on the whole, unsatisfactory. It is well, therefore, that the matter was allowed to go over to the next session of the Assembly. The Joint Committee of the Assembly which had the subject in charge was continued to report at this session.

The plan for centralization of administration proposed by the People's Power League met very general opposition. But this was at a time when numerous radical propositions for the reorganization of the state government were being agitated, and not long after the adoption of the several institutions of the "Newer Democracy," and the people were probably thus disinclined to favor any further innovations in government. It is impossible to say how much change of public opinion on the subject has occurred in the meantime, but is seems certain that opinion is much more favorable to the recent movement for centralization of administration than to the movement started several years before.

It is of special interest to note editorials from two of our leading newspapers in this connection. Said the Oregon Journal, in commenting on the constitutional amendment proposed in New York, which made the Governor and the Lieutenant Governor the only elective state administrative officers: "This concentration of responsibility has made its most notable advance in municipal government, as seen in the commission form. Example of the shortened ballot is manifest in the new municipal government in Portland. It puts administrative officials in the open, where their work is easily recognizable. It makes controlling officers directly responsible, whereby government is immediately established on a business basis. It is a sound plan, and in the time to come it will undoubtedly offer a basis for working out some similar form applicable to state government."

The Oregonian is more positive in commenting on the "short ballot" movement in Minnesota. "The plan of state government proposed in Minnesota is probably too ambitious in detail for Oregon. Here the population and developed wealth are much smaller. But in general it offers an idea of what may be accomplished toward efficiency and economy without remodeling the state constitution. The idea of giving the Governor power to get things done and making him res

ponsible for all appeals to good judgment. [The Minnesota plan] is more of an adaptation of the American idea of representative government to the modern ideas of governmental duties and activities than anything else. It is worth the study of those who would pull Oregon out of the ruck of rival authority and wasteful management."

In Oregon the number of elective state officials does not contribute to the length of the ballot to the degree that it does in some of the other states. However, some of the appointive officers are subject to no effective control on the part of the Governor. Indeed, in many cases, the terms of the Governor and the terms of the appointive officers do not coincide. Moreover, in case of the numerous boards made up wholly or partly of ex officio members, there is no effective administrative control, even with the presence of the Governor in the board.

For the attainment of effective responsibility in the state administration there is needed not only the subordination of the administration to the Governor, but also a proper classification and coordination within the subordinate administration. Wyman puts it thus: "The principle in organization is system. Organization requires system in the proper coordination of the officers. For this all officers upon the same grade must be so assigned that some are at one work, others at another work. Organization requires system also in the proper subordination of officers for direction. To make this out to its full extent each officer should be under his chief, these chiefs under another chief, this chief under the head of the chief executive himself. * The object of this

organism is to produce definite action. To this end there is specialization in the separate offices, so that there may be equipment for action. To this end, also, there is organization of these officers into a whole, so that there may be direction in action. The purpose in administration is the enforcement of the law; and this can only be accomplished through the process of an administration that is organized upon definite lines to that end."

"The general aim of a rational distribution of executive work," as Henry Sidgwick puts it, "will clearly be to place under a common management, in each department, such por

tions of public business as have naturally a close connectioneither because the efficient performance of one such portion of business is impossible if other portions are performed inefficiently on independent plans, or because the experience gained in the management of one portion of the business will tend to render the managers more competent to deal with another portion."

The division of labor in the state administration of Oregon is in very many respects extremely illogical and unsatisfactory, and overlapping and conflicting jurisdictions and unnatural segregations of function abound. Thus many rearrangements, combinations, and eliminations are required for an effective reorganization of the administration.

The determination of the proper number of departments into which the centralized administration should be divided is a matter of difficulty. The limitations of personal capacity and the character and scope of the various functions now assumed by the state, upon which the determination depends, involve so many considerations that no definite rule of action in this connection can be formulated.

The determination of the proper division of authority between superior and subordinate officers involves a similar difficulty, but fortunately this needs but little legislative action. For in most cases it will be best to leave it to the judgment of the superior officers for each particular case.

The division of the administration into several departments and the division of these departments, in most cases, into bureaus, should be made by the Legislative Assembly; but any further division of labor should be left to the Governor and the departments immediately concerned. However, after a reorganization of the system it might be expedient to vest more power of organization in the Governor and the departments, in accordance with European practice.

Although there is a general concensus of opinion and an absolute uniformity of practice in regard to the form of the chief executive office in the states-vested in a single individual-the other parts of the state administrations are organized under two different systems-the board system and the single commissioner system. The determination of a system adopted

for a particular office is often in practice based upon no logical grounds whatever. The board system predominates in Oregon, and probably in most other states; but in the federal government this system was early abandoned as unsatisfactory, in almost all cases, and the single commissioner system substituted in its stead.

Even Jeremy Bentham could hardly find language strong enough to express his condemnation of administrative boards in general. He said: "In political administration, a board, in contradistinction to individual management, is an invention which, throughout the sphere of its authority, has for its properties and effects the securing transgression against punishment, the depriving merit of its reward, the extinction of emulation and consequent exertion, the perpetuation of incapacity, indolence and negligence-in a word, of misconduct in every shape imaginable." Real responsibility and effectiveness of action in administration are so discouraged by the division of authority involved in the board system that it should never be adopted except, as Mill says, when it would make matters worse to give full discretionary power to a single officer. As a matter of fact, the most of the state administrative officers below that of Governor are so circumscribed by extremely detailed statutory regulations that generally broad questions of policy seldom come within their jurisdiction, but their functions are largely ministerial. In most cases, therefore, the single commissioner is to be preferred to the board.

The relations between the political officers of the administration and the professional subordinate civil service, to be presently advocated, would result in far more effective deliberation in most functions of the administration than could possibly be secured by the division of authority between several coordinate members of a board. In such cases, to quote Bentham again, "whatsoever beneficial effects can be expected from a multiplicity of functionaries in the same situation may, and in a much greater degree, be insured by means of other agents; namely, superordinates for control; by subordinates, for information."

However, in other cases, for deliberation upon matters of broad policy, for investigation, for examination, conditions

may be better satisfied by a board, or by a single commissioner with the assistance of an advisory board. In the national government, it should be noted, a very great deal of clearly legislative power is delegated to departments organized upon the single commissioner plan.

The system of boards composed wholly or partially of ex officio members, so extensively adopted in Oregon, is especially to be condemned. It imposes upon officers miscellaneous duties often entirely unconnected with the proper duties of their office, consumes time and energy which should be devoted to those duties, and is a productive source of conflict within the administration.

The social and economic conditions in all of the states are steadily becoming more complex, and these conditions are reflected in the multiplication of functions of the state governments. When functions were few and administration comparatively simple, the necessity of experts in administration was not felt; but with the increasing complexity of functions it has become apparent that economy and efficiency can be secured only with the aid of a professional civil service. Several states and many cities have already followed the precedent of the national government in this direction; but so far it has found but little favor in Oregon.

However, it is an absolutely essential element in any really effective reform of the state administration. It is not here suggested that "government by experts" should be established in Oregon, but rather "government with the aid of experts.' As Lowell puts it, in describing the British civil service: "Experts acting alone tend to take disproportionate views, and to get more or less out of touch with the common sense of the rest of the world. They are apt to exaggerate the importance of technical questions as compared with others of a general nature-a tendency which leads either to hobbies, or, where the organism is less vigorous, to officialdom and red tape. In order, therefore, to produce really good results, and avoid dangers of inefficiency on the one hand, and of bureaucracy on the other, it is necessary to have in any administration a proper combination of experts and men of the world."