REORGANIZATION OF FEDERAL AGENCIES 



administrative branch was established by joint resolution 

 adopted on December 17, I92O. 46 This committee then re- 

 quested the President to prepare a plan, which has come to 

 be known as the " Cabinet Plan " since it was discussed by 

 the President and cabinet and is a consensus of their opinion. 



The Cabinet Plan of Reorganization: The principal ad- 

 ministrative changes advocated in the cabinet plan of re- 

 organization 47 (1923) were: (i) combination of the War 

 and Navy Departments in a Department of National De- 

 fense, (2) establishment of a Department of Education and 

 Welfare, (3) transfer, largely to the Department of Inter- 

 ior, of the non-military activities, especially civil construction 

 work, now under the War and Navy Departments, and (4) 

 a grouping of bureaus in each department under assistant 

 secretaries. 



In regard to the conservation bureaus no change was 

 proposed except that the conservation bureaus already in 

 the Department of Interior should be grouped together 

 under an Assistant Secretary for Public Domain. The Bio- 

 logical Survey and the Bureau of Fisheries would stay out 

 of this group, remaining as they are now in the Departments 

 of Agriculture and Commerce, respectively. 



The chief virtue of the cabinet plan was that it represented 

 the first plan agreed to by the men who were to administer 

 it, the cabinet officers. It had been thrashed out over a 

 period of two years and represented a compromise of views 

 among them. 



The Proposals of Joint Committee on Reorganisation: 

 Although this committee was established December 17, 

 I92O, 48 the cabinet plan prepared at its request was not sub- 



* Public Resolution No. 54, 66th Cong. 



47 See Report of the Joint Committee on Reorganisation, June 3, 1924, 

 68th Cong., ist Sess., Doc. No. 356, Appendix A. 



* 8 Public Resolution No. 54, 66th Con. as amended P. R. No. I, 6;th 

 Cong. 



