quiring an act of Congress to abolish and eighteen which could be abolished by executive action, but there were no provisions of law requiring any specific organization of the General Staff. If he wished, the Secretary could probably transfer responsibility for procurement to the Chief of Ordnance, for supply to the Quartermaster General, and for research and development to the Chief Chemical Officer.

Colonel Baya also prepared a Plan for a Bill which Colonel Johnston submitted at this time to the Army staff for comment. The object was "to provide for the Organization of the Army and Department of the Army." It was not a reorganization bill but only a legislative study proposing to place the Army "on a sound statutory basis" with greater authority granted to the Secretary of the Army, the Secretary of Defense, and the President to adapt the Army's organization to changing conditions than existing legislation permitted. It did not assign specified functions, duties, or powers to any particular agency within the Army, leaving this up to the Secretary's discretion, except for the civil functions of the Engineers and the duties of the Judge Advocate General, Surgeon General, and Chief of Chaplains.

66

The Baya bill led to another battle with the technical service chiefs concerning their assigned statutory responsibilities. While the bill proposed to continue the offices of the chiefs as statutory agencies, it granted the Secretary authority to change their duties and functions as he saw fit. Individually and collectively the technical service chiefs attacked this provision. In another round robin they objected to this grant of authority to the Secretary. They believed the "soundest statutory basis" for organizing the Army was still the National Defense Act of 1916, in particular Section 5 which recognized them and their authority and restricted the General Staff to

(1) Memo for Secretary of the Army, thru: Chief of Staff by Lt. Col. G. E. Baya, FA, sub: Extent to Which the Target Organization May Be Put into Effect Under Existing Law without Enactment of Additional Legislation, 21 Dec 48. OCA: O&M: Memo for the Secretary of the Army (Brown Binder) RG 117, NARS. (2) Plan for a Bill (Draft of 20 Dec 48) To provide for the organization of the Army and the Department of the Army, and for other purposes by Colonel Baya. Designated as Inclosure 1 to DF, 20 Dec 48, from Army Comp., sub: Army Organization Bill. CS/ USA 320 D/A (20 Dec 48) Plan for a Bill. RG 110, NARS. (3) DF, 20 Dec 48, sub: Army Organization Bill of 1949, to: Directors, General Staff Divisions and others, by Col. Kilbourne Johnston. Army: O&M: Organization Bill of 1950, Implementation of Project 0-133, pt. II. RG 117, NARS. Col. Archibald King, JAGD, drafted this DF.

duties "of a general nature," forbidding it "to assume or engage in work of an administrative nature that pertain to established bureaus or offices of the War Department."

The Baya bill placed "unrestricted power," they said, in the hands of the Secretary.

The traditional system of necessary checks and balances and the protection against weaknesses in the human element, to which even the greatest minds are susceptible, have not been insured. The broad peacetime powers requested are like a two-edged sword in that the Secretary of the Army could be subjected to pressures from all echelons to reassign duties and functions in order to increase their prestige and power. Experience shows that the Army is safeguarded against illconceived changes only as long as organization and functions are prescribed by statutes.

Proper legislation ought also to prescribe a commodity-type organization "from factory to firing line" for the technical

services.

The chiefs objected that the bill would undermine morale. It did not provide the same status in law for all the technical services, granting professional recognition only to lawyers, doctors, clergymen, and civil engineers, but not to others. By eliminating those provisions guaranteeing the services their independent status, the bill left the impression that they might one day be liquidated. Otherwise why remove these provisions? Finally there was the question of esprit de corps.

In the proposed organization military and civilian personnel of the Army are members, perhaps very temporarily, of some nebulous organization called a service, a service without functions, without permanence, without stability. There can be no esprit de corps since there is no corps in which to have any esprit. In order to maintain the high standards of morale and insure its everlasting continuance, currently designated names and appropriate functions of the Technical Services should be retained.

In conclusion the chiefs wanted the Baya bill referred back for redrafting to a committee on which they were represented.67

The chiefs' statements about morale and esprit de corps were questionable because, as Colonel Baya's compilation of

67 Round Robin Memo, Chiefs of Technical Services, thru: Director of Logistics, to: Army Comptroller, 14 Jan 49, sub: Proposed Army Organization Bill of 1949, Tab Tech Ser., Army: O&M: Organization Bill of 1950 (sic) -Comments-1949. RG 117, NARS. In addition to the round robin there were individual memorandums from each of the Army staff divisions, general and special, and also each of the technical service chiefs.

existing legislation demonstrated, nowhere in the National Defense Act of 1916 or its amendments was legal recognition or status granted to the several technical services, corps, or departments as such. The law designated and assigned specific functions to the offices of the chiefs of these services only. The question was not one of unrestricted power and authority but where and at what level such power and authority should be exercised. Traditionally and in law it lay with the chiefs rather than the secretaries.

While the technical services chiefs opposed the Baya draft, the rest of the Army staff agreed in general with its provisions. The Management Division revised the Baya draft in the next six months as the result of specific criticisms and suggestions from the Army staff, the Navy, the Air Force, the Secretary of Defense, and the Bureau of the Budget before sending it in July 1949 to the Secretary of the Army for submission to Congress. 68

The bill, finally submitted to Congress on 21 July, followed the general outlines of the Baya draft. Secretary Gray in a covering letter pointed out that "the desired flexibility in organization in the Department of the Army is in part accomplished by the repeal of laws specifying the duties of various officers in the Department, and by providing that the Secretary of the Army under the direction of the President and the Secretary of Defense, be authorized to describe the duties of these offices." Hereafter, various duties and functions could be performed by whatever office or branch of the Army the Secretary might designate. Among other provisions specifically proposed for repeal were the first twenty sections of the National Defense Act of 1916, which the technical services regarded as their "Magna Carta.” 69

The bill was submitted too late in the session for action, and it was not until March 1950 that the House Armed Services Committee held hearings on it. General Collins and Colonel

as Material bearing on the Army Organization Bill of 1949 is in CS/USA 320, D/A, Cases 1-10, 1949, RG 110, NARS. The file, unindexed, indicates that this material is probably Case 2.

6 Secretary Gray's letter to Congress explaining the bill is included in Department of the Army, Analysis and Explanation of Army Organization Bill-81st Congress, 1st Session, S. 2334, H.R. 5794-a bill to provide for the organization of the Army and the Department of the Army and for other purposes, February 1950. Copy in OCMH files.

Baya testified at great length. The Army Organization Act of 1950 passed by Congress basically followed the Baya draft. It contained only three substantive changes. To control the number of Army officers serving in Washington it provided that "not more than 3,000 officers of the Army shall be detailed or assigned to permanent duty in the Department of the Army, and of this number, not more than 1,000 may be detailed or assigned to duty on or with the Army General Staff, unless the President finds that an increase in the number of such officers is in the national interest." Second, the law protected the medical and legal professional staffs by stating that "Nothing in this Act shall be construed as reducing or eliminating the professional qualifications required by existing laws or regulations of officers of the several different branches of the Army." Finally, it added that "nothing in the Act shall be construed as changing existing laws pertaining to the civil functions of the Chief of Engineers or the Engineers Corps of the Army." This prevented assigning the civil functions of the Engineers to any other Army agency. Other provisions continued unchanged concerned the military functions of the Engineers, the functions of the Judge Advocate General and the administration of military justice, and the National Guard and Organized Reserves.70

The new law marked the end of a five-year period of continual organizational change within the department and the Army. The technical services were the victors in several campaigns designed by their opponents to functionalize them out of existence. The Army Organization Act of 1950 left this issue open open by providing that the Secretary of the Army could legally reassign the duties of any technical service, except the Corps of Engineers, along functional lines. To this limited extent Congress had now granted the Secretary executive authority previously denied him under the National Defense Act of 1916.

The Command of the Army

One issue the Army Organization Act of 1950 and parallel 70 (1) Memo for Record, Colonel Embry, typed on carbon of DF, 12 Jul 50, sub: Proposed Changes to SR's 10-5-1 and 10-500-1. Tab 1950, O&M: SR 10-5-1, General, RG 117, NARS. (2) DF, Colonel Baya, 3 Aug 50, sub: An Explanation of Army Organization Act of 1950. Misc. 320.1, Army Organization Bill of 1950, OCMH.

Army Special Regulation 10-5-1 settled, presumably for good, was the question of the "command" of the Army. According to existing law and the Constitution the President was Commander in Chief of the Army, a function he normally exercised through the Secretary of War. The Chief of Staff acted under the direction of the Secretary of War and, after 1947, the Secretary of the Army, except as otherwise directed by the President.

Congress had abolished the Office of Commanding General to eliminate the friction between that office and the War Department under the Secretary. Unfortunately Secretary Baker ignored this and resurrected the problem by making General Pershing commander of the American Expeditionary Forces independent of the War Department General Staff. The subsequent antagonism between General March and General Pershing was almost inevitable."1

The Pershing reorganization tried to eliminate this friction. by providing that the Chief of Staff in the event of war would command the "field forces," leaving the Deputy Chief of Staff behind and subordinate to him as Acting Chief of Staff. Army Regulation 10-5 of 18 August 1936 went further, stating that the Chief of Staff was also "in peace, by direction of the President, the Commanding General of the Field Forces.” 72

President Roosevelt at the outset of World War II chose to exercise his role as Commander in Chief actively by dealing directly with General Marshall on strategy and military operations, bypassing the Secretary of War. He repeated his intention to deal directly with Marshall in his executive order of 28 February 1942, approving the Marshall reorganization. As a result General Marshall in reality did command the Army throughout the war under the President's direction.73

War Department Circular 138 of 14 May 1946 actually had gone much further than previous regulations in stating that the Chief of Staff "had command of all components of the Army" within the continental United States and overseas.

There was no legal or constitutional basis for such a statement. This was the conclusion of a study undertaken by the Management Division of the Comptroller's Office as part of its See Chapter I, above, page 24.

72 Ibid.,

page 53.

73 See Chapter II, above, pages 58-59 and 74.