If the work is to be salient,
the men who do it must have dignity, security, and, in the upper ranks
at least, that freedom of mind which you find only where men are not
too immediately concerned in practical decision.
Access to the materials should be established in the organic act. The
bureau should have the right to examine all papers, and to question
any official or any outsider. Continuous investigation of this sort
would not at all resemble the sensational legislative inquiry and the
spasmodic fishing expedition which are now a common feature of our
government. The bureau should have the right to propose accounting
methods to the department, and if the proposal is rejected, or
violated after it has been accepted, to appeal under its charter to
Congress.
In the first instance each intelligence bureau would be the connecting
link between Congress and the Department, a better link, in my
judgment, than the appearance of cabinet officers on the floor of both
House and Senate, though the one proposal in no way excludes the
other. The bureau would be the Congressional eye on the execution of
its policy. It would be the departmental answer to Congressional
criticism. And then, since operation of the Department would be
permanently visible, perhaps Congress would cease to feel the need of
that minute legislation born of distrust and a false doctrine of the
separation of powers, which does so much to make efficient
administration difficult.
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