STATEMENT OF DILLARD B. LASSETER, EXECUTIVE OFFICER, ORGANIZATION OF PROFESSIONAL EMPLOYEES, UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE

My name is Dillard B. Lasseter. I am executive officer of the Organization of Professional Employees of the United States Department of Agriculture, usually referred to as OPEDA.

Our organization appreciates this opportunity to appear before this committee to endorse another constructive piece of legislation. With your permission, I should like to present the views of our organization on the proposed legislation. The Organization of Professional Employees of the Department of Agriculture has long recognized the major contributions of intensive professional training to effective public service. We have, therefore, consistently supported legislation which is designed to facilitate productive training in the Federal service. Of vital importance is the proposed legislation which would authorize Governmentfinanced training of selected Federal employees at non-Federal facilities. We reaffirm our position of strong support for this legislation.

In recent years the need for such authority has steadily increased. Currently the need is acute. It is the result of several strong and inescapable influences. Two primary ones operating together are (1) the critical shortages in skilled scientific and professional manpower, and (2) the rapid advances made in the technology of many fields. I shall confine my remarks primarily to the agricultural science fields. However, the general need for such training authorization is pressing in practically all of the professional fields across most Federal agencies.

Some specific areas within Agriculture where this training would be most valuable include microtechniques in wood plastic and chemistry, extended application and research in genetics on improved wood cellulose production and forest tree derivatives including naval stores, radioactivity in the study of disease control and plant growth, analytical techniques required for studying fertilizer use and management and telecommunication engineering study to advance an effective program for bringing modern telephone service to rural areas. Several other examples could be added to this list.

Current and rapid technological advances in agriculture and the related industries have given rise to greater specialization and intense demands for people with combination of special skills. Long-range planning and decisions, for example, as to the influence and adaptability of nuclear science and power in the future of American agriculture requires a knowledge which can only be obtained outside the Department. The advent of electronics data processing has inherent problems and methods which require specialized training, if the advantages of automation are to be realized. I cite two examples, only, where growing manpower shortages exist and advanced training is critically needed-the statistical and mathematical fields. None of these educational facilities is adequately available within the Department.

New programs legislated by Congress engender new responsibilities for technical and administrative competence. The increasing complexity of our modern organizations and interrelationships, both national and international, require advanced training in public administration's latest techniques and developments. In essence, all of the biological, physical, and social sciences generally require facilities and skilled instructorship that just do not exist within the Department. We do not propose that this legislation should provide the same rights as that of a planned system of sabbatical leave which has characterized the advanced training of the faculties of most American colleges and universities. Many of our truly great advances in science and administration have come from these men who were afforded this periodic and planned opportunity to keep abreast of major developments and carry on individual advanced study. Similarly, the Nation's future welfare and security can be promoted and protected by a dynamically trained Federal service personnel who are given this same opportunity. The needs of the specific public service job working toward the total national welfare should govern the selection of men qualified for and in need of such individual training. I reaffirm OPEDA's support of this principle which is recognized by the current legislation under consideration.

Private industry also has long recognized the value of scheduling and financing specialized training in outside facilities for selected personnel. The top position of American industry in the worldwide scene, and the resulting contributions to our high standard of living speaks of the high level skills, knowledge and executive competence. In great measure this leadership stems from their latitude to seek out and utilize advanced training in the best equipped and best staffed laboratories and educational institutions of the Nation.

We have long been proud of our world leadership in the professional agricultural arts and sciences. In no other period of our history has the need for continuing this strong position been more crucial-nor has this leadership been in greater jeopardy. Of equal importance is the great challenge for national leadership in maining a stable agricultural economy through technological advances which keep apace with the Nation's needs. This means getting, keeping, and developing competent people for all of the many fields of scientific and professional achievement. Putting the principle to work by means of training legislation which enables the maximum development of our people will directly contribute to efficient and effective public service.

In summary, this message has outlined some of the prime factors which are directly affecting a needed high level development program for professional personnel.

Although H. R. 6001 and H. R. 1989 would provide the authority which the agencies so badly need, S. 385 would provide the type of authority which could be most efficiently used by the Federal agencies. It is recognized that the Congress is concerned with the manner in which the agencies use this authority and that steps must be taken to prevent abuse of it. However, it is believed that the most effective means of doing this is by providing more or less general authority, leaving to the Civil Service Commission and the Federal agencies the responsibility for the proper use of the authority. Under such circumstances, reports on the use should be made to the Congress at regular intervals in order for its members to be assured of the effective and wise use of the training authority.

Mr. HEMPHILL. The subcommittee will now stand in recess until 10 a. m. Monday morning.

(Whereupon, at 12:06 p. m., Friday, June 13, 1958, the subcom mittee adjourned until Monday, June 16, 1958, at 10 a. m.)

TRAINING OF FEDERAL EMPLOYEES

MONDAY, JUNE 16, 1958

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,
SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE

COMMITTEE ON POST OFFICE AND CIVIL SERVICE,

Washington, D. C.

The subcommittee met, pursuant to adjournment, at 10 a. m. in room 215, Old House Office Building, Hon. Robert W. Hemphill (chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.

Mr. HEMPHILL. The subcommittee will come to order.

We are honored to have this morning as the first witness to appear, Hon H. A. Dixon, a Member of Congress from the State of Utah. Mr. Dixon, we are glad to have you with us and will be pleased to hear your statement.

STATEMENT OF HON. H. A. DIXON, A REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF UTAH

Mr. DIXON. Honorable Chairman and colleagues, I commend you upon this forward look in civil-service training legislation and I appear here in support of it.

The effectiveness of the democratic process is definitely being put to the test today in our race for economic and scientific supremacy. The democratic process is proverbially slow.

I recall reading that one historian has said that the totalitarian state is like a full rigged ship sailing majestically out of the harbor at full speed, but if it hits a rock it sinks. Democracy is more like a raft. It doesn't make much speed; on the other hand it does not sink but your feet are always wet. One reason why our feet are always wet is the slowness with which we are able to make correct and vital decisions in our administrative departments.

We urgently need a training program for our civil service which can greatly improve the ability of these professional employees to think and communicate with clarity and thereby assist the policy makers to have the facts and understand the implications of the decisions they must make.

The urgent need for both inservice and outservice training programs was recognized by the first and second Hoover Commissions, the Civil Service Commission in each of its reports during the past 3 years, the Land-Grant Colleges Association, the Bureau of the Budget, the United States Senate, and the American Federation of Government Employees.

I wish to emphasize the liberalization of H. R. 6001 along lines suggested by Budget Director Maurice H. Stans. Without repeating

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his recommendations I wish to support them and particularly emphasize the need for more flexibility. The colllege graduate of yesterday who doesn't study today will be uneducated tomorrow. I think that is definitely the truth. I believe implicitly that where growth stops death sets in and that these seeds of death are definitely in the makeup of many of our civil servants who haven't even been given the encouragement to grow continuously.

Even the most unpretentious institutions of higher learning have programs of sabbatical leaves for the improvement of their faculties. For 20 years I have administered such programs and can testify from firsthand experience to their indispensability to any progressive insti

tution.

I am concerned about the requirement in lines 3 and 4 on page 8 of H. R. 6001 where regulations include "requirements for *** maximum practicable uniformity ***." Perhaps the phrase, "reasonable uniformity" would be more appropriate. I believe this would meet the objectives of your committee in the spelling out of requirements for the need for this legislation. In this connection the Bureau of the Budget proposed that the phrase "Government-wide" on line 12 of page 2 be eliminated.

It might be possible to establish a uniform governmentwide training program in a country like Great Britain where you have professionally trained administrators throughout the civil service. These professional administrators have enough in common that a uniform program might be applicable to them. However, in the United States we have felt that a virtue of our civil service is its diversity, and I might add its creativeness. We have all types of professional people in the civil service with infinite diversity of backgrounds and specialized functions. Thus to establish uniform regulations for a training program throughout the Government would probably solidify the program because agencies with special needs might find that they couldn't fit into the uniform regulations.

For example, there may be employed in the Bureau of Standards a physicist who received his theoretical training some 10 to 15 years ago. It might well be desirable for that physicist to return to a university for, let us say, a 9-month period in order to gain instruction in the most recent theories in nuclear physics. If this were not done, the alternative for the Bureau would probably be to hire and additional physicist more recently trained.

Similarly, the Department of Agriculture may wish to insure that its research personnel are familiar with the most recent techniques. in the use of atomic radioactive isotopes in agricultural research. It would certainly be better to send a trained Government research man back to a university or other center to acquire this recent information than to hire additional employees, recently trained, for this purpose.

But, my point is this. If this legislation is to be used for these purposes and I think that it should be-then it should not contain provisions which require maximum uniformities in training programs among all agencies of Government. What is needed instead, to meet the specialized needs of our tremendously varied civil servants and to take advantage of the great plurality of educational and training status, is flexibility.

Again, I commend the authors of this legislation and the committee in giving it such serious consideration.

Mr. HEMPHILL. Thank you very much. We are glad to have you before the committee.

Any questions, Mr. Scott?

Mr. SCOTT. No.

Mr. HEMPHILL. Mr. Dennison?

Mr. DENNISON. Thank you very much for this statement, Congressman. I think for the record it would be interesting to have a summary of your background in the field of education, which I understand you have had. I think it would be helpful to have that recited at this time if you might tell us.

Mr. DIXON. Briefly, I started out as a teacher of the German language in World War I when they burned all the textbooks. I studied school administration, receiving my doctorate degree at the University of California. I was superintendent of the Provo city schools in Utah for 9 years; served as president of Weber College at. Ogden, Utah, for 17 years; was a member of the President's Čom-mission on Higher Education, and lastly, president of Utah State Agricultural College.

I have found that our sabbatical year program is one of the finest things that ever struck an institution of higher learning, and the incentive given through this legislation would do the same thing, I am sure, for our civil-service people, to keep them growing all the time.

Mr. DENNISON. Have you had any firsthand experience as a college administrator with similar types of training programs for private industry or perhaps even any experience with the Rockefeller program?

Mr. DIXON. In Weber College at Ogden we had a technical education program operating around the clock to upgrade the skills of workers at defense establishments in the area. The program was a successful example of cooperation between private industry, the college, the Federal Government, and the workers themselves. We convinced them that their education was not finished at the end of 2 years, but that they could learn while they earned, and it works beautifully. That is the finest situation you could get, to work and then come back to school. They find out where their weaknesses and deficiencies are and they can point their program definitely to their own needs. This legislation will do the same thing.

At the Utah Agricultural College we had tremendous programs in electronics for Government programs and our experiment stations in research for the farmers, which all ties in with the concept of this legislation.

Mr. DENNISON. Referring specifically to your example of the physicists in the Bureau of Standards, which you mentioned in your statement, do I understand, in your opinion, the language in H. R.

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