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"Worked Out in Fractions": Neutral Competence, FDR and the Bureau of the Budget
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9
Roosevelt’s transition team also hoped to take advantage of the president’s newly-
acquired reorganization authority to reduce duplication and inefficiency in the executive
branch.
16
Toward this end, they proposed folding the Bureau of Efficiency into the BoB,
and expanding the agency’s fiscal auditing functions.
17
Again, the intent was to change
the capacity, but not the character, of the BoB. Another transition memo captures the
general attitude among FDR’s advisers at this time:
I regard it as essential that the Budget Director remain a purely staff officer without administrative duties other than preparation of the budget, thus leaving him the utmost freedom and scope for the exercise of those staff duties of study of organization and expenditure control which are so important…. What is needed is a force of men who, in the course of time, will know about the departments than they know about themselves, and who, out of the power of that knowledge, will enable the Director to act in the interest of efficiency and economy. He needs, or should have, nothing more.
18
In his first months as President Roosevelt, with Douglas’ active support,
implemented many of these cost-cutting suggestions.
19
On March 20, 1933, he signed the
Economy Act into law (effective in June 30, 1933). Largely drafted by Douglas, it cut
government salaries by 25 percent (saving $100 million) and gave FDR the power to
slash another $400 million in veterans' payments.
20
When agencies complained that they
16
Reorganization authority, subject to a legislative veto, was first granted during Hoover’s presidency.
17
For instance, see the February 18, 1933, memorandum from George H. Parker, a consultant to Sherley.
Parker argued that the government auditing functions ought to be taken away from those who spend money and given to the BoB in order to provide the President with greater control over how money was spent. In RG 51, Reorganization of the Executive Branch under the Economy Act, Doc. Nos. 101-120. Unit no. 3f , NA-II.
18
Arthur Brown memorandum in ibid..
19
According to one source, Douglas went so far as to cut 31 employees from the BoB’s payroll! Harold
Roth, The Executive Office of the President, Ph.D. Dissertation, The American University: Washington, D.C., 1953), 120-1. During the Republican period under Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover, yearly BoB personnel had never exceeded forty-eight people. After Douglas' cuts and subsequent departure, it never went higher than forty-five until its incorporation into the EOP by Roosevelt in 1939. This total included about ten clerical staff. It does not include employees detailed from other agencies – usually the War and Navy Departments, and the Federal Coordinating Service. See Alfred Dick Sander, A Staff for the President (Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1989), 16-18.
20
That act also abolished the Bureau of Efficiency, and transferred its records and duties to the BoB.
William Leuchtenberg, Franklin Roosevelt and the New Deal, paperback ed. (New York, NY: Harper Torchbooks, 1963), 45; Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., The Coming of the New Deal (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1959), 9-11.
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| | Authors: Dickinson, Matthew. and Rudalevige, Andrew. |
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9
Roosevelt’s transition team also hoped to take advantage of the president’s newly-
acquired reorganization authority to reduce duplication and inefficiency in the executive
branch.
16
Toward this end, they proposed folding the Bureau of Efficiency into the BoB,
and expanding the agency’s fiscal auditing functions.
17
Again, the intent was to change
the capacity, but not the character, of the BoB. Another transition memo captures the
general attitude among FDR’s advisers at this time:
I regard it as essential that the Budget Director remain a purely staff officer without
administrative duties other than preparation of the budget, thus leaving him the utmost
freedom and scope for the exercise of those staff duties of study of organization and
expenditure control which are so important…. What is needed is a force of men who, in
the course of time, will know about the departments than they know about themselves,
and who, out of the power of that knowledge, will enable the Director to act in the
interest of efficiency and economy. He needs, or should have, nothing more.
18
In his first months as President Roosevelt, with Douglas’ active support,
implemented many of these cost-cutting suggestions.
19
On March 20, 1933, he signed the
Economy Act into law (effective in June 30, 1933). Largely drafted by Douglas, it cut
government salaries by 25 percent (saving $100 million) and gave FDR the power to
slash another $400 million in veterans' payments.
20
When agencies complained that they
16
Reorganization authority, subject to a legislative veto, was first granted during Hoover’s presidency.
17
For instance, see the February 18, 1933, memorandum from George H. Parker, a consultant to Sherley.
Parker argued that the government auditing functions ought to be taken away from those who spend money
and given to the BoB in order to provide the President with greater control over how money was spent. In
RG 51, Reorganization of the Executive Branch under the Economy Act, Doc. Nos. 101-120. Unit no. 3f ,
NA-II.
18
Arthur Brown memorandum in ibid..
19
According to one source, Douglas went so far as to cut 31 employees from the BoB’s payroll! Harold
Roth, The Executive Office of the President, Ph.D. Dissertation, The American University: Washington,
D.C., 1953), 120-1. During the Republican period under Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover, yearly BoB
personnel had never exceeded forty-eight people. After Douglas' cuts and subsequent departure, it never
went higher than forty-five until its incorporation into the EOP by Roosevelt in 1939. This total included
about ten clerical staff. It does not include employees detailed from other agencies – usually the War and
Navy Departments, and the Federal Coordinating Service. See Alfred Dick Sander, A Staff for the President
(Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1989), 16-18.
20
That act also abolished the Bureau of Efficiency, and transferred its records and duties to the BoB.
William Leuchtenberg, Franklin Roosevelt and the New Deal, paperback ed. (New York, NY: Harper
Torchbooks, 1963), 45; Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., The Coming of the New Deal (Boston: Houghton
Mifflin, 1959), 9-11.
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