just take an instance. We had an experience with the Customs where there was a decrease in the appropriation. Immediately something was done which shocked us all, because they cut off some very vital employees, whereas if there had been prior to that any knowledge at hand as to

the fact that they were understaffed, as they were in other branches, that wouldn't have resulted. I was wondering if you thought it could be undertaken.

Senator MILLIKIN. Senator, I do not see a single impractical feature about it. There might be just a shade of difference in approach between your approach and my own. I would make it a continuous operation. I would not just hire a group of experts to make a quick spot inspection. I would have congressional watchdogs in every х agency of this Government all of the time-all of the time.

Senator THYE. The only question that I would raise in connection with such a continuing operation is that when you establish a permanent, continuous agency, you will find the personnel getting themselves into classifications and they would immediately become a part of the body of Federal employees. On the other hand, if you went out and contracted with an engineering service and they did a certain function for you under specific contract and were discharged at the end of that contract, they would be ruthless and cold-blooded in their examinations. If they became a part of the Federal auditing agency, whether they were assigned permanently to Congress or otherwise, they would immediately have Federal status and they would become sympathetic to the bureau that had been developed for that very purpose. The importance of their own position would become contingent upon the number of employees within that department. Senator MILLIKIN. I think, Senator, they would become sympathetic to not having their own pay roll reduced, and they would seek to achieve that objective by seeing that the other fellow's pay roll is reduced, and that is what you want.

Senator O'CONOR. Right on that point-it certainly shows that Senator Thye is a very practical man-do you not feel that the fact this would be subject to congressional review or, rather, it would be constantly under the attention of the committees of Congress, such as your own and others, would possibly eliminate the thing that Senator Thye very correctly would worry about?

Senator MILLIKIN. Any time you set up any governmental agency, it at once acquires a vested interest in its own preservation. We have a vested interest in our preservation in the Senate. Everybody has a vested interest, once he gets a job, in keeping that job. But the fact of the matter is that we have a congressional duty to perform in this thing, and we have got to assume the hazards that we have been discussing in order to perform it. I believe we may fairly assume that we would have ways of keeping a legislative agency of that kind on its toes to ferret out the other fellow's faults, if not its own.

Senator O'CONOR. I had in mind, too, of course, that there are two parties, very fortunately, and constantly there is a vigilance which may not apply within a department but may very well be true of the legislative procedure.

Senator MILLIKIN. That is very right. I may add, Mr. Chairman, that it would take a sizable staff if you are going to do the job right, unless you are just going to skim the surface and from time to time make spot inspections. If you are going to do the job right, I think it would take a substantial staff, headed by a strong group of efficiency experts, such as the type referred to by Senator Thye.

The Bureau of the Budget has a staff-I am just speaking on very rough memory-I think, of about 800. That seems to me to be a pretty big staff, but since we are dealing with $40,000,000,000 a year, I don't think we should shrink from the cost of seeing that it is correctly expended, and if that involves 100, 150, 200 employees on the legislative side, so far as I am concerned, that wouldn't give me a moment's pause, and I am on the economy-minded side.

Senator THYE. Mr. Chairman, I dislike to belabor this committee with another thought on this question. My only further comment is that in the event such a committee were created today, here would be a certain political party that would have control, by its majority, of the committee. Immediately it would be said that it lacked a bipartisan attitude, and its report was naturally colored and partisan, whereas if a public service engineer was employed, that public service agency would enter upon the survey with a specified amount of money or a daily cost arrangement. When it made its report, that report could not be clouded in a partisan or political manner. It would be a public service. That is the reason why I think that the general public would accept its final report without a feeling that it was the Democrats or the Republicans trying to make political capital. There would be no question in the minds of the public that it was a political attempt by one party to discredit the actions of an administration of another party. That is the reason a public service agency survey seems more desirable to me.

I

Senator MILLIKIN. I should like to make two suggestions in reply. First, I think it would be a very wholesome procedure, assuming you had a regular staff continuously devoted to this purpose. think it would be a wholesome procedure to bring in some outside experts to run a check on what that regular staff has done. SecondlyI am not optimistic enough to think that it will always happen or that it is easy to make it happen, but it is possible to have a staff in the Congress completely nonpolitical, and that will earn the confidence of both parties. Let me give you an illustration.

The House Ways and Means Committee and the Senate Finance Committee get their technical work done by the Joint Committee on Internal Revenue Taxation. I will shortly be chairman of that committee; I am now vice chairman. Being a practical man, I have a little suspicion as to the political affiliations of some of the persons of that staff. But that never enters into the work of that committee in the slightest respect. Since the Republicans have taken over, we have not made one change in that staff, not one change, and under the information that I have so far, I would strenuously resist making a change. Those suspicions that I referred to a while ago might indicate that perhaps most of that staff, considering how the executive control of this Government has been for 14 or 15 years, would be Democratic. Yet, as I say, it has never occurred to any one of either party on either of those committees to tear that staff up for political reasons. I have complete confidence in what they give to us, and I have never had a political discussion with the members of that staff.

I cite that merely to show that it is possible-it is difficult, but it is possible to have a completely unslanted, unloaded, let us call it, bipartisan committee serve in fields where the facts are wanted, rather than where political philosophy is wanted.

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The CHAIRMAN. Of course, the Congress has taken a little different approach in setting up the Commission on Organization of the Executive Branch of the Government, with ex-President Hoover as Chairman, and this Commission decided that it would not be advisable to set up their own staff. In the first place, help wasn't readily available. So they have engaged management concerns to make studies of the different departments of the executive branch. One concern is to make a study of the Post Office Department, and the work of that Department has been mentioned here. I believe a maximum of $120,000 was set on the cost of that. That is not exorbitant, considering that the Congress appropriated $100,000 to the Treasury Department for an examination of the Customs Bureau alone. This whole work of the Reorganization Commission will probably cost in the neighborhood of $2,000,000, if the Congress sees fit to make that appropriation, which I presume it will. But when that work is complete and the report is made after the next election by a completely bipartisan commission, it should give us information of value on which to base future legislation, and I think it will be worth while. we are hiring the management concerns to do that work. They will do that work just as quickly as they can do it in order to get through with it and make the report and get paid for it. There wouldn't be any tendency to drag the job along there. The old job-preservation instinct should not be prevalent.

Are there any further questions?

But

Senator O'CONOR. Referring to the timeliness of this, Senator Millikin, do you not think that upon the completion of that undertaking, the Senate and House ought to have a very authoritative and bipartisan set of recommendations, so that this would be particularly a good time to inaugurate such a thing as you propose?

Senator MILLIKIN. Yes. I believe, gentlemen, that we must do something along the general lines that we have been talking, or we might as well forget and get rid of this budget procedure, which now at best can rest on no more than a guess.

The CHAIRMAN. Do you have a question, Mr. Van Horn?

Mr. VAN HORN. The Senator is no doubt familiar with the fact that the Bureau of the Budget maintains a unit called the Division of Administrative Management

Senator MILLIKIN (interposing). Yes.

Mr. VAN HORN. Whose function it is to do precisely what you are talking about?

Senator MILLIKIN. Yes.

Mr. VAN HORN. Have you had any occasion to inquire into that Division, or do you have any opinion of its effectiveness, Senator? Senator MILLIKIN. Yes. Last year I questioned Mr. Webb as to just what we have been talking about this morning with regard to what they do to check the work load against the pay roll in every agency of this Government. My net impression of what they do is, an agency comes before the Budget and asks for so much money, and in much the same way as is done in our Appropriations Committee. The Budget will say, "Well, we think that is too much. We had better cut that down 25 percent.' That sort of procedure bears no resemblance to a scientific, businesslike investigation of the relation of the work-load to the pay roll. To answer it another way, I was entirely dissatisfied with the explanation which Mr. Webb made.

Mr. VAN HORN. It probably illustrates that without the profit motive actuating it, the executive branch can never criticize itself well. Senator MILLIKIN. No one can criticize himself well. There is no living person who can be objective with himself. We try to be. We do the best we can, but we are much slanted in favor of ourselves. The CHAIRMAN. Are there any further questions?

Senator MILLIKIN. I may say also that you get into a conflicting philosophy of government. I am making no political talk now, but if one department of the Government believes in a high spending government and another department believed in a lower rate of spending, it is perfectly obvious that that department of the Government which believes in high spending will come up with reasons for the continuance of high spending. That is just human nature. It is also possible for that part of the Government which believes in lower spending to do arbitrary things if it acts on an uninformed basis.

The CHAIRMAN. We thank you for meeting with us this morning, Senator Millikin. We know how busy you are, but this committee is undertaking this study in all seriousness, and we feel that the place to get the best information is from the man who has the most to do with it. That is why we asked you to come here this morning, and we do appreciate your coming.

We also have with us this morning another one of our colleagues, Senator Pepper. We will be glad to hear from you, Senator Pepper, as to what you suggest for improving the work of the legislative branch of the Government.

STATEMENT OF HON. CLAUDE PEPPER, A UNITED STATES SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF FLORIDA

Senator PEPPER. I thank you, Mr. Chairman and gentlemen of the committee, for the privilege of being here with you.

I had the honor and the privilege to be a member of the special committee of Congress which held hearings on the reorganization of Congress and which was responsible for steering its recommendations on reorganization until they were enacted into law. The act, we all recognized, was not a perfect one, and we knew at the time of passage that we would have to feel our way along through experience to find methods of conducting the proceedings of Congress in the most efficient way possible.

During the course of our hearings on the Reorganization Act under the leadership of former Senator Robert M. La Follette, of Wisconsin, our committee had an opportunity to study and consider the possibility of broadcasting the proceedings of Congress and its committees. So many aspects of reorganization faced the committee that it was not able to make any recommendations, favorable or unfavorable, on the subject of broadcasting the proceedings. However, information was obtained and data acquired from the various broadcasting companies, from technical experts, on the general subject, and there was, therefore, I think, knowledge of value acquired. You will find, however, no reference to this matter in the report of the committee on the reorganization bill.

In order to keep this matter before the Congress and the people. I introduced in the opening days of the Eightieth Congress, Senate