The CHAIRMAN. I know that, but that is not all that you have in these days.

Mr. CARR. No; that is perfectly true.

The CHAIRMAN. So we need not worry about that phase of it. We should be frank about these things.

Mr. CARR. That is perfectly true. We go to the national-defense fund now for expenditures that we can not meet out of the emergency fund.

MONDAY, JULY 16, 1917.

TREASURY DEPARTMENT.

STATEMENT OF MR. H. P. HUDDLESON, ASSISTANT CHIEF DIVISION OF PUBLIC MONEYS.

CREDITS IN ACCOUNTS OF S. R. JACOBS PAYMENT TO ERNEST SATTERLEY.

The CHAIRMAN. "The accounting officers of the Treasury Department are authorized and directed to credit in the accounts of S. R. Jacobs, disbursing clerk, Treasury Department, the sum of $114.70, being the amount paid by him to Ernest Satterley, a clerk in the Treasury Department, as reimbursement for actual expenses incurred by said Ernest Satterley while on special duty at the Subtreasury, New Orleans, La., from November 20, 1916, to February 11, 1917, in accordance with and under orders of the Secretary of the Treasury dated November 15, 1916." What is this, please?

Mr. HUDDLESON. Mr. Satterley was receiving teller in the Subtreasury at New Orleans, and at the time of his transfer the Assistant Treasurer, Heard, had resigned. He was appointed to a State office, and we could not hold him under his bond after accepting the resignation, which the Secretary did, in order to permit him to take this State position which had been offered him. The laws of the State would not permit him to accept the position and at the same time hold a Federal position.

So we had to take charge of the Subtreasury. The Treasurer of the United States, being the only bonded official, took charge ad interim, and the Secretary sent Mr. Fort, the Assistant Treasurer, to New Orleans, accompanied by Mr. John Moon from the Public Moneys Division, to take charge of the office, Mr. Moon to keep the books and the cash and Mr. Fort to transact the executive business. At the time of this transfer Mr. Satterley wanted to come to Washington and was transferred from the position of receiving teller at $2,000 per annum to a $1.400 place on the rolls of the Public Moneys Division in the Treasury. It became necessary to have the services of Mr. Moon, who is a very valuable man; in fact, one of the best men we have in the office, and the Secretary, on November 15, assigned Mr. Satterley, after his taking the oath of office as clerk in our division, to relieve Mr. Moon, who was directed to return to Washington. We were paying the expenses of both Mr. Fort and Mr. Moon, who were in charge of the Subtreasury there. Mr. Satterley remained on duty until the new Assistant Treasurer was sworn in. Mr. Fort was then relieved, and both returned to Washington. When the accounts came to the auditor he disallowed those of Mr.

Satterley on the ground that he was not on a travel status; that it was simply transferring him from one place to another; and that directing him to stay there did not put him on a travel status. So Mr. Satterley will lose expenses unless you grant this relief.

Mr. SHERLEY. I do not know that I understand it. Satterley was on a salary in New Orleans?

Mr. HUDDLESON. He was; yes, sir.

Mr. SHERLEY. And he got transferred to this other position?
Mr. HUDDLESON. To Washington; yes, sir.

Mr. SHERLEY. And came up here?

Mr. HUDDLESON. He did not come up here. The Secretary directed him to stay there and relieve Mr. Moon, who came home.

Mr. SHERLEY. He stayed down there?

Mr. HUDDLESON. Yes, sir.

Mr. SHERLEY. On what basis should he get any different pay? How was his relationship changed at all?

Mr. HUDDLESON. There was a difference in compensation. He originally received $2,000 in the New Orleans Subtreasury, and we transferred him here at $1,400.

The CHAIRMAN. That was because his place was to be abolished, was it not?

Mr. HUDDLESON. No, sir; he wanted to be transferred to Washington?

The CHAIRMAN. He wanted to be reduced $600 and come to Washington?

Mr. HUDDLESON. He was willing to do that on account of his health. New Orleans knocked him out physically.

Mr. SHERLEY. But he did not come here and stayed down there.

Mr. HUDDLESON. He remained there by direction of the Secretary. He wanted to come here.

Mr. SHERLEY. I am not getting at what he wanted to do. The fact is that he stayed there?

Mr. HUDDLESON. Yes.

Mr. SHERLEY. Why should he be paid any more than he was receiving anyway for having stayed there?

Mr. HUDDLESON. If we had let him come on here and kept Mr. Moon there, we would have had to pay Mr. Moon

Mr. SHERLEY (interposing). That is not a reason.

We are not

hunting for reasons why we might have had to pay money if we had done certain things. He got the same amount of money he had been getting while he was there?

Mr. HUDDLESON. No, sir; he got $600 less.

Mr. SHERLEY. He got a new position and got the pay of the new position?

Mr. HUDDLESON. Yes, sir; $1,400.

Mr. SHERLEY. Then the reason is that inasmuch as he stayed at New Orleans instead of being transferred to Washington at a reduction of $600, then he ought to get the difference between the two salaries at New Orleans?

Mr. HUDDLESON. It has always been customary to pay a man's expenses when you send him out on duty.

Mr. SHERLEY. But this man was not sent anywhere. He was already down there.

Mr. HUDDLESON. Yes.

Mr. SHERLEY. You can not make a fiction out of a fact.

The CHAIRMAN. He was already living there and the theory is that you should pay his expenses although he remained there under these orders of the Secretary.

Mr. HUDDLESON. From the time he was transferred to the new position; yes, sir.

Mr. BYRNS. When he was reduced, was it expected he would be ordered here to Washington at once?

Mr. HUDDLESON. Yes, sir.

Mr. BYRNS. And after his reduction the Secretary of the Treasury decided to hold him there?

Mr. HUDDLESON. Yes, sir; to take Mr. Moon's place.

Mr. GILLETT. Why did he not change him and give him back his $2,000 pay?

Mr. HUDDLESON. Because another man had been put into the position on the Subtreasury roll.

The CHAIRMAN. It cost him no more to live in New Orleans than it would have cost him if he had come to Washington and lived here; he had to live any way.

Mr. HUDDLESON. Yes; he would have to live, Mr. Fitzgerald, but having been transferred and told he was going to be transferred, I understand he gave up his arrangements there in New Orleans and prepared to come to Washington.

The CHAIRMAN. But that does not increase a man's expenses. Mr. HUDDLESON. It was not of his own accord but by direction of the Secretary that he stayed there.

The CHAIRMAN. You paid him his expenses from New Orleans to Washington when he finally came here, did you not?

Mr. HUDDLESON. No, sir; we did not. We made him pay his railroad expenses to Washington.

Mr. GILLETT. Why was not he allowed to come here?

Mr. HUDDLESON. We thought Mr. Moon was a more valuable man to have in the department; and Mr. Satterley, being a bookkeeper, could do that work down there as well as Mr. Moon, and we relieved Mr. Moon and brought him home and put Mr. Satterley in his place down there. We were paying Mr. Moon's expenses.

The CHAIRMAN. Why is it you are trying to get him allowed the maximum sum allowed for subsistence to any officer in the Gov

ernment?

- Mr. HUDDLESON. No; we are not trying to get that.

The CHAIRMAN. $414.70 is just 30 cents short of being $5 a day for the period he was there, and that is the maximum allowed for subsistence.

Mr. HUDDLESON. I do not know about that. I did not figure it up in that way.

The CHAIRMAN. Do you think this $1,400 clerk incurred an expense of $5 a day for subsistence when he had been living all the time in New Orleans?

Mr. HUDDLESON. I do not know about that.

MONDAY, JULY 16, 1917.

CONTINGENT EXPENSES.

STATEMENT OF MR. JAMES L. WILMETH, CHIEF CLERK.

FILE HOLDERS, FILE CASES, FURNITURE, AND MISCELLANEOUS EXPENSES.

(See p. 653.)

The CHAIRMAN. For purchase of file holders and file cases, $4,000. Mr. WILMETH. Mr. Chairman, those three items, purchase of file holders and cases and furniture and miscellaneous items we would like to discuss together. The Treasury Department has in two offices alone, the Auditor for the War Department and the Auditor for the Navy Department, 169 new employees, beginning the 1st of July. That increase was occasioned, of course, by the war. Now, the reason for asking for this money is to purchase equipment for those new employeees. Take, for instance, the item of ordinary desk chairs, which last year we bought under the contract for $5.98. We are paying this year $9.10 under contract, and it is the very best we could do. Take desks, flat-top oak desks; they have jumped from $31.80 to $38.40. Desks for 169 clerks will cost $6,489, and chairs for them $1,537, which makes a total of $8.027, and the other equipment, such as costumers and desk accessories, we thought would make up the difference. There will also be a large increase in the filing space of the department occasioned by new records, and that is the reason we put in for file holders and cases. On miscellaneous we have put in an item of $3.000 to take care of miscellaneous expenses, which we think will be necessary for this number of employees.

The CHAIRMAN. What happens to all the-I will not say obsolete, but discarded furniture in the department?

Mr. WILMETH. Well, occasionally we have a sale. We are not having any more now, because we are not buying any new desks to take the place of old ones. We have heretofore occasionally had sales-all the departments do once in a while-of old discarded furniture that has become useless, but we are making no displacements now at all.

Mr. SHERLEY. Do you buy furniture of a certain standard type? Mr. WILMETH. Yes, sir: on a definite specification and drawing. Mr. SHERLEY. I do not know anything about it, but it looks to me like $9 for a chair is going some.

Mr. WILMETH. It certainly is, sir.

Mr. SHERLEY. I mean not only on account of the present prices, but I would have said that $5 in the old days was a rather large sum to pay for a chair.

Mr. WILMETH. No, sir; that is very reasonable, comparatively.

The CHAIRMAN. Did you buy furniture out of the appropriation for the expenses of the bonds?

Mr. WILMETH. We bought a few desks out of that appropriation for clerks who were used entirely on liberty loan work, but not as long as we could find an old desk around the department anywhere that we could use. We bought furniture very sparingly out of that appropriation.

The CHAIRMAN. What have you done with all these new employees since the 1st of July? Are they without equipment, some of them?

We

Mr. WILMETH. We are just making out the best way we can. have put in all the old equipment we could. We are just in process of appointing these clerks now.

The CHAIRMAN. And you say the additional force will be about 169?

Mr. WILMETH. There are 169 additional employees in those two offices alone.

MONDAY, JULY 16, 1917.

STATEMENT OF MR. WALTER W. WARWICK, COMPTROLLER OF THE TREASURY.

ADDITIONAL EMPLOYEES.

The CHAIRMAN. "For additional employees during the fiscal year 1918, at annual rates of compensation as follows: Law clerks-four at $2,400 each, five at $2,100 each; clerks-three of class 4, two of class 3, two of class 1; messenger, $840; in all, $31,940." Now, Mr. Warwick, will you explain the necessity for this?

Mr. WARWICK. The necessity for additional force in the office arises from the fact that the Army and the Navy appropriations have been so enlarged that it has already more than doubled the work coming from those two departments to our office. An increased force was granted for the Auditor for the War Department and the Auditor for the Navy Department, but the force in the comptroller's office is two men less than last year, and it will be impossible to do the work with that force. Of course, we could answer the inquiries of the Secretary of War and the Secretary of the Navy by saying yes or no, but that would not furnish any guide for the disbursing officers nor establish precedents. These new appropriations are in different languages from former ones, and, due to the war emergency, there are more calls for decisions under appropriations and necessity to use them for different purposes.

The office has the rather difficult and unpleasant task daily of enforcing the limitations put by law upon the use of appropriations, such as the use of appropriations for rent in the District of Columbia and employment of personal services and many other limitations. which are not pleasant always to the department spending the money. While I do not say they evade the law, I will say they want it construed liberally or an exception made wherever an appropriation is made for necessary expenses, they often insist that it should be construed as waiving all law. Therefore the work has grown enormously in the office, and in these times, if anything, it is of more importance than in the past. Out of nine law clerks we will have at least six changes in the last six months by the time the month of July is over.

Mr. GILLETT. Why is that?

Mr. WARWICK. Well, several of them are going into the Army. I would not refuse a man permission to leave the service to go into the Military Establishment. One young man goes into the Regular Army, in the Dental Corps, and two others are going in, one in the Ordnance Department and one in the Quartermaster Department, and one man has enlisted. He is the only man I know of around the