GOVERNMENT GEOLOGICAL SURVEYS 207 



which embodied the entire plan, however, failed of pas- 

 sage in Congress. 



The natural activity behind the scenes of the conflicting 

 interests represented by those connected with the sev- 

 eral surveys may be seen in the legislative history of the 

 moves leading up to the creation of the United States 

 Geological Survey. In the last session of the 45th Con- 

 gress the special legislation embodying the recommenda- 

 tions of the National Academy was included in the 

 Legislative, Executive, and Judicial Appropriation bill 

 as it passed the House of Representatives, while the Sun- 

 dry Civil Appropriation bill carried an item simply mak- 

 ing effective the longer section in the other appropriation 

 bill. The item in the Legislative appropriation bill 

 created the office of the Director of the Geological Sur- 

 vey, provided his salary, and defined his duties, as well 

 as specifically terminating the operations of the three 

 older organizations. The item in the Sundry Civil bill as 

 it passed the House appropriated $100,000 for the new 

 Geological Survey, but when this appropriation bill was 

 reported to the Senate a committee amendment added 

 the words "of the Territories," and further amendments 

 offered on the floor changed the item so as to provide 

 specifically and exclusively for the continuation of the 

 Hayden Survey. Other amendments provided small 

 appropriations for the completion of the reports of the 

 Powell and Wheeler surveys, and the bill passed the Sen- 

 ate in this form. The Legislative Appropriation bill was 

 similarly pruned, while in the Senate, of all reference to 

 the proposed new organization. This bill, however, died 

 in conference, but in the last hours of the session the 

 conferees on the Sundry Civil bill took unto themselves 

 legislative powers and transferred from the dead bill to 

 the pending measure all the language which constitutes 

 the "organic act" of the United States Geological Sur- 

 vey. This action was denounced in the Senate as "a 

 wide departure from the authority that is possessed by 

 a conference committee," and it was further stated in 

 debate that the inserted provision which created a new 

 office and discontinued the existing surveys was one 

 "which neither the Committee of the Senate nor the Sen- 

 ate itself ever saw." This assertion was perhaps par- 



