APPROPRIATION BILL FOR 1934

HEARING

BEFORE THE

US Cong

SUBCOMMITTEE OF "HOUSE COMMITTEE

ON APPROPRIATIONS

CONSISTING OF

MESSRS. WILLIAM B. OLIVER (CHAIRMAN)
ANTHONY J. GRIFFIN, CLARENCE CANNON
THOMAS L. BLANTON, MILTON W. SHREVE
AND GEORGE HOLDEN TINKHAM

IN CHARGE OF

DEPARTMENTS OF STATE, JUSTICE, COMMERCE, AND
LABOR APPROPRIATION BILL FOR 1934

152857

SEVENTY-SECOND CONGRESS

SECOND SESSION

UNITED STATES
GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE

WASHINGTON: 1933

COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS

JOSEPH W. BYRNS, Tennessee, Chairman

Massa

HEARINGS CONDUCTED BY THE SUBCOMMITTEE, MESSRS. WILLIAM B. OLIVER (CHAIRMAN), ANTHONY J. GRIFFIN, CLARENCE CANNON, THOMAS L. BLANTON, MILTON W. SHREVE, AND GEORGE HOLDEN TINKHAM, OF THE COMMITTEE ON APFROPRIATIONS, HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, IN CHARGE OF THE DEPARTMENTS OF STATE, JUSTICE, COMMERCE, AND LABOR APPROPRIATION BILL FOR THE FISCAL YEAR 1934, ON THE DAYS FOLLOWING, NAMELY:

WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 30, 1932.

STATEMENT OF HON. WILLIAM DE WITT MITCHELL, THE
ATTORNEY GENERAL

GENERAL STATEMENT

Mr. OLIVER. We will take up this morning appropriations for the Department of Justice. The committee is pleased to have with us the Attorney General, General Mitchell. Mr. Attorney General, if you desire to submit a general statement to the committee, as in previous years, we will be glad to have you do so at this time.

INCREASE IN VOLUME OF BUSINESS OF DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE

Mr. MITCHELL. Mr. Chairman, I shall endeavor to give briefly a general review of our situation, which may throw a little light on the details with which you will deal afterwards.

The principal problem we have been confronted with in the last year has been the problem of a steadily increasing volume of business with steadily decreasing appropriations.

There have been no reductions in the functions of the Department of Justice. In all our efforts for economy it has not been possible to cut out services to the public in the department of the type which exist in other departments. We do not perform services of the kind that are useful but dispensable.

We have the task of collecting money due the Government. There is no economy in reducing our efforts along those lines.

We have the task of defending suits against the Government. We do not save any money by weakening there.

We have the task of furnishing tribunals for private litigants, which we have to maintain.

We have the task of enforcing Federal criminal laws and if there is to be any economy along that line it is not by lax enforcement.

During the past two or three years, instead of there being any reductions in the functions of the department, there has been the usual 934194

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grist of bills granting additional jurisdiction to the Federal courts to maintain suits and claims against the Government, creating new fields of civil litigation such as the acquisition and condemnation of property for public use, and various other activities.

There have been some additions to our Federal criminal laws, but no repeals, and the reconstruction program has involved a great mass of administrative and office work for the department, legal questions, and so forth.

GROWTH OF CIVIL AND CRIMINAL LITIGATION

•MA OLIVER. I would like to have you at the proper place in your statement; insert the interesting table that you prepared last year, showing the growth of the criminal and civil business. You will please insert it where you think most appropriate.

Mr. MITCHELL. I shall insert it and bring it up to date. As I remember it, it went back as far as 1910.

Statement showing various classes of cases and other proceedings in the United States district courts commenced during the fiscal years 1910 to 1932, respectively

Comparing the volume of business that we have been confronted with, in 1932 there were commenced 34,189 Government civil cases as against 25,332 in 1931. We terminated in 1932, the year ending July 1 last, 29,591 Government civil cases as against 25,010 the previous year.

NUMBER OF CRIMINAL CASES

We commenced 92,000 criminal cases, in round figures, in 1932, as against 83,000 the previous year. We terminated, that is, disposed of, 96,000 criminal cases in 1932, as against 91,000 the previous year.

BANKRUPTCY PROCEEDINGS

In bankruptcy proceedings, for which we provide a tribunal, the number instituted in 1932 was 70,000 as against 65,000 the previous year. The number terminated was 63,000 as against 60,000 the previous year.

PRIVATE LITIGATION

Under the head of private litigation other than bankruptucy the number of private suits commenced in 1932 was 26,000 as against 24,000 the previous year. The number terminated was 26,000 as against 24,000 the previous fiscal year.

So that our immediate situation has been a steadily growing business of all kinds. The number of civil-government cases in the courts commenced in 1932 was just ten times what it was in 1917, and the amount of criminal business in 1932 was just five times what it was in 1917.

Our appropriations for 1932 were approximately four times the appropriations for 1917. So that going back through that period, our picture is one of steadily increasing business and of steadily diminishing appropriations in proportion to the work we have to do. That problem has been very acute in the last year or two.

ECONOMIES EFFECTED IN 1932

I would like to turn for a moment to what we did with this tremendous volume of business in 1932 with the money you gave us. It became evident in January last that we were headed for a deficiency in a great many items unless stringent efforts were made to avoid it. I took the bull by the horns at that time and served notice throughout the department that I was not going to apply for any deficiency appropriations, considering the state of the country, in any controllable item; that I would close down the operations before I would come up here and ask for more money during this past fiscal year. The whole department turned to, then, to save money, out in the field and in the department, and I am furnishing a statement showing the unexpended balances for 1932 under each item. I will not read all of it, but it will go into the record. The net result of our efforts was to turn back into the Treasury at the end of the last fiscal year, $1,917,274.

APPROPRIATIONS, 1931, 1932, 1933, AND ESTIMATES, 1934

Mr. MITCHELL. I have here a table, which I will insert in the record, first giving you briefly some of the figures.

For the fiscal year ending June 30, 1931, our total expenditures were $48,804,140. For 1932 that dropped to $47,871,927. For the current fiscal year our appropriations have dropped to $45,966,000. Our present Budget estimate, as we bring it here, is $44,282,487. That gives you a picture of the appropriation situation.