How does it secure such information to-day? The information is
probably scattered through the Departments of Interior, Justice,
Commerce, Labor and Navy. Either a clerk in the State Department looks
up Mexican oil in a book of reference, which may or may not be
accurate, or somebody's private secretary telephones somebody else's
private secretary, asks for a memorandum, and in the course of time a
darkey messenger arrives with an armful of unintelligible reports. The
Department should be able to call on its own intelligence bureau to
assemble the facts in a way suited to the diplomatic problem up for
decision. And these facts the diplomatic intelligence bureau would
obtain from the central clearing house. [Footnote: There has been a
vast development of such services among the trade associations. The
possibilities of a perverted use were revealed by the New York
Building Trades investigation of 1921.]
This establishment would pretty soon become a focus of information of
the most extraordinary kind. And the men in it would be made aware of
what the problems of government really are. They would deal with
problems of definition, of terminology, of statistical technic, of
logic; they would traverse concretely the whole gamut of the social
sciences. It is difficult to see why all this material, except a few
diplomatic and military secrets, should not be open to the scholars of
the country.
Pages:
378
379
380
381
382
383
384
385
386
387
388
389
390
391
392
393
394
395
396
397
398
399
400
401
402