Tenure of Department Officials.-All of the employes of the Department of Agriculture except the Secretary, Assistant Secretaries, the Chief of the Weather Bureau and the Solicitor are in the classified civil service. The Secretary, who is a Cabinet member, is not only appointed because of his fitness for the headship of the department, but also for the reason that he has a political following and the good-will of the farmers. The choice of the Secretary of Agriculture has about as much political significance as the selection of any other Cabinet member. Although the Chief of the Weather Bureau is appointed by the President by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, politics has very little influence in making the appointment. This is true because the work is mainly scientific and only a properly qualified chief can efficiently direct the activities of the bureau. In 1895 Willis L. Moore was appointed Chief of the Bureau by President Cleveland at the recommendation of the Secretary of Agriculture. The administration in power at the time was democratic, while Mr. Moore declared his party affiliations to be Republican. The appointment of Charles F. Marvin, the present incumbent of the office, was also solely made on the basis of fitness and qualifications.

The tenure of office of the personnel of the department below the Assistant Secretaries rests mainly on competency, proper conduct, and amiable relations between employes and their superiors. All employes below chiefs of divisions and the scientific staff are usually secure in their position so long as they do not take a hostile attitude toward their superiors because of the protection they have under the Civil Service. law. They are secure in their position so long as they assume a proper attitude toward their work. Division and bureau chiefs sometimes develop strained relations with their superiors because of a different viewpoint taken concerning departmental policies. Where this happens the official finds it convenient to resign.

There are some notable examples of long office tenure among the officials of the Department of Agriculture. Dr. H. W. Wiley was chief of the Division and Bureau of Chemistry from 1883 to 1912, a period of twenty-nine years. Dr.

L. O. Howard has been associated with the department as entomologist since 1878, a period of forty-four years. Since 1894 he has been chief of the Division and Bureau of Entomology. Dr. A. C. True has served in the department since 1889, a period of thirty-three years, and since 1893 has been in charge of the Office of Experiment Stations, now the States Relations Service. Mr. A. Zappone, the present disbursing officer, has also had a long period of service. In 1906 he became chief of the Division of Accounts, and for many years before that date he was assistant chief of the division. There are other examples, but enough has been said to show that the tenure of the officials of the department below the secretaries in no way depends upon political party affiliation. In at least one case a bureau chief used his position for political aggrandizement, but was rebuffed through failure both to secure the office to which he aspired and to keep the one he had.

The Secretary of Agriculture with other Cabinet members is paid a salary of $12,000 a year. According to the Official Register for 1919 the first assistant secretary receives $5,000, the chief of the Bureau of Public Roads, $6,000; and other bureau chiefs from $4,000 to $5,000. Chiefs of divisions seldom receive more than $4,000 and frequently less than this amount. Members of the technical staff are limited to $4,500.

The Constitutionality of the Department's Operations.The legal basis of the work of the Department of Agriculture is found in several constitutional provisions. Its investigational, demonstrational and educational functions, including also the service rendered by the Weather Bureau and the Bureau of Markets, rest upon Article I, section 8, clause 1, of the Constitution. This clause is as follows:

The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States; but all duties, imposts and excises shall be uniform throughout the United States.

"To lay and collect taxes" for the general welfare of the United States, is the specific authority in the Constitution upon which champions of public agricultural organization. have based its legality. The solicitor in a circular issued in

1916 states that "there appear to be no cases adjudicating the precise point but the general extent of the authority of Congress under this clause formed an important subject of discussion by our early statesmen and jurists, and has been alluded to by the courts." The solicitor refers to George Washington's effort to establish a national department and to the inaugural addresses of Jefferson and Madison, both of whom expressed themselves in favor of agriculture as an object which ought to receive special care and aid from the National Government. What the Government may do under authority of the phrase "for the general welfare" was variously construed by our early statesmen. Some constructionists have contended that the phrase is meaningless, and others that it confers upon Congress an independent power under which it may enact any legislation conducive to the general welfare of the country. These are the extreme views, and the more generally accepted view holds that it is not a power in itself but limits the exercise of the taxing power to purposes which conduce to the general interests of the United States. While the taxing power of Congress is distinct and independent, it is not absolute. It may be exercised "(1) to pay the debts of the United States, (2) to provide for the common defense of the United States, and (3) to provide for the general welfare of the United States." This is the position of Justice Story, whose opinion is as follows:

It is, therefore, of necessity left to the discretion of the National Legislature to pronounce upon the objects which concern the general welfare, and for which, under that description, an appropriation of money is requisite and proper. And there seems no room for a doubt that, whatever concerns the general interests of learning, of agricul ture, of manufactures, and of commerce, are within the sphere of the national councils, so far as regards an application of money. The only qualification of the generality of the phrase in question, which seems to be admissible, is this, that the object to which an appropriation of money is to be made must be general and not local-its operation extending in fact, or by possibility, throughout the union, and not being confined to a particular spot. No objection ought to arise to this construction from a supposition that it would imply a power to do whatever else should appear to Congress conducive to the general welfare. A power to appropriate money with this latitude, which is granted in express terms, would not carry a power to do any other thing not authorized in the Constitution, either expressly or by fair implication.1

1 Quoted by the Solicitor in his Circular of October 23, 1916, from Story's work on the Constitution, Vol. 1, Sec. 978.

In the opinion of the Solicitor this is the point of view the courts would take if attempts were made to test the constitutionality of appropriations made to promote the general interests of agriculture. It is, however, unlikely that such proceedings will ever be instituted because Congress has made appropriations for the purpose for more than half a century and its action is thoroughly sanctioned by public sentiment.

The authority for the performance of the greater part of the regulatory function is found in the interestate commerce clause of the Constitution, Art. I, Sec. 8, which provides that "Congress shall have power to regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian tribes. During the last twenty years Congress has taken a liberal view concerning the construction of this clause. When the food and drugs act was passed in 1906 there were, of course, men like Senator Bailey who attacked the measure on the ground that it was unconstitutional. This and other acts, however, have been passed by Congress on the assumption that the United States has the right under the Constitution to exercise its police power over interstate and foreign commerce. The validity of this assumption has been upheld by the Supreme Court of the United States.1

The Place of the United States Department of Agriculture. -Considerable attention is given to the question of the place of the respective functions of agriculture, including general education and demonstration, research, college instruction, investigation or the collection of statisties, service and regulation, in the chapter dealing with State Departments of Agriculture in the section entitled. Ideal State Departmental Organization. The domain of the United States Department of Agriculture will therefore, only briefly be outlined here,

It is plain that the weather service, which extends over the entire country and whose ba is lies in data collected from not only American territory but al o from the West Indies and other outlying points, must be operated by the federal government. Such other service functions as the collection

1 Hipolite Egg Co. v. United States, 220 U8 lo ao L. Ed. 364, 31 Sup. Ct. Rept. 364.

and publication of market information and the collection of various agricultural statistics must for similar reasons be placed under a federal department. Inasmuch as Congress grants aid to the states for college instruction, experimentation, and for extension work it becomes necessary that a federal department, preferably the Department of Agriculture, supervise the expenditure of funds appropriated.

The regulatory function, associated largely with the pure food problem and the prevention of frauds in the sale of seeds and fertilizers, requires the use of the executive forces of both state and nation inasmuch as these products pass very largely into interstate commerce. It is contended here as well as later in the chapter dealing with the State Department of Agriculture that all regulatory functions should be divorced from the agricultural colleges and experiment stations and lodged with the State and National Departments of Agriculture. It is pointed out in subsequent chapters that in the administration of such acts as the pure food and meat inspection laws that cooperation with state officials is necessary if all fraud is to be weeded out. There is a twilight zone, so to speak, in the execution of law in the United States due to the division of powers between the states and the federal government and unless cooperation by voluntary agreement is entered into between the inspection forces of the state and federal governments many of the fraudulent practices will go unpunished and uncorrected. The control of contagious and infectious diseases of animal and plant life is a national problem and the federal government must necessarily be armed with quarantine powers against the movement of diseased animals and plants into interstate commerce.

In research, as pointed out in a subsequent chapter, the United States Department should be restricted to problems of national importance covering at least several states in extent and to problems too difficult and expensive for local experiment stations to undertake.

In other words, the department should not work on problems distinctly local in character. It should deal with state. institutions as entities and not with inferior officials of such