Senator O'MAHONEY. I am referring solely to the additional appointments which may be made to take the burden off the secretary. Mr. MERRIAM. Those are all changing with the secretary, unless you may desire to keep them. Otherwise I do not see how you would operate the system of government.

Senator O'MAHONEY. You do not propose in any way to take away from the functions, powers, and responsibilities of the various Cabinet heads?

Mr. MERRIAM. No; not in any sense.

Senator O'MAHONEY. And there is nothing in this bill that does that?

Mr. MERRIAM. Not the slightest. It really enlarges their opportunities and of course their progress within their fields.

Senator O'MAHONEY. Do you think there is any basis for the fear that an increase of the personnel on the White House staff, or secretarial staff, with a division of responsibility among them to keep the President in closer contact with the departments, would tend in any way to reduce the importance and significance of the Cabinet?

Mr. MERRIAM. That is a matter which we considered very carefully, Senator, from time to time, and what we intended to set up was a group of persons who would not have authority to decide, or would not be in a position to assume authority which they do not properly possess. If these men were to put themselves between the Cabinet members and the President, or between the Cabinet member and the political leader, that would be unfortunate. That would be the last thing in the world we would want to have happen. To take a particular case we will take Mr. Rudolph Foster. He carries on certain useful work there.

Senator O'MAHONEY. He does it in a very efficient way.

Mr. MERRIAM. He does it in a very efficient way. He does not interfere between the Cabinet member and the President, or between the political leaders and the President, or the public and the President. Senator O'MAHONEY. Do you think then it would be desirable to have in the bill itself any language the effect of which would be to make certain that these additional White House appointees would not have any public contact?

Mr. MERRIAM. If we could do that, Senator, and still not put them in a glass case, I agree entirely. The moment any one of these men became a political power, or the people thought he had political power or began to obtrude himself between the President and public, the President and Cabinet member, and the President and political leader, that person's usefulness is very largely ended.

Senator O'MAHONEY. For instance, we have the Packers Act administered by the Department of Agriculture, which is of importance to a large proportion of the population of the country and cases arise under that act upon which the Secretary of Agriculture must pass, hearings are held from time to time, and a vast multitude of functions are performed. Obviously if persons concerned in such a case should imagine that by going to the Presidential secretary to whom had been allocated the work of the Department of Agriculture they could influence the decision in a particular case, there would be a tendency to find out what avenues of approach might be uncovered to that person. Do you think it is desirable to prevent such a danger by language in the bill?

Mr. MERRIAM. I think it is desirable to prevent that, Senator, but I have my doubts whether you can do that by language. The President would have to be successful, if this should prevail, in selecting the type of man who does not aspire to power, but is willing to be useful. There are men now in some departments who are useful, whose pictures have never been taken by the photographers; their names are never in the headlines, and in fact the personnel is never known people who have been here some time, who are immensely useful to the Government. Mr. McReynolds, we will say, in the Treasury, is mighty useful.

Senator BYRD. You spoke of being useful. He may have great power.

Mr. MERRIAM. Of course, you cannot prevent a man, if he has knowledge, from having some indirect influence.

Senator BYRD. Is it not true that this gives great power to people who are unknown, who work behind the scenes?

Mr. MERRIAM. Well, the responsible heads are certainly out in the open. Everybody knows what the President is doing, everybody knows what the Senate and the House are doing.

Senator O'MAHONEY. Of course, it is a very difficult task. No one can doubt that. Whatever system may be used is liable to abuse. Our object here is to draw the bill in such form as to reduce that possibility to a minimum.

Mr. MERRIAM. The President has asked for help. He said, "I cannot manage this. I would like to have half a dozen men to help me." In view of the enormous responsibilities that he had that did not seem to us to be unreasonable.

Senator O'MAHONEY. You have done a valuable thing in placing certain restrictions upon the activities of these individuals, as well as to allow it to depend solely upon the good fortune of the President in making his selection.

If

Mr. MERRIAM. Well, I will repeat what I said, Senator. I think you probably could not do that by statutory language, but the President will or will not be successful in choosing that type of man. he does not choose that type of man, his usefulness is ended, he is out. Senator O'MAHONEY. One President may be very successful in his selection of the personnel and another President may not be so successful, so our duty is to seek for language that will maintain the highest standard all the way down the line.

I was interested in what you had to say about regional administration and planning. One of the principal functions of the system that it is proposed to set up by this bill is to establish a more definite planning authority under the White House management. To what extent do you think that planning should go, and is there any danger of a conflict there between the legislative authority and the executive authority?

Mr. MERRIAM. There is always danger, Senator, but I do not think there is any probability, provided these personnel, the fiscal and planning agencies remain the staff agencies of the President, I see nothing but advantage to come from it.

Senator O'MAHONEY. Well, planning, of course, has to do with future policy.

Mr. MERRIAM. Long-time policy.

Senator O'MAHONEY. And therefore it is the basis of all legislative activity.

Mr. MERRIAM. Yes.

Senator O'MAHONEY. Of course, it is the constitutional duty of the President from time to time to make a report to the Congress of the state of the Union, and therefore I assume that no government would presume to deny to the President the right to have a suitable staff to enable him to make such plans as he desires.

Mr. MERRIAM. Looking a long way ahead.

Senator O'MAHONEY. Looking a long way ahead.

Mr. MERRIAM. As far ahead as you can look, but if you undertake to tell Congress what they are going to do in the next sessions of Congress, or at a given moment, then it is another situation. It depends upon your discretion and upon gathering together material, data, offering alternative suggestions that would be valuable in a long time to look forward. That is quite a different proposition.

Senator O'MAHONEY. Does it not occur to you that a planning function of the Government might be normally more of a legislative function than an executive function?

Mr. MERRIAM. Would you mind saying that again, Senator? Senator O'MAHONEY. I say to you that the planning function of the Government might more normally be a legislative rather than an

executive function?

Mr. MERRIAM. Yes. Of course everybody plans in a certain way. The idea of a planning board was that it took a longer look ahead than a particular Congress, which is burdened with many immediate responsibilities, would or could take. You gentlemen would have to work every day of the week on very many important measures, while some other group might be going out, some jumps ahead, trying to get material on the basis of which to shape up plans for other sessions. Senator O'MAHONEY. To what extent is it proposed, in the reorganizaton of the housekeeping functions of the independent agencies, to bring all the various Federal corporations under executive management to a better degree than they are now?

Mr. MERRIAM. There is a very good study of that in one of these reports to which I just referred, one of these separate reports, giving a tabulation of all the kinds of corporations, their origin, their functions, and their accountability. There are really about 15,000.

Senator O'MAHONEY. And it is the intention to bring them into closer relationship with the executive?

Mr. MERRIAM. To bring them into managerial lines, yes; operating through some department.

Senator O'MAHONEY. And at the present time they are practically independent?

Mr. MERRIAM. Some of them are. That is given in a table there. A large number of the 90 Federal corporations report, we will say, through Agriculture, through Interior, the Treasury, but not all of them. If I might say, it could be a very serious, from our point of view, detriment to the Government if you keep expanding a large number of quasi-governmental corporations until you have a field there of which nobody would have complete administrative control. Senator O'MAHONEY. With respect to the regional division of the Government functions, do you think there is any danger that that might be permitted to develop to such an extent as to break down State lines, or do you think that is desirable?

Mr. MERRIAM. No; I think that is not desirable, to break down the State lines. I would think that a proper kind of Federal decentralization would help the State to hold its position rather than hinder it. That is, if the alternative is concentration in Washington, then the States are very seriously burdened. If you can diffuse your administrative representatives and responsibilities you avoid that mass of overcentralization in Washington which we would come into.

Senator O'MAHONEY. Of course the planning commission has already a recommendation for, I think, 12 regions in the United States, has it not?

Mr. MERRIAM. We did not recommend a positive number. We said where the main concentrations were.

Senator O'MAHONEY. I do not mean your committee, I mean the committee of which Mr. Delano is head, and Secretary Ickes. Mr. MERRIAM. Yes; that is the one.

Senator O'MAHONEY. They have made such a recommendation? Mr. MERRIAM.. You raised that point before, Senator.

Senator O'MAHONEY. You are a member of that committee. Mr. MERRIAM. You raised that before, and we submitted a report of the committee on regionalism.

Senator O'MAHONEY. I must confess that my attention got sidetracked about that time on other matters.

Mr. MERRIAM. I can well believe that.

Senator O'MAHONEY. So I did not see the reply to that.

Mr. MERRIAM. I would be glad to supply you with a copy again. Senator O'MAHONEY. I am going to read it. It is true, however, is it not, that if we increase the functions of the Federal Government and then decentralize the administration into a given number of regions, establishing thereby what amounts to subcapitals, we tend to decrease the significance of the States, although we do decentralize the Federal administration?

Mr. MERRIAM. You could get into difficulties there, but there is another report made later by a member of our staff, Mr. Fesler, on decentralization, which gives in compact form a very good statement of what is involved in administrative decentralization. The title is Administrative Management.

The CHAIRMAN. Senator, have you any further questions?
Senator O'MAHONEY. I can suspend at any time.

The CHAIRMAN. May I say this: We are going to adjourn until tomorrow morning at 10:30, but at tomorrow's session we do not want to go into anything except the forestry item. Senator Byrd wanted to be present when the other members of the President's committee testify. I am also going to ask Doctor Merriam if he cannot remain over until Wednesday.

Mr. MERRIAM. I will be delighted to, Mr. Chairman.

The CHAIRMAN. We will ask you to be here Wednesday at 10:30. (The substance of the acts referred to heretofore are as follows:)

[Public, No. 212, 72d Cong.]

AN ACT Making appropriations for the legislative branch of the Government for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1933, and for other purposes. (Approved June 30, 1932)

SEC. 407. Whenever the President makes an Executive order under the provision of this title, such Executive order shall be transmitted to the Congress while in session and shall not become effective until after the expiration of sixty calendar days after such transmission, unless Congress shall sooner approve of

such Executive order or orders, by concurrent resolution, in which case said order or orders shall become effective as of the date of the adoption of the resolution: Provided, That if Congress shall adjourn before the expiration of sixty calendar days from the date of such transmission, such Executive order shall not become effective until after the expiration of sixty calendar days from the opening day of the next succeeding regular or special session: Provided further, That if either branch of Congress within such sixty days shall pass a resolution disapproving of such Executive order, or any part thereof, such Executive order shall become null and void to the extent of such disapproval: Provided further, That in order to expedite the merging of certain activities, the President is authorized and requested to proceed, without the application of this section, with setting up consolidation of the following governmental activities: public health (except that the provisions hereof shall not apply to hospitals now under the jurisdiction of the Veterans' Administration), personnel administration, education (except the board of vocational education shall not be abolished), and Mexican Water and Boundary Commission, and to merge such activities except those of a purely military nature, of the War and Navy Departments as in his judgment, may be common to both and where the consolidation thereof in either one of the departments will affect economies in Federal expenditures except that this section shall not apply to the United States Employees' Compensation Commission.

[Public, No. 428, 72d Cong., 2d sess., ch. 212, Mar. 3, 1933]

AN ACT Making appropriations for the Treasury and Post Office Departments for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1934, and for other purposes

SEC. 407. Whenever the President makes an Executive order under the provisions of this title, such Executive order shall be submitted to the Congress while in session and shall not become effective until after the expiration of sixty calendar days after such transmission, unless Congress shall by law provide for an earlier effective date of such Executive order or orders: Provided, That if Congress shall adjourn before the expiration of sixty calendar days from the date of such transmission such Executive order shall not become effective until after the expiration of sixty calendar days for the opening day of the next succeeding regular or special session.

SECTION 1. Sections 407 and 409 of title IV of part II of the Legislative Appropriations Act, fiscal year 1933, as amended by section ly of the Treasury and Post Office Appropriation Act, approved March 3, 1933, are amended to read as follows:

"SEC. 407. Whenever the President makes an Executive order under the provisions of this title, such Executive order shall be submitted to the Congress while in session and shall not become effective until after the expiration of sixty calendar days after such transmission, unless Congress shall by law provide for an earlier effective date of such Executive order or orders.

"SEC. 409. No Executive order issued by the President in pursuance of the provisions of section 403 of this title shall become effective unless transmitted in the Congress within two years from the date of the enactment of this Act."

(Provision relative to effective date of Executive orders contained in Reorganization bill S. 2700) SEC. 4. Whenever the President issues an Executive order under the provisions of this title, such Executive order shall be submitted to the Congress while in session and shall not become effective until after the expiration of sixty calendar days after such transmission, unless the Congress shall by law provide for an earlier effective date of such Executive order: Provided, That if Congress shall adjourn before the expiration of sixty calendar days from the date of such trans