AMERICA'S EXTRAVAGANCE.

Colonist, Volume LII, Issue 12767, 13 April 1910, Page 4

AMERICA'S EXTRAVAGANCE.

Senator Aldrich asserted the other day that the cost of maintaining the United States Government could be reduced by £60,000,000 in the year if business methods were adopted by the va nous departments. Senator Crana, of Massachusetts, commenting upon the statement, contended that the duplication of work was the main cause of the tremendous total to which the. annual expenditure had attained. Senator Cullorn, a representative of 111---nois, remarked that the way to save money was for Congress to refuse to undertake many of the services at present in its hands. "Congress has boen doing prdactically everything that anybody asked us to take up," he added. Every chief of a bureau is anxious to make a showing, and if he is concerned with some branch of scientific inquiry, the expenses increase enormously. We do too much public printing, we .have too many army posts, too many useless navy yards,too much scientific research that ought to be done by private institutions or universities. We have gone on until we have got beyond the field that properly should be occupied by the Federal Government." Several other prominent politicians spoke in similar terms. One senator complained that the various statistical departments did practically tho same work, and that many of their figures were not trustworthy. When' he wanted "real statistics" he had to use those of the British Board of Trade which Becured reliable information. Senator Aldrich had suggested that vast economies could be effected by. applying business methods to the affairs of the country, and this remark seems to have provoked a good deal of criticism from the men who delieved that

a private concern was inevitably more eifhcient than a State department. "The Government never can run its affairs like those of a great corporation" said a Wyoming senator. In the course of the discussion a good deal of attention was directed to the fact that last year a sum of over £30,000,000 was paid out in pensions, many of them admittedly undeserved.