Mr. VINSON. As suggested by the chairman, you are dealing now with the special branches. The Army, then, is divided into two branches General COLLINS. Two groups of branches. Mr. VINSON. That is right. The basic branches and the special ones. General COLLINS. Yes, sir. Mr. VINSON. There are three special branches: The Medical Service, the Judge Advocate General, and the chaplains. General COLLINS. Right, sir. Mr. VINSON. Is there anything further on this section? (No response.) TEXT OF SECTION 308, "JUDGE ADVOCATE GENERAL'S CORPS" Mr. BLANDFORD (reading): SEC. 308. There shall be in the Army a Judge Advocate General's Corps, which shall consist of the Judge Advocate General and the Assistant Judge Advocate General authorized by sections 206 and 208 of this Act, three officers with the rank of brigadier general, Regular Army officers appointed and commissioned therein, and such others members of the Army as may be assigned thereto by the Secretary of the Army; but the Secretary shall not assign to the Judge Advocate General's Corps any officer who has been appointed and commissioned in some other special branch or in the Regular Army without specification of branch. The authorized number of commissioned officers of the Regular Army on the active list in the Judge Advocate General's Corps shall be prescribed by the Secretary of the Army, but such authorized number shall not be less than 11⁄2 per centum of the authorized number of commissioned officers on the active list of the Regular Army. The Judge Advocates' promotion list prescribed in section 247, Public Law 759, Eightieth Congress, shall include only commissioned officers of the Regular Army on the active list in the Judge Advocate General's Corps. EXPLANATION AND DISCUSSION OF SECTION 308, Colonel BAYA (reading): "JUDGE ADVOCATE Explanation of section 308: This section will make no change in the substance of the statute quoted in paragraph 3 of this comment. That statute, which is section 8 of the National Defense Act, was rewritten by section 246 of the act of June 24, 1948 (Public Law 759, 80th Cong.). The 1948 act is the one which revised the Articles of War and made a number of changes in the organization of the Judge Advocate General's Corps. In preparing the Army Organization Bill it has been the policy of the Department of the Army not to recommend changes in important postwar enactments of the Congress, and section 308 of the bill accords with that policy. The last sentence of section 308 of the bill has been included in the interest of clarity. It will make no change in the law now in force, as non-Regular officers are not carried on any of the several promotion lists. Reserve and other non-Regular officers are promoted on a different basis. Mr. KILDAY. Any questions on this section? Mr. VINSON. Yes, sir; I would like to ask this question, General. In view of this statement, "In preparing the Army organization bill it has been the policy of the Army not to recommend changes in important postwar enactments of the Congress," then the committee can understand that section 308 does not in any way repeal or diminish the law we passed establishing a Judge Advocate General's Corps in the Army? General COLLINS. That is correct, sir. Mr. VINSON. Of course, my recollection is when we did that the Department of the Army was very much opposed to establishing the corps and did not go along with the committee in regard to it. General COLLINS. No, sir. We have had a corps right along. Mr. KILDAY. A separate promotion list. Mr. VINSON. That is right. General COLLINS. A separate promotion list was the thing. Mr. PRICE. General, in the section of the act that you are repealing it makes reference: and in addition warrant officers and enlisted men in such numbers. You leave all reference to warrant officers and enlisted men out of this section. Is there any particular reason for that? General COLLINS. I would like to have Colonel Baya answer that, if I may. Colonel BAYA. Yes. Sir, they are included by the words in line 11 and such other members of the Army as may be assigned thereto by the Secretary. Members of the Army are defined over in section 2 of the bill to include warrants, commissioned, and enlisted. Mr. BLANDFORD. May I ask one further question, Colonel? Who are these officers that are appointed or commissioned in the Regular Army without specification of branch? Colonel BAYA. Those are the Regular officers who are assigned to the basic branches. SEC. 309. There shall be chaplains in the Army. The chaplains shall include the Chief of Chaplains authorized by section 206 of this Act, Regular Army officers appointed and commissioned as chaplains, and other officers of the Army appointed and commissioned as chaplains in the Army, or in any component thereof, as now or hereafter provided by law. EXPLANATION AND DISCUSSION OF SECTION 309, Colonel BAYA (reading): "CHAPLAINS" Explanation of section 309: This section makes no change whatever in existing law. The statute quoted in paragraph 3 of this comment fixing the number of chaplains was superseded by section 502 (e) of the Officer Personnel Act of 1947 (61 Stat. 883; 10 U. S. C. 506 (e)), which authorizes the Secretary of the Army to prescribe the number of chaplains. Mr. KILDAY. I want to state at this time that there are representatives of the chaplains here who want to be heard. I believe in the interest of orderly procedure we will hear them now and then we can discuss the proposal of the bill and any proposal they may care to make. You can just come around, please. Mr. REYNOLDS. I am Fred Ĉ. Reynolds. Mr. KILDAY. Just have a seat, sir. Mr. REYNOLDS. It isn't necessary. It will be very brief. STATEMENT OF FRED C. REYNOLDS, PRESIDENT OF THE MILITARY CHAPLAINS ASSOCIATION Mr. REYNOLDS. At the present time I am the president of the Military Chaplains Association of the United States. What we are requesting is, if you see fit, that there be included in this act a definite proportion of chaplains to the Army personnel. That is, as I understand it, not specified anywhere at the present time, but is a matter of policy. That policy changes at times and we feel that we would like to request that the proportion of 1 chaplain to every 800 Army personnel be specified in the act. Mr. VINSON. Mr. Chairman, did we not in the Personnel Act of 1947 remove the limit? Mr. REYNOLDS. I understand that that is true. Mr. VINSON. Under the old law it was one chaplain for every 1,200. Mr. REYNOLDS. That is right. Mr. VINSON. And you want one chaplain for every 800? Mr. REYNOLDS. Well, it was, as I understand it, one chaplain to 800 up to the time that that was eliminated by the Personnel Act of 1947. Mr. VINSON. Well, prior to that time somewhere in the National Defense Act, section 15 provided one chaplain for every 1,200. Mr. REYNOLDS. That is right. Mr. VINSON. Then in the Personnel Act of 1947 we left it entirely to the discretion of the Secretary as to how many chaplains he should have. Mr. REYNOLDS. That is right. Mr. VINSON. Irrespective of the number. Now let me ask the general: How many chaplains have you now based upon the number of enlisted men and officers? General COLLINS. I would have to ask someone of the Staff here. Mr. VINSON. What figure do you use? Do you use 800, 1,200, orGeneral COLLINS. I do not know the answer to that, Mr. Vinson. You see, the one disadvantage of having a prescription as to the number of chaplains that you must have in relationship to your men is that the strength of the Army goes up and down depending upon what the world situation is. Mr. VINSON. That is right. Mr. KILDAY. Appropriations? General COLLINS. And appropriations. This would be the only part of the bill in which it would be prescribed that the number of offiers of a particular branch must bear a relationship to the number of enlisted men. So we would prefer not to have that fixed by law. However, I want to take this opportunity, in the presence of the president of the Chaplains Association, to state that the Army, in asking for this flexibility, in no sense is endeavoring to reduce the proportion of chaplains in the Army. The chaplains in the Army today are doing a marvelous job. In my judgment, they are better recognized now than they have ever been in the history of the Army. And they play an exceedingly important part in the morale of the officers and men of the Army. We are for them. But we do not believe that it is wise to prescribe in law the ratio between the number of chaplains and the number of men. Mr. KILDAY. What is the experience of your association as to the number in the past, Mr. Reynolds? Mr. REYNOLDS. Well, I understand that in actual practice at the present time there is about one chaplain to every 1,300. I may be incorrect, but I have been informed to that effect. I happened to be in Germany a year ago, in the summer, at the invitation of the Department of the Army and the General Commission on Army and Navy Chaplains, studying the chaplains situation with the European Army of Occupation. Possibly it was because of the peculiar conditions that existed there but it was generally felt that there wasn't at that time a sufficient number of chaplains. For instance, there was a large number of civilian personnel in various activities and the chaplains were responsible for the morale and religious supervision of the civilian personnel as well as the military personnel. And, because of conditions there, they felt that there was an inadequate number of chaplains, if that answers the question. Mr. VINSON. My reaction is that you have so many doctors and so many dentists based upon a certain ratio. It may not be written in the law; but, in figuring it out, you say, "I am going to have a dentist for so many men. "You work that out in regulations. That is the basis for the number you have; isn't that correct? General COLLINS. Yes, sir. In general terms, plus a reserve, or course. Mr. VINSON. That is right; exactly. You say you have so many men in the Regular Army; so therefore you will need, to administer dental care, a certain number of dentists, and that is based upon so many enlisted men, and so forth. Nothing contributes more to the morale of the Army than a strong chaplains' organization. I was a little bit surprised that the number now is one chaplain for 1,300, when the old law was one chaplain to 1,200. General COLLINS. I do not know that that is the case, Mr. Vinson. I will have to check that and I will give you a report on that. Mr. VINSON. All right. I cannot see any harm to this from my viewpoint, because it is a strong factor in the morale and the discipline of the Armed Services, especially abroad. There are no two ways about it, we must have a sufficient number of chaplains. Now, if the Chaplains Association thinks that you do not have enough and it ought to be based on something, regardless of whether it is written in the law, if it can be understood that you will have a chaplain for every 900 or 1,000 enlisted men and you adopt that as a policy, it would take the place of writing it in the statute. But you have to reach some number. General COLLINS. Let me make clear, though, Mr. Vinson, that even if you should write that in the law you still do not solve the particular problem that the chaplain has just spoken of. You have a small garrison we will say somewhere. You might want to have a chaplain there even though you had only 250 men. In the United States where our officers frequently live off posts in civilian communities, the need for chaplains here at home is not as great as in Germany, for example. Mr. VINSON. That is right. General COLLINS. So if you really want to get down to it, you would have to specify that on Foreign Service we would have to have so many per each thousand men and so many in isolated garrisons, and so on. In other words, you would be writing regulations into law. That is the point, and we say we would prefer not to have you do that. Mr. KILDAY. In that connection, in a combat organization, what is the smallest organization to which a chaplain is assigned? Does it go down as far as battalion or regiment? General COLLINS. It is by tables of organization. I cannot give you a specific answer to that, Mr. Kilday. I wouldn't trust my memory. Mr. KILDAY. Do you know, Mr. Reynolds? Mr. REYNOLDS. Well, during the war there was one chaplain, approximately, to each battalion. For instance, an Infantry regiment had three chaplains. General COLLINS. Right. Mr. REYNOLDS. One to each battalion. As the general says, we are not asking that one chaplain be assigned to definite units. General COLLINS. Yes. Mr. REYNOLDS. But that the general percentage be on the basis of 1 to 800 men. Now, here, regarding the Judge Advocate General's Corps, it is specified: But such authorized number shall not be less than 12 percent of the authorized number of commissioned officers on the active list of the Regular Army. There is a definite number specified there. That is a definite percent age. General COLLINS. Right. Mr. VINSON. This is off the record. (Statement off the record.) Mr. REYNOLDS. Then the disposition of them can be made, of course, at the discretion of the military. Mr. VINSON. That is entirely a military matter. Mr. REYNOLDS. Of course. That is all I have to say. Mr. KILDAY. We will take it under consideration. Mr. REYNOLDS. I would like to, if it is in order, introduce Mr. Rymer, who is the Director of the General Commission on Army and Navy Chaplains. Mr. KILDAY. Come around. We will be glad to have any statement you desire to make, sir. Mr. RYMER. Thank you, Dr. Reynolds. Mr. Chairman, I am Thomas Rymer, the Director of the General Commission on Chaplains. Mr. KILDAY. Just have a seat. STATEMENT OF THOMAS RYMER, DIRECTOR OF THE GENERAL COMMISSION ON CHAPLAINS Mr. RYMER. The General Commission on Chaplains is an organization that has been in existence over a third of a century. It was organized for three general reasons: First of all, Protestant chaplains |