Page images
PDF
EPUB

DEVELOPMENT AND ORGANIZATION OF BUREAU OF CUSTOMS

The history of the Bureau of Customs starts with the very establishment of the American Government. At present, its primary objective is to enforce the Tariff Act of 1930. Principal functions are to enter and clear vessels; supervise discharge of cargo; measure, appraise, and classify imports, and collect duties thereon; control warehousing of imports; inspect international traffic by vessel, highway, railway, and air; review protests against payment of duties; determine admissibility of imports; prevent smuggling; issue documents to vessels; apprehend violators of customs and navigation laws; enforce Antidumping and Export Control Acts; and perform duties under Foreign Trade Zones Act. The Bureau's collections, number of formal entries (requests for custom's release of imported good), expenditures, and number of employees in selected years are tabulated below:

[blocks in formation]

Despite a large increase in activities, improved management of the Bureau of Customs has held down the rise in number of employees. This improvement has been based primarily on the McKinsey report which is discussed below.

The organization of the Bureau of Customs is rather complicated. Field operations are located at many different points along the periphery of the United States and its island possessions. Internally, the Bureau consists of 46 customs collection districts, 7 comptrollers' districts, 9 customs agency districts, 32 offices of appraisers of merchandise, and 9 customs laboratories. These types of districts are not uniform, and overlap in considerable degree. Except for 52 politically appointed top officials of the Bureau, these districts are in charge of career employees. Housekeeping has been consolidated with respect to payroll work, personnel records, allotment of funds, purchase of supplies and equipment, and the like.

Among the divisions of the Treasury Department (total of 89,409 employees on January 1, 1952), the Bureau of Internal Revenue is by far the largest (55,433); the Bureau of Customs is a comparatively small second in size of personnel (8,603, 7,930 full-time and 673 part-time and WAE employees); and the two next smaller divisions are the United States Coast Guard and the Bureau of Engraving and Printing (6,118 and 6,089, respectively).

GENERAL BACKGROUND

1948 McKinsey report.-Complaints were voiced by various Senators during the Eightieth Congress over the way in which the Bureau of Customs was spreadthe red ans which had been voted in its appropriations. This committee

reupor

immy ate

3 re

re

preparation of a staff report which not only helped to correct ition, but also led to an extended management study by the irm of McKinsey & Co., which was issued in Janauary 1948. total expenditures of about $200,000, half for the survey for its implementation. In contrast, the Treasury Departe report is causing the much larger permanent savings of ar on a recurring basis.

port recommended that the customs service be reorganized or 11 regional offices, that there be 3 assistant collectors in ice, and that 1 of these assistant collectors be in charge of sifiention, and merchandise and baggage inspection. It also nal offices be furnished with technical and legal staff or on all legal and technical phases of customs work. Treasury Department decided against the regional xtra cost involved, and (2) likely to care o lack

[ocr errors]

W

We eci

Progress under the McKinsey report was recently summarized as follows by customs officials: The total number of recommendations in the report is 178, on which Treasury Department action is completed in the case of 173 recommendations (97.2 percent). Of the latter total, 101 recommendations have been put into effect, 31 have been rejected, 29 require legislative action, 6 have been approved but await necessary appropriations, and 6 were approved but referred to other Federal agencies for implementation.

At recent House committee hearings on the 1953 Treasury-Post Office appropriation bill, questions were raised about the independent actions of customs collectors, appraisers, and comptrollers, possibly because of their political basis of appointment. It was emphasized "that the left hand hardly knows what the right hand is doing," and that to achieve coordination a regionalized organization, such as that included in plan No. 1 of 1952 for the Bureau of Internal Revenue, ought to be given serious consideration.

1949 Hoover Commission recommendations.-The following quotations from Hoover Commission documents relate to plan No. 3 of 1952. The Commission and the plan are in complete accord as to extension of the carreer service, but the plan does not follow the Hoover Commission's proposal of a Consolidated Revenue Service for the Treasury Department, functioning under a politically appointed Assistant Secretary, to be assisted by two career service chiefs of the Bureaus of Customs, and of Internal Revenue. Excerpts from Hoover Commission documents follow:

"One of the chief handicaps to effective organization of the (Treasury) Department is the political appointment of collectors of internal revenue and of customs, and certain other officials. These appointments are regarded by some as sinecures. In any event, they form a bar to orderly development of an experienced staff * Recommendation No. 7. The Commission recommends that all officials in the Department below the rank of Assistant Secretary should preferably be appointed from the carrer service without Senate confirmation" (Treasury Department, p. 17).

* *

"Recommendation No. 19: We recommend that to lay the foundation of authority and discipline, the staff officials, and as a rule, bureau chiefs should be appointed by the department heads and that proper consideration be given to the promotion of career employees." (General Management, pp. 38-39.)

* *

66* * * Political reasons must necessarily dominate the choice of department heads. But the department head must have persons to help him who combine political and administrative talents with emphasis upon the administrative qualifications *. We believe that a standard practice should now be introduced in the Federal Government whereby the heads of the subordinate operating units of an executive department are selected by the department head on a merit basis. At the same time we believe that the department head should be free to dismiss any bureau, chief with whom he is unable to collaborate effectively." (Task Force Appendix E on Department Management, pp. 9, 10.)

Hoover Commission typescript report on Federal field services makes the five following recommendations (vol. 1, pp. 26–27): (1) Customs procedures and regulations should be minimized and liberalized; (2) the existing confusion in both authority and responsibility between the collector and appraiser in the classification of merchandise should be removed as a step to greater efficiency; (3) the positions of collector of customs should be filled through the civil-service merit system, and the responsibility of the collector's office should be consolidated with that of his deputy; (4) the office of the comptroller of customs should be abolished; and (5) the establishment of about eight or nine regional offices on some logical geographical basis is desirable.

Hoover Commission Task Force Report F on Fiscal, Budgeting, and Accounting Activities, urges "a complete reorganization of the major revenue-producing agencies of the Government-the Bureau of Internal Revenue and the Bureau of Customs-into a single service of the Treasury Department" (p. 24).

1951 related proposals.—Of three pending 1951 proposals, S. 1150 was drafted by the Citizens Committee for the Hoover Report to include all outstanding Hoover Commission recommendations relative to the Treasury Department. It was introduced on March 15, 1951, by Senator Humphrey and nine cosponsors, and is now pending before the Subcommittee on Reorganization.

S. 1150 would regroup the functions of the Treasury Department into seven specified administrative units. One of these regroupings would constitute a proposed Consolidated Revenue Service within which the Bureaus of Internal Revenue and of Customs are to be continued. "The Secretary shall provide for the integration of the overhead management, the administrative services, and

the field offices of such bureaus, and shali appoint the heads and all officers and employees thereof."

The Secretary of the Treasury discusses S. 1150 as follows in a letter of May 14, 1951, to this committee: "As you know various officers of these bureaus, including the collectors of internal revenue and of customs, are appointed by the President by and with the advice and consent of the Senate. It has been the Treasury Department's experience that Presidential appointees located in strategic positions in these bureaus can do and have done effective, efficient work." Among other department comments on S. 1150, the only other reaction is that of the Civil Service Commission, favoring the proposed change.

Two other pending 1951 proposals reflecting much staff work by the Bureau of Customs are designed to bring about economies in the Bureau by making major simplifications in customs and navigation laws. Thus, H. R. 5505 (Doughton) proposing the Customs Simplification Act of 19, of 42 printed pages, has passed the House, and hearings of the Senate Finance Committee are now under way. It proposes amendments of the Tariff Act of 1930, and related acts, for the most part removing cumbersome requirements now applicable to imports.

Similarly, H. R. 2641 of 186 printed pages, pending before the House Committee on Merchant Marine and Fisheries, revises the navigation laws relative to entry, clearance, coastwise trade, foreign trade, fisheries, and the like.

1952 related proposals.-Three proposals of this year are directly related to Plan No. 3 of 1952, as follows: (1) Plan No. 1 of 1952 applied to the Bureau of Internal Revenue, the same extension of civil service as is now proposed. In place of 64 politically appointed collectors of internal revenue, it provided for appointment on a civil-service basis of not more than 25 new district commissioners, and not in excess of 70 other officials.

(2) Two bills have been recently introduced which would place officials of the Bureau of Customs under civil service. S. 2899, introduced by Senator Thye on March 19, 1952, and referred to the Committee on Finance, would place the same top customs officials under civil service as is proposed under plan No. 3. The statute is to become effective 6 months after passage.

S. 2990, a broader "blue ribbon" civil-service bill was introduced by Senators Humphrey, Monroney, and Moody on April 2, 1952. In addition to customs officials, it includes United States Attorneys, United States marshals, and postmasters of the first, second, and third class.

SUMMARY

Management of the Bureau of Customs has been considerably improved. Plan No. 3 of 1952 is proposed to stimulate further improvement by replacing 52 politically appointed top customs officials with such number of career employees as is authorized in annual appropriations, including up to 20 new supergrade career appointees. Extension of a career basis of Federal service was repeatedly urged by the Hoover Commission of 1949. Plan No. 3 would also eliminate antiquated and cumbersome accounting and other requirements from statutes of many years standing, to help achieve eventual future savings of at least $300,000 a year, as estimated in the President's message.

No attention is given in plan No. 3 to a merger of the Bureaus of Internal Revenue and of Customs (55,433 and 8,603 employees, respectively), as was vigorously urged in the Hoover Commission report.

For legal aspects of plan No. 3, see Staff Memorandum 82-2-28.

Approved:

HERMAN C. LOEFFLER, Professional Staff Member.

WALTER L. REYNOLDS, Staff Director.

SENATE COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT OPERATIONS,

May 6, 1952.

'Staff Memorandum No. 82-2-31. Subject: Reorganization Plan No. 4 of 1952-Reorganizations in the Department of Justice.

Plan No. 4 of 1952 abolishes the 94 existing offices of United States marshal, establishes 94 successor offices of "United States Marshal” in the Department of Justice, and vests authority in the Attorney General to appoint the marshals under the classified civil service.

SECTION-BY-SECTION ANALYSIS

Section 1.-Abolishes the 87 offices of United States marshal for the judicial districts defined in title 28, U. S. Code, chapter 5, the four offices in Alaska, and one each in Guam, the Canal Zone and the Virgin Islands. Provides for terminating the affairs of those offices.

Section 2.-Establishes 94 new offices of United States marshal in the Department of Justice, as follows: 87 for the judicial districts defined in title 28, U. S. Code, chapter 5, four in Alaska, one in Guam, one in the Canal Zone, and one in the Virgin Islands. Provides for appointment of each marshal by the Attorney General under the classified civil service at compensation fixed by the classification laws.

Section 3.-Transfers to the Attorney General any functions now vested in United States marshals by statutes or reorganization plans.

Section 4 (a).-Makes section 1 (abolition of existing offices), with respect to statutory terms of office, effective as follows: (1) For offices having no incumbent on the date plan No. 4 becomes effective, or for offices having hold-over incumbents, the effective date shall be such date as the Attorney General specifies, but in no event later than January 1, 1953; and (2) for offices having an incumbent serving a specified term which has not expired whein plan No. 4 becomes effective, the date on which said term expires or whenever the office becomes vacant. Section 4 (b).—Makes section 1 (with respect to offices not having a specified statutory term) effective on such date as the Attorney General specifies, but no later than January 1, 1953.

Section 4 (c).-Provides that section 2 (the establishment of new offices) shall become effective for each judicial district concurrently with the taking effect of the provisions of section 1 for the same judicial district.

Section 4 (d).-Provides that section 3 (transfers of functions) shall take effect on the date plan No. 4 becomes effective.

HISTORY OF APPOINTMENT OF UNITED STATES MARSHALS

Since the first Congress in 1789, United States marshals have been appointed by the President with the advice and consent of the Senate. The Judiciary Act of 1789 established the office of United States marshal (one for each judicial district), limited the marshal's term of office to 4 years and provided that marshals should be removable at pleasure. The act authorized each marshal to appoint deputy marshals, who were subject to removal by either the district or circuit judges whom the marshal served, but lated statutes made deputy marshals subject to removal at the discretion of the marshal. The Act of November 26, 1940 (the Ramspeck Act), provided for the bringing of deputy marshals under the classified civil service, making their appointments subject to the civil service merit system which was subsequently accomplished by Executive Order No. 8743 in 1941. A bill to restore appointment of deputy marshals without reference to the civil service law is presently pending, as hereafter indicated.

REASONS ADVANCED FOR ADOPTION OF PLAN NO. 4

Plan No. 4, according to the Presidential meassage accompanying it, would establish "clear lines" of accountability from the United States marshals to the Attorney General by vesting in him the power to appoint those subordinates for whose performance he is responsible.

In 1937, the President's Committee on Administrative Management reported: "The continued appointment by the President of field officials, such as postmasters, United States marshals, collectors of internal revenue and collectors of customs is not only antiquated, but prejudicial to good administration."

In 1949, the Hoover Commission in its report on general management of the executive branch recommended that postmasters, customs officials, and other officials in the executive branch below the rank of assistant secretary should be appointed from the career service, which recommendation would also embrace the office of United States marshal.

In addition to the primary objective of achieving greater accountability for performance, the President emphasizes plan No. 4 would give to the office of United States marshal the benefits of the classified civil service system under which civil servants not only obtain but hold their positions strictly on merit. In submitting the plan, the President stated that the abolition of the existing United States marshals' offices would have no effect upon powers of those offices

except as they relate to appointment under the reorganization plan. Excerpts from his statement follow:

"The abolition of offices by Reorganization Plan No. 4 of 1952 will not abolish any rights, privileges, powers, duties, immunities, liabilities, obligations, or other attributes of those offices except as they relate to matters of appointment, tenure, and compensation inconsistent with that reorganization plan. Under the Reorganization Act of 1949 all of these attributes of office will attach to the new offices of United States marshall, either automatically or upon the occurrence of an appropriate delegation of functions to such new offices by the Attorney General. For example, the statutory provisions requiring the marshals to be bonded (28 U. S. C., 544) will attach to the successor offices of United States marshall created by Reorganization Plan No. 4 of 1952."

Another objective sought is to relieve the President, as well as the Congress, from the multiplicity of Presidential appointments of a subordinate nature which distracts from consideration of issues of national importance facing both branches of the Government in increasing numbers every day.

APPARENT CONFLICT WITH THE REORGANIZATION ACT OF 1949

Concern has been expressed that Plan No. 4 of 1952 violates Public Law 109, Eighty-first Congress, first session, the Reorganization Act of 1949, which authorizes the President to submit reorganization plans to the Congress.

Section 5 (a) of Public Law 109, which limits the President's power in submitting reorganization plans, states: "No reorganization plan shall provide for, and no reorganization under this act shall have the effect of—(5) increasing the term of any office beyond that provided by law for such office;

[ocr errors]

As previously indicated, United States marshals are now appointed for a statutory term of office of 4 years' duration, but section 2 of plan No. 4 provides for their appointment under the classified civil service system for permanent, indefinite terms, subject to removal pursuant to civil service regulations only. This possible conflict with Public Law 109, along with other legal aspects of Reorganization Plans Nos. 2, 3, and 4 of 1952, is analyzed in detail in Staff Memorandum No. 82-2-28.

STATUS OF DEPUTY UNITED STATES MARSHALS

As indicated before, deputy United States marshals were brought under the civil service system pursuant to the Act of November 26, 1940 (54 Stat. 1211), the Ramspeck Act.

However, a bill, S. 35 (McCarran), which would restore appointment of deputy United States marshals without reference to civil service laws, is now pending on the Senate calendar. This bill is identical to S. 3993, Eighty-first Congress, which passed the Senate on August 23, 1950.

S. 35 was reported favorably by the Committee on the Judiciary on January 17, 1951. In its report (S. Rept. No. 5, 82d Cong.) the committee argued that since United States marsals, like United States district attorneys who also are appointed by the President with the advice and consent of the Senate, are responsible for the conduct of their offices, they should be permitted, without regard to civil-service laws, to choose their assistants. The committee noted pointedly that assistant United States district attorneys were specifically excepted from the statute which incorporated deputy United States marshals in the civil-service system.

On March 12, 1951, upon request of the chairman of the Senate Committee on Post Office and Civil Service, the Senate, with the agreement of the Committee on the Judiciary, rereferred S. 35 to the latter committee. That committee reported adversely upon the bill on May 8, 1951 (in S. Rept. No. 313), stating that it found no solid basis for removal of deputy United States marshals from the civil-service system; that such action would be detrimental from the standpoint of increased costs, increased turn-over, uncertain tenure of office, and a general loss of efficiency in operation of the United States marshals' offices. The following is an extract from the report:

"The Committee on Post Office and Civil Service has received no testimony in favor of enactment of this legislation.

"Deputy marshals and representatives of the National Association of Deputy Marshals appeared in person and were unanimous and very strong in their opposition to this bill.

« PreviousContinue »