REORGANIZATION OF FEDERAL AGENCIES 



173 



would not be subject to changing political fortunes, because the 

 commission would be free to lay down broad policies and to 

 direct the conservation affairs of the federal government in the 

 same unbiased manner as the judges of the United States Su- 

 preme Court, members of the Interstate Commerce Commission 

 and other life agencies discharge their duties. 



However satisfactory such a program might be to the 

 sportsmen whose attention is fixed on their own field, to the 

 general public viewing the government structure as a whole, 

 it is anathema. Already too many independent and semi- 

 independent boards and commissions clutter up the adminis- 

 trative organization. While the existence outside the execu- 

 tive departments of semi-independent commissions exercising 

 quasi-judicial or legislative functions is admittedly wise, the 

 direction of conservative activities cannot be put in that 

 class. 



The question might well be raised whether the nation is 

 ready to hand over control of federal conservation agencies 

 " lock, stock, and barrel," in the words of Mr. Gordon, to 

 the sportsmen's organizations. Should the American people 

 abdicate control over wild-life resources in favor of the 

 professional sportsman? This proposal means little else in 

 view of the way in which the same system has worked out 

 in the states. 



The proposal had the support of many of the state con- 

 servation commissions, 66 no doubt because a similar organ- 

 ization is used in their own states. But conditions in the 

 federal service are essentially different from those which 

 exist in the states. The civil service system is better 

 organized and politics do not, at least at the present day, 

 enter into the administration of the federal conservation 

 agencies to the extent which they do in the states. Even in 

 the states in recent years attempts have been made to put 



66 Hearings, Senate Committee, op. cit., p. 10. 



