From July 6, 1915, to June 30, 1923, this Service included the Office of Experiment Stations, the Office of Extension Work in the South, the Office of Extension Work in the North and West, and the Office of Home Economics (36). Dr. True (35), who was to head this Service, said during the 1914 convention:

So far our agricultural experiment stations and Department of Agriculture have been hampered in their research work because of the varied duties imposed on them outside of their research functions and the lack of proper differentiation of lines of work and personnel. The Department is now alive to this deficiency and under the plans for reorganization undertaken by Secretary Houston aims to make a distinct separation between research, extension, and regulatory activities. It will thus be possible to know what funds, equipment, and force the Department actually has for research, to determine definitely what problems it will attempt to solve, and to put a more rigid responsibility on its research workers to formulate good plans and to hold to their work on the chosen projects until something worth while is accomplished. If adequate supervision of the research work of the Department is provided this plan should result in better and more productive research.

At the 1915 convention held in Berkeley, Calif., ESCOP's report dealt at length with the functions of the experiment stations in regulatory activities. ESCOP pointed out that the fundamental idea upon which all our experiment stations are based is that of service to agriculture "in acquiring accurate information, in place of tradition, conjecture, and empirical theory." The report (7) continued:

They were a direct response to the need for knowledge resting on a reliable scientific basis, in order to make teaching sound and agriculture a more intelligent art. They represented the introduction of the experimental method in testing experience and theory and securing reliable facts and principles in agriculture. They were to be stations for experiment. Through the years the experiment stations had to take on a good many service activities that were not research. . . The extension work, which is a direct development of experiment station work and was born of its practical results and the public confidence won through it, has for some time been recognized as illogically grouped under the station and has been split off as a separate division or department. State laws have been modified to permit the new organization. . . . In addition to the three divisions of the agricultural college which we have begun to recognize in research, college teaching, and extension, we now recognize at least one other group which has to do with regulation-the machinery for the enforcement of laws for the protection and promotion of agriculture. retention of such measures by the agricultural colleges is retarding the formation of strong state departments of agriculture, which it is the interest of the colleges to promote.

. . The

The principle that regulatory work should not be a part of the research-teaching-extension activity of the land-grant institutions, as recommended by ESCOP in 1915, was accepted and eventually put into effect by the Federal Department of Agriculture. It was voiced officially in a letter dated February 23, 1923, sent to Governors of all States by Secretary of Agriculture Henry C. Wallace.*

In its report, ESCOP reaffirmed that the function of an experiment station is to carry on scientific research for agriculture:

The experiment station has justified research in agriculture. It should be able to justify its own maintenance as a research institution. It is believed that at this time we may propagate to advantage to the whole agricultural system the conception of the experiment station as a research institution-one for discovering, verifying, and establishing the practical bearings of scientific facts and principles in agriculture.

4

*See appendix for USDA policy letters relating to relations with Agricultural Experiment Stations.

ESCOP and its closely associated Committee on Projects and Correlation, in their re-evaluation of the experiment stations' job in 1914 and 1915, delineated clearly the responsibilities of two of the three major divisions-research, resident teaching, and extension work-of the land-grant agricultural colleges. And they strengthened a system of Federal-State science-education relations that still is regarded as a most successful model (39).

National and world events in the years immediately following were to overshadow consideration of such matters as "project correlation." Nevertheless, from the standpoint of the history of public administration, benchmarks were established. One was the first major effort by the Association and the Department to arrive at mutually acceptable principles and standards relating to the essentials of research project outlines. Some principles and rules were established that set precedents for those now governing cooperative regional research.

SYSTEM TESTED BY FIRST WORLD WAR

With the coming of the First World War, scientific agriculture as organized under the USDA-land-grant college system was to meet its first real test. Emphasis, as later in the Second World War, was on production more than on research. This meant drawing on the reserve of scientific know-how accumulated in previous research.

ESCOP's 1917 report, which dealt primarily with "Publishing the Work of the Experiment Stations," provided further guidelines for station publication policy. The closely cooperative agricultural and home economics extension services of the parent institutions, recognized nationally in the Smith-Lever Act of 1914, authorizing Federal support, had been given the green light for assuming leadership in the production program under the stimulating nationwide slogan, "Food Will Win the War." ESCOP's report (8) urged that—

the stations ought frankly to accept the fact that their present field and functions are agricultural investigation and experiment-the discovering and verifying of exact information pertaining to agricultural science and practice, and this view ought to be clearly reflected in their publications. Their success lies in that direction, for they cannot hope to compete with the extension departments now organized in a large way with steadily increasing funds. These on the other hand must rely upon the stations very largely for the matter they attempt to teach and demonstrate, while the stations can secure through their cooperation the desired contact with the public and can effectively place their practical results and recommendations before the farmers. Manifestly, the stations should not be wholly cut off from contact with the agricultural industry, and it is proper and just that to them should be accorded credit for the matter given out through extension channels, so that the public may not lose sight of the practical character of their work and may know the important part they are playing.

The 32d annual meeting which had been planned for the usual time in November 1918, was "postponed on account of the disorganization due to the prevailing influenza." It was held in Baltimore, Md., on January 8-10, 1919. ESCOP's report (1) dealt with the relation of agricultural institutions to the changed conditions and the problems arising out of the war. The report is significant in that it laid a sound basis for study of the production and related agricultural problems. If all the thought expressed in this report could have been carried into action, one may question seriously whether such programs might not have proved successful in absorbing for agriculture some of the severe economic shocks of the 1920's and early 1930's.

ESCOP emphasized that "the time has come for us to be more selfreliant as a nation in the development of our science and our thinking." It placed emphasis on "administrative leadership in the stations both competent to guide scientific investigation and with sufficient time for thoughtful study and plans." Registering an early voice for what was later to become legislation under the Purnell Act of 1925, which authorized further funds for station research, ESCOP recognized that "Problems in the field of agricultural economics should be met and solved in the same thorough and scientific way as questions in nutrition and the suppression of disease and soil management." The report pointed to the need for research that would help individuals and segments of agriculture make adjustments as the result of changed conditions.

AGENCIES REGROUPED IN 1923

How long were the experiment stations to enjoy the unique status of participating in a program that was in part nationally financed under the "principle of local control?" At various times this principle had its challengers. As recently as 1921 ESCOP devoted its major consideration to a proposed reorganization of experiment station work. It had been presented the previous year by Dr. J.H. Webber, a former director of the California station (42). Briefly, Dr. Webber had urged in terms reminiscent of the Knapp plan of 1882:

(1) That each experiment station become a State bureau of the United States Department of Agriculture with the director of the station its head; (2) that the experiment station director plan and direct all experimental agricultural work conducted in the State, in consultation with and reporting directly to the Secretary of Agriculture and the dean of the State college of agriculture; (3) that the maintenance for the agricultural investigation in a State be supplied jointly by Federal and State appropriations, analogous to the plan followed in extension work. . .

A year later, after having given the plan full and free consideration, ESCOP (9) reached the following conclusion:

In the opinion of this committee, if the operation of the proposed plan would in any way tend to lessen the probability of the maintenance of the experiment stations as separate units of the land-grant institutions, it would be a most undesirable step to take. The maintenance of the State stations as distinct entities, with their organization, staffs, and environment favorable to research of the highest type, is an indispensable consideration in all plans for future development of the agricultural research possibilities of the country. The experiment stations which have been established as a result of the operation of the Hatch and Adams Acts constitute one of America's greatest contributions to agricultural organization, agricultural science, and agricultural progress, and their permanency should be carefully safeguarded in any plan for the future development of research in agriculture in the United States. If, however, Dr. Webber's plan contemplates only a closer union of the work of the State stations and that of the United States Department of Agriculture, its purpose is a thoroughly desirable one.

ESCOP then reiterated its faith in the principle of cooperation and coordination between the Federal Department and the stations, but with the administrative autonomy of the research units left intact. It pointed to numerous examples of cooperation and coordination, emphasizing that the principle is each year becoming less of a bugbear and more fully accepted.

The longtime result of this careful review of the Webber plan in 1921 was that it constituted the last time in the initial century of land

grant history that integration of State and Federal research in agriculture was seriously proposed. The immediate result was crystallization of a recommendation which the Association had made repeatedly to the Department of Agriculture, namely that as mentioned previously a director of scientific work be appointed in the Department.

Since the turn of the century the directors of the stations had become increasingly conscious of the need for perfecting and maintaining the stations as truly as scientific institutions for serving agriculture. This objective had brought about passage of the Adams Act in 1905. Since the early 1900's, also, the directors had urged that farm demonstration work, based largely on scientific findings, required a separate staff of demonstrators so that the experiment station scientists could devote more time to research.

In those years the Department's various research activities were organized largely on an independent bureau basis. ESCOP's recommendations for closer coordination of experiment station and bureau research was accepted by the Department. On November 21, 1922, in his address before the general session of the 36th annual convention of the association, Secretary of Agriculure Henry C. Wallace (40) said

A year ago last July we were authorized by Congress to create the offices of Director of Scientific Work and Director of Regulatory Work. The theory is that not only will the Director of Scientific Work coordinate the scientific work carried on in the Department proper, but that he will gradually endeavor to bring about a more complete cooperation in scientific research work in the Department and the various State experiment stations and colleges.

The proposed reorganization was outlined by Assistant Secretary C. W. Pugsley (27). The Department's activities were divided into three major divisions, namely scientific, extension, and regulatory work. The Office of Experiment Stations was transferred from the States Relations Service, which was discontinued, to the contemplated office of the Director of Scientific Work. The Director of Scientific Work was charged with the responsibility, not only of supervising the scientific work of the Department, but also of "endeavoring to correlate that with the scientific work of the stations, and in every possible way to aid the stations connected with the various colleges to correlate their work, not with a view of imposing any plan of the Department on them, but in a thoroughly sympathetic cooperative spirit" (41).

While the post of Director of Scientific Work had been authorized by Congress in 1921, actual authority for the departmental reorganization did not come until 1923 under the agricultural appropriation act of February 26, 1923 (42 Stat. L., 1289).

In his contemporary monograph, Milton Conover (6, p. 61) wrote as follows:

In the reorganization the States Relations Service as a bureau was abolished, but its component agencies were maintained as separate units. The Office of Home Economics became a separate departmental bureau. The Office of Cooperative Extension Work, also the Office of Exhibits and the Office of Motion Pictures, became a part of the Federal Extension Service administered by a Director of Extension Work. The Office of Experiment Stations was continued as a separate unit in the Office of the Secretary of Agriculture under the direction of a Chief who, also, became Assistant Director of Scientific Work reporting to the Director of Scientific Work.

The primary activities that remained with the Office of Experiment Stations after this reorganization of 1923 were to pass upon and

approve the research projects to be carried on under the Adams Act; to make an annual examination of the work being done under the Federal and State funds at each of the stations; to review the expenditures from Hatch and Adams funds; to confer with the local officers regarding matters of policy and administration; to compile annual classified list of projects conducted at each station; to promote coordination and cooperation between the stations and with the Department; to make an annual report to Congress on the progress of the stations: to maintain advisory relations with the stations on a wide variety of matters; and to exert influence on the organization, management, and standards of the stations through editorials in the Experiment Station Record.

ESCOP URGED ACCOUNTING FOR STATE AND FEDERAL FUNDS

Since the fiscal year ending June 30, 1895, annual financial statements had been required by Congress with respect to expenditures of Federal-grant funds by the stations. The annual reports of the Office of Experiment Stations, commencing with the report for 1901, contain statistics concerning State support and expenditures. Yet, in consideration given the matter during the 37th convention in 1923 ESCOP (31) reported, as follows:

As the matter stands, it is very difficult to get reliable information of a definite nature regarding the station funds and the use to which they are put. Fully a third of the stations omit from their annual reports a statement of their revenues, or give only those from Federal sources a considerable number

of directors are unable to supply more than a rough estimate, sometimes little more than a guess, of the funds devoted to the station, and a far larger number lack information as to the amounts available for research after the routine and service features have been cared for.

Manifestly, before such figures can be published, they must be known; and before they can be known there must be a fairly clear differentiation of the experiment station expense from that of other branches of the college.

The very complexity of the average station is a strong argument for a system of accounting which will enable segregating the expense. If the stations are to carry such a range of duties, it is due to them that the expense of these be charged off or definitely taken account of. Apparently it is our fault if this is not done or at least the basis for it supplied.

To that end it seems desirable for each station to know as definitely as possible: (1) The amount of money it receives in appropriations, allotments, or otherwise, and (2) how much of that amount it employs for its primary function, namely in acquiring and applying scientific information.

After three pages of such reasoning, ESCOP recommended that the Office of Experiment Stations be authorized to request each experiment station to report annually the amounts of its State and other supplementary funds expended for each of the following purposes:

(a) Research and experimentation.

(b) Regulatory work, e.g. inspection and analysis, stallion registration, advance registry tests.

(c) Public service and advisory work, e.g. State entomologists, health and sanitation laboratories, marketing services.

(d) Soil and other surveys.

(e) Management of farms and other commercial enterprises and any other class of activity not embraced in the above.

(f) Capital outlay.

The recommendation was approved in the Section of Agriculture and adopted by the Association (13). This was the first time the