370 NATIONAL OCEANOGRAPHIC PROGRAM LEGISLATION 



then it was to make its recommendations to the Federal Council, which 

 is in the highest level that you can get in the Executive Office of the 

 President. 



Mr. Clotworthy, Certainly. 



Mr. Lennon. Now, on paper it looks pretty good. There is no 

 faraway chain of command in this setup, it is a direction where the 

 Director of the Office of Science and Technology, of course, wears two 

 hats. He is Chairman of the Federal Council in the President's 

 Office. 



I just do not know how you could, by legislation, create what you 

 propose here in your statement as a strong — a stronger agency with 

 Executive powers in attempting to stimulate oceanography, than you 

 have now. 



And I want you to tell me how the Congress could draft legislation 

 that would beef up the powers of the ICO. 



Mr. Clotworthy. Unless I am ill informed on the subject, the Fed- 

 eral Council has no muscle when it comes to setting budgetary levels 

 m the agencies whose recommendations come to it through the ICO. 

 They do a lot of other things, too, which dilute the total activity of the 

 Federal Council — oceanography is just one of the elements of it. 



The member agencies, at least as I understand it, establish their 

 budgets through normal agency procedures and they first recommend 

 and then defend these budgets in many parts of the Congress. 



The loop back to the Federal Council is never closed, the means for 

 putting the screws on the committee of Congress who must approve 

 the budgets of any one agency is not there. The means to say to that 

 iigency that the oceanographic portion of its budget is sacrosanct, you 

 cannot tamper with it — that is not there. 



I feel that the total expenditure for a national oceanographic effort 

 must be set at the liighest levels, must be defended in a body at the 

 highest levels, and that the Congress look at progress in oceanography 

 with a broader perspective. 



What is it accomplishing ? What will it accomplish for the Nation ? 

 And, in turn, be able to hold the agency accountable for success. 



I clo not believe that the Federal Council has that kind of mechanism 

 in its structure. 



Mr. Lennon. You do not feel that the Federal Council has the 

 mechanism in its structure to review and to have oversight over the 

 various agencies who get funds from their particular budget? Is 

 that the basic complaint here ? 



Mr. Clotworthy. It has the ability to review and recommend, but 

 there it stops. And it can only recommend downward into the agency. 

 The agency still must carry the ball when it comes time for the prepa- 

 ration of the budget. 



Mr. Lennon. Well, the President got out this year on March 2 his 

 special message and attached thereto was the national oceanographic 

 program and a line item on each agency and each department and each 

 function and each mission in oceanography. 



And I dare say that both the legislative committees and the Ap- 

 propriations Committee has by this time approved it in toto. I am 

 sure that everything that was requested has been authorized and 

 appropriated. 



Now, there are some areas in which you do not have an annual 

 authorization, such as the Department of Commerce that we talked 



