NATIONAL ACADEMY OF SCIENCES 



The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) was another important 

 quasi-governmental science agency created during the nineteenth 

 century. Founded on 3 March 1863, the NAS was granted a Federal 

 charter as a private organization, and was charged with providing 

 expert scientific advice to the Government. The Academy was to 

 assist any Department of the Government with science-related 

 questions when so requested. Such assistance was to take the form 

 of investigations, examinations, experiments, and reports. Congress 

 was to appropriate funds to cover the actual expense of preparing 

 such studies, but the Academy itself was to receive Federal com- 

 pensation only for services rendered directly to the Government. It 

 was both a private, nonprofit organization and an official advisory 

 group to the Federal Government. 7 



THE ALLISON COMMISSION 



The dispersed and uncoordinated state of Federal science support 

 led many Members of Congress to consider the possible problems of 

 waste and inefficiency. In 1884, a joint Congressional commission 

 was established to investigate the advantages and disadvantages of 

 reorganizing Federal research activities through the creation of a 

 department of science. 8 Senator William B. Allison of Iowa was 

 made chairman of the Commission, and he promptly requested the 

 National Academy of Sciences to assist the Commission by conduct- 

 ing its own independent study. The Academy report, submitted in 

 September 1884, favored the creation of a Department of Science to 

 conduct research not undertaken at university research laborato- 

 ries or within private enterprise. Nevertheless, after extensive 

 hearings and debate, the Allison Commission shelved the proposal 

 on the grounds that centralized agencies ultimately did not serve 

 the general welfare of the nation. Moreover, the Commission also 

 recognized that the formation of such a department was not politi- 

 cally feasible. 9 



IMPACT OF WORLD WAR I 



With the Allison Commission's ratification of the status quo, the 

 Federal Government's support of science continued in its fragment- 

 ed fashion until the demands of World War I prompted American 

 planners to experiment with centralized administration of scientif- 

 ic research. Historically, governments have sponsored the work of 

 scientists and engineers in the hope of obtaining military superiori- 

 ty. 10 Support of research and development typically increased 



7 See Rexmond Canning Cochrane, The National Academy of Sciences: The First Hundred 

 Years, 1863-1963 (Washington: National Academy of Sciences, 1978); Nathan Reingold (ed.), Sci- 

 ence in Nineteenth-Century America: A Documentary History (New York: Hill and Wang, 1964), 

 pp. 200-225; and A. Hunter Dupree, "The National Academy of Sciences and the American Defi- 

 nition of Science," in Alexandra Oleson and John Voss (eds.), The Organization of Science in 

 Modern America, 1860-1920 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1979), pp. 342-363. 



8 The agencies under study included the Army Signal Service, the Geological Survey, the 

 Coast and Geodetic Survey, and the Navy's Hydrographical Office. 



9 See Dupree, Science in the Federal Government, pp. 215-231. 



10 See William H. McNeill, The Pursuit of Power: Technology, Armed Force, and Society since 

 AD. 1000 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1982); and Bernard Brodie and Fawn M. Brodie, 

 From Crossbow to H-Bomb (Bloomington: University of Indiana Press, 1973). 



