66 CHAPTER IX THE PORK-BARREL PROBLEM We have a crooked creek, that has a crooked name, BUT the greatest legislative problem in connection with the budget is pork. This problem arises from the very make-up of Congress. Five hundred and thirty-one Congressional districts of the United States send five hundred and thirty-one men to Congress. There is no unifying force in Congress, no dominant force. Much of the major appropriation bills is merely the compromises of these local interests to get as much as they can for the people "back home ❞ irrespective of the actual needs of the situation.1 National interests 1 The point frequently made that the North is paying the major part of the taxes and getting the minor part of the appropriations and the South is getting the major part of the appropriations and paying a minor part of the taxes is not discussed in the text. It hardly deserves discussion. In February, 1917, in a debate in the United States Senate, Senator Smith of Michigan raised the point, and Senator Sheppard of Texas replied conclusively: "Any criticism of Texas comes with ill grace from the senator . . . because we have sent more money into Michigan for Ford automobiles than Michigan ever contributed to the Federal Government above appropriations received." In other words, the consumers generally distributed over the United States are bearing the burden of taxation, and not the producers localized in certain parts of the country who pay the taxes to the government. are sacrificed for local, sectional or personal interests. Congress speaks not so much as a national assembly but as a loose aggregation of representations from all parts of the country to secure the best they can at the political bargain counter. These "bargains" secured for the 'people back home are familiarly referred to as pork. The appropriation bills carrying these appropriations are known as pork-barrels. It is a common practice to refer to the river and harbors bill as the pork-barrel. Sometimes the public buildings bill is used as the best example of the porkbarrel. But the army and navy bills are reeking with pork, and it may be found in many unexpected places, for example, the tariff. The tariff as we know it in this country is merely another scheme for the distribution of favors largely to the manufacturers of this country. A nice sectional balance is maintained. So competent a scholar as Professor Taussig of Harvard says: "Tariff bills are inevitably dealt with as are river and harbor bills and general appropriation bills. The only way in which a desired result can be brought about has been Senator Hardwick of Georgia in the same debate said: “If any appropriation that has been made for Georgia is wrong, fight it on its merits, and you will not find me defending it if I think you are right. If any appropriation that is made for Texas is wrong, fight it because it is wrong, not because it is for Texas, and I believe you will find the distinguished and able senators from Texas agreeing with you if they believe you are right. But this proposition - narrow, infinitesimally small, unutterably little of taking any state in this Union and saying: 'Oh, this State got so much money and paid so much taxes,' is one that will not appeal to the good sense of the American people." (Cf. Collier's Weekly, Feb. 10, 1917, and Congressional Record.) through the influence of individual legislators and in the traditional ways. We cannot escape log rolling, private interviews with influential politicians, settlement of details in quiet committee meetings.' 99 And former Secretary of War, Henry L. Stimson, said: "Tariff legislation, instead of being the great national instrument for upbuilding the industries of the country, which Alexander Hamilton proposed, has long been carried on as a systematic series of deals between various manufacturing districts, and the hostility of Congress to a more scientific method has been recently illustrated by its abolition of the Tariff Commission, which was seeking to raise tariffmaking to a more national standpoint." THE PROCESS OF SECURING IT One of the greatest national services performed by a Congressman is the exposé of pork-barrel methods begun in 1913 by Mr. James A. Frear of Wisconsin. He has described the pork process in these words: "Dredgers, contractors, and other beneficiaries want work for private profit. They start things and urge local communities to get something from the Government for nothing. The local commercial or boosters' club, aroused to action, says to Representative Gettum from Grabville, 'Bring home the money or don't come back.' Every Representative is confronted with the utterance of Ellison, secretary of the $50,000,000 waterway lobby, 'Get what is asked or get out.' So Representative Gettum begs the committee for a local survey. The committee shifts responsibility by putting the project up to Army engineers for approval. The engineers survey and reject. Mr. Gettum shouts for help and reëlection while engineers reëxamine Mud Creek and again repudiate the job. Under pressure he then corrals his state delegation, reaching to nine Congressmen and two Senators in the Cumberland River case. Statesmen show Army engineers where to jump off. The board reflects; the board sees new light and somersaults and approves. Then Mr. Gettum presents his approved contract to the River and Harbor Committee. Our committee finally agrees with Gettum - who has nine votes in his pistol pocket with two more in the upper watch pocket and so we eat persimmons, declaring them good though puckery. Solemnly we are now pointed to the engineer's approval, and all doors to legislative criticism thereafter are forever closed. We pretend to expect that our subordinates, the engineers, will withstand pull, pressure, and power. Constituencies, animated by secret agencies, seek questionable aid from their Representatives, and we pass it on to the engineer. How does he acquit himself? (Speech of Rep. Frear, Cong. Record, p. 1123, Jan. 10, 1916.) Representative Fitzgerald has very aptly described the pork-barrel with reference to public buildings in these words: "This is what happens on public buildings in the Federal government: Suppose I represent a community or district which has no large city, perhaps the largest town in it may be twenty or fifteen thousand. I may have one or two communities like that. And none of them has a public building; but across the line in some other district, the town of equal size has a public building that cost $50,000 or $75,000. Now, I am a candidate for office and I go in that town and in my speech I announce that I propose to have a public building put there. In most of these places, unless you have a good-sized city, a thousand dollars furnishes ample funds for postal facilities, and they have an authorization to buy a site. And they pay New York prices out in the sage brush country for lots, and the government buys post offices. And then, in a community of eight or nine hundred, based upon the theory that there is a tremendous postal business, they will authorize a building for $50,000—nothing less than $50,000 and up. Then, in order to get a better building, a member of Congress will pass a bill providing that there shall be a term of court held in this town, and maybe the court the Federal Court-will sit there three terms a year, and maybe it will take two days each term to do all the Federal Court business in the town; and then because a Federal Court is to sit at that town, they need a court room and additional facilities and they increase the amount to be expended in the building and some other governmental activity will be provided, and the result is that you can go all over the United States and find buildings costing from $75,000 to $150,000 in communities ranging from one thousand to five thousand people." (Budget Systems, p. 325.) Perhaps some concrete illustrations will help in understanding the process. Mr. Jones is sent to Congress from Wyoming. He arrives in Washington with the best intentions in the world. Evanston, Wyoming, wants a post office or a real waterway where the creek is. Local manufacturing concerns are interested and begin writing letters. The local chamber of commerce adds its words of approval. A delegation calls on him. By this time. any good intentions he had of not prostituting his high office have "gone to the winds." 1 He gets into the legislative scramble. Smith, under pressure from Kalispell, Missouri, and Brown from Chickasaw, Oklahoma, have done likewise. Let us suppose that this 1 How great the pressure is indicated by the fact that a Congressman like William Kent of California succumbs even with modifications: "These buildings inculcate a spirit of patriotic pride which is not measurable in dollars and cents. They remind the people of the glory, the majesty and the power of this great republic." (Cf. also World's Work, April, 1916, p. 601, ff.) |