168 DEPARTMENTAL REPORTS. 



of preventing changes in the membership of the board from causing 

 an overturn in policies which had been established as the result of 

 careful consideration and discussion by the Offtce with the former 

 managers of the station. In a number of recent cases new boards have 

 at their first meeting made radical changes in the staff and work of 

 the station, the first intimation of which has reached this Office weeks 

 after its consummation. 



The lack of stability which still exists in the operations of a number 

 of stations is a serious hindrance to the development of cooperative 

 enterprises between the stations and the Department, such as are 

 demanded by the best interests of our agriculture, and are in accord- 

 ance with the expressed policy of Congress, as shown in recent 

 appropriation acts for this Department. In many kinds of agricul- 

 tural investigations continuity of plan and effort for a number of 

 years is absolutely essential to success. It is therefore impracticable 

 for the Department to effectively cooperate Avith those stations in 

 whose management a vacillating policy is pursued. 



The amount and variety of inspection service required of our ex- 

 periment stations continue to grow from year to year. Beginning 

 with commercial fertilizers, it now includes feeding stuffs, dairy prod- 

 ucts and other foods for man, creamery glassware, insecticides, 

 nurserj^ stock for injurious insects and j)lant and animal diseases. 

 The benefits of this service are so apparent and so much appreciated 

 by farmers and the general public that station managers and officers 

 have, in most cases, been quite willing to accept its duties and respon- 

 sibilities. The results of the assumption of this service have not, 

 however, always been fortunate as regards their effect on the investi- 

 gations for Avhich the stations were primarily established. Too often 

 the severe routine which the inspection service necessarily demands 

 has grown to be too heavy a burden to allow the station officer charged 

 with it mucli time or energy for original work, and in the active pur- 

 suit of the immediate benefits coming from this service he has allowed 

 the more difficult and remote possibilities of original investigation to 

 pass into the background of his thought and activity. Legislatures 

 and governing boards have had considerable difficulty in distinguish- 

 ing between the routine labor of inspection and the liigher work of 

 original investigation. Several times during the j^ast year this Office 

 has been called upon to aid in preventing the passage of laws imposing 

 inspection duties on the station without provision for paying their 

 expenses, or to guard the national funds from diversion by governing 

 boards desiring to include inspection service in the programme of sta- 

 tion work without having special funds for this purpose. Fortunately, 

 the Department has maintained from the beginning that the Hatch Act 

 was not intended to cover this class of work, and this principle hav- 

 ing been once established in the case of commercial fertilizers it has 

 been comparativelj^ easy to apply it to the new kinds of inspection 

 which in recent years have claimed the attention of our stations. 



For a considerable j^eriod this matter affected only the stations in 

 the East, where commercial fertilizers are largely used, but it is now a 

 live question in all sections of the country, since there is no region 

 which does not have some evil against which the agricultural public is 

 demanding protection by inspection under State or national auspices. 

 It becomes, therefore, of considerable importance to have a careful 

 consideration of the policy of our stations regarding this matter. In 

 the present condition of affaii-s, uniformity of attitude regarding this 

 question can hardly be expected of station officers. Many believe 



