Relation of the Federal Government to Research 



31 



population of a lump-sum appropriation under the 

 Banlchead-Jones Act of 1935. This sum amounted to 

 $1,800,000 for tlie fiscal year 1938 and will reach a 

 maximum of $3,000,000 by 1940. Only the Bankhead- 

 Jones grants arc required to be mat died by the States, 

 although aclually 8lale expenditures for the experi- 

 ment stations are more than double Federal expendi- 

 tures. There are currently in progress in the various 

 stations about 7,000 separate research projects, of 

 which some 3,000 aniuially are reviewed by the Office 

 of Experiment Stations. 



In the administration of grant-in-aid funds, the 

 Office of Experiment Stations is responsible, but in 

 the selection and approval of projects the experiment 

 stations frequently consult with the subject-matter 

 bureaus. Through this practice a system of coopera- 

 tive agreements between the various research bureaus 

 of the Department and the several State experiment 

 stations has grown up which has proved one of the 

 most effective devices for con elation in the whole field 

 of governmental research. The use of these agree- 

 ments has gone beyond the projects subsidized by 

 statutory giants, and has come to include in many 

 cases all the research of nn experiment station in a 

 given field. Similar agreements are also in effect be- 

 tween the bureaus of the Department and various 

 private institutions. 



The following excerpts from a memorandum of un- 

 derstanding between the Iowa Agricultural Experi- 

 ment Station and the Bureau of Plant Industry will 

 serve to show the general form and j^hilosophy of these 

 agreements : 



The Iowa Agricultural Experiment Station and the Bureau 

 of Plant Industry recognize that cooperation is a matter of 

 working together to a common end, rather than one of financ- 

 ing, each agency contributing what it can to the planning, 

 conduct, and interpretation of the experiments as a whole, and 

 furnishing such facilities and funds for particular experiments 

 as is practicable. To this end it is mutually agreed that all 

 investigations on the production and improvement of cereals 

 and the control of cereal diseases undertalien by either agency 

 in the State of Iowa will be deemed to be cooperative. Noth- 

 ing in this broad understanding is to be construed as inter- 

 fering ^\ith the basic responsibilities of either party, and it is 

 recognised that successful operation can be only through 

 mutual helpfulness. 



The specific object of these cooperative investigations is to 

 improve the status of cereal production through (1) develop- 

 ing better cultural practices, (2) producing varieties superior 

 in yield and quality and more resistant to disease and other 

 factors adversely influencing production, (3) studying the dis- 

 eases of cereals and determining methods for their control, (4) 

 developing and applying methods for utilizing and maintaining 

 quality seed stocks, and (5) determining the underlying 

 principles concerned in the biology of cereal plants, including 

 research and genetics, cytology, and physiology. 



It is understood that both the Iowa Agricultural Experiment 

 Station and the Bureau of Plant Industry are interested in 



fundamental research, the Bureau of Plant Industry being 

 concerned primarily with the results having regiotuil applica- 

 tion, and the Iowa Agricultural Experiment Station with the 

 results having local application. 



A specific division of the field to be covered follows, 

 with the responsibilities of each party itemized; and 

 the agreement concludes with arrangements for dispo- 

 sition of findings, furnishings of supplies and equip- 

 ment, and financial responsibilitj'. 



The advantages of such cooperative understandings 

 have been well summarized by a former Chief of the 

 Bureau of Plant Industry: 



Under its system of cooperative relations, the Bureau has 

 laboratory and other facilities available that cannot be sur- 

 passed by any other agency engaged on similar problems. Not 

 only does it have its own excellent facilities in Washington and 

 vicinity, it al.so maintains fiehl stations and, finally, it can 

 negotiate cooperation with institutions, State or otherwise, 

 having facilities superior for any specific purpose. 



The cooperative nature of the Bureau's undertakings is one 

 of its greatest assets and coutributions, and suggests what 

 might perhaps be the most important single contribution that 

 the Federal Government could make to research In other fields. 

 Research requires funds. Even more than this, however. It 

 requires brains. Research brains are born, not made, and 

 occur in insufficient quantities. A large appropriation for re- 

 search in any field by the Federal Government may do little 

 to promote research along the given line if the money is ex- 

 pended merely to take proven researchers off one salary roll 

 and place them on another, without perhaps giving them much 

 in the way of superior facilities and help. Grants-in-aid by 

 the Federal Government must in general be made on a prorata 

 basis of one kind or another without reference to the relative 

 merits of the institutions to which the funds are allocated. 

 Cooperative undertakings, on the other hand, with able admin- 

 istrative leadership in the Federal agency permits attack on 

 the various phases of any problems at those institutions where 

 these particular phases may be prosecuted most efficiently by 

 outstanding men in the given field, and with coordination and 

 integration achieved through the Federal agency. 



Tlie Chief of the Office of Experiment Stations is a 

 member of tlie Committee on Experiment Station Or- 

 ganization and Policy of the National Association of 

 Land-Grant Colleges and Universities, and of the joint 

 committee of the Association and the Department of 

 Agriculture on Projects and Correlation of Kesearch. 

 These committees act in an advisory capacity with re- 

 spect to policy in the administration of research under 

 the grant funds. Advisory assistance in connection 

 with individual problems or research projects is se- 

 cured from personnel of the subject-matter bureaus 

 and from research personnel in the States. 



In addition to supplementary grants to the States, 

 the Bankliead-Jones Act sets up a special research 

 fund, one-half of which is for the establishment and 

 maintenance of research laboratories in the major agri- 

 cultural regions of the United States. In establishing 

 and administering each of the.se laboratories, use is 

 made of two advisory groups, one administrative and 



