474 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XVI 11. No. 458. 



SHALL WE DISMEMBER THE COAST 

 SURVEY?* 



The proposition to turn the hydrographic 

 work of the Coast Survey over to the .Navy 

 Department has been so long urged and so 

 often rejected that its revival at the present 

 moment seems singularly inopportune. Twice 

 at least within the last twenty years it has 

 been exhaustively considered and adversely re- 

 ported on by committees of Congress when all 

 tlie circumstances were much more in its 

 favor than they are at present. Prominent 

 treasury officials under the first administra- 

 tion of President Cleveland were known to be 

 so hostile to the management of the sui-vey 

 tliat an investigation not only unfriendly, but 

 very far from judicial in its character, was 

 undertaken with the approval of the President. 

 The report set forth that abuses had crept 

 into the management, some of them of long 

 standing. The resignation of the superin- 

 tendent was forced, and it only remained for 

 Congress to take the necessary action to trans- 

 fer the survey. At the following session a 

 committee of Congress, having Senator Allison 

 at its head, made a thorough investigation of 

 the whole subject. The result of this inqtiiry 

 was to leave things as they were. 



The efFort to effect the transfer was re- 

 newed with great vigor in 1893. A majority 

 of the naval committee was believed to favor 

 the change, several of its members being warm 

 advocates of the measure. But, after a care- 

 ful hearing of all that was to be said on both 

 sides, the committee reached a conclusion ad- 

 verse to the transfer. "What has happened 

 since to lead to a change? Nothing what- 

 ever. On the contrary, the establishment of 

 the Department of Commerce with the Coast 

 Survey as one of its bureaus removes the last 

 reason for considering the subject. No work 

 is more appropriate to the Department of 

 Commerce than that of providing facilities 

 for navigating our coasts. Charts and sound- 

 ings are of the first importance not only to 

 our coasting ships and our entire mercantile 

 marine, but to all ships from abroad which 



* Editorial in the New York Evening Post, 

 September 2.3, 1903. 



enter our ports. Of course, a naval ship has 

 as much need as a merchantman for these 

 means of navigation. There is nothing re- 

 quired on a chart for naval use different from 

 that required for tlie ordinary purposes of 

 commerce. Accordingly, the Coast Survey 

 was very naturally included among the 

 bureaus to be transferred to the new depart- 

 ment. 



Extraordinary though the proposition to 

 reverse this action may now appear, the rea- 

 sons against it are so strong and so near the 

 surface that they hardly need to be cited if 

 the question is to be decided on its merits. 

 Looking at the matter from a purely abstract 

 point of view, the question is whether such a 

 work as that of making charts of our coast 

 can be most efficiently and economically un- 

 dertaken by the navy or by a civilian organ- 

 ization like the present one. Let us carefully 

 weigh all that is said in favor of the proposed 

 transfer. Hydrographic surveying is part of 

 the business of a naval officer. He learns as 

 much about it while at the Naval Academy 

 as the absorbing character of his other studies 

 will permit. The question whether, during 

 the limited periods which he can possibly de- 

 vote to such work, he can acquire as much 

 skill as a civilian wholly engaged upon it, is 

 a question which the reader can decide for 

 himself. But the mere fact that naval officers 

 can do the work does not prove that it should 

 be placed under the Navy Department rather 

 than under that of commerce. The argu- 

 ments on the question whether naval or civil- 

 ian methods are the more economical have, on 

 the whole, been favorable to the civilians. 

 But even here one important item has been too 

 little considered, and that is the cost of the 

 naval officer himself. The mere salary of 

 the latter is but a part of what it costs the 

 government to educate and train him. In 

 estimating his cost, we must include not only 

 what is expended in his training and his off- 

 duty pay, but his retired pay also. To reach 

 a correct conclusion on this point, we shall 

 probably have to double the pay of every officer 

 of the navy from the time when he gets his 

 firet commission up to the date of his retire- 



