PROPOSALS FOR BUDGET CONTROL REFORM mony of a Bureau official would be of great value to the subcommittee. One of the serious weaknesses of the present procedure, and a cause of frustration to appropriations subcommittees, is that effective means are lacking, as a rule, for dealing with alleged unsound administrative practices. The facts are often obscure and may entail problems that are complex and government-wide in scope. Close working relations with the Bureau of the Budget would enable the subcommittees to refer such matters to the Bureau for investigation and corrective action. It cannot be doubted that such day-to-day relations would greatly aid the subcommittees in their work, and enable the Bureau, as the President's agent, to explain and defend his budget. In most states, the governor's budget director or one of his assistants customarily attends the hearings of the appropriations committees. Although this official does not ordinarily participate actively in the presentations, which are made by department officers, he is often called on by the committees to answer questions, to supply additional information, and to explain the budget actions of the governor. These day-to-day contacts greatly facilitate the work of the appropriations committees and keep the governor in close touch with the work of the legislative committees.20 Sound budgeting and wise management of the finances of the government require close cooperation between Congress and the Executive branch. As Rowland Egger has stated, the budget is the vehicle of the President's "most significant act of legislative leadership and most important act of collaboration. . . . If the President and the Congress are to discharge their common and overlapping policies, the formalistic aspects of the separation of powers may have to be substantially modified."2 Under our form of government it is necessary, of "In a few states the finance committees of the legislature borrow personnel from the executive budget office to serve as committee clerks during the session, with the understanding that these employees will be wholly responsible to the committee while they are on loan. This practice may be criticized as contrary to the principle of separation of powers, but it appears to have worked to the satisfaction of the legislative committees. The same practice obtains in some other countries. In France and Sweden the parliamentary committees on finance borrow personnel from the Ministry of the Treasury, and in West Germany the Director of the Budget works closely with the finance committee of the Bundestag. In Great Britain members of the Treasury staff are in constant attendance at meetings of the Public Accounts Committee of the House of Commons, and assist the Committee of Estimates. "Egger, "The United States Bureau of the Budget," Parliamentary Affairs, Vol. 3 (1949), pp. 48-50. In a memorandum prepared for the first Hoover Commission in 1949, Professor Egger stated: "The greatest single deterrent to good budgeting CONGRESSIONAL CONTROL OF ADMINISTRATION course, to preserve the independence of decision and action of each branch, but there is no reason why there should not be frequent consultation and open communication between the two branches in budgetary matters, a practice which would better enable each to arrive at its decisions. Congress and the Executive branch cannot operate in water-tight compartments, especially in financial matters. The greater the mutual understanding, confidence, and respect, the better each will be able to perform its own functions. The absence of day-to-day personal contacts breeds misunderstanding, suspicion, and distrust, and makes cooperation more difficult. It may be objected that staff members of the Bureau of the Budget could be of little assistance to the appropriations committees, since they are under instruction to support the President's budget and hence could not recommend reductions. But what the committees really need is not advice on where to make reductions (although some members think that they do), but detailed information on department programs and activities and on the reasons for the President's budget decisions, which will enable them to decide for themselves what action to take. It may also be objected that members of the Bureau staff would be hectored by subcommittee members. This has not been the experience in the states; on the contrary, the budget officers in attendance command the respect and confidence of the committee members because of their expert knowledge of the budget. Various other largely theoretical objections may be raised, but the experience in many of the states indicates that a close, informal working relationship on budgetary matters is highly practicable and beneficial to both branches.22 Questions for a Select Committee Almost half a century has passed since 1919, when both houses of Congress established select committees to consider the adoption of a national budget system. In that period the annual expenditures at the present time is a persistent and pervading failure of liaison on budgetary matters between the President and the Congress." (The Division of Estimates of the United States Bureau of the Budget [mimeo], p. 17.) "A White House release of December 8, 1959, stated that the Bureau of the Budget desired to extend and enlarge its cooperative relations with the financial committees of Congress as a major step in improving the budget system. PROPOSALS FOR BUDGET CONTROL reforM of the federal government have become a vastly more complex and important factor in the national economy and in world affairs. There is great need for Congress once again to establish a select committee to conduct a broad inquiry into the budget system and to consider how the financial system of the government may better meet the needs of today-and particularly how Congress may improve its methods in determining the fiscal policies of the government and controlling public expenditures. Since the action of Congress is inextricably associated with the preparation and administration of the budget in the Executive branch, it would be highly desirable to create a joint legislative-executive committee, patterned after the Hoover Commissions and with citizen representation, to consider all aspects of the budget system. Among the numerous questions to be considered by such a committee, the following are outstanding: 1. How may the executive budget be simplified and improved? How may it be more closely related to program, accounting control, and performance? 2. Should a separate capital or investment budget be adopted and, if so, under what policies and limitations? 3. Should long-term budgeting be used for public works and permanent structures? 4. Should the budget be placed on the basis of annual accrued expenditures? 5. Should a consolidated appropriation act be adopted? 6. How may more effective controls be established over the authorization of new programs? 7. How may Congress better consider the budget as a whole, the relation of proposed expenditures to revenues and economic conditions, and the relative needs of major programs throughout the government? 8. How may the work of the finance committees be better coordinated? 9. Should the staffs of the appropriations committees be increased? Should a special congressional budget staff be created? 10. Should the President be granted the item veto? 11. How may closer, informal working relations in budgetary matters be established between the Executive branch and the Congress? 12. What control should Congress exercise over the finances of government corporations and business enterprises of the government? Alfred de Grazia, Coordinator of the Project CONDUCTED UNDER THE AUSPICES OF THE AMERICAN ENTERPRISE INSTITUTE WASHINGTON, D. C. 1966 AARON WILDAVSKY is Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of California at Berkeley. He formerly taught at Oberlin College. He received his B.A. from Brooklyn College in 1954 and his Ph.D. from Yale University in 1959. His books include: Studies in Australian Politics, the 1926 Referendum (F. W. Cheshire, 1958); Dixon-Yates: A Study in Power Politics (Yale University Press, 1962); Presidential Elections (with Nelson W. P&lsby) (Scribner's, 1964); Leadership in a Small Town (Bedminster Press, 1964); and The Politics of the Budgetary Process (Little, Brown & Co., 1964). He is currently engaged in constructing an empirical theory of the budgetary process and in studies of the presidency. I have said-if it were possible for man to be so constituted, as to feel what affects others more strongly than what affects himself, or even as stronglybecause, it may be well doubted, whether the stronger feeling or affection of individuals for themselves, combined with a feebler and subordinate feeling or affection for others, is not, in beings of limited reason and faculties, a constitution necessary to their preservation and existence. If reversed-if their feelings and affections were stronger for others than for themselves, or even as strong, the necessary result would seem to be, that all individuality would be lost; and boundless and remediless disorder and confusion would ensue. For each, at the same moment, intensely participating in all the conflicting emotions of those around him, would, of course, forget himself and all that concerned him immediately, in his officious intermeddling with the affairs of all others; which, from his limited reason and faculties, he could neither properly understand nor manage. Such a state of things would, as far as we can see, lead to endless disorder and confusion, not less destructive to our race than a state of anarchy. It would, besides, be remediless-for government would be impossible; or, if it could by possibility exist, its object would be reversed. Selfishness would have to be encouraged and benevolence discouraged. Individuals would have to be encouraged, by rewards, to become more selfish, and deterred, by punishments, from being too benevolent; and this, too, by a government, administered by those who, on the supposition, would have the greatest aversion for selfishness and the highest admiration for benevolence. To the Infinite Being, the Creator of all, belongs exclusively the care and superintendence of the whole. -JOHN C. CALHOUN, A Disquisition on Government |